It’s so easy to fall into the partisan trap. To assume that your party or religion, or whatever, is the sole repository of truth, or integrity, or wisdom, or even just “the facts.”  But that’s a fool’s errand. We’re all struggling out here, we all have our chosen mechanisms, we all experiment with different strategies, we all adopt those vehicles that seat us best. Doesn’t mean the others are of no value. And just because you don’t care for the driver or the way the other car is headed doesn’t mean its a bad vehicle. Sometimes, you just need someone different in the driver’s seat.

I bring this up because I honestly believe that there’s a rare opportunity for Greens to support a (*gasp*) Democrat without holding their noses.  A Democratic candidate for an incredibly important seat: Scott Brown’s. I’ve posted on the brand new “Half-Term Senator” web site my own reasons for unseating Brown-if you’ve been studying his votes, you already have your own. The candidate I have in mind supports single-payer health insurance. He supports an immediate drawdown of US forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. He’s promised that his first act as Senator will be to introduce legislation overturning the Supreme Court’s decision in re Citizens United. He has Bill McKibben’s unique endorsement. And unlike Senators Kerry and Brown he would have voted against the debt ceiling “deal” (insisting instead that the President invoke the 14th). (Oh-and he testified against predatory gambling here in MA, too).

Thom Friedman introduces AmericansElect in today’s New York Times.

I have no idea whether this “national referendum” kind of thing has or could have any legs whatsoever–if nothing else, it’s an extremely unwieldy way of identifying a “candidate,” much less getting into campaign mode, and probably just reflects dismay with all the parties currently  in existence. The two major parties are clearly not delivering–leastways not to their consitutents, and not in the way voters would like; and existing alterna-parties are far too radical in their own right to ever attract the kind of plurality needed to have any real influence on their own (otherwise, by now, they would have; but they shed at the same rate they attact. Or in the case of of some state organizations, at far higher clip.)

But as I’ve suggested before, the age of traditional parties in the US (which would include Green, Libertarian, Reform, etc) may be drawing to a close. Sloowly, to be sure, but my guess is that defections from the two mainstream Parties are likely to land most exiles in the ranks of Independents, not simply different ideologically-driven organizations. And up-and-coming generations are bored with the endless parade of white-guys-in-suits (struck again looking at the team assembled behind John Boehner when he gave his latest statement; it might as well have been 1950) spewing canned rhetoric, and turned off by the equally dated sixties-style rhetoric and identity politics blame-casting emanating from the further reaches of the left.

As the curtain comes down on “The American Century” and the electorate is forced to change not their simply their lifestyles but their aspirations and consciousness of what it means to be an “American,” politics is likely to be more volatile than ever. The alternative proferred by Friedman in this peace sounds attracive at first glance, but also seems to open a very wide door to populist demagogues of the scary variety.    

So: a Green Party Local is promoting a  fundraising event (if I’m not mistaken) for Cynthia McKinney to allow her to go on another “fact-finding” junket to Libya.

This is disheartening to say the least. Was a time when Greens would have been PROTESTING outside a hall where a speaker was defending a dictator. Seems it’s okay to be a dictator, a thug, and a sadist when s/he opposes US imperialism. Or to suggest that the jaw-dropping words Ms McKinney recently spake were not her own (Cynthia’s long history of anti-semitic remarks and associations, along with other zaniness, should suggest that any crackpot statements are MORE than likely to have come from her own mouth! For example, she is also quite smitten with Mugabe:

GRP members issued a statement and joined with others outside the StateHouse this winter to vociferously oppose the possibility of MA signing on to the so-called “Secure Communities” program.

Deval Patrick has announced that he will NOT sign on.

Credit to those who demonstrated–and to our Governor. It’s a controversial issue, I’m pretty sure the majority are in favor–and he did the courageous thing here.

See, there are no demons. And see what happens when we all work together?  

CAMBRIDGE – Bill McKibben, dubbed “perhaps the nation’s leading environmentalist” by the Boston Globe, formally endorsed Democratic Senate Candidate Bob Massie and headline a fundraiser in Cambridge Thursday night.

The renowned author, journalist, and environmentalist is known as one of the world’s most visionary thinkers on the environment and global climate change.

“In climate change, the United States faces a problem of historic and global magnitude, which so far, the U.S. Senate has failed to address,” McKibben said, “Bob Massie offers a depth of leadership and commitment to solving this crisis unmatched not only in this race, but anywhere in the country.

. More here.

Bob at the Mass Democratic Convention this afternoon (sorry for my poor shooting, but the audio will give you the gist of it):

Here’s the complete speech, in better quality:

My (short) video here:

People’s Rally for Clean Air  Boston MA 5 20 2011 from michael horan on Vimeo.

No reason to reinvent the wheel when Josh Lynch has already provided a good summary:

Today I got to stand next to more than 50 Massachusetts mothers, children, workers, community leaders, and people of faith to kick off something truly unique – a “crowd-funded” citizen’s campaign to hold Senator Scott Brown accountable for voting to gut the Clean Air Act. At 12:00pm on the sidewalk in front of the JFK Federal Building in Boston, also known as Scott Brown’s district office, we held banners and puppets of Scott Brown and his fat cat supporters “Coal” and “Oil, signs, and a blow-up of the new ad our friends and neighbors funded.

The text of the ad read: “Senator Brown: On April 6th you voted to gut the Clean Air Act. Was it because dirty energy companies and their corporate front groups poured more than $1.9 million into your campaign last year? Are you working for people or Big Polluters?” Interested in joining us in funding the ad? Check it out here.

Right after the rally Marla took our message up the JFK elevators to Senator Brown’s office, delivering word of the rally along with 103 postcards and 240 letters from members of the Massachusetts Council of Churches and Mass Interfaith Power and Light. The messages called on Senator Brown to support the EPA’s ability to regulate carbon dioxide next time a vote comes up on the Clean Air Act and ensure low income people have access to weatherization and green jobs.

At 6:30pm tonight at a podium inside the Newton Marriott Hotel Scott Brown will host a “Women for Brown” fundraiser (with a $1000 minimum) alongside the brand new Women For Brown coalition, a group created to respond to the League of Women Voters’ ads calling Scott Brown out for his April 6th vote to gut the Clean Air Act. We know what Scott Brown is going to say at that podium tonight: “Today in front of my office the political attack machine was at it again, playing politics as usual with the public.” He’ll talk about the “special interest groups” who are attacking him for trying to defend jobs. Yes, he will raise some money tonight. But the more Scott Brown digs in his heels, the more votes he will lose.

Today’s rally was no “political attack machine,” as Brown calls people who criticize him. Today’s rally was everyday-Massachusetts – a state where you don’t get to draw a line between jobs and the environment, the economy and climate change. People here across the political spectrum and in all corners of the state understand the threat of climate change and know that the jobs of tomorrow and today are in clean energy.

Pleased to see Bill Kibben (new activity previously noted here) and 350.org going beyond the one-off media stunts and rallies and getting real. Brown’s a terrific initial target for efforts like these.

Can 350 build the kind of poitical and fundraising muscle move.on did?

…posted below.

Of course, if you’re gonna see it anywhere, it’s likely to be GMG. So, ’twas even better to see it posted by a serious candidate for US Senate on his public FB page–Somerville’s Bob Massie. How many mainstream candidates do you see touting McKibben? And how many mainstream candidates do you see McKibben showing up to endorse?

Eli wrote some time ago that “Bill McKibben has accepted that the time for individuals acting on their own has past, and that it is time for collective (i.e., political) action.” He seems to be embracing this with a vengeance now. I know that his decision to actively fundraise for a Democrat will be disappointing to some–Eli’s point, of course, was that Bill should be actively working to promote a party/parties that share an ecological vision as opposed to a growth-oriented economy.

But simply deriding or dismissing individual candidates because they’ve opted for a different strategy gets us nowhere.

So, with, so far as I can tell, no GRP candidates prepared to take on Scott Brown, I’d urge all Greens to have a look at Massie. I’ve come out about as publicly as possible noting that I’m very much liking what I’m seeing.  

Just sayin.’.