The 420 holiday–by all appearances a national feast–got off to an early start here in MA with Extravaganja in Amherst over the weekend. Which is only fitting, since a recent headline in the Daily Collegian proclaimed that the “Marijuana Legalization Bill With Origins in the Pioneer Valley has Hearing on Beacon Hill.” Now that may have been easy to miss, what with all the hullaballoo over healthcare and casinos; but if you didn’t come across it, more’s  the pity, because it’s high time that the Green-Rainbow Party join the Libertarians and more than a few right-thinking Democrats in advocating total legalization of the kindly herb.

Crowd at Hempfest 2009, Boston Common, September 21 2009

Time to Align Ourselves on the Right Side of History

I’d love to see the party  go on the record…

A propos of nothing in particular, here’s a digest of some April news regarding food ‘n farming. I post not to make any particular point, except, perhaps, that there aren’t too many hard-‘n-fast points to be made in this area (or, better, arena, since everywhere you turn in this debate someone’s ready to stick a pitchfork in your ass). There’s a lotta folks from along the political, sociocultural, and planting spectrum who seem fixated on  solutions that arise from ideologically-fixated positions, from biotech-will-solve-all-our-food-problems to only-100%-organic-locally-sourced will do, but man, if there’s one area where we need a lot less ideology and a lot more pragmatism, it’s in feeding ourselves. Me, I tend not to be overly religious about these matters–I don’t oppose GMOs on principle, I’m no wussy vegan, and I love the olive oil that comes from halfway around the world. But even I know that our current practices are currently unsustainable for more reasons than I’ll bother enumerating here–and that our current system of livestock production is a bloody goddamned disgrace. That’s enough for me to support a wholesale agricultural revolution

If anything, a cursory review  

From: Green-Rainbow Party of Massachusetts

April 2, 2010: For Immediate Release

Contact: office@green-rainbow.org

Green-Rainbow Party Regional Conventions provide a great opportunity to meet fellow Party members and supporters in your community, share your ideas, discover ways to support action on your key issues by working with others…

…and to get involved playing an important role in an important, high-profile campaign! This year’s slate of six regional conventions will feature appearances by gubernatorial candidate Jill Stein; Rick Purcell, candidate for Lieutenant Governor; Nat Fortune, running for Auditor of Massachusetts; and other candidates for local legislative offices. Our conventions serve as intimate forums in which to meet Jill and to hear her unique and inspiring message:

Arundhati Roy:

…So the first message I would have to peace activists is — I don’t know what that means, anyway. What does “peace” mean? You know, we may not need peace in this unjust society, because that’s a way of accepting injustice, you know? So what you need is people who are prepared to resist, but not just on a weekend, not peace but not just on the weekend. In countries like India, now just saying, “OK, we’ll march on Saturday, and maybe they’ll stop the war in Iraq.” But in countries like India, now people are really paying with their lives, with their freedom, with everything. I mean, it’s resistance with consequences now. You know, it cannot be — it cannot be something that has no consequences. You know? It may not have, but you’ve got to understand that in order to change something, you’ve got to take some risks now. You’ve got to come out and lay those dreams on the line now, because things have come to a very, very bad place there.

Full article here.

This goes back to December, but some points about organizing in the current political environment may be worth thinking about. I like the way the author frames the healthcare debate: it’s important to keep in mind that, been as we stick to our convictions, we’ve all created our own stories, and that whichever we subscribe to probably doesn’t tell the whole story (e.g., Obama is neither the socialist messiah nor a latter-day Borgia).

Green Change blog action day on “War and Peace” is Wednesday, March 24th!

And you can blog on the subject elsewhere (as in here) and post a link…

Or so I’ve been hearing listening to “debate” on healthcare insurance reform for the last seven hours. And so the right would have ya believe. As the roll call for the health insurance reform bill approaches,there are actual Congresspeople standing on the floor ranting about stalinism. Never mind that the damn bill doesn’t even include a public option. Meanwhile, the far left would have you believe that this pretense of reform is nothing but a major handout to private insurance companies–and neglects to mention the dozens of actual benefits the bill provides.

It wasn’t what anybody wanted. But to my mind, the first element in any definition of democracy is that no one gets what they want. You go in with a swagger, you bluff and deal, and when the rubbers hits the road, you grit your teeth, make the deal, and you hope you’ve helped people just a little bit. You don’t get what ya want, ever, but if ya try sometimes, then, yeah, maybe ya get what ya need.  Here and there, anyway.

This isn’t a bad bill.

Tonight I sat down and watched the second half of the Northern Iowa-Kansas upset. Thrilling stuff. Reminded me again why I watch the tournament each year. What else could reduce a grown man to screaming and convulsing over two college teams that aren’t even Big East? Nothing like it.

Seven years ago I was watching the tournament when I heard the news. After all the strutting and swaggering at the joke that is the UN; after the Colin Powells and Dominique de Villepins had exited stage left; after our impotent howls in the press and in the streets, and after all the lies, the sewer-stream of filthy goddamned lies from the throne, the endless droning repetition of lies by CNN and The New York Times, after more bullshit than I’ve ever seen in my life–there was the President, live from the Oval Office, telling me that he’d just bombed Baghdad. I don’t remember what game I was watching. I know that I turned it off and walked outside, smoked a cigarette or two, and thought: we failed.

I’ve posted on this subject previously, but this is so critical–and it crystallizes so perfectly the absolutely insane freaking gap between rich and poor in Boston–that I can’t refrain. City Life Vida Urbana held a series of demonstrations over the weekend in an attempt to get big-time Boston hotelier/restarateur Paul Roiff to end his own attempt to evict residents from 22 Princeton St in East Boston. They hit his hotel on Beacon St on Thursday night; on Friday night, we, we gathered in front of his fancy-ass restaurant Teatro, next to Loews on the Common; and on Saturday night we’ were at at Mistral on Columbus Ave in the South End.

Why?

(Oh, about that hotel of his: rates START at $295–but include a “complimentary overnight shoe shine.” A burger’s a bit pricey at $16, but a bottle of Heidsieck Monopole, ‘Gout Americain’ is a bargain at $14,000. Yeah, you read that right).

To hell with that. And to hell too with the paid infiltrators who showed up–and who were pretty quickly chased away (you’ll see some of their signage in the clip–the tenants are not “refusing to pay,” nor are they demanding to be “paid to leave.” Never underestimate the lows to which our high-rollin’ “betters” will stoop to discredit the very best among us).

Here’s a slideshow from the Friday and Saturday night demonstrations.

And a short video:

And an excerpt from a note from from CLVU:

I’ve posted on this subject previously, but this is so critical–and it crystallizes so perfectly the absolutely fucking insane gap between rich and poor in Boston–that I can’t refrain. City Life Vita Urbana held another in a series of demonstrations last night in an attempt to get big-time Boston hotelier/restarateur Paul Roiff to end his own attempt to evict residents from 22 Princeton St in East Boston. They hit his hotel on Beacon St Friday night; last night, we gathered in front of his fancy-ass restaurant Teatro, next to Loews on the Common; tonight we’ll be at Mistral on Columbus Ave in the South End.

(Oh, about that hotel of his: rates START at $295–but include a “complimentary overnight shoe shine.” A burger’s a bit pricey at $16, but a bottle of Heidsieck Monopole, ‘Gout Americain’ is a bargain at $14,000. Yeah, you read that right).

Fuck that. PLEASE JOIN US TONIGHT!!!!!!!

[Here’s a slideshow from last night ]

Short video:

And an update just in from CLVU: