If I may, I want to share three articles (linked below) that were in NY Times, not that they indicate “magic bullets” for our situation, but I think they do point the way.

The victory of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortex in New York, as well as several young radical candidates (often women) in other parts of the US – including “red states” – are not necessarily “the turning point” either, but I think they indicate that there is a lot more going on under the mainstream media’s radar than what we read and see.

Most journalists are middle class professionals who are wed to reporting on the institutions and trappings of “normal” US politics, personalities and traditions. That’s the “only thing that matters” because this is the way that it has been for the last 50 years or so.

But under the surface, below what’s considered newsworthy and “balanced journalism,” I think there are many people in motion, drawing conclusions about the present non-normal times that usually lie outside the parameters of usual American politics. It has always been young people that lead revolts, reforms and revolutions, and there are many young people in motion these days, as well as many older people (especially women) who have been organizing on their own for 18 months now for something better than just the status quo ante.

Obviously there is a polarization going on where the right is also attracting and energizing its base, which is very helpful for the 1% that wants to use the Trump administration to impose numerous draconian policies that benefit them, and to divide, dispirit and demobilize the actual majority that opposes these policies.

There are no guarantees of anything, of course, but I think the articles below (just one day’s newspaper) show that there is a lot of ferment and activity below the surface that could – like the Hawaii volcano – break through the surface in unexpected ways and locations…

My 2 cents, Garrett Brown

Michelle Golberg: “The Millennial socialists are coming”
“The combination of the Great Recession, the rising cost of education, the unreliability of health insurance and growing precariousness of the workplace has left young people with gnawing material insecurity. They have no memory of the widespread failure of Communism, but the failures of capitalism are all around them…They often seem less panicked about what is happening in America right now than liberals are, because they believe they know why our society of coming undone, and how it can be rebuilt…and socialists have been saying, this has actually been going on for a long time. It’s not just Trump. It’s not just who’s in office.”

Ginia Bellafante: “Lesson of the Blue Wave primaries? We’re all struggling now”
“If you live in a place where a master’s degree won’t permit you a lifestyle that looks much different from an office clerk’s – if, in fact, it means you moonlight in a cubicle doing something you despise and eating lentils for dinner in the Rubbermaid TakeAlongs you brought from home – it follows that you will be less likely to think of yourself as a member of the privileged elite to which you have been told you belong and more inclined to find affinity with the broadening numbers of the more obviously oppressed, and vote accordingly.”

Maureen Dowd: “Local girl makes good”
“She (Ocasio-Cortez) did not dwell on Trump in her campaign, preferring to offer a positive vision. ‘We get dragged onto his turf,’ she said. ‘I feel like we should be catching up to the dice game by now, the Twitter distractions, the cries for attention.’”

Photo copyright: Robert Gumpert 2018

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