Corn Fields and Supreme Court Judges

While the debate about whether or not Clarence Thomas would succeed Thurgood Marshall Jr. to the Supreme Court raged across the country a group of friends and I were traveling from corn field to corn field in Eastern Iowa working as summer labor for my father who at the time was a labor contractor bringing workers from the Rio Grande Valley in southern Texas to hire them out to local farmers.

We worked from sun up to sun down, through heat and flash thunderstorms, but the money to be made from detasseling corn was to good to be passed up. We walked rows of corn, some a mile long. Since we were being paid by the acre the faster we worked the more we were paid. Every field we arrived at the first thing we ask was how many rows made an acre. The longest was four. Four rows made one acre. That was a lot of corn.

All of us were undergraduates at the time and out there in the corn fields of Iowa we were feeling a little cut off from the greater world around us. My father had a broken down old television with rabbit ears that didn't work and for some reason the only paper available in Columbus Junction was the local weekly. In the mornings we would tune in the Public Radio station out of Iowa City on the way to the wet dewy cornfields. Those early mornings we would listen intently to the confirmation hearings on the radio. We would listen and jeer at the radio as the liberal commentators talked about Clarence Thomas' opposition to affirmative action. His solid conservative credentials. We listened as he was charged with sexual harassment by not one, two but three different women.

We spent the week talking, ranting about how this white man who was against Affirmative Action, who openly harrassed women at their jobs how could this man be chosen to replace one of the fiercest legal minds of our time. Even as young men just coming to understand the world it was a shock to us. So there we were driving down this dusty dirt road in the middle of Louisa County Iowa on our way to the next fields listening the confirmation hearings when we heard the statment that would change dramatically the way we saw things:

"and his wife is white"

Tony Spangler (we were riding in his 1988 mercury lynx) slams on the brakes. The five of us get out of the car stopped in the middle of that dusty dirt road and looked at each other with concern.

"Why would they say something like that."

The realization hit us all at the same time. Clarence Thomas was Black. We stared at each other for a minute or so and then got back in the car. I said "How can he be Black?"

"There are Black devils as well white" said Fred Guy. Basically summing up the political reality of the next two decades.

Thomas went on to be appointed to the Supreme Court where he has done is utmost to fulfill a conservative agenda. That was the last summer most of us spent a significant amount of time together but that one moment is burned into my mind. A time of political innocence coming to an end the day I found out Clarence Thomas is Black.

Methodology of Mobilization

All community organization, mobilization and change centers on contacting people. So, any serious community campaign begins with contacting people sympathetic to or interested in your campaign. For our purposes we should begin with the idea that the main goal of community mobilization is to create grassroots or bottom up power for regular people. If this is true knowing who lives in your community and who wants to help make change is important. There are many ways to gather this information and we are going to go over a few of the main ideas and information that needs to be gathered. In this post we will talk briefly and specifically about lists of supporters and how and why these lists are created and used. The methodology of mobilization teaches us to understand the intentional movement of people.

Identify supporters and potential allies – Much of the work we need to do in communicating with others the importance of what we are doing can be eliminated by taking a moment and listing out for ourselves an initial list of supporters and allies. When we do this it helps us create in our own minds the directions we can go in and the possibilities of where the alliances we create in and out community mobilization can go.

Make contacting members simple and easy – Quick mobilization can be of the utmost urgency. How do you get a hold of people? There are times in every community mobilization program when quick and significant turnout can mean difference between success and failure. Every list should be set up with ease of use in mind. Provides a means of quick mobilization for activists

Record everyone you speak to - Make a record of their contact information and make a note about their level of interest, skills, or concerns. 

New volunteers need to be contacted – New people should be contacted within 24-48 hours. This is critical to bringing in new energy and activist. If they request additional information get it to them in a similar timeframe. Remember most people are moved to action through personal contact.

Make information accessible – your list should be structured in such a way that you can easily access names and phone number as well as other key information.

Set guidelines for using the list – Access to names and addresses is power. Set some working ground rules for their use. In one community mobilization drive a married couple working on the issue was having problems. As a means of retaliation one of the spouses wrote a letter detailing how their partner was not a good parent because they were using politics to ignore their family. They then mailed this letter to everyone on this list. Needless to say that was the end of that community mobilization movement.

Constantly update your list – Assign someone to systematically maintain and update your list. List can quickly become outdate – don’t wait for a crisis to find out about yours.
Invest resources in maintaining the list – Computer Software is cheap and easy to obtain. Computers come with database software.

Within each organization are individual members that will serve as contacts or liaisons for your mobilization effort. These individuals are very important. When experienced organizers talk about having good relationships with different organizations what they really mean is that they have taken the time to cultivate strong relationships with certain individuals within that organization. Business people call this networking - if it works for them why not us?

What you need to know for organizational networking. Identify other groups and make contact: Everyone has potential allies. Make a list of different organizations who you think maybe yours. Think of groups that may be economically affected by a particular issue. Try to meet with organizational leaders before arranging to address the larger gathering of its members.

Develop a plan for contacting area organizations by gathering the following information.
Contact person
Home, Work and Fax number
Pager or Cell Phone if possible.
Size of each organization and
Schedule of each organizations meetings

Far to often people are lazy in their mobilization. They think because they have created an email list with hundreds of addresses or a webpage that everyone who needs to know about something. Ask yourself; do you email everyone? Does everyone you know have email? More importantly and take a moment to consider this. Does everyone who might be interested in what you are doing have email or access to the Internet? 

The answer is obviously no. 

Getting Smarter -Strategy and Tactics what is the difference?

Is it just me, didn't the last guys who did this win? I mean they won big. Sacked city, ruined culture, women and children enslaved. Was this a good idea or what? Thought of by the great Odysseus whose fame reaches down through the ages to our modern time. While it is pretty clear who ever did this was probably trying to make fun of Mexicans,  I'm not sure they picked the right visual. But it does offer an interesting visual context to begin to talk about strategy and tactics.

Strategy, writes Gene Sharp, the director and founder of the Albert Einstein Institution and alleged mastermind of the non-violent "color revolutions" that swept across Eastern Europe after the fall of the Soviet Union, in his book "From Dictatorship To Democracy" is "the conception of how to best achieve particular objectives in a conflict ... strategy is concerned with whether, when, and how to fight, as well as how to achieve maximum effectiveness in struggling for certain ends" (Sharp, 39).

Sharp goes on, "some individuals and groups, of course, may not see the need for the broad long-term planning of a liberation movement. Instead, they may naively think that if they simply espouse their goals strongly, firmly, and long enough, it will somehow come to pass. Others assume that if they simply live and witness according to their principles and ideals in face of difficulties, they are doing all they can to implement them. The espousal of humane goals and loyalty to ideals are admirable, but are grossly inadequate to end a dictatorship and a to achieve freedom" (Sharp, 37). 

Just to be clear. Whether it is deserved or not Gene Sharp is quite a controversial figure. He has been accused by the likes of Hugo Chavez, the Government of Iran and others of playing a significant role in the overthrow of governments across the globe considered unfriendly to the United States. Not to shabby. For those of us purporting to engage in the building of a mass movement reading Gene Sharp might not be a bad idea. In what I would call some very sound advice and as a definite thread in his most wide spread and read publication Sharp is clear among many other things about the need for strategic planning. 

Tactics, according to Sharp are "a limited action, employed to achieve a restricted objective. The choice of tactics is governed by the conception of how best in a restricted phase of conflict to utilize the available means of fighting to implement the strategy ... tactics are always concerned with fighting, whereas strategy includes wider considerations" (Sharp, 40). 

The picture above is an example of a tactic, one used at the end of a seemingly failed strategy. What makes this picture tragically humorous is that it serves to point out our greatest failing as a community, that we as a people do not have a master strategy for political empowerment - only tactics. Which brings us to the news article below. This story tells how Jack Davis, a self made manufacturing millionaire and DEMOCRAT candidate for Congress in New York's 26th district. To some it may seem like beating a dead horse, but look at what is written below. This guys was a Democrat running for U.S. Congress; a millionaire, self made man, business tycoon the type of guy everyone looks up to. Is this guy a crack pot? I mean if this man sat you down at a table and said "I think you can make money, this way" you would take what he has to say very seriously.

Instead this guys says, "I think they'll do it without a civil war. They'll take control of the state government and start voting themselves anything they want." 

Excuse me, but isn't that what democracy is all about? Or is it only okay when we're forced to vote for the only game in town? It is easy for me to say I think this will happen. But imagine the anguish and torment this patriotic old man must have gone through to come to this mind numbing conclusion. He sees something is us we do not see in ourselves. He also see through the eyes of a free person. Free to make his own destiny. 

We don't get it. But men like Jack Davis and Gene Sharp do. It is all about power and how we go about building power to make change. Gene Sharp knows it is possible for the citizens of a government by their non compliance topple that government or at the very least create some political elbow room for themselves. Down load the Sharp booklet, read it and implement it. Who knows, maybe there is something to this advice he's been spreading around the rest of the world for the past 25 years.  

------------News Article------------ 

Davis warns of a new civil war with Southern states
Sees possibility of secession due to Mexican immigrants

By Jerry Zremski NEWS WASHINGTON BUREAU CHIEF
Updated: 08/23/08 8:17 AM

WASHINGTON — Congressional candidate Jack Davis, in a speech earlier this year, warned that increasing immigration from Mexico could lead to a new civil war between northern states and Mexican-influenced Southern states that may want to secede from the United States.

“In the latter part of this century or the next, Mexicans will be a majority in many of the states and could therefore take control of the state government using the democratic process,” Davis said in the speech. “They could then secede from the United States, and then we might have another civil war.”

A supporter of one of Davis’ rivals for the Democratic nomination in the 26th district, Jon Powers, posted the video to YouTube. The Powers campaign alerted The Buffalo News to the Davis video.

The YouTube video is labeled as a speech Davis gave at the Center for Inquiry in Amherst on Feb. 1, but a center press release indicates that he spoke there on March 19.

No matter when he spoke, Davis could not have made his point of view on Mexican immigrants any clearer.

“They have an allegiance to Mexico, where they were taught the U. S. fought an unjust war with Mexico and took this territory,” Davis said. “They believe the territory of these states belongs to Mexico.”

Davis did not name specific states that might be prone to succession.

But he appeared to be referring to Texas — which seceded from Mexico, briefly became an independent republic and then joined the United States — and the territories Mexico lost as a result of the Mexican-American War of 1846-48. California, Arizona, Nevada, Utah, New Mexico and much of Colorado were all once Mexican territory, only to become U. S. states after the war.

Asked this week about his speech, Davis said he no longer believed Southern states would be prone to leaving the union in order to assert Mexican control over what is now U. S. territory.

“I think they’ll do it without a civil war,” he said. “They’ll take control of the state governments and start voting themselves anything they want.”

The video of the Davis speech was posted to YouTube on April 14 by Robert Harding, a blogger at the Albany Project blog who supports Powers. He said the video was provided to him by someone who attended the speech.

Powers’ campaign manager, John Gerken, said the speech was very telling.

“I think Jack Davis’ rant says it all: He thinks we are going to go to war with California and Arizona,” Gerken said. “This is probably why his handlers won’t let him debate and hide him from the press.”

Alice Kryzan, an environmental lawyer who is also running for the Democratic nomination to face Republican Christopher Lee in the race to replace retiring Rep. Thomas

M. Reynolds, R-Clarence, was equally critical of Davis.

“Many of these comments are wrong and offensive,” she said. “We should address our illegal problems thoughtfully, not by demonizing anyone.”

Meanwhile, a top official at the National Council of La Raza, the nation’s leading Hispanic organization, termed Davis’ comments “extremely offensive.”

“He’s feeding an environment of intolerance that doesn’t distinguish between legal and illegal immigrants,” said Clarissa Martinez, director of immigration and national campaigns for the organization. “He’s presenting our whole community as invaders — people who want to take over the country.”

In fact, Davis in his speech, said: “Our country has been invaded, occupied and settled by 10 million illegal aliens.”

Davis issued a statement Friday, trying to clarify his earlier comments.

“My remarks at the Center were designed to bring urgency to the conversation,” he said in the statement. “I believe passionately in protecting our homeland and securing our borders. If my language was hyperbolic, the danger it described certainly is not.”

In the Thursday interview where he discussed the speech, Davis said he didn’t recall everything he had said in the speech.

But among the topics he discussed in the speech was his solution for the illegal immigration problem.

“I think building a double wall long the southern border is the least expensive long-term solution to maintaining the heritage of our fathers,” Davis said in the speech on YouTube.

Davis, a 75-year-old Akron industrialist who has vowed to spend $3 million of his own money on the congressional race, plans to stay on the ballot in November — on his new “Save Jobs and Farms Party” line — even if he loses the Democratic primary.

Many Western New York farmers rely on migrant workers from Mexico to bring in the crops.

After hearing quotes from Davis’ speech, John Lincoln, the president of the New York Farm Bureau, said: “The farmers overall would be really concerned about his statement.”

Told what Lincoln said, Davis replied: “He’s not a regular farmer. He’s one of these big guys . . . I’d call him a multinational farmer.”

Lincoln, 70, is a dairy farmer with 200 head of cattle in Bloomfield, a village of 1,258 in Ontario County, southeast of Rochester. Asked if he had ever met Lincoln, Davis said he had not.