Seven Act-i-visms

Note: The 8th day of Christmas has been delayed. it will arrive, but some 9 hours late or so...

On the seventh day of Christmas the Book World gave to me...

Seven Activisms
Six Plots-a-Brewing
Five RE-JEC-TIONS
Four Steampunk Stories
Three Co-zies
Two Fabul-Agents
And the notice of a best selling book!


Okay, so it might be a little bit of a stretch on thinking this is about books, but it IS about freedoms, specifically from censorship...

You see, quietly under the radar this fall, first the senate then the house passed a VERY UGLY bill—bi-partisan support. In which American citizens, on American soil, can be indefinitely be detained (the new piece of this is that the entire US has basically been added as a 'war zone'). The cause is 'suspicion of terrorism' but the definition is vague and even includes such things a 'stockpiling food' (defined as having more than a weeks' worth stored at home)--so any of you who have disaster supplies? Yeah... good luck with that.

A separate bill that seems to somehow be piggy backed and I find even scarier in some ways is this internet censorship thing—where the government or corporations can remove content you post. Now THIS media blackout is related to increasing the POWER of existing media. If the internet is censored, then the traditional media wins back some ground—we no longer have 'somewhere else to turn'.

Now WHY has this all passed so quietly? I will tell you. Our media has been bought at paid for by large corporations. These large corporations have provided HUGE sponsorship related to this bill.

The LAST CHANCE to stop this nonsense from passing is to convince President Obama to veto this. So I am throwing out seven things YOU can do... the FIRST one is REALLY REALLY important.


1)  Call (202-456-1111) or email President Obama (online form) and ask him to PLEASE veto this atrocity!

2)  TELL people. It is shocking how many people this has caught by surprise. People who only watch network news DON'T KNOW. Strangely, other than my social network, Jon Stewart seems to be the only one talking about it (the jester has always been the truth teller, eh?) But if you have friends and family who are NOT active in social networks, they may not know.

3)  Look up your own legislators. Which way did they vote? Are you happy with them? There is a certain Carl Levin in Michigan who won't be getting my vote again. But I really should tell him...

4)  Get involved locally. I believe the only way this police state doesn't become a done deal is if more real people ENGAGE. We need to elect people who are NOT corrupted by corporate politics or cronyism.

5)  In fact... I'd like to see a PLEDGE. I would like everyone running int 2012 to sign a pledge to put people before corporations in all cases, and not to take money from Special Interests with corporate funding—a SIG of volunteers is one thing, but a SIG or PAC with corporate origins has NO BUSINESS influencing government. This PLEDGE should include a commitment to lobby reform (elimination, even) and a PLEDGE for campaign finance reform. Commit to only voting for people willing to play by the people's rules.

6)  Commit to Civil disobedience. In the case of the internet censoring, commit to speaking your mind loud and often. Don't be afraid. If too many of us do, they can't silence all of us... erm... I suppose they COULD, if they shut down the internet, but if they do THAT, there is no more hiding what game it is they're playing.

7)  Please don't go back to sleep. This thing is big and scary and it seems to be coming from several directions. Look at what you care about and fight for it.

Sorry to be so heavy, but this is important.

Note:  Saw this morning that the house had dropped the internet thing without a vote this session, but Harry Reid intends to make it first thing in the new year--definitely time to tell your senators what you think of it.