Elle Smith and Kim Jong-un Exposed!

I was at an embassy luncheon in San Francisco.  It was first class all the way, caviar canapes, vodka flights, and snifters of brandy.  The high life, these are the circles I run in and why not.

If you grease enough wheels or even just polish the right ego, then an ambassadorship to some low maintenance country can be yours!  Besides flying first class, transporting all the drugs and explosives you can smuggle (no one looks!), there are parties galore with the movers, shakers, and palm greasers across the globe.

It was at this soiree in San Francisco that I was introduced to Kim Jong-un.  People were just tip-toeing around the guy.  I can't help but poke fun in these situations so when introduced. I said, "You're the guy lobbing nukes around."  Kim Jong-un looked at me in surprise and we chatted about the city and North Korea.  "Is dim-sum a thing there?"

The afternoon wound down and I walked out of the embassy, through the columns and down the marble steps to the street.  Kim (I could call him Kim now) came rushing out and down the stairs to walk with me as I headed towards Golden Gate Park on my way home.

Mr. Jong-un grabbed  my forearm and was pulling me along the path in the park.  For a moment I thought I was being kidnapped into North Korean slavery.  Doing what?  Laundry?  I thought they were already good at that.

"What are you doing?" I asked, highly annoyed.  Kim looked at me puzzled, and let go.

After we walked in silence for a bit, he tentatively reached out and held my hand.  We strolled on like that for a ways.  No one seemed to notice that this was Kim Jong-un and why would they?  It made no sense.  Here was this guy, the size of a Presto log, dressed like The Littlest Communist, walking hand in hand with a young, vivacious, and utterly gorgeous blond through Golden Gate Park.

"Kim.  You can't hold my hand.  I have a boyfriend so it's not OK."  Kim looked crestfallen and let go.  I attempted small-talk but he would just look up at me with those inquisitive, shy, and slightly sad eyes.

He reached for my hand again.

"No, Kim.  You cannot hold my hand.  Put your arm out, you can escort me."

"But escorting is for old ladies."

"It doesn't matter, Kim.  I have a boyfriend so you cannot hold my hand but you can escort me."

We continued on across the park until we reached my painted lady Victorian home along the panhandle.  The 3rd floor was my apartment.

"I want to see all of it."

"What, Kim?"

"I want to see all of it.  This building.  I do not see anything like it in my home.  What is the top like?  What is the bottom like?"

I showed Kim my flat and my bedroom with the big pink fluffy comforter.  And then my roommate's, with her Vogue covers and Robert Mapplethorpe on the walls.

We went downstairs to the basement door so Kim could see "what the bottom of the house looked like."  But when I opened the door the stairs were gone, having crashed away as water was pouring through a wall and filling the basement.  My roommate, Janice Dickinson appeared and tossed a bag of garbage past me into the abyss.

"Oh.  You know Kim Jong-un," she sniffed, like it was the most normal thing in the world. 

A Family Meeting

"We are having a family meeting."

It is always the family room.  Always.
 It is mid-century modern, lingering redwood scent from ashes in the fireplace.

It is always the weekend.  Always.
My brother sits to my right on our nubby sky blue couch.

And it is always bad news.  Always.
 I wonder if my brother is feeling the same stomach dropping dread?
 Does a black hole open before him as my parents explain the history of depression in our family?

My parents dropped a bomb that afternoon, the concussion of which resonates throughout my life.
 "Your grandfather did not die of a heart attack, he committed suicide."

It is always a gun.  Always.

We have faded photos of my grandfather holding my brother, his face weathered from the New Mexico sun, a laborer from the Great Depression.  You could see it in every line of his face.
I wonder in that moment if he ever held me.  It was Christmas when he left us and I was just a baby.

  "He was so sad and lonely after Grandma divorced him."

My grandfather had been the first to go, but I never knew until that day.  That gun blast resonates through three generations, harming family members in ways he would never have to know.

I am standing on the precipitate.

I carry that day with me.  Always.

A black pit opened before me, the whoosh of updraft beckons me to spread my arms and fall forward.
Maybe forever.

I learned that we can be sad in a way where we no longer want to continue.  That day I learned we can be so alone in our despair that there is no relief except at the end of a gun.

I wonder if it is ok to learn this so young. 

Is There A Home in the Valley of Capitalism?

God help me, but I am glad my parents are not here to see this. Mountain View, California. There are

people living in their cars on the streets now. Never, never in my life have I seen such a thing here.

I was born in Palo Alto and raised in Mountain View. This is the home of Facebook

and Google. This is the home of capitalism. This is my home.

Every family has it's myth, or it's truth. My parent's story sounds somewhat like a truth of mythic

proportions. My mother was the first woman to graduate as an electrical engineer from New Mexico

State University. My father was a mathematician and engineer. They met while working on missile

telemetry at White Sands Proving Grounds in the post Manhattan Project cold war era. In 1955 they

left to Palo Alto, California in an exodus of engineers and scientists for the peace movement of the 

San Francisco Bay Area. Many landed as professors at Berkeley, or to Palo Alto as teachers and

engineers.  Many joined the Unitarian church, the epicenter of political activism.

“We no longer wanted to work on weapons of mass destruction,” my mother said.

So I grew up learning to program computers with punch cards. I grew up in an economy that was

nothing but upwardly mobile. I grew up understanding that as my parents were of the Great

Depression, it was a given in this life: Work hard, things get better.

It was one of those endless Saturday afternoons, the type where all options are yours when you're

ten. Coloring, reading, bike riding, playing my little guitar... the world was wide open for a child in

the early 70's. An old truck pulled up in front of our manicured lawn. A man, he was Mexican, and a

boy about my age walked up to our front door and I ran to answer. My father joined me and spoke to

this man while his son and I looked at each other curiously.  He probably wondered about my life as 

much as I wondered about his.

The boy's dad said that he and his son would wash all the windows on our house for twenty

five dollars, and my father said yes. They did the work and my father offered them a few more jobs.

     One day my mom told me that the man who came to our door that day now had a full time job as 

the handyman at a motel our neighbor across the street owned. I asked my dad about that one day. He

told me how impressed he was. He told me of the important and valuable lesson this father, who

 barely spoke English was imparting on his son. That it is ok to knock on someone's door. There is no

 shame in asking for work. This boy had a good father who was teaching him important values in this

 world.

So I wonder when I look at the level of homelessness where I come from, Silicon Valley. I wonder

how my father's values translate now. How can any society continue when those whose hard work 

doing the most basic things we all need, childcare, cleaning, making food, washing windows... are

 left to be homeless?

My father felt a deep commitment to his fellow man. My father grew up in poverty, but he worked

hard and Things Got Better.  In all truth, my father could never say no to those who knocked on our

door for help.

So I wonder what he would do now. There are so many to help. On the streets of Mountain View,

people have no place to live.

Right up until the crash of 2007/2008, my father's life got better. That's when two thirds of everything

he worked for in this world vanished. And it killed him. He died April 3^rd, 2009.

God help me but I am thankful he is not here to see what is happening in the town he made our home.

Bernie Sanders; The Match That Lit the Flame.

    It is the match that sacrifices itself, now and forever more.  We must never attach ourselves to the match.  It is from the flame of which we grow.
Bernie has been the voice across 5 decades for civil rights and equality.  It is a life spent as an independent thinker.  My God, how difficult that is, how isolating it must be.

   Bernie Sanders did not betray you, my friends.  He sacrificed himself.  At 74, he looked at his life's work and knew that time is short upon this planet of ours.  Bernie stood up for all of us and the establishment despises him for that.  He made many enemies within the Democratic Party for being so bold.  He was mocked and his supporters are told to get in line.  Bernie put his life in danger for us.
74 years old and we will never have anyone like him again.

  That flame, so tiny in May of 2015... who knew that Bernie Sanders voice spoke for millions then?  We are in a unique time in history, as our country slides out of our grasp and we have lost our direction. We have been handed a gift.  Every single supporter of Bernie is our 2nd Greatest Generation.  We know the truth.  We know what is good and we are fighting the good fight.
Bernie Sanders is the match, my friends.  He lit the flame and now it up to us to burn brightly.

Every Bernie supporter shed a few tears last night to see Bernie speaking.   This is not a cult of personality, or maybe it is.  To be a leader and speak for millions is not an easy thing.  Movements need leaders to direct focus.  It is up to us now to elect the leaders who truly represent you and me.
Be the change.
It is our revolution now.  The ascension of progressives has begun.  We will take the White House with a true progressive in 2020. We will fill the Congress and take over the Senate.  We must move forward.   Bernie brought us together and if we do anything at all, we will honor the voice he has given each of us.  A voice that stands up to the oligarchy.  A voice that stands for what is good and what is right.  He has given us organizational tools.  He encourages you and he encourages me to run for office.  He has raised us up to be better and active citizens.

  I have learned so much over this last year.  At some point I realized that even if we got Bernie into the White House, change takes work, time, and real effort.  I learned that I don't have to feel so cynical.  I learned to pay attention.  Bernie's words, "If we stand together, there is nothing we cannot accomplish." finally make sense.

Bernie was the match that lit the flame.  It is up to us now.  The match always sacrifices itself. Always.  We will keep the flame going and burn stronger and brighter than ever.

This Is My Blog So You Never Have To Read It

This is my blog so I can write what I want.
This is my blog so you never have to read it.

It's the dead of night ramblings when all things come into sharp focus.  I feel like a chewed up carcass, shat out on the side walk by a work house dog.  Run over by a dump truck veering to take out the hyenas babbling and groveling for  scraps on a corner in Times Square.

It's a dark night of the soul and all things surround a democracy dying while people shout to be heard.

Buried.  We are buried.  Democracy scrapes the dirt from her eyes and blindly pitches forward grasping at the tiny bit of light that somehow seeps through the gaping wounds.

Stumbling through the sycophantic Stockholm legion of HRC followers with their ears unable to hear, their eyes unable to see, the truth rises like scum on a putrid pond, fracked out to such toxicity that the lifeless fish are the least of our worries.

Ugly, ugly, ugly.  Trolls, child porn, bomb threats, there is treachery at every turn.

We Got 99 Counties and Confusion Has Won

Can you breath? Did you sign up to be a delegate? Then show up.

That's my frustration speaking, can you tell?

On March 12, in Cerro Gordo county, Iowa, what should have been an 11/11 split between Hillary and Bernie ended as Hillary-12, Bernie-10. As many as possibly 80 Bernie delegates and alternates just not showing up was made worse by delegates leaving as frustrations mounted and time dragged on.

This is the day that precinct delegates from each of Iowa's 99 counties choose their district delegates. If all goes properly, the number is already set. We know how many precinct delegates there should be from each county and once at the county convention, the district delegate count is assigned accordingly.

But that is not the case. It comes down to this:

A. How much do you really want it?

and

B. An endurance challenge.

I cannot impress enough that those who sign up to be a precinct delegate must be committed to showing up. We will lose and it may be down to a handful of people who forget how important their involvement truly is.

There is an unsettling number of those in charge of these county conventions who are Hillary supporters. Wasting a lot of time and dragging out counts play out well for the Hillary side. Any observer can see that the Hillary side of the room has more retirees while the Bernie side has more people of age who need to rush out the door and get back to work. This is not a judgement. I was there to observe, but as Quinn Symonds, Bernie Sanders County Captain and owner of @Iowa4Bernie stated, "Anything to win but actual democracy." This was never more apparent than when the time came for realignment, a vote passed unanimously by the now tired and frustrated delegates to change it to one minute rather than the usual one hour. If you are unfamiliar with realignment, it is the time allotted to talk to those on the other side and sometimes, just sometimes your belief, your passion, and your words will bring someone to your side. This is what democracy looks like, talking to each other and sharing your views. Democracy limped home today in the confusion of signing in, being seated, repeated counts, and frustration across Iowa. Bernie supporters in Dubuque, Waterloo, and Polk county among others reported in with concerns similar and much worse.

As we move forward, these mistakes must not be made in any other states. LEARN FROM IOWA. Understand that Hillary has a bag of dirty tricks that include paid delegates, disrupters, those in place whose job it is to throw the counts, and people in high places who run and organize these conventions.

What do we do?

We make sure that those who sign up to be a district delegate understand immediately what they are getting into and the time commitment it involves which may possibly be all day.

understand that we do not depend upon being reminded and if for any reason you cannot make it to the county convention call your Bernie office so they can set up the alternate. If you don't know or have a local Bernie office, get on a Bernie Facebook site and ask for help.

Do not be late. Be early! Mingle. If you are unsure of the time, again reach out.

Make sure you sign in immediately. Get your packet. Sit down.

Monitor, monitor, monitor the situation. Ask names. Get clarifications.

Do not leave until it is over. Don't just take anyone's word for it either. Look for Bernie staffers.

The confusion in Cerro Gordo county was multiplied across Iowa by 99. There are reports from across the state that Bernie delegates did not show up. DO BETTER THAN US. This cannot happen in other states. Learn from this. We must be vigilant. We must stay on top of this situation.

Bernie is in this to be the next President of the United States. We must not let him or ourselves down.

.

Is Bernie Sanders Our Last Chance?

We want what is good for this country.  We may not agree on how we get there or what that looks like, but that is our common ground.

We agree that the health of this nation and the people in it is of vital importance.  What does that look like?  Does a hand-to-mouth existence inspire one to work harder and reach for higher or are we slowly beaten down by the odds stacked against us in this new economy?  Are we stymied by futility in the face corporate greed that employ so many at the expense of worker's health, welfare, and pride?

How is our minimum wage $7.25 per hour in this America?

I am frustrated by conversations implying those who work in retail or food services do not deserve better.  That somehow we can judge how others choose to work and decide they deserve an abusive wage.  I hope the person wiping the table, flipping a burger, or sweeping the floor is paid well.  In this country we should all be making enough money to live reasonably.

I was challenged on this.  What's your definition of reasonable, I was asked?
Well, here's my definition of reasonable:  Enough to pay rent, utilities, food, and a few bucks left over to save.
How about that?
How about if I don't wish ill upon my fellow man?
How about if I want everyone's life to be better?
Hey, what if I said I'd gladly give some of what is "mine" to help others?

Are we so broken as a society that we must guard what is "ours", hard earned yes, with a suspicion and even hostility?  Are we a society living in that much fear?  I sadly think so.

Do you believe that a government that cares about it's people is wrong?
How do we move past that fear?

I came of age in the 80's.  There was a lot of cynicism by then about 1960's idealism.  We laughed as Reaganomics kicked off our country's slow, nearly imperceptible decline and here we are.  I am not laughing now.  We have reached a tipping point. 

We are Feeling The Bern.  Why now?

There are too many of us who have been affected by this stagnating economy where jobs of quality are no longer widely available.  We are talking.  We are connecting.  We are rising together and our voice is Bernie Sanders.

We may have one last chance here.  This is why Bernie Sanders supporters are so passionate.  We can't help but feel we are walking on some sort of edge.  That this income inequality and our lives at the mercy of bought and paid for politicians is at a precarious end-point of no return.
If we continue the politics as usual, our lives will be set.  We will continue this slide towards shorter life spans, struggle, an inability to meet even our most basic needs, and despair.  The American Dream is vanishing as I write this blog.
This time there will be no turning back.

We feel, and I will not apologize, that Hillary and the status quo will be the marker of what this country becomes.
We will be the land of the haves and the have-nots, with nothing in the middle.  You are either the server or are served.

It is un-American to question our right and our ability to make it the American way.
Here is the reality:
You are only worth $7.25 per hour.