For years, I’ve heard your laments
About why the young
Are not as politically active,
Are not as politically engaged
And as many activists
Have known throughout history,
Sometimes in negotiation
If you threaten a more extreme position,
You’re more likely to persuade the government
To act on a more compromised one
Than had you only proposed
The more compromised one….
So is it any wonder I feel a deep sadness
(if not quite disgust)
when I see so many my age and older
scorning the Bernie Kids.
I see them getting their no TPP signs
Into millions of households
When CNN and even Fox pan the audience
(google searches for TPP have spiked!)
and I find them absolutely darling, charming
and it kinda reminds me of the Time ACT UP!
managed to chain themselves
to Dan Rather’s desk
until one of the few moments
of live nationally televised TV left
and jump out at the camera:
“Fight Aids, not Arabs.”
& I hope they keep the pressure up
and exact more demands from HRC before the election
I do not wish to exacerbate
The generation gap the media pushes
As Bernie gal and guy
Are scolded by ex-1968 McCarthyite
Or 1980 Kennedy democrat
Or 1992 ex-Perot-ite
Or 2000 Naderite—
Don’t Do What We Did…
Young Bernie woman responds:
“Okay I’ll hold my
nose
and vote
for HRC.
Are you satisfied?
Will you stop hassling
me now?
Can we move on and get
back to the issues?”
They flood her comment boxes:
“But in the meantime take down that NO TPP sign.
Hold your tongue until after the election.
Your vote is not enough,
We need your endorsement.
Your voice on facebook!
Otherwise, you’ll give fuel to Trump.
You’ll play into Trump’s hand (and Putin’s!)
We declare a moratorium
On any activism that might
Inadvertently elect Trump until after the election.
And during lame duck season”
“But if we must hold our tongue
until the election,
you’ll surely find some reason
to make us hold our tongue
after the election
(“you might play into
the republican-controlled congress’s
attempt to impeach her
(which of course they’re gonna start on day one)”
as the Obamania movement fizzled after the election
and what makes you so sure
that a Gore Presidency
wouldn’t have bombed the shit out of Afghanistan, Iraq
and let the Oil folks set up their forts
while increasing Islamaphobia
and the wealth gap at Home
(after all the democratic mayors
of many major cities
bear more of the blame
--and, for some, I’m sure credit--
for the war against its black residents
in the last three decades
(and, damn, I need to fact check
whether Ras Baraka
spoke at the DNC
and I wish Chokwe
Lumumba was still alive)
It feels like we’re damned if we do
And damned if we don’t—
compromise
and begrudge a vote
for Wall Street, globalism,
more bombings of
innocent Muslims,
and the refusal to
root out
The New Jim Crow.
but as many activists
have known throughout history,
Sometimes in negotiation
If you threaten a more extreme position,
You’re more likely to persuade the government
To act on a more compromised one
Than had you only proposed
The more compromised one….
Haggling (that is, to say, democracy)
may still have its place
Even in a Goldman Sachs land
of fixed rising prices
and votes as meaningless as sex to a playa’
but it could be possible, possible,
to exact more demands from HRC
and their senate and house candidates
between the convention
and the election?
are you “slumming it” in the national electoral circus?
(note: the opinions expressed in this ruff draft don’t
necessarily represent the author’s)
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