IN HARMONY AND UNITY

• I love this photo and the caption that came with it described a scene in Africa where some white person put a basket of fruit under a tree and then tried to get the kids to have a race to see who would win the fruit.  The children objected saying they could not imagine having one person "win" the fruit while all the others went without.  So the kids sat down in a circle and shared the fruit with one another.  Tell me - is it really our nature to cut each others throat or are we cooperative beings?  Is capitalism's dog-eat-dog culture the appropriate answer to our problems on Mother Earth?  Are the indigenous cultures backward and out of step?

•  Last night we had over 40 people turn out in Bath for a public meeting to discuss big corporate $$$ in politics.  Next month we take a resolution to our city council so it was a good warm-up toward that end. 

• Tonight I go to Augusta for a meeting of the Alliance for the Common Good.  We've got alot on our plate as the state continues to slash social spending while at the same time handing out $100 million this year in corporate welfare.  In a small population state (1.2 million) like Maine, mired in fiscal crisis, that $100 million would go a long way in helping to prevent social collapse.

• On Saturday I will be at the annual day-long retreat of Maine Veterans for Peace in Augusta.  Then in the evening I will attend a public meeting at Bowdoin College to support some students that are attempting to get their administration to divest from fossil fuel stocks.  Should be an interesting meeting as this junior Ivy League school tends to have very conservative politics as it is primarily a rich kids campus.  One Asian student recently told me that her effort to show a Jeju Island Navy base resistance video at the college was met with anger and derision by a fellow Asian student "leader" who told her that at Bowdoin "We don't get involved in political issues."  It's a training ground for the children of the 2%.