RETURN TO SYRACUSE

• I have to make the eight-hour return trip to Syracuse, New York for my second appearance before the Dewitt Court on May 7.  Mary Beth is taking a couple days off work and coming with me so we will leave this morning and drive half-way there and stay with a friend in Massachusetts and then make the second-half of the journey Tuesday morning. I don't really know what to expect from this trip but doubt that it will be much of anything.  Likely just a decision by the court that I don't qualify for a court appointed attorney because our combined income puts me over the poverty barrier (which I have been expecting) and means I will represent myself.  They will also probably give me another appearance date in the near future.  This is part of the punishment process - long travel to court.

• Yesterday I made the trip two-hours north to Belfast for the Maine Green Party annual convention which was one of the better ones I've attended over the years.  Many of the key activists in Maine (representing various issues) were there and Green presidential candidate Jill Stein was also present.  She's doing a good job building the party by connecting the various movements.  Looks like her campaign is not really ending - she's already building for the next national election by integrating movement and electoral work.  The growing disappointment, outrage, and disillusionment with Obama and the Democratic Party is driving people to the Green Party in greater numbers.