Outreach, Framing/Reframing (Also see Organizing & Activism)

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Reject authoritarian rule and the idolatry of worshiping nationalism.

October 2, 2019 GlenAnderson 0

Historically the U.S. was created — and our Constitution’s First Amendment adopted — to protect us from any official religion.  Nowadays, the Religious Right is pushing hard to make their version of Christianity into the U.S.’s official religion. That would overturn 230 years of U.S. principled separation between Church and State.  And it would hurt many people’s human rights. But some people have said that the U.S. has — in effect — the truly dominant religion of Nationalism. Extreme nationalism corrupts many aspects of that nation’s society in many ways.  It causes people to hurt people of other nations.  The […]

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For many, many reasons, we need to “see God in every person.”

October 2, 2019 GlenAnderson 0

Many of the problems in our nation and in our world worsened and persist because people have created a gap between “us” and “them.” “Real” Americans vs. immigrants, Christians vs. others, rich vs. poor, straights vs. LGBTQ persons, and so forth — all of these divisions are ways for privileged people to put themselves above people of lower status. In 2018 some Church leaders who were appalled by the Religious Right’s cruelties and abuses wrote a statement they called “Reclaiming Jesus: A Confession of Faith in a Time of Crisis.” The document identifies six serious theological errors that the Religious […]

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Local people’s priorities for the federal budget are the OPPOSITE of Congress’s.

September 27, 2019 GlenAnderson 0

Twice in late summer 2019 the Olympia Coalition to Abolish Nuclear Weapons organized and staffed information booths at public events (Olympia’s Harbor Days from Fri. Aug. 30 to Sun. Sept. 1, and Olympia’s International Peace Day event on Sat. Sept. 21). I labeled six jars with different possible uses for our federal budget.  Our volunteers handed each visitor to our booth a stack of ten pennies and invited them to put the pennies into the various jars to show how the visitor would choose to spend the federal budget. The results (listed below) were similar for both events, except “Environment […]

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If Democrats nominate Biden or another neoliberal “centrist,” Trump could win in 2020.

September 27, 2019 GlenAnderson 0

Voters in 2016 were angry at the status quo, and they wanted Bernie Sanders, but the institutional Democratic Party manipulated things in order to cram Hillary Clinton down our throats instead.  Hillary thought the status quo was OK with just a little tinkering around the edges, and her “centrism” failed to inspire voters.  Voters voted for a radical non-politician named Trump and hoped for the best. Now the institutional Democratic Party is repeating their same mistake by opposing the true progressives (Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren) and trying to push Joe Biden or another “centrist” down our throats. 2020 will […]

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“Replace Negativity and Centrism with Bold Progress.”

September 27, 2019 GlenAnderson 0

A great many issues are important, but neither of the two big political parties is doing nearly enough to solve these problems.  While voting has some value, the most progress in solving problems will occur when ordinary people organize nonviolently, strategically, and vigorously from the grassroots. The article I am attaching below fleshes this out briefly.  For more information, see resources I’ve posted to this blog’s “Organizing” category. During 2019 The Olympian is publishing five op-eds that I am writing.  The one at this link was published in the newspaper on Fri. Sept. 27, 2019: BOC — 2019.09.19 — FINAL […]

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Pelosi GIVES TRUMP A FREE RIDE on everything except Ukraine. Urge her to investigate MANY, MANY impeachable offenses!!!

September 27, 2019 GlenAnderson 0

For 2 1/2 years Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic Speaker of the House, has refused to impeach Trump, despite his MANY, MANY violations of the Constitution and MANY, MANY violations of federal law. Her negligence has enabled and emboldened Trump to do worse and worse things that seriously hurt human beings, the environment, our nation, and Planet Earth.  Pelosi kept refusing to hold Trump accountable in the way that the Constitution specifies when a President becomes a tyrant:  IMPEACHMENT. Finally, now Pelosi wants to impeach Trump, but ONLY for his Ukraine scandal.  PELOSI IS STILL GIVING TRUMP A FREE RIDE FOR […]

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Our political culture keeps praising militarists. Why don’t they thank peace organizers?

September 22, 2019 GlenAnderson 0

The Port of Olympia issued a news release celebrating military troops and saying that the Port, the Chamber of Commerce, and the Olympia Yacht club will loudly blow sirens and horns to “salute the troops” on at 7:45 a.m. on September 6, 2019.  Law enforcement agencies and a variety of other local entities and power centers would supportively participate. Mainstream America and powerful sectors within the U.S. want to “support the troops.”  I’m still waiting for nearly 50 years for any local governments to celebrate Conscientious Objectors – the many people in the U.S. (such as me) and elsewhere whose […]

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How to stay focused on OUR message and not let an opponent create the soundbite that they want

September 22, 2019 GlenAnderson 0

  For EVERY issue we work on, we need to COMMUNICATE EFFECTIVELY with various kinds of audiences.  Sometimes this includes people who disagree with us — and sometimes people who want to attack or derail us. In order to make progress, we need to stand strong on OUR messages and not letting anyone hijack the conversation or distract the other listeners.  This is true whether we’re talking about Universal Single-Payer health care, changing our economic system, protecting the climate, abolishing nuclear weapons, or any other issue. HERE IS A GOOD EXAMPLE: Universal Single-Payer health care (“Medicare for All”) would save […]

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The Religious Right hijacked Christianity and government. This “Reclaiming Jesus” document sets the record straight.

September 14, 2019 GlenAnderson 0

Before the end of September I will post to this blog the video of the October 2019 TV program on my series “Glen’s Parallax Perspectives” and a thorough summary of what we said during the TV interview.  The thorough summary will include many links to additional sources of information. My TV interview guests — three retired Christian ministers — and I focused much of our conversation on the three-page document I’m linking below.  It recognizes that the Religious Right and some politicians have basically hijacked Christianity and are perverting it in governmental power.  Their abuses are bad for the American […]

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Let’s Boldly Create the Future We Really Want!

September 9, 2019 GlenAnderson 0

I wrote this powerful, inspiring essay because we have much more potential for solving problems and creating a better future than most people realize. Regardless of which issues you care about, I encourage you to read the essay at this link: Let’s Boldly Create the Future We Really Want                

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New report exposes Republicans’ 2017 tax scam as another handout to the rich instead of helping the poor

September 4, 2019 GlenAnderson 0

Trump and the Republicans lied about their 2017 massive tax cut for extremely rich people and big business.  They said it would help the middle class, and that it would stimulate investments that would help poor people. Of course, the opposite is what turned out.  Extremely rich people and big businesses reaped huge savings and profits, but the rest of us suffered. This new report provides additional information: https://www.alternet.org/2019/09/report-reveals-that-like-everything-else-about-gop-tax-scam-program-purported-to-help-the-poor-really-just-another-handout-to-the-rich/?utm_source=&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=1324