Billionaires Privateering on the high seas of Education

Modern privateers don't come across with eye patches or peg legs. And they don't wear fancy hats or run for President (except for the Donald) . They mostly work behind the scenes, with PR firms, "charitable donations" and paid think tanks doing their bidding. They run flotillas of law firms, PR firms, faux think tanks manned by men in suits. Sometimes they seem to even have convinced themselves that they are doing charity, doing good with their money, and that they are the "heros." But in reality these pirate fleets do as much or more, with the power of finance and undue influence, than their Sea Dog forebears ever could do. This is the case with education Anti-Reform. The only way you can sniff out who is in it for the public benefit is and who is doing "'private, separate advantage" and buccaneering, sometimes, is to dig into where the money is going.

The Southern Revanchist takeover of the GOP

There is a great article today In a Blog by Doug Muder, titled The Weakly Sift, titled "Not a Tea Party, a Confederate Party" [Not a Tea Party] which so expresses what I've been feeling for some time. That it adds some additional clarity. He writes about how Lincoln agonized about the Civil war, while he realized after after reading the book "Jefferson Davis, American" that Jefferson Davis wanted to prolong it. He then notes that, although the USA won the first part of the civil war:

"Here’s what my teachers’ should have told me: “Reconstruction was the second phase of the Civil War. It lasted until 1877, when the Confederates won.” I think that would have gotten my attention." Weekly Sift]

The Campaign against the 7th Amendment right to trial by Jury

I believe that the right to a Jury trial in Civil trials is a fundamental right that ought to be up to the discretion of the litigants and not the judges. And I believe that the 7th Amendment establishes that right. I also believe that it is our Justices and Legislators who are infringing on that right by denying people access to Jury trials, illegally reducing their findings of fact on Jury awards, and using "standing" arguments to deny due process in civil proceedings.

Jury Trials, Judicial Tyranny and the Seventh Amendment

I believe that people have a 7th Amendment right to a jury trial in civil proceedings if they wish it and that the case for that is established in the history of Common Law and the creation of the 7th amendment.

Food Hubs and Transportation

Our system is vulnerable to interruptions. It is especially vulnerable to interruptions in food supply. Currently we import food from as Far away as China and Chile, India and Africa. That's okay. But what happens if our traffic gets disrupted? What happens when in some future moment there is a massive drought in the West and the wells run dry? We can feed and electrify our lands now. The concepts are there. All that is needed is the execution. One of the projects I'm working on is supporting DC's efforts to create food hubs. this blog entry is based on that effort:

Food Hubs and Food Security

The following image is from a brochure on Food Hubs in DC by Sabine O’Hara:

And she writes:

"Food security demands a diversified food system that includes urban communities as locations for food production, food preparation, food distribution, and waste reduction/reuse. The Urban Food Hubs concept of the College of Agriculture, Urban Sustainability and Environmental Sciences (CAUSES) of the University of the District of Columbia (UDC) tests the feasibility of small-scale urban food systems that include these four key components."

It's possible to produce food everywhere, and set up means to get it to everyone.

"The heart of the CAUSES Urban Food Hubs are high efficiency food production sites that utilize bio-intensive, aquaponic, and hydroponic production methods. Co-located with these urban food production sites are commercial kitchens that serve as business incubators and training facilities for food processing and nutritional health related activities. Given their location in urban neighborhoods, the Urban Food Hubs also focus on waste reduction and reuse through composting, water management, and related approaches to minimizing pressure on urban land and infrastructure systems. In addition to improving food security, the Urban Food Hubs thus also contribute to job creation and urban sustainability in its economic, social/cultural, and environmental/physical dimensions." [www.thesolutionsjournal.org]

The goal here is to encourage a system that is fair to both cities, that are often currently food deserts and to rural areas that are usually money deserts, subject to abusive extraction and constant looting, and yet could be in a symbiotic relationship with the cities were it not for our centralizing organizations.

At one private Grocery chains acted like Food hubs. But conglomeratization and buyouts have led to them failing in that role. In my area Giant has become a giant company operating out of Holland. Safeway also a conglomerate. And they aren't even interested in serving under-served areas. They mostly seem to compete for the same yuppy upper middle class neighborhoods.

We obviously need an alternative, and reformed, system. And I'm working with friends to build one.

From Her Article: Key Concepts

• Food security demands a diversified food system that includes urban communities as locations for food production, food preparation, food distribution, and waste reduction/ reuse.
• The Urban Food Hubs concept of the College of Agriculture, Urban Sustainability and Environmental Sciences (CAUSES) of the University of the District of Columbia (UDC) tests the feasibility of small-scale urban food systems that include these four components.
• The Urban Food Hubs are centered on high efficiency food production systems including bio-intensive, aquaponic, and hydroponic production, commercial kitchens that serve as training facilities, and business incubators.
• In addition to improving food security, the Urban Food Hubs contribute to job creation and urban sustainability in its economic, social/cultural, and environmental/physical dimensions.

Further Readings:

http://www.thesolutionsjournal.org/

Got Food? How Local Food Systems Can Build Resilience for Turbulent Times

Safeway:

"AB Acquisition LLC, and Safeway completed a merger that created one of the largest food and drug retailers in the country, with over 2,200 stores in 33 states and the District of Columbia, and employing approximately 265,000 people. With Safeway stores in 19 states"

http://www.safeway.com/ShopStores/Our-Story.page

Using the Post Office to Organize for Democracy

In 2013 I introduced the idea of "Organizing Communities Around the Post Office" based on some readings (among them "the Kings Best Highway") about the early networked Post Office the US colonies had in New England before we became a country. At that time the Post Office was networked in a way similar to how our current internet is organized. Around that time I started realizing that our country needs a third force in addition to State Governments.

The national dialogue acts like our choice is between centralizing power in National Corporations, centralizing it in a Federal Government or centralizing it on States and Counties. But those are false choices. But A genuine equitable "third way" requires empowering boroughs, towns and cities as well as State Capitals or county seats. Centralization without these attributes is by it's nature "private, separate advantage" [tyranny].

It needs a healthy "polity"; cities, towns and counties in addition to States and the Federal Government. And power needs to be distributed in a manner based on the principle of "subsidiarity" -- but as it should apply in a Republican context: Local affairs controlled locally with Republican forms replicated locally. [See article on Republican Principles]

The reason we need this is that while the country is more robust if we are integrated both globally and locally. If both local governments and central governments are robust and resilient then they can aid each other in need, and provide checks on each other when folks get "consumed by their passions" and start going down a wrong path. A Genuine Democratic Republic replicates Republican forms while dividing up the responsibilities, down to the smallest possible unit of government. We are stronger together not just nationally but also locally when we are organized well.

I have a lot more to say about this. But it wouldn't require any constitutional changes to elect Post Masters and/or use them to organize fair elections, city and town participation in local governance, and local participation in control of our networked energy and communications systems. All it takes is restoring some of the ideas we had in our Colonial times. Having a post office should be a right for local communities. And local control over local communications and transport should be a right within a networked framework. We do that and our system will function a lot better.

Further Reading:

Organizing Communities Around the Post Office: http://holtesthoughts.blogspot.com/2013/12/organizing-communities-around-post.html

http://holtesthoughts.blogspot.com/2013/09/the-kings-best-highway.html

http://holtesthoughts.blogspot.com/2012/08/definitions-related-to-democratic.html

Georgia Avenue Business Improvement District & Development Corporation Non-Profit Organization

I've got a friend named Michael Jackson. Joe Orlow and I met him while I was trying to help Joe get his Farmer's market product sales going. He in turn is friend with some other folks in my old home of NW DC including Andre Carley who is a Neighborhood representative and Toussaint Tyson. He's trying mightily to improve things in his neck of the woods for all the people who live in DC (and of course generally) and the DC area. Anyway, he's working to get Georgia Avenue designated a commercial corridor and to that aim he and his colleagues have created Georgia Avenue Business Improvement District & Development Corporation Non-Profit Organization, or GABIDDC.

"Michael Jackson started GABIDDC. Michael has been a community activist for many years. He also teaches at the University of the District of Columbia (UDC). Michael picked the upper corridor of Georgia Avenue to work on as far as improving business there. He formed GABIDDC to pull together the many threads of his activism: working with youth to train them and find them employment, inviting businesses into the city, and promoting academic research that will lead to tangible results as far as increasing employment and attracting businesses." [http://gabiddc.blogspot.com/2015/06/welcome.html]

Also: https://gabiddc.wordpress.com/contact/

Some of my other friends have connected to him and I'm trying to help him, from my distant (semi) retirement at the 55 mile mark of the Great Chesapeake and Ohio Tow Path and former canal, once known as Berlin, then Smoketown and now known as Brunswick. I don't have much to say except most of my help so far has been volunteer stuff. We are pushing a health/medical readiness effort connected to disease outbreaks. We are getting ready for the DC Fair....[https://dcstatefair.wordpress.com/] On Saturday September 12 2015

DC having a Fair???? Yes!

Yes, amazingly Amazingly:

https://dcstatefair.wordpress.com/event-details/