----- Original Message ----- From: "Paul" <webmaster at globalcircle.net> To: <GreenParty2001 at yahoogroups.com> Cc: <and.individuals at mail3.registeredsite.com> Sent: Monday, July 30, 2001 12:19 PM Subject: [greenfreespeech] The "Big Lie" technique and the myths that split the party
>
> The "Big Lie", as we know, is a propaganda technique that relies on
> telling a whopper so big, and repeating it so much, that people start to
> believe it. These myths are being put out all over the Internet, by a
> handful who expect to profit from splitting the Green Party with a rival
> organization. See the actual ASGP press release at the end of this post.
>
> 1. MYTH: That most Greens -the "majority democratic grassroots voice of
> the Greens "- support ASGP and some new Green Party set up overnight in
> Santa Barbara, that they haven't even heard of yet, and therefore GPUSA is
> not a "credible" Green Party
>
> FACT: No evidence to support that claim. Nobody took a nationwide vote or
> poll of Greens, or even statewide votes or polls of registered Greens in
> any single state. We know that most registered Greens aren't even aware
of
> GPUSA or ASGP, much less some newfangled party, or aware that there's a
> difference, that ASGP and the Green Party GPUSA are two different
> organizations. Obviously, most couldn't care less; they care about real
> issues. In state parties affiliated with ASGP, only a tiny fraction of
> registered Greens know anything about the state party, and even fewer know
> why they send an ASGP rep to meetings with other ASGP reps. State ASGP
> reps are self-selected and approved without discussion, for lack of
> interest. ASGP in fact is simply a collection of state cliques who can
> afford to send themselves to meet with the other cliques in fashionable
> locations most Greens could never afford to go to-- like La Casa de Maria
> in upscale Santa Barbara.
> FACT: There's nothing grassroots OR democratic about the meeting in Santa
> Barbara. 99% of registered Greens never heard they were even meeting. How
> many showed up? A handful who could afford to stay at La Casa de Maria
for
> "panoramic views over the Pacific Ocean to the Channel Islands National
> Park" at a "place of peace where people of all faiths can search for
truth,
> engage in dialogue, experience personal growth, realize their
self-worth.."
> blah blah blah --- and pay big bucks to "get spiritual", far from the
> dirty, real problems of the world, the homeless, the imprisoned, the sick?
> See for yourself at http://www.lacasademaria.org/ . Can YOU afford the
> price to be in their clique?
> FACT: If you look closely, you see those splitting the Greens with
> another national party were paid Nader operatives in his campaign, and
> overlap with Nader's Campus Greens head honchos. And as for democracy in
> Campus Greens, their own website shows they had highly detailed bylaws and
> membership restrictions, before they even had a founding convention where
> students could vote on things (so who wrote the bylaws? follow the money).
> They STILL haven't had any convention with democracy and voting, and there
> they were in Santa Barbara with Ben Manski promoting a split in the Green
> Party. And its leaders got $30,000 "seed money" from Nader to start Campus
> Greens. And they've all been on the Nader payroll starting with his
> campaign, including Ben Manski, the former Wells Fargo investment adviser
> who is nothing if not loyal to Nader. They admit these facts. Ask them.
>
> 3. MYTH: That Nader is building the Green party grassroots.
>
> FACT: Nobody hears Nader preaching the 10 Key Values, because he
> doesn't. He's not Green. He's building his own party, with Campus Greens,
> with his own money (which by the way is invested in corporate mutual
funds,
> not ecologically sustainable business stocks). He's doing to the Green
> Party what Buchannan did to the Reform Party. While many of his positions
> are commendable -- and I hate to say this since I initially supported him
> and Winona -- his platform is simply not Green--it is 100% identical to
> traditional liberal Democrat agendas, single-payer, minimum wage, reform
> the corporations, and some liberal social issues like legal reform.
> He refuses to share the podium with real leaders and activists in peace,
> anti-globalization, anti-military, human rights, civil rights,
> environmental, homeless, or feminist movements. Sadly, he hobnobs with his
> fellow millionaire Hollywood supporters, but quietly avoids side trips
into
> poor neighborhoods or even middle-class minority areas. The homeless,
> indians, hispanics, will not see his limo pass by. Well, you can brag you
> don't own a car-- when you always have a limo waiting. You don't need to
> own a home when you live in your brother's tax-writeoff mansion in
> Connecticut while your (nonunion) staff works out of cardboard boxes in
> rundown buildings.
> It may be hard to accept, but his agenda is simply not the Green agenda;
> it's a populist or liberal agenda. Hence it makes perfect sense for him to
> blow off the existing national Green Party, GPUSA, which is too Green for
> him, and split the Greens with a new national party that's watered down
> beyond recognition. Look at the issues they support in their press
release.
> Haven't they left out 99% of the real Green agenda? Are those the
campaign
> issues that will save the environment and establish social justice for the
> downtrodden of the world?
>
> 4. MYTH: That some mysterious clique took over GPUSA in the Carbondale
> national Green Party convention, to thwart the will of the majority of
> greens, therefore they need to split the party and set up a rival party
for
> the sake of "Unity". HUH???
> FACT: That line comes from the tiny, loud minority of the ASGP clique who
> got outvoted in the GPUSA convention in Carbondale, who have been pushing
> the democratically rejected Boston Proposal (which Nader wanted) for
months
> to get GPUSA to disband as the national party, so they could take over the
> Greens nationwide. Yet they made no specific allegations of bylaws
> violations or undemocratic tactics in Carbondale. They were just outvoted
> by the majority.
> Those who feel the national Green Party USA should be even more democratic
> (as I do) should work to make it more democratic, not split the party.
> As for the splitters' unbelievably overblown rhetoric of womens' equality,
> they'll be believable when they put a woman in Nader's place, instead of
> blindly following a man for the prestige and money at his campaign trough.
> They even make excuses for Nader dismissing feminist issues and snubbing
> womens' movement leaders. Look closely at the way they hype gender
> equality in the press release (quoted in full below) :
> "This is the vision of the Seneca Falls Declaration of 1848, drafted by
> Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and others -- a political
> movement in which men and women are truly equals in power. What other
> American political party can claim this at its founding moment?" Then the
> final insult, dropping the name of Fannie Lou Hamer, civil rights hero,
> when they can't count five blacks in their whole organization, and no
> blacks at all in Nader's superrallies. That little gem came from ASGP's
own
> Ann Goecke, jet-seting fashion model who identifies with "poor women of
> color".
> I suspect those women would turn over in their graves.
>
> --paul, webmaster http://globalcircle.net
> networking for ecology, justice, and all our relations
>
> Here is their own press release. Please note the claim to speak for the
> "majority" of Greens in the United States in forming their new rival
party.
> But they won't say how many showed up at the posh resort. Was it thousands
> of Greens? Hundreds? Or fifteen?
>
> >GREEN PARTY PRESS CONFERENCE (to be broadcast by C-SPAN)
> >Monday, July 30, 2001, 11 a.m.
> >at the office of the Los Angeles County Green Party
> >2809 Pico Boulevard, Santa Monica, CA 90409
> >Office phone: 310-449-1882
> >Office fax: 310-449-1810
> >
> >PRESS CONFERENCE CONTACTS:
> >Anne Goeke, Former Co-chair, cell phone 717-468-1880, ajgoeke at igc.org
> >Dean Myerson, National Organizer, 303-956-0827, greens at deanmyerson.org
> >
> >
> >WASHINGTON, D.C. -- As the national meeting of the Association of State
> >Green
> >Parties (ASGP) commenced at La Casa de Maria in Santa Barbara,
> >California
> >this weekend (July 27 through 29), Green organizers discussed the
> >significance of ASGP's plans to file with the Federal Election
> >Commission
> >(FEC) to establish a formal national Green Party.
> >
> >"Women have always played a leading role in the Green Party," said Annie
> >
> >Goeke, former chair of ASGP, noting that feminism is one of the key
> >values of
> >the Greens. "At the same time the national party is being founded, we'll
> >be
> >electing a majority of women to the Steering Committee. This is the
> >vision of
> >the Seneca Falls Declaration of 1848, drafted by Elizabeth Cady Stanton,
> >
> >Susan B. Anthony, and others -- a political movement in which men and
> >women
> >are truly equals in power. What other American political party can claim
> >this
> >at its founding moment?"
> >
> >"The FEC filing and founding of the Green Party of the United States is
> >a
> >landmark among landmarks," said Nancy Allen, ASGP media coordinator.
> >
> >"Over the past two years, we've witnessed the rise of a protest movement
> >
> >against anti-democratic and anti-environmental 'free trade' authorities,
> >
> >beginning in Seattle in 1999; the Nader-LaDuke campaign, numerous local
> >Green
> >candidacies, and emergence of the Green Party in the national
> >consciousness
> >in 2000; the outrage at the 2000 election scandal; and the birth in 2001
> >of a
> >new democracy movement, with protests at the Bush Inauguration,
> >participation
> >in the Democracy Summer Institute at Florida A & M in Tallahassee and
> >the
> >Pro-Democracy Convention in Philadelphia. Greens took the lead in all of
> >
> >these."
> >
> >"Make no mistake -- this is a Green moment," said Allen. "Some
> >progressive
> >Democrats show up at anti-globalization protests and pro-democracy
> >meetings.
> >But the Democratic Party has given up on real election reform, and
> >leading
> >Democrats favor corporate globalization pacts like the WTO, FTAA, etc.
> >instead of global democracy. No Democratic Senator, progressive or
> >otherwise,
> >stood up in support of the Black Caucus's challenge to Bush's election."
> >
> >"Greens are pushing for instant run-off voting, proportional
> >representation,
> >and other ways to give minorities of all kinds a greater say in
> >government,"
> >said Holly Hart, Secretary of the Iowa Green Party. "We demand real
> >campaign
> >reform: free air time for candidates so voters know who stands for their
> >
> >interests, public financing of elections, an end to the privileged
> >status of
> >corporations, an end to ballot access restrictions designed by Democrats
> >and
> >Republicans to exclude third parties and independents, and, most
> >important of
> >all, the tools of civic participation -- ways for people to represent
> >and
> >speak for themselves."
> >
> >"The Mississippi civil rights activist Fannie Lou Hamer said that the
> >standard of reform was whether it would make the system more fair for
> >someone
> >like Hamer herself, a poor woman of color," added Goeke.
> >
> >"We share this standard. From the rights and freedoms of the least
> >powerful
> >to the globalization of democracy -- these are the goals of the Green
> >Party."
> >
> >MORE INFORMATION
> >
> >Association of State Green Parties
> >http://www.green-party.org
> >
> >Information on ASGP filing with FEC
> >http://www.greenparties.org/fec/fec.html
>
>