Great, you should write more [my work in local politics] about it more often ... cause frankly you hide it pretty well. I mean, fooled me. (and remember you started this ... with the tosser comment.)
.........
Oh okay, now I get it.
You sincerely believed that your previous post -- which included a quick, how-to guide to progressive politics -- was introducing me to unfamiliar ideas. Just as your post in reply to my scifi flavored joke in the "you can be the next Joe the Plumber!" thread was apparently intended to introduce me to the travails of the African American working class.
I'll reserve my shouts about the former, since I haven't used the list as a platform for writing my autobiography and have left large parts of my life out of the discussions here. But about the latter...good god! Do you think I came fully formed from the head of Zeus! It's almost impossible to be black in the US and not know about the problems faced by teachers, construction workers, LPNs and LVNs laboring in nursing homes, RNs in hospitals, custodial workers, electricians, carpenters, the chronically unemployed, the incarcerated and so on.
It doesn't matter one whit that my HAL 9000-ish working conditions are quite different from any of that; I have a family and friends -- individuals perched at spots far up and low down the social ladder -- so I'm still very much connected, on a daily basis, with these concerns.
Jesus, that makes me salty! The presumptuousness!
So yeah...volunteering as a youngster for the Wilson Goode election campaign, participating later in homeless advocacy groups, learning about the mechanics of municipal government by working for a council woman's office, participating in information and lobbying campaigns about the use of surveillance technologies in the city, working in support of urban garden initiatives (lately, I've been very interested in the 'Farmadelphia' proposal)...teaching classes on computers as a command and control technology in a Philly HS (that is, discussing the political aspects of automated bureaucracy, the credit rating system, etc, in addition to the required career guidance talk)
A cursory overview of some of the things I've been involved with.
C. Grimes wrote:
It certainly is a stress test. Big oil, big agriculture, the whole Dept of Energy scene and parts of the military industrial complex, big utilities. The DOE around here is pushing so-called new electricity based systems, etc. LBL is a federal lab and has a lot projects on `clean' energy sources. The only parts I used to know about were developing various storage systems with exotic battery technology--various scary, deadly stuff that powers satellites. They (LBL) don't seem to be able to escape their first and best invention, plutonium.
``For me, this kind of stress test, so to speak, is much more important than all the pro and con chat...''
Okay, so write a little about it. Since I agree this is a stress test, where are the fault lines? You obviously don't have to be too concrete, in names and programs, but then talk on the fault lines, where they are, and what's involved, which industries are on which sides, and why, etc.
[...]
I wouldn't be so hard on Lawrence Berkeley.
I can think of three initiatives which have nothing to do with Pu-94. For example, the Helios solar energy project along with their efforts in cellulosic biomass and 'high performance buildings' (that is, buildings whose energy use profile is so significantly reduced -- while preserving modern services -- that they essentially contribute to the increase of aggregate available energy by demanding far less of the grid).
Beyond LBL's projects, I could talk about current energy policy using the example I know best and from the inside: Exelon.
But that'll come later. Right now, I'm still a bit pissed about the lecturing.
.d.