Democracy, coming to a town near you

Speak Out Californa!With all the frustrating and regressive things happening at the national level, there are some reasons to be hopeful that the public may once again weild power. IRV or Instant Runoff Voting is looking very likely in Takoma Park, Maryland this election cycle. If this intiative passes, Takoma Park will be the 4th city in the US to adopt this major election reform. We had IRV in effect here in San Francisco as of last year for the local Supervisors race. What this means is no more spoiler charges, no Ralph Nader to kick around anymore. It means that you can vote your conscience for someone that probably won’t win AND vote for the lesser of two evils. Since you rank 3 choices, your vote will automatically apply to all the candidates you pick. This also has the effect of encouraging more people to run for office. It allows a voter to truly express their intent and vote for whom they really want to win.

There is still that nasty issue of whomever raises the most cash, wins problem. That is being address here in San Francisco with campaign spending limits and something called Voter Owned Elections. In a nutshell, Voter Owned Elections is public financing for a given race. Public financing removes the corruptive process of raising private funds to pay for a campaign. Historically, whichever candidate can court enough private special interests, wins. Public financing levels the playing field for all viable candidates. We already have it here for the Board of Supervisors races, now it’s time to bring it the Mayor’s race as well. Supervisor Ross Mirkarimi just introduced a resolution to the Board to do just that. If you live in San Francisco, contact your Supervisor and let them know you want this.

On the California tip, we’ve got this lame ass special election happening this Tuesday. Thanks Arnie! It shouldn’t be happening and most likely no one will turn out for it, which is a bad thing. Conservatives usually cash in during low turnout elections. Speak Out California!’s recommendations pretty much sums up my views on the California props. Just remember to ‘nix the first six’.

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Monday brain food

Monday night was rad. Media Alliance did an informative thing at 111 Minna on wifi in San Francisco. Larry Lessig did an incitement and wry presentation and slideshow on the history of communication monopoly, specifically touching on how AT&T stifled any sort of creativity when they felt the least bit threatened. One example of this is being the Hush-a-Phone case. With the FCC in their pocket for many decades, AT&T got their way until they were finally broken up in the 80’s. After Larry, a panel discussion followed by three people representing communities that have stakes in wifi access. A reoccurring point of the evening was that whatever gets deployed in San Francisco, should be ‘network neutral’ and ‘platform neutral’ meaning that the city and the provider don’t get to decide who does and does not have access to the network. Neutrality being the key concept here.

After the intellectual fun, a bunch of us headed across the street to a Thai restaurant to munch and shoot the shit. It was cool meeting Jimmy Wales, the genius behind Wikipedia, one of the best things about an open Internet. Rene shot some video of Irene interviewing Jimmy and Irene interviewing Craig Newmark (yes, THAT Craig).

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Simnuke: 60 Years After Trinity

Simnuke VideoI hit the desert with MGL and Ted this weekend for the experience that was Simnuke. Simnuke is the culmination of megatons of hard work by conscious fire artists who created a 1/10,000 scale of the infamous Trinity first nuclear test exactly 60 years ago. The simulation was created by the use of large fans fed with 400 gallons of pressurized biodiesel, going up in less than 30 seconds. Simnuke is meant as a reminder of the horror of nuclear weapons, something that many of us don’t really think about anymore in this post-Cold War world, myself included. Considering that the Bush administration spends more on nukes now than we did on average during the Cold War and that we are minting new would-be terrorists daily with western actions in Iraq, Afghanistan and Palestine it is a super important reality to keep in mind. This video is a little something I shot and edited capturing the explosive beauty of what the Simnuke Project was able to illuminate. Length: 01:27 [3MB Quicktime7] [10MB Quicktime MPEG4]

Major Ripoff

Major Ripoff

So, so lame. News from Dischord Records:

Many people have now noticed that Nike has appropriated the Minor Threat artwork and logo for a new skateboard demo / ad campaign. To set the record straight — Nike never contacted Dischord to obtain permission to use this imagery, nor was any permission granted. Simply put, Nike stole it and we’re not happy about it. We are not yet sure what options, if any, we have to stop Nike from using our images to sell their shoes, but if you would like to direct your complaints to Nike that would be a good place to start.

Come on Nike. With an army of marketing drones and a limitless advertising budget at your disposal, all you could come up with is a blatant ripoff of DC’s seminal punk rock band’s art? Ironically, this whole thing should bring more attention to how lame Nike is and hopefully educate a few people on the meaning of corporate co-optation of culture. Conact Nike or give them a call at 1-800-344-6453 and share your thoughts on the matter.

According the Urban Environment

Hammering out the Accords at World Environment Day
I got to do something pretty cool over the weekend. My friend Julian hooked me up with an opportunity to be a volunteer facilitator during UN World Environment Day, which really is like 5 days. My job was to sit down at a table of mayors and delegates from all around the world and be a notetaker while they hashed out the wording on 3 specific Accords within a category that most interested them. The table I sat down at was Urban Design and was occupied with Mayor Jason West of New Paltz, New York, Mayor J. Ssebaana Kizito of Kampala, Uganda, Sustainabilty Officer Fred Blood of Austin, Texas (pictured above from right to left) and a fourth guy whose name I didn’t catch. He was from the mayor’s staff of some new city outside of Seattle which I also didn’t catch, though it does begin within a ‘B’ an no, it’s not Bellevue. These are the Accords that our table worked on:

Action 7 Adopt a policy that mandates a green building rating system standard that applies to all new municipal buildings.

Action 8 Adopt urban planning principles and practices that advance higher density, mixed use, walkable, bikeable and disabled-accessible neighborhoods which coordinate land use and transportation with open space systems for recreation and ecological reconstruction.

Action 9 Adopt a policy or implement a program that creates environmentally beneficial jobs in slums and/or low-income neighborhoods.

Our table was pretty much satisified with items 8 and 9, but item 7 needed a little work. Jason West wanted to see green building technologies mandated in municipal building design, not just a standard that a builder could easily choose to ignore. The good mayor from Uganda wondered why we had to limit this to only municipal buldings. Why not all new buildings, he asked? West was all for it. The Austin guy was trying to be a bit of diplomat about it, stating that it wouldn’t fly in Texas. He ultimately agreed to go with the stronger wording knowing that these Accords are only has binding as cities want them to be. Item 7 became this:

Create a regionally appropriate green building standard which mandates the use of green building technologies on all new construction.

Everyone in the room regrouped for a final group sharing moment. A mic was passed around and any mayor or delegate could offer a last word or thought. A whirlwind of accents surrounded the room, from India, Sweden, Peru, Brazil, Nigeria, Uganda, Japan, Cambodia and even somewhere in the deep south. Only one mayor used a translator.

The next day, everyone gathered under the rotunda of City Hall with their golden pens and signed the Accords. The idea is for each city to pick 3 Accords a year to implement with the goal of implementing all 21 by the end of 7 years. The cities with the most Accords implemented will receive gold stars and the thanks from humanity for preserving it. Another great first step in the survival of the human species.

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Recent photos



Pitching Machine has a face
Originally uploaded by ekai.

Finally put my photos up from LA. They’re mostly pre and post show as I was otherwise occupied trying not to get fried in the frenzy.

Also, some pix from Tuesday night’s protest of the Shar-Pei skinned Governator‘s plan to privatize pensions for nurses, firefighters, police and teachers. Not your average San Francisco protest. Lots of middle age nurses, firefighters police and teachers turned out. And Frank Chu of course. Coincidentally, Ah-nawld today chose to drop the privatizing idea, at least for the time being.

That Subliminal Kid



Blackster
Originally uploaded by ekai.

DJ Spooky is friggin’ brilliant, let it be said. He kicked off Rhythm Science, a lecture last night on art history, philosophy, hiphop and remix culture, by invoking the gift economy. He handed out free mix CDs to everyone in the audience. He then proceded to pull out a personal stash of records that are obviously the tools of his trade and shared them with everyone in the audience. Not for keeps, but show and tell like, letting everyone fondle and caress each piece of vinyl before passing it on to his and her neighbor.

And then the lecture started. Here’s some notes I picked up along the way.

-the culture of copy
-information ecology
-the source code is human expression mediated by human interpretation
-the Beats of the 50’s gave birth to the beats of the 21st century
-fuckitall.com
-discourse of the nation state
-Internet inheriting the remixing from the streets (the first network)
-the artist as font, moveable to different compositions
-Spooky is a French lit and philosophy major
-dialectics of sound
-streetlights as controls of the original network, the streets
-music is liquid architecture
-copyright as it is written and as it is lived is diverging
-electronic music is the folk music of the 21st century, everyone knows and plays each other’s music
-Birth of a Nation was the first film to play in the White House

And then there was the other reason he was here. This free lecture proceeds a $40 a head gig he’s doing this weekend at Yerba Buena in San Francisco. Spooky uses the 1915 silent KKK propaganda film The Birth of a Nation as source material for video on 3 giant screens and an accompanying composition he created. Too rich for my blood right now, but I’d love to hear report backs.

UPDATE: Some pix I took. Steve Rhodes has more.

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Matt Gonzalez – One Year Later

smash1.jpg
It’s been just over a year since the runoff mayoral election last year in which Matt Gonzalez almost pulled one off against the machine. I can still recall vividly, the Dems scared at the prospect of losing a major city election to a Green, calling on Bill Clinton AND Al Gore to swoop in and stump for Gavin Newsom. Newsom did win, though mostly due to early absentee voters as Matt rocked the city at the polls on election day. The Progressive Voter Project was born as an answer to the absentee problem.

Two books have been published centering around the Gonzalez campaign. The Political Edge, from City Lights Press, is a collection of essays covering different points of view from volunteers of the campaign, local journalists and long-time activists. I’m interviewed by David Rosen for his piece, “130 Parties in 30 Days:” The Matt Gonzalez Mayoral Campaign & the Restructuring of the Culture Industry. He explores the idea that the culture of the campaign is what brought people together. Matt’s cultural identity is something that resonated with many of us thus driving his unprecedented support manifested in the form of spontaneious house parties, raffles, poetry readings, art auctions, rock shows, and yoga benefits to name a few.

The other book is called Go, Matt, Go edited by Nicole Walter. It’s also a collection of essays, blurbs, poetry, manifestos and interviews from many more volunteers of the campaign. Self published and editorially raw, it’s a good window into feeling of those short couple of months. I have a short essay that describes my experiences and emotions of the campaign. Both books are well worth picking up.

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Gone Green

whiteleaf.gifThat’s it. I’ve gone Green. The Democratic Party has failed me something fierce. Their strategy was to go against Bush playing his own game, trying to position Kerry as a slightly “gentler and more thoughtful” version of Bush. Kerry agrees with the war in Iraq, but he would have “executed it differently”. Kerry voted for and believes in the Patriot Act but would “tweak it” a little. Guess what? A watered down version of Bush is not that appealing to either the left or the right! The Democratic Party has let the Republicans walk all over them this election and they can’t blame Nader for it this time. But they are blaming. Diane Feinstein is blaming Gavin Newsom for the Republican attack on gays. This is classic broken Democratic Party thinking at work. Find someone else to blame, don’t look inward and take responsibility for your own failings. That’s EXACTLY the game the right wing idealogues play! Democrats are supposed to be the ones standing up for civil rights, social justice, peace, equality and a living wage.

That has changed, it is now the Green Party espousing these values along with corporate accountability, electoral reform and environmental sustainability. It’s going to take a third party to “remind” the Democrats what their principles are. History has shown that when one of the major parties strays too far from their principles, it takes a third party eating their base to bring them back to reality. Either way, going Green can only mean good things. Either the Greens grown in strength and continue to win more local and state offices or the Democrats finally wake up and co-opt the values they have strayed from. The outcome is good for anyone who cares about democracy and equal representation for all.

If you live in California, here’s a link to change your voter registration online. I recommend it.