Sit Down for the Constitution

All right: Blackwater and other contractors have four BILLION dollars in US funds and, the New York Times reports that almost no oversight in Iraq; wildfires are consuming acres of Southern California and many counties have been declared to be in a state of emergency -- and nothing at all but a whisper of popular opposition and a prayer -- nothing legal -- would prevent Bush today from declaring that the National Guard is overstretched and that it is Blackwater's torturers and murderers, recruited from Salvadoran, Ecuadoran and Nigerian paramilitaries, who will be `maintaining order' in the `public emergency' that is Southern California; and here in Chicago, at two separate events today citizens have told me that `Blackwater is in Illinois' -- the paramiltary force apparently having opened a training facility this summer in the heart of the nation, in a site with easy access to the main waterway of the Mississippi River; and Mukasey has informed Congress that he has no idea what waterboarding is -- which professed cluelessness alone should disqualify him from service -- and that the president does not actually need to obey the law of the United States of America -- which alone should alert us that if he is confirmed the ga me is over. Once Congress confirms someone to decide the law of the land who holds that the president is exempt from the law of the land (which assertion was, notably, an historic tipping point when Hitler asked his Reichstag to confirm a similar position about his powers in regard to the law and the constitution) it is open season on all of us.

It is time to take to the streets.

Many of you have asked about a national strike. This is the next step in a democracy movement. We need to hold monthly strikes -- a word that is too scary for some, and we want to be inclusive, so rather we will urge people of all walks of life to participate in mass-action Constitution Days.

What will we do -- in our millions, hopefully, we will Sit Down for the Constitution in the most public space in our communities. The seated mass citizen action is more effective now than a march; less cause for confrontation, more family-friendly, you can gather more people for a longer time and it can be more of a community affirmation of American values and the Rule of Law. Daniel Ellsberg, whom I had the honor of meeting last week in Berkeley, along with his brave and beautiful wife Patricia, reminded me that it took only three days of a widely observed National Moratorium to strike a real blow to the war in the Vietnam.

We propose that local citizens organize these Constitution Days once a month, on the 6th, starting Nov. 6 (before or after you vote). We suggest that those who can refrain from going to work or to school -- use the time to be with your fellow citizens at the event or reading about democracy and sharing those ideals with your friends and neighbors. Those who can't leave work, come for lunch hour. If millions join the nation will react, and even if the first few are small, we must begin. You guys have to organize these locally -- we can't. But that is powerful. Here is how to proceed:

The Liberty Kit for Constitution Days: Assemble a Powerful `Sit Down For the Constitution' Citizen Action November 6 and Monthly Thereafter

1. Locally, a volunteer should set up a website announcing the time (start at noon, stay till five; you will have most visitors between twelve and two). The place should be the steps of the Town Hall or the most obvious civic space (in Chicago for instance everyone said Fenwick Park). Send a press kit to all local media outlets -- you can get the resources in the library or online. If you don't get coverage you can write to local advertisers of your local news and newspapers -- cc the ad department of the media outlets -- that you will stop buying their products and will urge others to do so as well unless they encourage local media to cover this local important news. Barbara Martinez who started at sitdownfortheconstitution.org provides a central space -- send an email to the site after you event so we can get an accurate nationwide count of participants.

2. Ask all to wear red, white or blue t shirts or sweaters and dark slacks. A strong visual is more likely to get wide press coverage and a good color photo on the cover of a news section of local news. It is an even better visual if you arrange people into red, white and blue sections. That will inspire wide angle shots from a higher position. Protests from progressives always seem visually disorderly -- making coverage less likely -- and a visually orderly, peaceful set of groups also makes it harder for police to crack down violently on protesters after accusing them of misconduct.

3. Have people bring uniformly sized US flags -- tell them a good local or internet source -- or buy a lot and sell them there. It reinforces that this is pure support for the American system, not partisanship. (And it is a bad media image to taser people supporting the flag.) We want to send a clear message that this is above all a patriotic, transpartisan action on behalf of our founders' vision. People should not wave the small ones, but rather good-sized ones that will blow in the breeze (again, visuals and media attention) -- 2x3 at least. Signs should be in red, white and blue and uniform: `Moms for the Constitution', `Vets for the Bill of Rights' `Teachers for Liberty'; `Americans Don't Torture' `The Constitution Keeps us Safe' `Stand Up for the Founders'. Important are: `Independents for the Constitution' `Swing Voters for the Constitution' and `Republicans for the Constitution' and `No President is Above the Law'. Signs should NOT address unrelated issues -- veganism, Palestine or Israel, patriarchy -- the left tends to let a chaos of messages dilute the force and inclusiveness of one strong message. The civil rights marches were always disciplined in focusing only on civil rights, for instance.

4. Encourage soldiers and vets to sit down for the Constitution in uniform. Give them the names of good local pro bono lawyers to call if they face reprisals. Publicize the reprisals.

5. Distribute copies of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. Let people download them from the website.

6. Have people bring guitars, musical instruments and sing. Let ordinary citizens lead the singing from a microphone. For some mysterious reason, protests swell and move people when there is singing, but depress and dispirit people when there are only speeches or angry chanting. The civil rights movement sang. The contemporary left speechifies. So sing. Create a Constitution Songbook you distribute -- with songs that are widely known and loved. Often our protests have some very edgy band that alienates others not so edgy -- people want to feel included across the political spectrum. Have the words of the Star Spangled Banner, My Country 'Tis of Thee etc -- as well as inspirational songs that are inclusive -- in the songbook. It is hard to engage in mass arrests against people singing the national anthem.

7. Have people also bring sleeping bags and folding chairs, food and drink and children. Encourage people to bring food to share informally -- it is a community pot luck in honor of Liberty. You can set up folding tables where people bring their food to share across race, class and party lines. People feel disconnected and powerless after random protest meetups. You want to foster community and let people find each other as local patriots and build bonds that make other kinds of action possible.

8. Invite local clergy of all faiths to sit down for the Constitution in their religious garb. Ask local clergy of many faiths to bless the gathering in their many voices from their many different faith traditions, thus reminding us that this is a pluralistic society (and making it hard to dismiss protests as hostile to mainstream values).

9. There can be periods of quiet or people simply playing their own music as an offering to the community during the Sit Down for the Constitution. Have children give five minute talks or read essays of `What America Means to Me.' Have ONE lawyer who speaks ENGLISH explain every hour on the hour just what the Bill of Rights means to ordinary people. Endless speechifying exhausts people. You are there to be witnesses and to encounter one another as citizens. Have ONE table where local literature about activism is displayed and have people wear name tags that identify them by name and also by resource or skill or organization that they can contribute to saving democracy. Let them find one another. Give priority to vets or military men and women to speak very personally about what liberty and the Bill of Rights means to them -- the values they wish to uphold.

10. At the end of the vigil, create a massive circle and light a million candles and ask everyone to take the AFC pledge to protect the Constitution. It is powerful to hear the sound of a multiplied voice. Go home in a broad stream holding your candles -- another great visual for the cameras. Meet again in a month. If you want to connect before that in a Citizens' Home Gathering -- which many people have asked for -- let someone host it in his or her home or in a public space in a restaurant or friendly bookstore/cafe. Take citizen action out of an impersonal space -- make citizenship human, face-to-face, easy, supportive and effective.

These are just suggestions -- but order, strong visuals and patriotic symbolism are key. Most important is simply to act.

Will it be a groundswell all at once? Maybe not, but we have to begin; all great democracy movements began with a handful of citizens. Will it be challenging? Yes, but you can do it and maybe bring to nation to a radical pause to reconsider its darkening path. After all, you are Americans.

americanfreedomcampaign.org/

Comments

[JustifiablyParanoid]

I'm going to agree with a well-know corporation - of all things - on this one....

"Just Do It."

[CitizenEd]

I've been watching this post since last night and, aside from my response, there hasn't been an additional one. Sorry I'm not a Dem/Rep, but, I have defended Dems on this site from the trolls...Why? I don't know yet. I'm saddened that this important issue is not on the 'Homepage' and simply a blurb on this page.

This leads me to believe that HuffPo is content with the situation in OUR nation and is guilty of pushing the status-quo. I knew the Dems wouldn't do squat after the last election and here everyone is still pushing the same product.

Wake up people! Naomi is right! I'm tired of writing emails and letters to gov reps, they dont' care. I'm tired of all the whining on sites as these where there is no movement for action...until now. It's time to step away from your keyboards and take to the streets to save OUR country and what's left of the Constitution. Ever since the coup of 2000, I decreased my spending immensely in protest. Now's the time for the next step.

Don't be afraid...OUR country needs this cleansing...NOW!!!

See you all on November 6th...I hope.

[ajclowder]

I'll Be There

[plainsman]

Thanks for the post Naomi. Let's hope the movement catches on for all our sakes.

[flanardiente]

Naomi Wolf, I started to skim over your post with a yawn, ho-hum, another call for mass action, wonder what's on TV tonight? But one line and then another caught my eye and then I was reading it and then I was studying it and now I take off my hat to you and throw it in the air. You described the crisis facing us and how to deal with it in a way that is uniquely American. This needs to be in print, millions of copies, free for the picking up and reading. I won't compare you to Tom Paine but whenever you're in the room I think he is too.

[SamEllison]

Moratorium was my favorite.
It should be done again, a couple of single day sit-down-in-town events leading to a two or three day-er. Did I tell you we have CACI in our area, yup right behind Fort Monmouth.

[Rule Of Law]

Naomi,

This is absolutely one of the bravest posts I have seen here or anywhere. And the majority of responders still use it for politics as usual.

My guy, your, guy, uniforms, ad nauseum...

I have asked the celebrity bloggers on HuffPo time and time again to give us a plan, create a movement, bring people together to take back our Country--and, at best I get a yawn...or the 2,000th post about Obama and the Homophobe!

Stop diminishing what this woman has written here, because while you are all still worrying about the Republican Gutter machine, she will be among the first swept up and taken to Hotel Haliburton. For fighting your fight.

Do you not see how Revolutionary and dangerous this column is? This woman has ceased to be one of those other posters on HuffPo content to moan about the situation and count their responses (Sirota exvluded) and has waved the flag of fucking LIBERTY, AND YOU DON'T SEE IT!

I am not a believer, but if I were I would say, god bless you Naomi Wolf! You have more courage than our entire misbegotten government.

Don't stop, and don't ever apologize.

[JustifiablyParanoid]

Here here!

[itmaybetoolate]

Come on MoveOn. You can help get this organized!

[realitytrumpsbull]

I disagree, having a sit-down strike is well,
flat-out childish. Take all that political
energy, and write a reasoned, well-informed
letter to your representative instead. It'll
get you a little more respect, I think.

Until, and unless, the public at-large displays
sufficient mature unity of purpose, then
the 'fun' we're seeing these days will continue.
If we are to ever regain the moniker of
'citizen' from the likes of Mr. Bernanke, then
it's going to take a lot of people engaging
in the lost art of personal correspondence
to their appropriate representatives.
You can wave all the signs you want, have
all the Cindy Sheehan moments you want, I thought that that lady chasing Rice around
was kind of funny, yet somehow still inappropriate. You don't gain 'cool points'
with Congress by having people act like
little kids who didn't get what they wanted
for Christmas. No, it takes a little bit
something more, there, like a documented
argument in favor of ending the war, with
sufficient signatories to make the demographics
peeps sit up and take notice, enough people
taking issue with the chronic and systemic
overspending that's helped to lead us to
this point, and the Cheney-esque energy 'policy', if you can call it that, that's
helped set the stage for this war in the first
place. It goes into an in-depth analysis of
cause and effect, a calculus of energy
consumption and production practices, as well
as more detailed questions concerning the
influence of the oil lobby, and others.
Reform, as such, doesn't even have to hurt,
but you do have to get started, and the more
people in more states that avail themselves
of the attentions of their representatives,
the better. Let's see some votes directed towards building a good, quality, workable foundation of principle and practice that'll set the stage for bringing the troops home quickly, efficiently, peacefully
etc. The minute the last one steps off the
boat, as it were, the impeachment begins.
Ready? GO!

http://www.impeachbush.org

[princessofnowt]

I'm a fan of your posts, Reality, but can you reconsider on this one?
Naomi does lay out a nice prescription for an effective display of support, one that can grow exponentially if it is repeated every month as she suggests.
I've been writing to my rep, Ginny Brown-Waite regularly, and continue to get form letters saying why I am wrong and should be ignored.

Yesterday I heard her talking about the Childrens Health bill, saying that 'manure rolled in sugar does not make it a donut'. (I'm pretty sure if kids were donuts she'd be all for them.)

All of this information is relatively new to me- exactly how screwed up our country is, and how close we are to losing everything we thought it was.

I am trying to educate friends and family, and they think I am off my rocker- until a tiny bit of the truth accidentally makes it into mainstream news. Like on Jack Cafferty the other night- he actually showed letters from viewers with phrases like King Bush and Queen Hillary, also fascism and other truths which on Huffpo are pretty freely discussed.

My point is, I found a piece of truth and kept looking for more. There are so many who are not looking for truth, and need to find out how many people think it is URGENT that they begin to pay attention.

[itmaybetoolate]

If you only knew the time and effort I have used to write my reps/senators. Guess what - THEY DON'T CARE! At first, it was the form "thank you" letter. Then, no response. I, for one, don't use that strategy anymore. I can only use the "I am not going to vote for you" tack once. How much traction have we gotten on Impeachment with your letters? Zilch. When Democrats are bullied by a pResident with a 24% favorablity rating, they have become part of the problem. What do you think you can POSSIBLY say to them that they care about? You won't vote for them? THEY DON'T CARE. Now, if you have a LOT of money to throw their way, they WOULD CARE.
In fact, your assertion that a sit-in is childish suggests that you are a supporter of the current administration. Guess what was one of the most successful strategies during the civil rights fight - sit ins.

[Rule Of Law]

Yeah, and those guys who dumped that tea into that harbor...what a bunch of jerkoffs!

Write your letters, it can't hurt.

Then go out and buy this woman's book--The End of America-- read it, highlight it give it to your firends, talk about it and then tell me we have the luxury of time to be "nice."

[TJTelecaster]

A National Strike a series of them, to save the Republic from Fascism is perhaps our only hope as Congress has betrayed us and the Constitution as well...

"Let's Roll...!"

[knobby]

Do you think any would be willing to put their name to this? I would like to see this distributed across the country and get 500,000 names on it and then sent to Ron Paul to read before Congress.....
American Republic Defense League Covenant:
Being convinced in our consciences that the present un-constitutional actions of the Executive, Legislative & Judicial branches of these United States of America is disastrous to the mental well-being of all America as well as the whole of the world, subversive of our civil and religious freedom, destructive of citizenship, and perilous to the unity of the United States, we people, whose names are underwritten, humbly relying on the Creator whom our forefathers in days of stress and trial confidently trusted, do hereby pledge ourselves in solemn covenant to stand by one another in defending for ourselves and our children, our cherished position of equal citizenship in these United States of America, and in using all means which may be found necessary to defeat the present conspiracy to overrule our Constitution & Bill of Rights in America. In the event of such an action being forced upon us we further solemnly and mutually pledge ourselves to refuse to recognize its authority. In sure confidence that the Creator will defend the right we hereto subscribe our names¦

Thomas J Kaminski

[Ben Dixon]

Encourage soldiers and vets to sit down for the Constitution in uniform. Give them the names of good local pro bono lawyers to call if they face reprisals. Publicize the reprisals.

Are you ignorant of the Uniform Code of Military Justice or are you just trying to get soldiers in trouble?

But if you really want to support the constitution then why don't you go out and vote and partake in the democracy that the constitution gave us.

[transendentilist]

The "democracy," that the constitution gave us is not working. When you have an out of control executive branch, and a politically paralized congress, what other recourse is there? Our elected leaders aren't listening, and have forgotten who they work for.
Phone calls and letters are just fine, but they are invisible to the world at large.
The only thing that would get the attention of this administration and Congress, would be a mass rally in DC. I don't mean 10 or 20 thousand people, but 2 or 3 MILLION people. We have to say, "The whole world is watching." And we have to give them something to watch.

[SpencerCat]

Ben Dixon, the author does suggest that we vote on November 6.

General strike on November 6. Pass it on!

[peterg76]

Something might actually get done! Best of luck!

[CorkExaminer]

Way to go; and shouldn't we be signing the AFA pledge and publicizing Ron Paul's bill too.

[Bad actor]

I have suggested boycotting Christmas purchases as a means of making a statement, as follows:
Give each member of the family a blank check and when the turkey is served, all stand, tear up the check and shout hallelujah. If you have cash to spend, pay a bill for one who really needs the help. Most of the products are produced in non-Christian countries anyway by cheap labor and toys can not be trusted as far as safety is concerned for the kids. Customers didn't make this mess. Greed did !

[nowaterboardUSA]

Good Luck, you'll need it.

[Pdubya]

My thinking is we need to change to the Republican party to elect Ron Paul. I don't want a neocon running against Hillary, the foreseable choice for Dems. If she runs against a neocon, she may lose. If she runs against Ron Paul, we all win.

[hopeless277]

You seem to forget that God himself has demanded this war. How can mere mortals change the will of God?

[INQUIRER]

Good point, hopeless. It appears that mankind has reached the crisis point where human conscience requires what is contrary to the designs of god. We can either evolve in conciousness or go back to another dark age. The choice is ours.

We all got real euphoric when we voted every single open seat to Democrats last time, producing a statistical majority. The keyword is statistical. A lot of those Democrats are right-wingers.

Current demographics show the probabilty of a Democratic tidal wave in the next Congressional elections. We know by now that will only be a victory if we get a government which is progressive. This will happen only if we all do the political work, and I do mean work.

We must diligently select our candidates, starting with the primaries. Leaving the Presidential race aside, we must identify and set up primary opposition to every right-winger we can touch. In the general election, we must concentrate our efforts and money on maximizing the progressive character of Congress.

No more support for Lieberman or Feinstein. That means no donations to the DCCC or the DSCC. They pass it on to the right-wingers. Give only to individual campaigns or the ActBlue selection of your favorite websites. I know, Al Gore sends out mailings asking you to give to the DSCC. Believe me, Al won't mind if you give it to campaigns instead.

See why I said work? Among others, Open Left has already started compiling the information we all need.

Those in districts with a progressive character but without progressive representation will have to do the real political organization to be able to field progressive candidates. Be glad you have the opportunity. The rest if us will have to pay attention and target our contributions. Not a lot of us are rich, but there are a lot of us.

That's because a lot of us have come out of our trance in the last few years. With the level of political consciousness approaching 70%, we can take our Democracy back. If we work hard enough.

[Lute]

Winston sitting in the pub, noticed that the black shirts removed only the loudest offenders, most of the rest were clubbed and disbursed.

Loyal members were never so abused, being tidy in their habits and quite complacent about their situation. No, Winston thought, twisting his cup of brew, it would never do to disrupt the flow, and really, if one must do without, it was because of the War, and surely one could see that it was for the greater good that some things would have to be given up,
for the good of the nation.

"It's likely," Winston thought, sipping his tasteless concoction, "that those louder ones will not be seen again; Rather than poisoning the populace with their unthought they will be taken away and untaught, that being the safest course of action."