Mn-prog-events Mailing List: Progressive Calendar 08.06.06

[David Shove (shove001]

            P R O G R E S S I V E   C A L E N D A R    08.06.06

1. MN FOR picnic     8.06 2:30pm
2. KFAI/Indian       8.06 4pm
3. Women in Black    8.06 4pm
4. Left Spanish talk 8.06 7pm

5. Pentel/Provencher 8.07 7pm
6. AI vigil/Lebanon  8.07 8pm

7. Vs slacker reps   8.08-9.01
8. Corp power/SPNN   8.08 5pm
9. Vs park giveaway  8.08 5pm
10. IRV weenie roast 8.08 5:30pm
11. Native plants    8.08 6:30pm
12. Abomb/poems      8.08 6:30pm

13. Gina McKenzie  - A call for children's books
14. NLG            - Mobilize to oppose US intervention in Cuba
15. Mitchel Cohen  - Mexico rising: follow the Yellow Brick Road
16. Cynthia Peters - The corporate parent

--------1 of 16--------

From: "Don,Rachel Christensen" <chris385 [at] umn.edu>
Subject: MN FOR picnic 8.06 2:30pm

Members and Friends of Minnesota FOR,

We hope you can join us at Lake Harriet next Sunday, August 6, for the MN
FOR Summer Picnic, and the Hiroshima Nagasaki Commemoration.

2:30 p.m. - Family event with songs, dance and stories in the Peace Garden
4:00 p.m. - MN FOR Picnic at Lake Harriet Picnic Area, north of Bandshell
5:30 p.m. - Peace Concert at Lake Harriet Bandshell

Beverages, ice, plates, cups, cutlery provided.  Bring a dish to share and
your own meat and charcoal if you want to grill.

For information and to confirm that you're coming, contact Don:
chris385 [at] umn.edu (651)690-2609


--------2 of 16-------

From: Chris Spotted Eagle <chris [at] spottedeagle.org>
Subject: KFAI/Indian 8.06 4pm

KFAI's Indian Uprising, August 6, 2006

VOICES OF ETHIOPIA (news and culture), a one and one-half hour program
that normally starts at 4:30 p.m., Sundays, will start at 4:00 p.m. for
this date only, utilizing Indian Uprising broadcast time.  IU producer is
traveling.

Ethiopia, a federal republic, is located in Eastern Africa, West of
Somalia, surrounded by the countries of Sudan, Eritrea, Djibouti, Somalia
and Kenya. It is slightly less than twice the size of Texas.  Ethiopia is
the oldest independent country in Africa with a population 74,777,981.
The three main colors of her flag were so often adopted by other African
countries upon independence that they became known as the pan-African
colors of green, yellow and red.

Unique among African countries, the ancient Ethiopian monarchy maintained
its freedom from colonial rule with the exception of the 1936-41 Italian
occupation during World War II. In 1974, a military junta, the Derg,
deposed Emperor Haile SELASSIE (who had ruled since 1930) and established
a socialist state. Torn by bloody coups, uprisings, wide-scale drought,
and massive refugee problems, the regime was finally toppled in 1991 by a
coalition of rebel forces, the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic
Front (EPRDF). A constitution was adopted in 1994, and Ethiopia's first
multiparty elections were held in 1995. A border war with Eritrea late in
the 1990's ended with a peace treaty in December 2000. Final demarcation
of the boundary is currently on hold due to Ethiopian objections to an
international commission's finding requiring it to surrender territory
considered sensitive to Ethiopia.  Current environmental issues are
deforestation; overgrazing; soil erosion; desertification; water shortages
in some areas from water-intensive farming and poor management.
https://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/et.html#Intro

* * * *
Indian Uprising is a one-half hour Public & Cultural Affairs program for,
by, and about Indigenous people broadcast each Sunday at 4:00 p.m. over
KFAI 90.3 FM Minneapolis and 106.7 FM St. Paul.  Producer and host is
Chris Spotted Eagle.  KFAI Fresh Air Radio is located at 1808 Riverside
Avenue, Minneapolis MN 55454, 612-341-3144.


-------3 of 16--------

From: Terri Hawthorne [mailto:TerriHawthorne [at] comcast.net]
Subject: Women in Black 8.06 4pm

The women's international league for peace and freedom (wilpf) will lead a
meditative procession of the women in black along the pathway to peace as
part of the annual hiroshima/nagasaki commemorative event on

Sunday, August 6
at 4pm
beginning at the corner of 40th St and Bryant Av S Mpls.

The procession will make a brief stop at each of seven cairns along the
three-block-long pathway to peace which leads to the Lyndale Peace Garden
across the street from the Rose Garden by Lake Harriet.  The intent of the
procession is to remember the first destructive use of atomic energy, to
seek more creative and nourishing uses of the forces of nature, and to
find ways to achieve peace in the nuclear age.

Women in black is a worldwide movement focusing on promoting civil protest
to all forms of violence its activities are generally led by women but are
open to men and children as well.

Please join us on August 6.  Dress in black, if possible

For more information, call 612 825-9419.


--------4 of 16--------

From: Lisa Luinenburg <starangel187 [at] hotmail.com>
Subject: Left Spanish talk 8.06 7pm

Mayday Books hosts...
the Leftist Spanish Conversation Group

Are you looking for a place to speak in Spanish about political issues
that matter to you?  Are you interested in discussing the mass movement
for immigrant rights in the United States? Or the current political
situation in Latin American countries? To participate, come to Mayday
Books at 7 pm on the 1st and 3rd Sundays of the month!

August 6, 7 pm
Reading and Discussion of the Poetry of Eduardo Galeano

Location: Mayday Bookstore (301 Cedar Avenue; Minneapolis, Minnesota);
www.maydaybookstore.org (choose Events)
For more information: Call Lisa at 651-636-3769 or email her at
starangel187 [at] hotmail.com


--------5 of 16--------

From: Ken Pentel <kenpentel [at] yahoo.com>
Subject: Pentel/Provencher 8.07 7pm

Dear Pentel/Provencher supporters,
This is a notice of the weekly meetings NEW location:

Monday
Wolves Den Cafe', 1201 E. Franklin, Minneapolis (Next to Maria's Cafe' in
the strip mall.)
7pm

Agenda:
--Prep for Phone banking
--Creative Arts Day update.
--Identify needs of campaign
--More TBA


--------6 of 16--------

From: Margaret Levin <margaret_levin [at] yahoo.com>
Subject: AI vigil/Lebanon 8.07 8pm

Amnesty International Global Vigil
Calling for a Ceasefire in the Israel/Lebanon Conflict
Monday, August 7
Lake Street/Marshall Avenue Bridge - 8-9pm - Bring a candle

The vigil, sponsored by Amnesty International, will 1) Call for a
ceasefire, 2) Demand that all governments stop the supply of arms to the
conflict, and 3) Stand in solidarity with victims and survivors on both
sides of the Israel Lebanon conflict.

This is a completely apolitical vigil where we will call for an end to the
human rights violations that are occuring, and implore governments around
the world to intervene to help the people of Israel and Lebanon.

FFI: margaret_levin [at] yahoo.com or 651-261-2713


--------7 of 16--------

From: Charles Underwood <charleyunderwood [at] hotmail.com>
Subject: Vs slacker reps 8.08-9.01

[This schedule will be printed ONCE. SAVE it if you want it later. -ed]

8/8 to 9/1, Military Families Speak Out stage hour-long vigils confronting
Minnesota's Senator and Representatives who aren't working to change the
course of death in Iraq.
   Tuesdays, 4:30 to 5:30, outside Betty McCollum's office in St. Paul
   Tuesdays 4:30 to 5:30 at Ramstad's Minnetonka office
   Wednesdays, 4:30 to 5:30 outside Norm Coleman's office in St. Paul
   At Gutknecht's Rochester offices Thursday 8/10, 4 to 5 pm, plus
Wednesdays 8/16, 8/23, 8/30, 4 to 5 pm
   Klines's Burnsville office, Tuesdays 8/8, 8/15, 10:30 to 11:30, Tuesdays
8/22 and 8/29 noon to 1 pm
   Kennedy's St Cloud office Fridays 4:30 to 5:30 on 8/11 and 9/1, his Hugo
office on Monday 8/14 3:30 to 5, his Buffalo office Friday 8/25, 3:30 to 5.
   FFI, write annie [at] fireman.net


--------8 of 16--------

From: Eric Angell <eric-angell [at] riseup.net>
Subject: Corp power/SPNN 8.08 5pm

Dear St. Paul Neighborhood Network (SPNN) viewers:
While we still have local public access tv (see: www.saveaccess.org),
select SPNN Channel 15 for "Our World In Depth/Our World Today".  Show
times are 5 pm and midnight on Tuesday evenings and 10 am on Wednesdays.

Schedule:
(5 pm and midnight every Tuesday and 10 am on Wednesdays)

8/8 and 8/9
"Can Corporations Be People?"
w/Molly Morgan and Jan Edwards.  About the legal rise of corporate power,
a presentation given in the Twin Cities June '03.


-------9 of 16-------

From: Lydia Howell <lhowell [at] visi.com>
Subject: Vs park giveaway 8.08 5pm

TUE.AUG.8, 5pm: Nicollet Is. Stadium Letter & Announcement

Letter to Minneapolis City Council from Friends of Coldwater regarding
proposed Nicollet Island football stadium for DeLaSalle High School on
regional public parkland.

Minneapolis Planning Commission meeting Tuesday, August 8, 2006--begins at
5 PM City Hall, 4th St. btw. 3rd & 4th Ave.S. Council Chambers, Third
Floor

Contact SUSU Jeffrey: susujeffrey [at] msn.com


--------10 of 16--------

From: Lydia Howell <lhowell [at] visi.com>
Subject: IRV weenie roast 8.08 5:30pm

Wienie Roast for Better Democracy! Bring IRV to MINNEAPOLIS TUES./AUG.8

Host: Kelly O'Brien
Location: Doug Kress's home
3904 Garfield Ave S, Minneapolis, MN View Map
Tuesday, August 8, 5:30pm to 8:30pm
612-825-8245 or 612-227-9102

Please join us for a fun fundraiser for the BETTER BALLOT CAMPAIGN which
is working to bring Instant Runoff Voting to Minneapolis this November.

We'll be serving all-you-can-eat hot dogs (& veg options) and sides, plus
beer and soda. Only $10 for adults, $5 for kids 5-12 yrs, and free for
under 5 yrs.

Entertainment by Calamity Jean, country cocktail music for rural-at-heart
sophisticates.

Your hosts: Doug Kress, Mary Breitenstein, Darrell Gerber, Elizabeth
Glidden & Eric Pusey, Jeanne Massey & Paul Taylor, Kelly O'Brien, Nicole
Pettit, BethMarie Ward & Jay Sitter


--------11 of 16--------

From: Corrie Zoll
Subject: Native plants 8.08 6:30pm

We have several events over the next few weeks at The Green Institute's
Phillips Eco-Enterprise Center.  They're not all garden-related, but I
thought you'd appreciate the full list.

Several of the workshops listed below will be held in the Eco-Yard
Midtown, a new sustainable landscaping demonstration site at the north
edge of our parking lot along the Midtown Greenway.  The eco-yard is worth
a visit even if you're not attending a workshop.  More information online
at:

www.co.hennepin.mn.us/vgn/portal/internet/hcdetailmaster/0,2300,1273_83222_124817263,00.html

And if you do stop in, please visit our AWARD-WINNING green rooftop on the
third floor.  Or at least visit the live green roof web cam at
www.greeninstitute.org.

Tuesday, Aug 8, 6:30-8:30pm
Incorporating Native Plants in Your Landscape
www.co.hennepin.mn.us/vgn/portal/internet/hcdetailmaster/0,2300,1273_83222_100295472,00.html


--------12 of 16--------

From: Patty Guerrero <pattypax [at] earthlink.net>
Subject: Salon/Abomb/poems 8.08 6:30pm

Next Tuesday, Aug. 8 will be open discussion, but will be a remembrance of
Hiroshima and Nagasaki.  If you can, please bring poems, prayers,
incantations, quotes, statistics all having to do w/America's decision to
drop two atomic bombs on Japan in 1945.  Clips of the film, Black Rain,
will also be shown.

Pax Salons ( http://justcomm.org/pax-salon ) are held (unless otherwise
noted in advance): Tuesdays, 6:30 to 8:30 pm. Mad Hatter's Tea House, 943
W 7th, St Paul, MN

Salons are free but donations encouraged for program and treats.
Call 651-227-3228 or 651-227-2511 for information.


--------13 of 16--------

Date: Tue, 01 Aug 2006 11:25:11 -0500
From: Gina McKenzie <gmckenz [at] umn.edu>
Subject: A call for Children's Books

I am the Development Director for an inner city youth program in the
Hawthorne neighborhood of north Minneapolis.  We have a kids club, a teen
group and a summer day camp for the youth of north Mpls.  We would like to
start a library.  To do that, of course, we need books!

If you have any books that would be appropriate for children from age 4-12
or teens from 13-18 that you could donate to this very worthy cause,
please let me know and I will make arrangements to pick them up.

If you have any questions, email me. Thanks for considering us.

Diane Beving
Development Director
The Patchwork Quilt Neighborhood Outreach Program
2507 Bryant Avenue North
Minneapolis, MN 55114
<mailto:dbeving [at] qwest.net>dbeving [at] qwest.net


--------14 of 16--------

National Lawyers Guild Urges Mobilization To Oppose U.S. Intervention In
Cuba

The National Lawyers Guild called today for all Americans who support the
rule of law to mobilize to oppose any intervention by the United States in
the internal affairs of the government of Cuba.  The Guild declared that
the plans that the Bush government has made plans to spend $80 million
dollars in a "post-Castro transition" violate international law and the
sovereignty of a foreign country.

NLG President Michael Avery stated, "The country of Cuba has every right
to choose its own government and the United States has absolutely no right
to interfere with that choice.  If Cuba chooses to continue its socialist
experiment it has an absolute right to do so.  Such a government poses no
security threat to the United States and we have no legitimate basis to
attempt to subvert it.  In the event that Fidel Castro does not survive
his current illness, it is for the people of Cuba to choose his successor,
not the government of the United States."

The National Lawyers Guild called for the United States to normalize its
relationship with Cuba by ending the boycott against trade and travel.
NLG Executive Director Heidi Boghosian stated, "We should be enjoying
peaceful trade with, and travel to a Cuba that determines its own future,
rather than preparing an intervention in that country's affairs that will
lead to bloodshed in Cuba and destabilization in all of Latin America."

Founded in 1937 as the first racially integrated national bar association,
the National Lawyers Guild is the oldest and largest public interest/human
rights bar organization in the United States, with more than 200 chapters.
Over 5,000 volunteer lawyers, law students, legal workers and jailhouse
lawyers work together "in the service of the people, to the end that human
rights shall be regarded as more sacred than property interests," as
members of the National Lawyers Guild.

Contact: Michael Avery, President, 617-335-5023
Heidi Boghosian, Exec. Dir., 212-679-5100, ext.11;


--------15 of 16--------

Mexico Rising: Follow the Yellow Brick Road
By Mitchel Cohen
August 01, 2006
ZNet Commentary
http://www.zmag.org/sustainers/content/2006-08/01cohen.cfm

(Mexico City -- July 30, 2006)  The sea of yellow swept through the veins
of Mexico City en route to the Zocalo on Sunday, the platelets returning
to the heart. Yellow for clean elections; amarillo for democracy, as
manifest in the candidacy of Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador who believes that
his populist electoral victory in the presidential election three weeks
ago was stolen from him and the working class and poor of Mexico who voted
for him.

Unlike John Kerry, Obrador - the mayor of Mexico City - did not disappoint
the perhaps 2 million people who completely filled the Zocalo and avenues
in every direction for block after block after block. He has presented
evidence of fraud at 70,000 polling places to the Supreme Court. And, as
his voice echoed from loudspeakers everywhere, he called on his supporters
to remain in the Zocalo (after apologizing to the thousands of street
vendors who would be inconvenienced by the occupation), setting up dozens
of large white tents - one for each Mexican state - for the vigil to use
to organize itself and expand.

It was impossible to get to the giant central square (zocalo) until long
after the rally had ended and the round-the-clock vigil had commenced with
cultural festivities. Three members of the Brooklyn Greens - myself,
Cathryn Swan, and Robert Gold - along with a grouping of Mexican comrades
who helped with the translation, found a shady corner a few blocks away
and listened to the crowd's cheers as Obrador announced the occupation of
the central square. (Being mayor certainly helps here in Mexico City, as
the police were all smiles and supportive of the protests despite the
negative media barrage that batters Obrador and his working class base on
a daily basis.)

Earlier, we inched our way down Avenida Juarez, where artists had hung
dozens of dramatic paintings and historic quotations about the need for
democracy. A few days ago, right wing vandals slashed a number of the
artworks, each around 12 feet wide. When the artists returned to repair
them, they found that hundreds of people had already shown up to defend
the art and people from the neighborhoods had carefully stitched each
tattered canvas back together, rendering them even more dramatic.

While the amarillo waves washed down the streets, many focused not on
Obrador himself but on the need for free elections, real democracy, an end
to the corruption of all of the institutional political parties. Obrador
has become the symbol of that movement, that hope. Not that he will be
able to solve the momentous problems Mexico faces, particularly in the
face of International Monetary Fund and U.S. economic pressures (which are
intense). But, they feel that at least Obrador is honest and will clean
house.

It remains to be seen how this movement for democracy will play out. The
Zapatistas, for instance, were critical of Obrador as a candidate but many
EZLN supporters were evident in the crowd demanding free elections and
supporting the movement. We stopped at one EZLN tent in which Zapatista
supporters displayed pictures of numerous political prisoners in Mexico
and raised funds for their defense. Other tents contained literature from
scores of political organizations, and giant banners sweated their slogans
in the hot Mexican sun. One political party even hung huge pictures of
Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin across one section of the plaza, and
elsewhere anarchist symbols and sentiments were much in evidence.

On a personal note, I can only wonder what would have happened in the U.S.
had John Kerry or Al Gore called for protests and occupations of public
spaces across the United States. Would the world look very different today
had they done so? The swiftness with which both abandoned those who voted
for them, who voted against war and for civil liberties and the
environment, becomes even more despicable when contrasted with the
opposite approach being taken today in Mexico by the possibilities being
opened up by Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador and the working class and the
poor. Even the military has become more questioning of its support for the
history of scandalous electoral fraud in Mexico.

A revolution is brewing in Mexico, one that for now is non-violent,
powerful, and visible everywhere. Can the movement be co-opted? Will
Obrador betray his base?  The Zapatistas understand that the revolution
proceeds on many fronts. As of this Sunday, the revolution has taken a
giant step forward. What will happen tomorrow is anyone's guess. But, for
now, these are very exciting times, and the hopes of a huge swath of
humanity rides on the ability of the Mexican people to reclaim liberty,
not only for themselves but for the rest of us as well.

Mitchel Cohen
(writing from Mexico City)
Brooklyn Greens / Green Party

[Again, you can't expect a backward brainwashed country like the USA to
stand up for itself, or demand free elections or demand honest
politicians or accurate voting, or get in the streets and close down all
business via a general strike until justice is done. It must be something
in our genes, or in our white skin color, or Protestant Christianity, or
lack of siestas and tamales. The US a superior country? Superior to what?
-ed]


--------16 of 16--------

The Corporate Parent
By Cynthia Peters
August 03, 2006
http://www.zmag.org/sustainers/content/2006-07/29peters.cfm
ZNet Commentary

When I gave birth to my first daughter, I was in a hospital.
Contraction-inducing pitocin was dripping into my veins, and I was hooked
up to a monitor, featuring a jagged line graph which represented the force
of each contraction. During heavy contractions, the jagged line spiked up
towards the top of the screen and hovered there for the duration.

"Ooh, that was an intense one," my helpful support team would murmur as
they tracked the progress of my labor on the screen. Or: "Ooh, that one
lasted a long time."

"No kidding," I thought to myself, not necessarily needing a news flash on
the details of my labor - each detail of which was excruciatingly clear
to me.

Not that I blame them. My support team endured fifteen hours at my
bedside. Who can fault them for occasionally ignoring me and turning
instead to consult the screen - a much calmer, less profane, and
not-so-sweaty object of attention?

I remembered this long ago run-in with monitors, when I read recently
about a new kind of monitor on the market - one that also promises to
translate the profane and sweaty cries of a loved one into easy-to-grasp
images blinking at you from a screen.

It's the "WhyCry Baby Cry Analyzer," selling in the United States for
$184.95, and it's seductive for the same reason the monitor in the
birthing room was.

Imagine the tired (brand new) parents are home and there are more vigils
by bedsides (or cribsides as is now the case). Forget 15 hours at a time
- a rather puny segment of time relative to what the new parents are now
in for. It's now day after day with never a break from tending to the new
little being who is your child and whose face is sometimes contorted in
various expressions, many of them puzzling. Being with the laboring mom
now seems easy in comparison. It was simply a matter of gauging degrees of
pain. There was the tearful, "I don't know if I can do this," ranging all
the way to the extremely focused commitment to murder the next person who
tells her she's doing "fine, just fine."

The jagged green line helps the birthing team figure out where the
mom-to-be is on the tearful-to-murder range. But now the parents are home,
and the squirming little being in the crib has more to communicate. She is
sometimes hungry, after all, sometimes wet, tired, cold, hot, lonely,
bored, uncomfortable, among many other emotions - all communicated
without language.

It's all so complicated, and new parents are apt to feel vulnerable,
exhausted, and isolated. It's the perfect moment for the marketers to step
in and suggest hooking that baby up to a monitor. Why not? We're so used
to monitors. They are familiar, straightforward, and they come with an
off/on switch. Think how much more relaxed you'll feel interpreting the
digitally analyzed transmissions of the "WhyCry Baby Cry Analyzer."
Instead of looking directly at your baby when he or she cries, you can now
turn your attention to the electronic monitor programmed to recognize and
interpret different tones of a baby's cry.

No jagged green lines here. This monitor provides user-friendly baby-face
icons to interpret your baby's needs. I don't have the manual, so I can't
say for sure, but I'm guessing the baby-face icon with the tongue hanging
out means the baby is hungry. The baby-face icon with the jagged mouth
must mean stress. And there are other icons for sleepiness, boredom, and
discomfort.

Just the icons themselves are comforting. In my experience, a hungry baby
is capable of yowling at the top of his or her lungs. It's a profoundly
not-comforting sound that most people have a strong aversion to, a fact
which no doubt helps preserves the human race by convincing sometimes
weary or busy parents to feed their baby NOW. For the nursing mom, there's
an additional incentive. The baby's cry causes a hormone to be released
which causes the milk to "let down," which means it will soon be leaking
down the front of her shirt unless she gets that baby to the breast
immediately.

But the hungry baby icon on the WhyCry Baby Cry Analyzer looks positively
cute. Round eyes, upturned lips, and a cute little slurping tongue may not
stir the same urgency as the great genetically coded howl for food.The
icon that lights up when the WhyCry Baby Cry Analyzer detects crying due
to fatigue shows a baby with closed lids and a relaxed countenance. How
pleasant to gaze on this angelic face rather than the real one crying in
the crib in the next room.

I understand why parents want help from experts. It's a hard job, you've
had no training, and your shift never ends. An electronic monitor posing
as translator for the baby might come as a relief. It comes with operating
instructions, after all; which is more than you can say for the baby.

But more than experts, parents need support for simply being themselves in
this most human of circumstances. Through the ages, humans have been
parented without the help of electronic devices. A baby's cry communicates
something to parents; parents react in a certain way; both babies and
parents learn from the interactions and modify their behavior, forming a
unique dynamic that is the bedrock of communication and human connection.

At best the WhyCry Baby Cry Analyzer is a waste of money, resources, and
labor power. You'll buy it and maybe briefly tune into the cute little
baby face icons. But soon enough, you'll realize that electronic mediating
of the human cry doesn't make it go away, and you're at precisely the same
place you started before you studied the monitor. That is, with a baby who
is attempting to communicate with you and needs you to tune into her! The
WhyCry Baby Cry Analyzer will thus follow the natural course of its many
brother and sister gadgets from manufacture by underpaid workers in a
far-flung factory, to retail sale in some big box store, to brief duty as
a dust-collector on a shelf, and finally to the landfill.

At worst, the WhyCry Baby Cry Analyzer is an example of corporations
trying to replace intricate (sometimes complicated and confusing), human
experience with an overpriced, over-simplified gadget that steps in and
suggests a purchaseable replacement to something that is by definition
irreplaceable.

This is the message corporations give to parents about their role: You
don't know what to do; we do. You're scared and confused; we're confident
and clear-headed. You want the best for your kid; so do we, and we can
sell it to you.Having virtually conquered the globe, capitalism is looking
for new frontiers. Previously uncolonized aspects of human experience and
interaction appear ripe for the taking. First they make it so we have to
work all the time to make ends meet. Then they take away community by
organizing our lives around cars, malls, and more work, of course, which
we have to double up on to be able to afford the cars and the things in
the malls. After they induce isolation, they sell us back the stuff that
appears to connect us to human experience.

The WhyCry Baby Cry Analyzer wants you to think that unquantifiable
(unpurchaseable) attributes such as good parenting, the ability to listen
and interpret, and the ability to respond appropriately to your baby are
available for a price.

When you're not monitoring the monitor for changes in your baby's
emotions, you can study the book that accompanies the device called,
"Understanding your baby will stimulate development"
(www.whycrycanada.com).But if you want to understand your baby, put away
the books and the monitors. You might also put away the invasive,
self-scrutinizing question of whether you are properly stimulating
development. Development is good, of course, but there's no reason to have
it hanging over you like the proverbial carrot that will drive you to try
harder to "understand" your baby. There is no external reward for
understanding another person - there's just the understanding itself,
always evolving and gaining in richness, and that's reward enough.


[Then there's the "BushBaby War Analyser" - it gives subscribers a
five-minute notice of which country de jour the US or its proxies are
bombing or invading! The Bush-face icons include: smirk, bronx cheer
tongue, eyes closed, ears stuffed, blood-red lips and chin, glaring eyes;
hand icons include: third finger salute, fingers 2 and 5 BS gesture, thumb
down (non-Christians die), seig heil salute. As scary as these are, at
least you won't have to look at or listen to Bush every day, and that has
to be worth a lot.
 Or there's the "Legislator PAC/vote Analyser". Know *immediately* which
PACs paid for which vote, and how much more money citizens would have to
pay them to have them actually vote for the public interest. -ed]


------------------------------------------------------------------------------

   - David Shove             shove001 [at] tc.umn.edu
   rhymes with clove         Progressive Calendar
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