On the 4th floor there were twenty tables staffed by employees and volunteers for Municipal agencies and non-profits.
email: alaskamarchon@gmail.com
Facebook: Alaska March On
Bluesky: @alaskamarchon.bsky.social
And in the Moose Room, they had two showings of the film The Officials about election officials who, despite all the the attempts to challenge the 2020 elections stood firm.
The Anchorage Equal Rights Commission takes complaints about discrimination in housing, employment, and other areas in businesses and in government agencies within the boundaries of Anchorage.
equalrights@anchorageak.gov
My personal goal is to work to get as many non-voters to vote, with a particular focus on young voters. Not much is going to change in Alaska politics unless we engage the people who have decided that 'voting is not my thing' or 'every party is equally corrupt so why vote?’ A huge swath of people eligible to vote, regularly do not vote. They can make all the difference. There are several groups that seem to be working toward that goal and I will follow up with them.
Steve, It seems obvious that (new) voter registration is urgently needed. It makes me think of our parents, born to the huge wars of the 20th century. And now for us to see how, once more, forces threaten representative democracies in the 21st century.
ReplyDeleteI've seen how we in Europe were shocked to see the rise of Trump in the USA become a real & present danger to international cooperation mechanisms among liberal democracies in the West.
And then I read in national and European press of Americans exploring how to leave the US, to find a safer, better life -- rather than fear of dissent branded un-American.
I have talked with any number of Americans asking how Eugene and I moved to Britain and how they might. I tell them honestly: Settlement possibility here is tightening for regular folk now. Europe is growing cautious of admitting migrants for howls from those who would naturally limit citizenship to a 'Europeans Only' metric.
After I give it a better look, maybe I'll send you a few ideas on what we can do to open hearts & minds to settlement by working together.
Next morning and surfacing now after deep-reading professional news & analysis of European allies, their hopes and ideas for action. So yes, PLEASE do work to get out the vote in the US mid-terms (maybe some thinking folk?) for all of us in this big, wonderful, beautiful Earth... while we all can.
DeleteAnd thanks.
Thank you for this lovely article! As one of the organizers I enjoyed seeing this.
ReplyDeleteIt was fun & educational.
Anonymous - thank you for putting in all the work necessary to pull off such an important event.
DeleteAnd Jakob, I appreciate your concerns and comments. Getting a perspective from someone living permanently in Europe (Northern Ireland is still geographically, if not politically, in Europe, right?)
Good morning from across sea
ReplyDeleteI'm doing some thinking, writing & a bit of cleaning this morning. Playing LOUDLY in the background are songs from the very AMERICAN civil rights movement, the AMERICAN anti-vietnam war movement, and songs of AMERICAN union organising from the 30s, 40s and more.
All these songs come from the people affected. All these words hit people where they lived and felt. And it was part of the push-back in those troubled times laying out artists' protest, hope & activism.
The US needs this again. The songs must be written, the words and chords learned and again set up the voices of a nation for change -- to claim the America of promise for all people, great & small.
This crisis in America isn't following some small back trail, a sign-posted path to exit at the end of some saunter. Its crisis has taken the on-ramp to the freeway of its own destruction -- A destruction of a UNION of people bound by the promise of opportunity, to that hope of being given that CHANCE to do better.
These songs I listen to today are powerful. They are full of heart pulled from grieving loss and hope. They are the AMERICAN STORY.
Fight for that HOPE, grieve no more. Light that candle. Light the hope. And gather the people who will carry out -- NO, carry ON that work.
TO A MORE PERFECT UNION. That is the work before all of you.