asa's website

Santa Barbara bike trip pictures 

Tags: Santa Barbara, Bicycling

Posted at 2:56 PM | Link to this post | Email this post

6 years on 

"Six years ago was a Tuesday, too. Six years ago we stood, united.

That Tuesday helped push me into political action -- I'd always been interested, followed the news, but with the stakes so high, it was clear that it was time to get involved to push our country in the right direction. Unfortunately, even with all of our shoulders leaned in, pushing, we've continued to drift off course, further and further. We almost managed to kick Bush out in 2004, but fearmongering still worked. We took back both houses of Congress in 2006, and the drift has slowed, but we're still off course. What will it take to get us moving in the right direction again? We, the people, have to lead if our "leaders" won't. People power streams from our connectedness, our networks. Can a national liberal social club change the world? We can certainly try. Join us tonight."

Tags: 9/11, Drinking Liberally

Posted at 11:43 AM | Link to this post | Email this post

New fundraising badge for John Edwards 

As you can see, the badge lists the current total raised and the number of donors. It also fills the big number "1" with more and more red and the funds flow in, in the tradition of the Howard Dean "bat" and those thermometers outside your local United Way.

If you'd like to add the badge to your own page, you can get the HTML code by visiting http://www.opencampaigns.net/edwards/. (And you should click on the image and contribute!)

Tags: John Edwards, ActBlue

Posted at 5:12 PM | Link to this post | Email this post

Fixing politics isn't enough 

We have two top-tier candidates for President who are running on "vision": John Edwards and Barack Obama.  Hillary Clinton has based her candidacy on resume/experience.  I'm a vision person, so her lack of a coherent vision for the country turns me off to her.

Let us compare the visions of Barack Obama and John Edwards: Obama wants to fix our politics, Edwards wants to fix our country.

Quotes from Senator Obama's announcement speech:

• "I know I haven't spent a lot of time learning the ways of Washington. But I've been there long enough to know that the ways of Washington must change."


• "What's stopped us is the failure of leadership, the smallness of our politics - the ease with which we're distracted by the petty and trivial, our chronic avoidance of tough decisions, our preference for scoring cheap political points instead of rolling up our sleeves and building a working consensus to tackle big problems."


• "And as people have looked away in disillusionment and frustration, we know what's filled the void. The cynics, and the lobbyists, and the special interests who've turned our government into a game only they can afford to play. They write the checks and you get stuck with the bills, they get the access while you get to write a letter, they think they own this government, but we're here today to take it back. The time for that politics is over. It's time to turn the page."

Compare with these quotes from Senator Edwards's DNC speech:

• "The causes of poverty are complex, entrenched, and powerful. And our will to address them and restore the promises of equality and social justice must be just as strong. Are you strong enough? Will you stand up to end poverty in America? It means addressing education, jobs, health care, housing, predatory lending, and personal responsibility. The fight will be long and it will not be easy. Are you ready? Will you use your voice against poverty, or will you stand silent? Stand up. Stand up to eradicate poverty in America.
• "The 47 million are silent victims of a health care system gone wrong, where policies are driven by profits not patient care. We have to stop letting the health insurance companies and the big pharmaceutical concerns decide our nation's health care policy. We have to give the silent victims, who stand in line at free clinics and use the expired medicines of friends and neighbors, we have to give them the dignity of universal health care."
• "[By] breaking the silence we are not breaking faith with our flag or our forefathers or our brave young men and women in uniform. We are keeping faith with America."
• "We are Democrats, the party of principle - not appeasement. The time for half-measures, empty promises, and sweet rhetoric is gone. Now is the time for courage, decisiveness and moral leadership."

I'm sure that Senator Obama will address policy as he goes along (and he did run down a list of policy visions in his announcement speech), so this may simply be a matter of the stages of the two campaigns, but I think it goes deeper than that.

Obama is both cynical and blindly optimistic about politics: Cynical in that he has given up on the system as it is today, and demands we throw it out and build anew.  Overly optimistic in that he thinks that a new politics will fix our country.

Edwards takes a different approach: To fix our country by inspiring all of us to act, locally as well as globally.  It's a bigger task, but a constructive one in which we all have a part to play.  "People power" can do more than Washington ever could.

We don't have to wait to see if someone keeps the promises of a 2008 campaign. In fact, the transformational change this country needs cannot wait until January 2009.  Tomorrow begins today. And our obligation to act starts right here, right now.  Because somewhere in America, because everywhere in America, people are counting on us to stand by them and to fight alongside them for what we know in our hearts is right. John Edwards, DNC Speech

Tags: John Edwards, Barack Obama, politics

Posted at 7:56 PM | Link to this post | Email this post

Why I support John Edwards: Vision and Hope 

First, let me say that I was a John Edwards supporter in 2004, and had the honor of representing him as a grassroots delegate to the Democratic National Convention in Boston.  The big-picture reason why I supported Edwards last time is still true: He knows where he came from, where he's going, and where he will lead the country.  He has a cohesive vision for the country, concrete plans for how to make that vision a reality, and the deep-seated moral drive to fight for his vision.  The country in his vision is one I'd like to live in: one that cares for the least among us, with the resources for all Americans to get ahead, not just get by.  A country with the respect of the world, trusted as a leader.  I'm pleased that nothing Edwards has done in the intervening years has broken my trust in the strength of this vision.

I've had the privilege to see him speak about poverty (at a conference on the issue) and I know that he has both committed himself to taking action to fight poverty, and immersed himself in the policy options available.  I trust him to devote the same intellect and energy to the rest of his vision for America, at home and in its role in the world.

Having followed Edwards closely in the 2004 cycle, I'm struck and impressed with how he has changed over the last few years.  First, he has clearly been in "school" for most of that time.  Those of us who have recently graduated from college know how much you can learn, and how much you can grow, in 4 years.  He has a much deeper understanding of many policy areas than he did in 2004.  Of course, as you can tell by my support of him in 2004, I was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt then, and trust that the strength of his vision would carry him through.  He didn't get the chance to prove me right, but his maturation as a leader in intervening years gives me confidence that our country will be in good hands.

There is another striking difference from 2004, and it's one that Edwards himself talks about: he has been "loosed" from the confines of consultant-driven, poll-tested, cautious politics.  For our current national situation, this is a political strength -- America is yearning for leadership.  This is also a consequence of his maturation and burgeoning policy knowledge.  He doesn't need someone to tell him about X or Y any more; he knows it already himself, and has formulated his own opinions about the right course of action.  Of course, he will have a stable of policy experts, as will all the candidates, but he will be able to check their recommendations against his own understanding.  I trust now that what he says is what he believes, and America needs that from our President -- now more than ever.

All of this isn't to say I exactly agree with Edwards on all details, or even on where to put emphasis.  I wish he would speak more directly to the insecurities and aspirations of the middle class, rather than risking being defined in the public consciousness as "that guy who fights for people poorer than me."  Health care is a source of uncertainty, and college a focus for aspiration, but I'd like to see him connect all of this, in a positive "we can do this together" language, with broader concerns about maintaining our competitive edge as the world's innovation leader in a globalized economy (which is going to globalize regardless of which trade deals or immigration reforms are passed or exactly what they say).

What makes me confident enough to throw my support to Edwards now, more than 11 months from the first caucus, is that he offers hope.  I know that Barack Obama has wrapped that word around himself, so it will be hard for Edwards to reclaim it, but it is rightly his.  I recently read a short Harvard Business Review article about hope (free access until later this month), which divided hope into its component elements: possibility, agency, worth, openness, and connection, with the critical two being "possibility" and "agency".  That is, to be hopeful about something, we must believe that it is possible, and that we, personally, have the ability to make it happen.  This is where OneCorps closed the deal for me.

While Obama offers hope as a rejection of cynicism, which is indeed critical, Edwards offers the challenge to do something to build a better country, to show by our actions that we reject cynicism.  OneCorps affirms our worth as Americans, our value to our own country.  Pundits have spoken a lot over the last few years about "sacrifice", and whether Americans are being asked to "sacrifice" enough for the country as we fight al-Qaeda and attempt to stall a full civil war in Iraq.  OneCorps turns that around, and says no, it's not sacrifice, it's service.  It is our honor to build a better country for today and tomorrow.  OneCorps has the potential to rebuild communities, both in the literal, physical sense (winterizing homes, etc), but also in the critical sense of feeling like we're all an integral part of a community.

I'm looking forward to working with all of you across the country to elect a candidate of integrity, hope, compassion, and vision in 2008.  Tomorrow begins today.

Contribute: http://www.actblue.com/page/asaslist

Tags: John Edwards, Politics

Posted at 7:50 PM | Link to this post | Email this post

We have a moral obligation to Iraqi refugees 

Reuters had a nice summary story out recently about how stingy the U.S. is being about allowing Iraqi refugees into our country.  202 Iraqis last year, out of 70,000 spots.  We made the mess, we should be willing to deal with all the consequences.  

Particularly sad is the quota of only 50 spots per year for Iraqis and Afghanis who have worked as translators for the U.S.  There is already a 6 year waiting list for these visas.  Don't you think we could handle another 250 folks who have put their lives on the line for us?  

I keep reading stories about attacks on Iraqis just for talking with Americans, much less working for them.  The Reuters article quotes a former translator: "'Iraqi citizens, including translators, have been shot in the head or beheaded, but only after terrorists forced these people to 'confess' that they were spies and agents of the United States,' Al-Obiedy said."

We need to get out, and make sure that those who helped us get out, too.

Tags: Iraq, refugees

Posted at 7:46 PM | Link to this post | Email this post

Stollen :) 

ingredients:

• 2 1/2 cups flour
• 2 tsp. baking powder
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 1/2 tsp. mace
• seeds of 6 cardamom pods, crushed
• 3/4 cup ground blanched almonds
• 1/2 cup butter
• 1 cup softened cream cheese
• 1 egg
• 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
• 1/3 tsp. almond extract
• 2 Tbs. cherry brandy
• 1/2 cup dried currants
• 1/2 cup dried cherries (you might want to cut them in half)
• 1/4 cup poppy seeds (roughly half of a normal spice jar)
• confectioner's sugar (for sprinkling over)

Soft together the flour, baking powder, sugar, salt, mace, and crushed cardamom seeds. Stir in the ground almonds. Cut the butter in with a pastry cutter until the mixture resembles coarse sand.

In a blender (or power mixer), cream the egg with the cream cheese, vanilla and almond extracts, and cherry brandy. Pour it into a bowl (or use the mixer bowl) and stir in the dried fruit and poppy seeds. Gradually stir in the flour mixture, until it's all well blended.

Work the dough into a ball and turn it out on a lightly floured board. Knead it for a few minutes, just until it's smooth. Shape it into an oval, about 10 inches long and 8 inches wide. With the blunt edge of a knife, crease it just off-center, lengthwise. Fold the smaller side over the larger and place the stollen on an ungreased baking sheet.

Bake the stollen in a preheated 350 degree over for about 45 minutes. Allow it to cool a bit before dusting with confectioner's sugar.

Tags: Recipe

Posted at 6:07 PM | Link to this post | Email this post

July 4th Oratory Contest 

In the primary election just passed, about 23 percent of registered voters in the 44th Assembly District voted, and even in Presidential years we never pass 60 percent nationwide. Political consultants rejoice: Low turnout makes elections easier to win -- you don’t have to convince as many people to vote your way to emerge as the victor. I can’t help but think that it’s not inconvenience, or indifference, that leads to low turnout, as well as the boom in Decline to State registration. Instead, the glacial pace of change, combined with the argumentative culture of shrill partisanship, has led many people to give up on government, from either Party.

The game as it’s played today has allowed massive problems to develop, then fester, and then explode, leaving the common good charred and struggling for breath.

Deficits as far as the eye can see, at both state and federal levels. Health care costs that climb without end. CEOs paid hundreds of times as much as their average employee. Global climate change that may make our world almost unrecognizable. Our political leaders have failed us, and we wonder and moan about the common perception is that it’s a choice of the lesser of two evils -- we should respect that perception, and work to change its cause!

"The old parties are husks, with no real soul within either, … boss-ridden and privilege-controlled, … and neither daring to speak out wisely and fearlessly what should be said on the vital issues of the day." Sound like a common complaint today? That was Teddy Roosevelt, as he set about trying to change the game. Teddy and the rest of the Progressives made some progress, but they didn’t fully remove the cancer.

Mr. Schiff, Mr. Portantino, Ms. Liu, and Mr. Scott: The time is over for incremental piddling around the edges of the nation’s problems. With majorities in Sacramento and soon to come in Washington, let’s stand up and show people what governing looks like, and not be afraid to change the rules. Let’s allow good candidates who don’t want to whore themselves to special interests to run for office on the people’s money -- they will do a better job of serving the people’s interests. And let’s allow voters to pick their representatives, instead of the other way around. Once the People’s house belongs again to the People, the common good can overtake the corporate good.

Let’s pass strong legislation addressing climate change, health care, and build a real safety net that works for today’s workers, who will have 10 employers in their lifetimes. Let’s beat down the astronomical debt that you and your colleagues keep piling up for my generation to repay. Only when government makes real, positive differences in people’s lives will their faith be restored.

A final note to the rest of us: We’re lucky to have friends in Sacramento and in Washington. Friends watch out for each other and prod each other to stay on the right path. That is our job, and one that we must embrace without reservation.

Tags: Politics, Speeches

Posted at 4:03 PM | Link to this post | Email this post