The clues are all around. The faction of the business party in power has been making sweeping statements against the so-called "axis of evil", aggressively formulating their "one world government" ideology, aggressing like hell without publicizing alleged facts of terrorism (latest illegal aggression on Afghanistan), bringing in new broadenings of the power of the political police at home, hyping up the population against all dissent, making several tries at tying up the power of the Internet, etcetera, and now we apparently have this situation with bringing back the draft (as reported by the St. Louis Indymedia Center--article and comments re:  http://www.stlimc.org/front.php3?article_id=1563&group=webcast )...?

Is there any good that can come of this at all??

One thing we know from history is when authoritarian force steps on our toes more...

...the more likely a new wave of rebellion will form. This is what happened in the 1960s, basically. So in that way this latest hardliner push
will bring some value as always.

This time around, we'll hopefully have learned from the mistakes of previous rebellions.
We'll have studied the lessons and alternatives still open to us, as articulated by people
like Brian Glick (1960s activist lawyer, author of _War At Home: Covert Action Against U.S.
Activists and What We Can Do About It_ South End Press, 1990).

And hopefully we'll also engage in tactics that can not only avoid and undermine our
nation's political police, but realize that *even they* (and their handlers) are human
beings who need to be A PART OF OUR SOLUTION. Not demonized; by perpetuating the insanity
they author, we only perpetuate the insanity.

Here's a method that ought to be looked into while we still have as much freedom as we do:
*RESISTANCE CONSCIOUSNESS.* It's basically a technique very similar, I suspect, to what
people of the Third World have utilized every time the northern Bullies make attempts to
smash them.

A man, an American Indian visionary (who's been around; see: www.dickshovel.com/JTT.html )
by the name of John Trudell has articulated this method. I personally have been GREATLY
inspired by his charisma. Trudell has basically articulated this idea, and I've run with it
a bit:

It's a way where we don't *need* above-ground organization, at least the type we now have.
We can keep our affinity groups, and we can still come together, but we don't *need* these
above-ground methods we have used for so long. We can use them as we use those who still
wish to have their organizations, all tools are important. Yet we need to understand the
short-comings of these methods.

We need to understand that many of our protest methods up to now are pretty much obsolete.
Like the Red Coats of the Revolutionary War, we have been taught that traditional protest
methodology can work; but we didn't realize that these tools are really the "Master's Tools"
and these strategically-challenged persons can utilize them much better than we
can--especially since their budgets are astronomically larger than ours.

Our naivity (?) about getting serious mainline media attention, only to have such betray us
(street reporters, we learn the hard way, have no control over what their editors and owners
decide) and play their concision games, or stick us firmly in the margins. Or how about our
faith in policy makers? In "speaking truth to power" we have believed they would *be able*
to listen to our sanity-seeking. All of this has time and time again fallen far short of our
imaginations. See, we haven't understood how the game is played.

We are going to have to learn how this game is played--not just our leaders knowing; we're
going to have to begin to educate the traditional followers so that they become their own
leaders, and when traditional leaders are jailed and/or disappeared, momentums won't be
blocked and run-aground.

Noam Chomsky has already been a leader in demystifying the mindset of social and cultural
managers, and zmag.org, in their online archive has done a great service in keeping his
insights so fully online for all of us to explore. Take some time now and go see a little of
what gifts Chomsky has for us: www.zmag.org/chomsky/ni/

The basic idea is articulated well by John Trudell:
"Theoretically if everyone that disagrees with the lie that has been imposed upon
us--tomorrow, theoretically if everyone got up and said, all right I changed my mind. I'm
not going to believe the lie any more--you would have nonviolent change--and you would have
quick change--because the system goes upon our self-rationalizations and self-justifications
and insecurity: lack of respect for self."

And Chomsky says about the same thing too.
The angle is taking the power of a *General Strike* and broadening its implications so that
the resistance connects dots across the spectrum of policy implementation. When *everyone*
sees how WE ARE ALL being tooled by the prevailing cynical, alienating mindset--everyone,
not just "workers", but bosses and owners too--change will happen very very rapidly.

Now, I'm not going to say that I've got this all worked out. There are holes. But you can
hopefully see the basic sanity of this kind of approach. We've got to get beyond all of our
divisions and rigidly-held mindsets! We've got to get off of our reactionaryisms and
perpetuating the heart of the problem. We've got to get back in touch with the energy juices
that brought us into these idealistic communities in the first place. And begin to
articulate ourselves and actualize our art of everyday life!

I'm doing it. I know I would be greatly inspired to do it more--even constantly--if even a
few others tried it out for awhile!

Finally, we need to remember a cartoon I once happened upon. The caption read: "Never give
up!" and was a drawing of a frog being swallowed by a stork, only the frog's hands were
tightly fastened around the neck of the stork and it was asphysxiating it. The metaphor
there is pretty interesting, even though I totally see a problem with violence. (Rather, I
enjoy the CONFRONTIVE nonviolent techniques of Saul Alynsky in _Rules For Radicals_...did
you read the one about the beans? And, look, Alynsky only touched on the *tip of the ice
berg* of what's possible for creative--not passive--nonviolence!)