Off With Their Heads! (Or at least on with their clothes!)

For decades now American society has rewarded and promoted leaders who model narcissism and callousness over those with vision and service. What we must change is our idea of what leadership looks like, not just the people who have risen to the top as a result. We have to turn away from brash, egotistical leaders epitomized by George W. Bush, and respond with distrust to impudent, arrogant leaders like Dick Cheney. We have allowed too many of this kind of leader to fill top positions throughout our society. We can't wait for leaders to whom we should never have given our trust in the first place, to get it, because they have never had that capacity. The remedy to our cancerous condition is to rout out our false leaders by calling their naked strutting what it is and to reward and promote instead leaders who demonstrate humility and dedication to service. The election of President Obama is just the first step in this direction.

I hope Arianna Huffington is right in comparing the present obtuseness to French leaders on the eve of revolution, because I hope Americans are ready to hold ALL of our leaders accountable. The "they" her post refers to definitely don't "get" their own rapacious indifference to the suffering of others. I'm hopeful that another thing they don't get is the awakening of American people to the timeless wisdom contained in the "Emperor's New Clothes." We have been frustratingly slow to grasp what some of Americans saw as dangerous and bad for our country 20 or more years ago. The best thing that could result from the unapologetic, naked strutting of George W. Bush, Dick Cheney and their cronies, would be for the lunacy of rewarding such counterfeit leadership to be forever engraved in our hearts and minds.

Never Fear! The New Justice League (or something like that) Is Here!

Since my last post ended on a grim note, I felt the need to come back and share a link to this incredibly uplifting piece on why we're not doomed.

Check out Andrew Golis outlining ten of his favorite progressive intellectuals.

Reading this short list of brilliant, young dedicated people helps me maintain my faith in the phoenix-like nature of the human spirit. It also makes it undeniable that with all of the things we (the really really big we) have been doing wrong, we must also be doing something really right that is producing these brilliant, caring, minds and spirits.

Thoughts to get a good night's sleep by.

It's the Economy Stupid!

Ariana is saying it, but what other big voice out there is mentioning that there has been far too much hand waving about the mess our economy is in. Jay Smooth said it perfectly in this pre-election video:



Scores, hundreds, even thousands of people like Jay Smooth gave their time and creative talent to help the rest of us maintain consciousness in spite of the relentless thrum of mcnews and mcentertainment on our tv sets. Thankfully as a result enough of us got out and voted to defeat the right wing machine that drove our country into the middle of this morass.

The bad news is we're still in the middle of the morass.

I Laughed Out Loud!

Thank you 23/6!

Finally At Peace With Warren Invocation

UPDATE: Newsweek writer Lisa Miller does a nice job of parsing Warren's invocation that on the surface sounded pat and uninteresting, but as Miller points out contained some interesting and significant choices.

My post from January 16:

The subject of Rick Warren has disappeared from huffpo and other media, but I have continued to struggle with how to feel included in the world wide celebration on January 20th. That is, until today. Obama's talking points about including all points of view (including one that disaffirms my identity) only made me feel more excluded. I couldn't imagine watching the inauguration without feeling kicked in the stomach at the sight of Rick Warren smiling smugly on the platform.

Then something happened in my own life, in my own world. I found myself working to bring together two groups within my organization who have historically felt they are on opposite sides of important issues and the parallel with what Obama says he is trying to do suddenly struck me. After weeks spent reading everything I could find and agonizing over my own bitter disappointment, I could finally see beyond Rick Warren on that podium to the sea of Americans standing patiently shoulder to shoulder in the cold. Because of Rick Warren's presence some of them will be people who would not have otherwise come, who would not otherwise be feeling like Obama is their President and I could finally see that Obama's point might be more than the foolishness of trying to change the unchangeable mind of Rick Warren.

If you're reading this and thinking, 'well, duh!' bear with me for a few more lines. As I thought about the good, decent people I know in my own workplace who I want to bring together, I could finally imagine the millions of Americans who don't yet grasp what it is about Rick Warren and his deeply held and oft-iterated attitudes and beliefs that are so hurtful. I could finally imagine that among them are many who are decidedly less sure and even less adamant in their views on homosexuality. Paradoxically, it was when I stopped imagining what it would take to change one man, Rick Warren, and instead began to imagine what can change the hearts and minds of the millions of people who admire him that my feelings of anger and hopelessness subsided. Imagining ordinary people of faith, with life-sized egos, more permeable than Warren's super-sized one, standing shoulder to shoulder with gay people and their families, I thought about Harvey Milk and I began to feel a glimmer of hope.

The revolution Harvey Milk envisioned 40 years ago is on the march, and it won't wait for TV personalities like Rick Warren to "get it." The revolution is happening as Milk foretold, because of all of us who are able to live out, proud, happy lives, among the rest of the real world, beyond TV. It is when people come to know and manifest their full human dignity that it becomes undeniably apparent to all who witness it.

So my hope for the inauguration has changed 180 degrees. I've gone from not being able to imagine how proud, self-loving LGBTQ people could possibly go and be among the millions, to imagining how perfect and beautiful their presence there will be. Instead of dreading the thought of evangelicals showing up that day I am hoping for it, because I have remembered that it will be by standing together with LGBTQ people and our allies that they might begin to experience us as the happy and whole, loving and beautiful people we are.