The Words Matter
Last week, I watched Ed Rendell cite on television New Orleans’ 2005 flood as an infrastructure failure and couldn’t help but smile at how far we’ve come. He made no mention of a “natural disaster” or Hurricane Katrina, and rightly, finally so.
I’ve been honored and blessed to be a part of a group of people who’ve worked passionately for the past six years to bring about just such a change in lexicon, bloggers who adamantly referred to the event as The Flood, or even the Federal Flood, insisting that what it’s called accurately represents the actual truth of the event. It seems to be working. We can change the words if there are enough of us and we stick with it long enough.
This is the amazing gift that new, or social, media has brought to us: the opportunity to join voices and be heard as We, The People. The patriotic choice is to use it.
I should also like to stop calling them the Tea Party. It inaccurately infers patriotism when it’s closer to insurrection, and it suggests, erroneously, that it’s an independent party. I intend to always refer to them as Tea Party Republicans, since Secessionist Anti-Democracy Republicans doesn’t roll off the tongue as well. I accept that, delusionally embracing ignorance and without regard for history or truth, they’ve fully appropriated “Tea Party” so that it no longer means honorable patriots but now describes people who wish to tear down our government and to transfer significant portions of our nation’s wealth from the people to the very richest among us and the corporations that made them so.
The saddest aspect of this is that so many, falling victim to ignorance, have been persuaded to vote and march and passionately clamor for all these things that are not in their best interest. This movement preys upon some of the most vulnerable among us, the gullible, fear-motivated uneducated, who’re unable to think for themselves, and have done so with the collaboration of what we used to call the Mainstream Media, but should, from now on, refer to as the Corporately Owned Media, because that’s what they are. They, the Corporately Owned or Corporately Funded Media, have the power to affect public thinking, especially that of the most susceptible and those in the throes of latent or blatant racism, and mold it into a movement that will do the bidding of the most powerful against the people.
So, let’s review:
- It was a Catastrophic Infrastructure Failure.
- They’re the Tea Party Republicans.
- It’s the Corporately Owned Media.
We, The People, if we choose to raise our voices together for long enough, can change it.
The Revolution is on Twitter
The video below is of Tweetdeck columns or tweetstreams, from left to right, for the search terms egypt, mubarak, cairo & protest. As more and more people in the world post links and comments tagged with one of these terms, the faster that term’s search column moves. This broadcast capability makes it possible for large groups of people without any connection other than shared interest, to follow the same events and information, so folks posting links or comments know that others following those subjects might see their link, their video, their picture, their comment.
Now, I’m viewing this on a broadband internet connection, but one of the most interesting aspects of Twitter, the thing that makes it an important organizing or emergency tool, is that, while you might need a good internet connection to view Tweetdeck like this, you don’t need one to post or access Twitter, which can be done via text message from your mobile phone. This is a big part of why it’s so hard to stop. While a phone call is one attempt and then stops, so might fail when a network struggles, text messages are such small packets of data that, once sent, they wait patiently for enough signal to get through.
On Meet The Press yesterday, Martin Indyk of the Brookings Institute said,
You are witnessing here a 21st century revolution… Twitter and Facebook… this has changed the whole nature of communication and organization and made it now impossible for autocratic, authoritarian leaders to suppress the views of their people.
It’s an amazing time to be alive, this enormous change we are witnessing.
The pop sound in the background is the fire. Peace, out, y’all.
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Originally posted at Sophmom’s DotCalm.
The Music 8/28/10
This is Part 4 of a 4-part post of thoughts about Rising Tide 5 weekend. I’m publishing it separately so it will be independently searchable and so folks who are coming here after searching “Rob Thomas set list” don’t have to dig through The Museum, The Message & The Movie to find it.
For those who don’t already know, while in New Orleans for Rising Tide 5 I had the opportunity to see Rob Thomas play Studio A at the IP Casino in Biloxi. It was a bit of a mad dash in the pouring rain, but in the able hands of @brenyb, we just made it. I’ll never know if the dependably punctual performers were just a tiny bit late starting as a response to our pleas via Twitter, but we’re so glad they were, as we were in our front row seats just in time to take a big, deep breath before the show started. We were disappointed that we couldn’t buy a beer as the venue shut down the bars 15 minutes before show time, which sucked, but I don’t care. It was still Rob and, playing with Matt Beck and Frankie Romano, he was still wonderful.
It was a tough decision because a lot of us work really hard for a long time to put on this conference, and debriefing with the organizers after the main event (a/k/a the after-party) is one of my favorite parts of the weekend, but this was a special acoustic concert, the last of a special acoustic tour to raise funds for the Sidewalk Angels Foundation that he runs with his wife, Mari, as well as a local charity at each stop along the way. Who knows if he’ll ever do a tour like this again? He’s never done it before, and I’d never get tickets like these again. I’m so glad we went. I only wish I videoed every song, just for me. I’ve hesitated to publish the ones I did capture. Rob doesn’t normally ask fans to take down his work they publish online, although he could, and I so would, but I hope it’s okay with him if I post this one that I shot with my iPhone 3GS (in my lap), of his singing 3 A.M. to an appreciative audience, singing it right back to him.
Now, as promised, here’s the set list for Rob Thomas, IP Casino, Biloxi, MS on Saturday, August 28, 2010:
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RTs
I had hoped to try and grab some lucidity as the last few days’ adrenaline subsides and I drift into a short stupor before I have to drive back to Atlanta and return to my day job, so I could put down in words at least some of the things that have happened, that were created and shared by and with these NOLA Bloggers, this fifth anniversary of Katrina’s landfall and of the infrastructure failure that occurred in her wake, but, nah. I’m afraid it might be too late for that. So, if you don’t mind I’ll ramble and link to some of the fine friends who are better bloggers than I am. It will be best for us all if y’all go and read what they wrote. If you’re looking for well-written, cohesive narrative, I fear you’re in the wrong place. Here’s my report from Rising Tide & Rob Thomas with a few ReTweets thrown in, my RTs.
Loki, who once again did a great job as Master of Ceremonies, has posted a Cinchcast of Mother Jones’ Mac McClelland’s keynote speech, including the Q&A that followed. While she’s been generally regarded as the hottest keynoter yet, I happen to think that depends on how you define hot, since she’s up against last year’s keynoter, Harry Shearer. (Stop it, I’m serious. He’s certainly hotter from my POV, but I digress.) Aside from being brilliant and beautiful, she rocked for being the first keynoter to come to the Friday night party, and she signed NOLADishu’s Halliburton Cementing Handbook. Shearer, however, gets his own special kudos for being the first keynoter to show up at the year after his keynote Rising Tide as an attendee, which also rocked, a lot. His documentary, The Big Uneasy, shows one night only nationwide on Monday, August 30th. If you miss it, look for it soon in DVD.
Veracity Stew has a good recap of Tim Ruppert’s presentation on the differences between levees and dams, in fact and in how they are considered, regulated and maintained by governments, whether federal or local. It turns out those differences are big and important and affect millions of Americans who don’t live anywhere near the Gulf of Mexico. The Big American Night has a long post that pays particular attention to the Public Safety and Environmental panel discussions. If you didn’t follow Liprap’s live blogging on the Rising Tide blog on Saturday, then scroll down to see her live posts. @Dakinikat did something cool, putting up a post early in the day and then letting the comments thread be the live-blogging. I don’t agree with everything she says, but it’s a nice record, and her comment after noting that our keynoter was dropping f-bombs and drinking a Bloody Mary, “She’s gone native,” was hilarious (h/t @skooks).
We had a great crowd, with folks coming in all day and very few leaving, until the very last panel, or because of the very last panel, which was Maitri’s Treme panel. Jeffrey gets the quote of the day as a questioner when he asked Eric Overmyer, Treme’s co-creator and executive producer, whether there was a danger of “curating to death” the culture that the show is trying to capture. Overmyer recognized that danger.
I’ll toss up the links to pictures and interesting reports, hopefully including video, as updates to this post as I find them, and promise another post covering the Katrina 5.0 Symposium at the Louisiana State Museum as well as Shearer’s movie, later. We had over 200 attendees at this year’s conference, plus probably a dozen or so more press comps and unregistered panelists (it was my job to count them and I’ll work on getting the final, final head count after I get this post up). The Howlin’ Wolf turned out to be an almost perfect venue and h/t to Howie for getting it done on game day. The Marriott Springhill Suites was perfect as a conference hotel. With quite a few organizers encamped and many out of town guests, including our keynote speaker, I heard not one single complaint. Somehow, miraculously, our non-attendee hotel neighbors didn’t even complain about us, or at least not that I know. Walking back and forth between the hotel and the Wolf it was impossible not to notice the front of the Convention Center less than two blocks away, and I couldn’t help but wonder what passed in those spaces five years ago.
The organizers kicked ass, many shouldering multiple responsibilities. I did my best to manage the registration process from afar but would like to thank the real organizers for an amazing job done well: Peter Athas, Patrick Armstrong, Jeffrey Bostick, Leigh Checkman, Alli deJong, Mark Folse, Mark Moseley, Lisa Palumbo, Tim Ruppert, Rob Steinmetz, Lance Vargas, George Williams, and especially, our Chair, without whom it would have been something completely different, Kimberly Marshall. I kind of miss the days of live-blogging Rising Tide, because manning the check-in table means I don’t get to pay full attention to the program, although this venue was better for doing both at the same time than any place we’ve previously held the conference. I end up doing more tweeting than blogging and trying my best to follow as we go along on Twitter by keeping one eye on the #rt5 tweet stream, of greatest value when used as a guide to longer content by clicking the links shared. There were lots of great tweets, but my favorite was from Lamar White of @CenLamar who tweeted to @RisingTide the day after the conference, “This year was a smash success. Rising Tide is quietly emerging as the State’s most relevant and insightful annual conference.” Also, check out his report of running into President Obama at Parkway Bakery on Sunday.
It was a hard decision for me to make, because debriefing with the organizers after the conference is one of my favorite parts of our traditions, but last April, when, on a whim, I tried to buy tickets for Rob Thomas’ acoustic concert in Biloxi on 8/28 for his Sidewalk Angels Foundation, the last of the summer tour, I hit the jackpot and came away from Ticketmaster with front row seats. I was fortunate enough to enlist @brenyb as my enthusiastic partner in crime, and we high-tailed it out of Rising Tide and to Biloxi in the pouring rain, without eating dinner or so much as having a beer, landing in our seats barely in time to catch our breath before they started. Playing with Matt Beck and Frankie Romano, he performed a mix of his solo material, Matchbox Twenty favorites, some covers and two Tabitha’s Secret songs, one of which I’d never heard, and really liked, Swing. Matt Beck did one excellent solo song that I have on video. My Flickr Pics are here, but I’m a little uncomfortable posting the videos I made. Unlike most artists, Rob doesn’t take down concert vids folks post online, but these are such high quality that I’m not sure it’s okay (or maybe I just want them all to myself?). It was a soft concert, relaxed, with everyone seated except at the very end, with the appreciative audience singing back to him all night. On our ride back to New Orleans (okay, after a stop for a late dinner at Waffle House), we talked about Rob’s way with words, and maybe I’ll come back and write a whole post on his remarkable ability to distill complex concepts into a very few cleverly turned words, and add a set list, but this line from MBT’s Hand Me Down, which he did not sing on Saturday, seemed to us to perfectly fit the day’s theme, nailing what passes for information right now in this country, what a corporate for-profit media teaches us: “gonna like the way they lie, better than the truth.”
Jeffrey pointed out a few things in a blog post on the Friday before Rising Tide that I think bear repeating. First, he points out this paragraph from the RisingTideNOLA.com home page:
We come together to dispel myths, promote facts, highlight progress and regress, discuss recovery ideas, and promote sound policies at all levels. We aim to be a “real life” demonstration of internet activism as we continue to recover from a massive failure of government on all levels.
Then he adds this:
I very much like that little block of text. It says an informed, engaged public can debunk and overcome damaging untruths which emerge either through general laziness or from powerful institutional malefactors. This is, in my opinion, the very best of what internet media offers us.
I hope people came away from this year’s Rising Tide both more informed and engaged. I know I did.
*** We already have an update. Crystal Kile’s video of Mac McClelland’s keynote is here.
**** Watching Treme has a comprehensive post up here with detailed coverage of the Treme panel.
***** Mark LaFlaur’s live blogging for Levees Not War. The conference is always better for having Mark around.
Eat, Pray, Gag
I’m sure Elizabeth Gilbert is a lovely woman, and that her book, Eat, Pray, Love and the hit film made from it are both full of great spiritual guidance, universal truths and enlightened insights beyond my imagining. I just cannot muster the desire to explore the wisdom of a woman who sought to heal from her terrible, terrible divorce by taking a year to travel the world, poor dear. While I’m pleased for her that she was able to turn healing her broken heart into a really great career, I’m much more interested in the women left to raise children alone or those who’re forced into the workplace for the first time in decades after being dumped for a younger model, or maybe the ones dealing with not ending a hopeless marriage because they can’t possibly afford the divorce, or they’re married to men who really can’t take care of themselves. I’d even listen to the stories of the average wives just muddling through or brave women holding their heads high while stuck in dead-end jobs they hate because they, well, need to avoid homelessness and keep or provide health insurance.
Maybe I’m being unfair, and I know that these less fortunate women with fewer, um, travel options aren’t nearly as, well, scenic. I also risk sounding bitter and cynical, although I really do feel happy and optimistic; I swear; pinky swear; double fuckin’ pinky swear. Seriously, I don’t mean to be mean. I might even really like her book or its movie. I just don’t have the stomach to find out. Please, forgive me.
Rising Tide 5
Rising Tide NOLA, Inc. will present its 5th annual new media conference on the recovery and future of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast on Saturday,
August 28, 2010 at The Howlin’ Wolf, 907 South Peters St. in New Orleans. The one-day conference features speakers and panel discussion on the status and future of the culture, politics, criminal justice system, environment and flood protection of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast.
Rising Tide NOLA, Inc.is a non-profit organization formed by New Orleans bloggers in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and the failure of the federally-built levees. After the disaster, the internet became a vital connection among dispersed New Orleanians, former New Orleanians, and friends of the city and of the Gulf Coast region. A surge of new blogs erupted and, combined with those that were already online, a community of bloggers with a shared interest in New Orleans and the Gulf Coast developed. In the summer of 2006, to mark the anniversary of the flood, the bloggers of New Orleans organized the first Rising Tide Conference, taking their shared interest in technology, the arts, the internet and social media and turning advocacy for the city into action. The idea for the conference originated with Scout Prime, then a blogger for First Draft and a tireless advocate for New Orleans. Her idea resonated with Mark Moseley, Oyster of Your Right Hand Thief, culminating in this post and the first Rising Tide Conference.
Conference registration is open and only $20 until July 31. Registration includes lunch, and there will be a pre-conference party hosted by the New Orleans bloggers on Friday evening August 27, also at the Howlin’ Wolf. More information is available at the Rising Tide website and blog. You can also follow Rising Tide on Twitter and become a fan on Facebook for regular updates.
This is always a great event. I look forward to seeing y’all there.
The Tide Rose
The Tide Rose in New Orleans last weekend, and I was still inspired by the NOLA Bloggers. The attendance was greater than previous years, the posters and t-shirts more beautiful, the keynote more riveting and the panels and parties, the participants and reparte, more wonderful than ever. Who thought that possible? The hard part about going to Rising Tide from out of town (and of insisting on driving) is that I don’t get much chance to blog about it because I’m busy driving home in the immediate aftermath. That’s also the worst thing about working the sign in table too. Live blogging is for those seated among the attendees (well, except perhaps for Liprap who maintained the RT Blog while also working the sign in and buy swag table with me *jealous raspberry at her mad skillz*), and Maitri killed it in this series of live posts. Killed it.
Harry Shearer’s Keynote was excellent, and much of its content ended up published as a blog post at HuffPo. He came early and caught most of the Culture Panel (my fav) and stayed for a long time shaking hands, posing for pictures, signing books, talking, listening. The lunch by Cafe Reconcile was amazing (thanks, David). If you don’t know what Cafe Reconcile’s about, then this is the one link in this post to click. In addition to their noble purpose and good works, Reconcile produces fabulous food. White Beans and Shrimp, Crawfish Pasta, Greens, Cornbread… oh, my! The afternoon was the Politics Panel & we closed with the Sports Panel, playing to the worn out but die hard crowd.
Coming home late Sunday and straight to work Monday was rough, but there’s no rest for these bloggers, and it’s taken just about all the focus I can muster while also working full time (and work’s been an intense dead run this week) to follow their creative bursts burning up the internet tubes with inspired and energetic plans for next year’s event. It will be bigger and better than ever before and I’ll be sharing specifics soon. We came away from Rising Tide pumped.
Harry Shearer: Comments at Rising Tide IV in New Orleans (22 Aug 2009) from Crystal Kile on Vimeo.
I came away from it all resolved to be a better blogger and with renewed devotion to New Orleans, more specifically, New Orleanians. I’m also increasingly convinced that self-censorship rooted in fear of what folks I know or work with or may one day know or work with will think if I speak my heart makes for bad blogging, the kind that’s gone on here for too long. As we approach the coming 4th anniversary of New Orleans’ flood that followed the landfall of Hurricane Katrina, the NOLA Blogosphere is full of eloquent posts about Rising Tide as well as the anniversary, but I’ll direct you to Scout Prime’s Farewell Post at First Draft:
I am just an American who felt strongly about the necessity of this country to right the wrong that had been done to the Gulf Coast and in particular New Orleans. I believed and still do believe that it is a moral imperative and that in not doing so we, as a country, as a community, risk losing our soul. I would submit that as a society we lost our moral compass when bodies were allowed to remain in the streets of N.O. for days and weeks, or in homes for months and even a year in some cases, as the powers that be argued over who would foot the bill to recover the remains of the victims of the flooding of New Orleans. There is something very wrong when such a thing can occur in a great nation.
Read her post. Watch her videos. Take a few moments to think, as this anniversary approaches, about how we can be a better country, how we can find our national soul. We’ve come a long way, but we still have far to go.
Peace, out, y’all.
Rising Tide IV
Rising Tide IV is coming Saturday, August 22, 2009. Harry Shearer is the Keynote Speaker and there are panels planned on New Orleans’ Culture, Health Care & Sports. There will be a cocktail meet and greet on Friday (details later) as well as a catered lunch. This is always a great event, characterized by lively interaction with incredibly interesting folks (and great food and plenty drink).