Zinn: spend your time on Direct Action, not Oba-Clin-cain

Howard Zinn makes a lengthy statement about why we should be more concerened with foreclosures than Hillary’s clothes, Barack’s childhood travels.

Historically, government, whether in the hands of Republicans or Democrats, conservatives or liberals, has failed its responsibilities, until forced to by direct action: sit-ins and Freedom Rides for the rights of black people, strikes and boycotts for the rights of workers, mutinies and desertions of soldiers in order to stop a war. Voting is easy and marginally useful, but it is a poor substitute for democracy, which requires direct action by concerned citizens [emphasis added]

Critical support of Obama, says Bill Fletcher

My attention is not only at the top of the ticket/ballot, and will be getting back to local and state campaigns, candidates, issues and possibilities soon enough. Yet, this perspective from BC Editor in Chief Bill Fletcher may well hit the nail on the head:

My conclusion, and I offer this with great caution, is that critical support for Obama is the correct approach to take. Yet this really does mean critical support. It means, among other things, that Senator Obama needs to be challenged on his views regarding the Middle East; he must be pushed beyond his relatively pale position on Cuba to denounce the blockade; he must be pushed to advance a genuinely progressive view on the rebuilding of the Gulf Coast and the right of return for the Katrina evacuees; and he must be pushed to support single payer healthcare.

As I emphasized in an earlier commentary, it is up to the grassroots to keep the candidates honest. Silence, in the name of unity, is a recipe for betrayal.