Start A Revolution AKA It's Time to Stop Singing and Start Swinging

Okay so about a week ago the Millennial Mayors Congress, met with the civic leadership of my hometown Southfield, Michigan, in an attempt to discuss how to get more young people involved with local government. Literally being the youngest damn person in the room, or possibly a close second to Councilman Jeremy Moss depending on how you do the math (Rather than asking people's ages I try to get a rough idea based on when they graduated college. He graduated first but I think I took longer so it's wash.), I have some pretty strong feelings on the matter.

Social Justice

Okay this is one of the posts where my nice guy facade is going to have to take a backseat to the growing criticisms and slight depression I have about my life. So fuck me.

This issue is kind of personal for me. I feel like I not where I want to be at in life. Yeah a lot of that is my fault but almost nobody in my generation is where they want to be at in life. One of the not talked about most talked about social issues is the loss of lifetime wages due to the economic fall out. Even if my life were to be roses and sunshine tomorrow I seriously doubt when all is said and done I would be making as much money as say my parents did, neither in a starting position or over the course of my lifetime. And that is just the issue that most affects me personally.

What about the wars? When the Iraq War started me and most of my friends a lot of whom served were in high school yet it and the subsequent wars lasted well into our adulthood.

What about the literal rather than metaphorical justice system? One of my worst fears is getting hauled  in for something I didn't do and not being in an economic position where I can hire a good enough lawyer to adequately defend myself. And I'm barely even touching race.

Sometimes it just feels like we are adrift in social and economic issues much larger than ourselves, with very little chance to sway those tides.

Well in my head I go why is that? Because of failed economic policies that all got us here.... As well as the fact that it takes a while to gain the social, political and economic capital to really gain the sort of self determination that would allow my generation to make real changes that affect our lives.

... Like landing appointed positions in companies and political organizations that give you the clout to have your ideas taken seriously rather than just being the intern or worse the kid.

The best person to speak for you is you. Since we live in a representative rather than direct democracy I'll allow that not every election is going to allow for that. There is not always going to be someone running who I can say represents me or my views, but we really should be doing better than we are when it comes to the appointed positions. The stats they pulled out were a bit shocking though since I haven't fact checked them I won't repeat them.

Why Aren't Young People More Interested

Well being one of the few young people who are interested in government part of me wanted to deny that claim but objectively, we have a problem.


Get of Your Ass Brother

What happened to us man. Three years ago seemed like a revolution. Dictators were toppled, banks were getting worried. The rage had a voice. Bodies were in the street. And the heads of the powerful had to take notice.

The dissent  was done fermenting and was a fine fine wine to be toasted to a new age. What the hell happened man? It couldn't be sustained? I try to keep sane but I'm always at a rolling boil!

Il nous faut de l'audace, encore de l'audace, toujours de l'audace. Damn it!

Protest, vote, run for office, disrupt, fight damn it! We are lions when we want to be!

Inside Baseball

Schools do a decent job at giving people a general idea of how government works but there is a lot of inside baseball. How many people know the difference between a bill and a resolution, or can name a standing committee of the House, specifically one that handles an issue you care about.

And that's the national stuff. What happens with the stuff schools can't teach? Local government. Curriculum is more and more managed by state and county.  Do you really want Beverly Hills' schools spending a week on the ends and outs of Clawson's City Council? No. So the best you get is very generalized stuff and there is enough difference so that the only real thing you can tell anybody is visit the Clerk's office and go to meetings.

The Generation Gap
Honestly I'll say it. There is a generation gap. My ideal life looks pretty different from my parents and it's difficult to have a political discussion when each side has vastly different goals. My ideal house, job, transportation, city, state and country, all look pretty different than what my parents' looks like and going back to what I said before it's really easy to get discouraged about that when you feel like you have less and less skin in that game. Who's going to listen to the 26-year-olds who don't yet have houses to pay property tax on, or own companies they can say create jobs yet. He's just the cat in the back room.



I Don't Want to Be That

You know there are times when I think I could be good at politics, where I think I have a head for the game. But then I turn on Fox or MSNBC and realize how much I hate it. No hate isn't the word. Loathe. No that's not it. Despise in the absolute. Yeah that works. Despise in the absolute. In my mind the way it works is getting as many smart people in a room as you can, a lot of whom  probably will disagree with each other but at the end of the day respect each other and the process enough to hash it all out in a way that's never personal. Where you punch the idea but not the person because at the end of the day somebody voted for the other guy, giving them just as much a right to be heard as you.




Right here, right now is not that age. I doubt we'll ever have another national Presidential candidate who will say "My opponent is alright guy who I just so happen to disagree with about some pretty important stuff". 

This is the dialogue about a relatively well received video game.




Short aside. Mass Effect is on my list, right along with the Bioshock trilogy. I should probably grab it since it's only about $15 these days. Okay back to your regularly scheduled programming.

What happens when we have to talk about real issues; public education, tax reform, infrastructure investment, privacy, net neutrality, drones, drug policy, free trade agreements, foreign relations, human rights, income inequality, immigration reform, digital first amendment rights, monetary policy, energy and environmental policy, entitlement reform, urban policy, and the goddamned penny?



Sorry they think all you want to do bang bang bang and take their money so that won't get resolved this election cycle.

Are we all just going to go to our corners screaming at each other across networks while nothing actually gets done and act like we actually accomplished something? That might be the world I live in but I don't have to be that. Nope I'll just write what I can and let people take it or leave it.