The Free View-- weblog of a presidential candidate

The Extremely Active Activist

The casual reader might get the impression as of late that all I've been doing is surfing the news and ranting about it. Nothing could be further from the truth. Behind the scenes, I'm a regular busy beaver of activism. I've been meaning to post some update/summaries of what I'm doing on the ground here, but I know that I'll end up wanting to tell the stories fully, which would make each entry take a half-hour or so (and there's maybe 15 different stories).

For now, I'll post a quick list of the stuff I worked on in February. My next ten days are going to be hectic in terms of activism, and the next two weeks after that will be hectic in terms of work, so I can't say for sure when I'll be posting in-depth stories.

In February, I:

--Participated in a Nevada County Green Party meeting about the USA-PATRIOT Act and other threats to civil liberties (Feb 3)

--Hosted a planning meeting for the Nevada County Bill of Rights Defense Committee (Feb. 10th)

--Made a short presentation about the Nevada County Bill of Rights Defense Committee at the county Republican Central Committee's monthly meeting (Feb. 12th)

--Presented at an "Introduction to the NCLP" meeting hosted by a local restaurant owner (Feb. 13th)

--Attended the California Libertarian Party Convention (Feb 15th and 16th)

--Took part in a meeting between the President of Sierra Students for CHANGE and the Provost of Sierra College's Grass Valley campus (Feb. 20th)

--Attended an organizing meeting for the Sierra Students for CHANGE's "Books Not Bombs" student strike and all-day rally, which is happening this Wednesday March 5th (Feb. 25th)

--Helped edit the March newsletter of the Nevada County Libertarian Party, which comes out tomorrow

On top of that, I've been doing lots of work in putting together a special "Law Enforcement and The War on Terror in Nevada County" forum, which is coming up on March 11th. This is a major event that I'm putting together as a private citizen (i.e., not under the rubric of an organization).

Some of the parts of organizing this have been:

--Arranging a venue-- the Center for the Arts, which is hosting the event for free (we'll take donations for it).

--Contacting local media-- the local newspaper (The Union) will be covering it, and one of the local radio stations (KVMR) will be broadcasting it live! This means it will also be broadcast live on the Internet. :-)

--Making contact with the following law enforcement agencies: California Dept. of Homeland Security, California Highway Patrol, the F.B.I. Sacramento Division, the Nevada County Sheriff's Office, the Grass Valley Police Dept., the Nevada City Police Dept., and the Truckee Police Dept.. This has gone really well so far -- the F.B.I. is sending the Special Agent In Charge of the Sacramento Division, which covers 34 counties in northern California; the County Sheriff is coming; and the Lieutenant Commander of the local CHP office is coming. I expect most of the rest of the agencies to confirm early this week. There will also be an attorney from the National Lawyer's Guild and/or the ACLU. Additionally, our County Librarian will be on the panel.

--Finding a moderator/facilitator. I made a major score here-- the editor of the local paper The Union is going to be the moderator. Not only is it great to have a major local figure as moderator, but I expect this will get the event put the event of the front of the plate in The Union's newsroom. :-)

This promises to be sort of a landmark event in our county, and I'm really excited at how well it's coming together.

There's more little details of what I've been doing, but that's a pretty good outline. So far, I have two events coming up in each of the next two weeks: tomorrow (later today) is a Green Party showing of the Bill Moyers NOW segment on the "Patriot Act II"; Wednesday is the Books not Bombs rally, at which I'll be staffing tables for the NCLP and the NCBORDC (as well as helping out Darlene, the organizer/MC); next Monday is our NCLP showing of "Hidden Wars of Desert Storm", and next Tuedsay is the law enforcement forum I mentioned above.

Phew! It feels good to get all that out! I'll try to give some more background when I find the time.