Newsgroups: comp.org.eff.talk
Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!casbah.acns.nwu.edu!nucsrl!ptownson
From: ptownson@eecs.nwu.edu (Patrick A. Townson)
Subject: Re: Amendments
Message-ID: <1991May5.021202.19465@eecs.nwu.edu>
Organization: EECS Department, Northwestern University
References: <1991Apr28.225438.16387@milton.u.washington.edu> <1991Apr29.234221.15210@chinet.chi.il.us> <1991May03.144614.13531@ddsw1.MCS.COM>
Date: Sun, 5 May 1991 02:12:02 GMT


In article <1991May03.144614.13531@ddsw1.MCS.COM> learn@ddsw1.MCS.COM
(William Vajk) writes:

> In idle anti-establishment supports, feeds, and nurtures the establishment
> through silence.

If anything is 'nurturing the establishment' I sure don't know what it
is. Everywhere I look the establishment is falling apart at the seams.
A totally rotted-out infrastructure; the highest rate of violent crime
we have ever experienced, etc ... where is the nurturing being done?

> By default, all non-votes are counted as votes for the status quo.

This is not so, at least not any longer. If if were, the newspaper
headlines the day after the election would have read "record high
number of citizens contented with the status-quo". Instead the papers
talked about the record-low turnout. There was only one thing wrong.
They thought it was apathy ... but I suggest a large part of it was
not apathy at all, but rather a refusal to go along.

> It was pointed out to me a number of years ago that folks have the right
> to not care about politics and the political process. But at the same
> time, folks who don't participate don't have carry much validity with
> me when it comes time to complain.

You'll have to pardon me, but who are YOU that I should be concerned
with validating what I say or think? Are you a government authority of
some sort? Can you make things change?  If so, tell me how to go about
validating my complaints before you ... otherwise, I won't bother.

> The political process in this country isn't limited to election times
> even for the 'average citizen' (whatever that means.) Every time each 
> of us remains inactive when we KNOW we should participate, we have once
> more failed to have our vote counted. And in this I include all those times
> folks don't make a phone call to the mayor's office, 

Isn't this precious!  You mean a call to 312-744-5000, the Office of
the Mayor of the City of Chicago, where one gets to speak with a
handful of admittedly highly-placed flunkies authorized to respond in
the name of the Mayor? They (sometimes) listen politely for a minute
or two, then hurry along to take other calls backed up waiting. Their
main purpose is to act as a buffer for the calls coming in. They don't
really do anything; they rarely make notes on the things people call
to tell them on the phone.

Or were you referring to 312-744-4000, the main switchboard number for
the City of Chicago / City Hall / County Building? If you call there,
the operators often times refuse to connect you with the person or
department you requested; deciding instead to bounce you over to the
744-5000 number where someone listens to you, attempts to placate and
humor you, then later ignores you.

Lucky me: I have a copy of the internal phone directory for City Hall
which I picked up on a visit there a few weeks ago. Yes, I go there
frequently, to use the municipal reference library among other things.
I had to threaten suit to be allowed to use that facility. Their first
question used to be when you walked in the door was 'are you employed
by the city or the county; if not, are you an attorney?'  If not in
one of those three categories, then you could not use the facility.
Once I could point out to them in the municipal ordinances where the
municipal reference library had been established and was open for use
by the PUBLIC they decided to let me in. Now when  I go in I get a
look of pure hatred from the woman there; that suits me fine, I give
her the same. So on one visit I copied the entire City Hall phone
directory on the copy machine. 

I pretty much limit my calls to emergency matters with various
departments. I call direct to the supervisor involved when I encounter
certain problems in my daily walks around our fair city: open hydrant,
pouring a thousand gallons of water an hour out into the street;
street/sewer cave-ins, so they can at least set up a barricade if they
don't intend to fix it right away; stop and go lights out of order
affecting traffic through the intersection; and dead animal removal.
("What kind of animal is it, sir?" "It *appears* to be a squirrel.")
When I witness a traffic accident of a serious nature in which one or
more ambulances may be required, I use my handy-dandy Radio Shack
handheld cellular phone to call the Fire Department paramedics on
their direct number ... never through 911, or goddess forbid, the city
hall switchboard number.

> or to their
> representative at whatever level of government happens to demand our 
> attention at the moment. 

har har har...  

> I include all those times each one didn't send a
> letter to the editor of your fave-rave publication in response to some issue
> they just wrote about. The political process is broad based enough that all
> the opinion forming/gathering media are included. Usenet has not yet achieved
> such status, though based on the increasing recognition in the mainstream
> media (see NOVA, _ConFusion In A Jar_) we are going to rapidly achieve that
> importance.

I frequently write to publications of my choice and as often as not my
essays are printed. I do not write 'letters to the editor'. I do send
longer essay items in from time to time. Usually I write to the Lerner
newspaper chain here in our neighborhood; also to the Sun-Times and
occassionally to the Tribune. In the late sixties and early seventies,
the Christian Science Monitor used to pay me for my articles, which
they used on the Home Forum page a lot. They never paid me *much*, but
it always kept me in beer and cigarette money. 

For a few years, I pretty much limited myself to talk-radio. The
former host at KOA in Denver would always call me when certain 'key
topics' were going to be discussed. As you may know, KOA is a
powerhouse station; it comes in like gangbusters clear over here in
Chicago most nights. And Larry King calls me now and then for the same
reason: to stir up hate and discontent on the air when he knows I can
do the job right. So I guess I make my voice heard, and express my
displeasure from time to time -- I just don't play in the
establishment game called 'First Tuesday after the First Monday in
November'.  In fact, I make a point of calling several talk-shows the
night before the election to encourage people to not vote the next
day. 

> If I sent a copy of your article to Washington, do you think the government
> is going to send out a team to beg you for your opinions ?

> Hardly.

So what else is old?  Do you think they plan to have a team of
interviewers at *your* door anytime soon?  The government seldom
responds to the public until/unless there is so much hell-raising they
have no choice in the matter; i.e. the jails won't hold everyone. Of
course, we are getting to that point again.

> Seems they only concern themselves with two classes of folks. The
> ones who can and will do something about matters of concern to them,
> and those who through disability are unable to. The rest ? Seems they
> actively disenfranchise themselves. 

Voting in an election is *hardly* the way to 'do something about
matters of concern' ... as stated earlier, the people who concern me
are effectively insulated, either behind bullet proof glass or in the
inner sanctums of the city hall. 

And to be disenfranchised by the government in this country is nothing
to worry about.  By ignoring them as much as possible, they ignore me.
After all, if you don't register to vote (a privilege, we are told)
then you don't have to worry about having your name on the jury-duty
roster either. Since your vote doesn't matter, and depending on the
judge your opinion as a juror doesn't either, I save lots of time and
energy both ways.

> After all, the politician's > aim is to please, no ? :-) 

No, the politician's aim is to fill up as much as possible at the pork
barrel, getting as wealthy as possible before the voters put him out
to pasture.  I mean really -- is an alderperson in the city of Chicago
worth forty or fifty thousand dollars a year?  I work 40 + hours per
week for honest employers. My feet and my eyes hurt when I come home.
I still sit down and write essays for the papers and I still call up
talk shows. I still do my volunteer work for the Chicago Public
Library, where I have labored weekly reading to people who are unable
to read for themselves for uh, eleven years now. I still produce my
thrice-weekly half-hour radio program on Chicago history for the
closed circuit radio service (Chicagoland Radio Information Service;
i.e. CRIS) the library operates for visually handicapped people.

My total income annually is about half what an alderman gets for
slovering at the pork barrel for a couple hours every other week. 

Ah yes, but I should go and vote also -- do a little slovering myself
for the Demopublicans of my choice, right?

If its all the same to you, I'll just wait, and try to wait patiently,
while the rest of the infrastructure falls apart here; until the publc
schools finally close for good and crime has overtaken our city to the
point that war exists in the streets (it almost is that way now on the
west side, you know). 

Until that point, if someone wants to know why I don't vote in the
elections I'll just point out it makes better sense to let a judge
somewhere decide what to do. Once things really quit running totally
and they want my help or the help of others like me who do give a damn
but refuse to be treated like ignoramuses in need of good humor, I'll
know about it and start pitching in.