The Wimpiest Revolution with the Biggest Impact?

The anti-globalization revolution of 1999 snd 2000 seemed stillborn in its aftermath. After successfully shutting down some sessions of the World Trade Organization(WTO meeting in the Battle of Seattle in 1999, subsequent protests in Quebec and Genoa were curtailed by massive military style police crackdowns that kept protestors out of sight and earshot of delegates, and overrode freedom of speech. Police chiefs around the world were mindful of the fate of Seattle's police chief at the time, ignominy and dismissal. Then the September 11 attacks came and the press declared the anti-globalization movement dead in the wave of sympathy for the victims and the anti-revolutionary mood. Indeed subsequent anti-globalization efforts were pale and small. Even some progressive and leftist pundits declared the efforts of the young anti-globalists shallow and unsustainable .

But the Battle of Seattle coincided strangely with the end of the power, even the decline, of the era of ever more encompassing and powerful, international, neo-liberal trade agreements. No agreement was reached in Seattle, even though the the meetings eventually convened, and some blamed the protests and the lame duck Clinton's too peaceful response to them. Since then the General Agreement on Trade and Tariffs(GATT), WTO and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) have suffered repeated failures and losses of influence. though the failure of Multilateral Agreement on Investment (MAI) dubbed NAFTA on steroids by its nemesis Maude Barlow, who just recently was appointed as the UN's Senior advisor on water, actually faltered in 1998, its successful David character, Maude Barlow of the Council of canadians, was a major influence and intellectual supporter of the following year's anti-globalization movement. Poor Latin American and other countries saddled with huge debts, and forced to abandon social programs following IMF bailouts with strings attached, rebelled against further interventions in spite of their continued need. And now some declare the decline of global capitalism as we know it.

Was the massive international globalization structure fragile in some way. Was it near a tipping point in 1999?

The unprecedented, 10 million strong, global 2003 protests ahead of the Iraq war looked and felt like the anti-globalization protests. Again, the impact seemed minimal and even protestors were demoralized when their efforts did not stop the invasion. But would US and world public opinion have swung so massively against the war later if the predictions of trouble ahead implicit in the protests and the support and limelight it gave to the small minority of investigative reporters criticizing the reasons for the war and the war's conduct in the face of the huge US public relations propoganda machine, without the seemingly ineffectual protests.

One wonders if the ancient Romans poo pooed the impact of the early Barbarian sackings as the attackers withdrew.

US election thoughts

As an international observer, I wonder if the international viewer ratings for the US election will surpass the Oscars or the soccer World Cup or whatever the record is until now.

Robert F. Kennedy and Greg Palast

In 2004 on the morning of election day, Palast listed states and counts of votes which were already discounted or suppressed totalling in the millions. Fortunately he and Robert F Kennedy are proactive issuing a 7 page comic book (linked to below the article above) "stealing back your vote", so voters can actively secure their vote, and do more than shake their heads.

When major scary things are happening, many are in denial as in 2004. Democrats, in my view, seem to accept they have to win a cushion of 5-10% of votes to counter the suppression, rather than fight back vigorously and use the "c" word, conspiracy, which you can't use in polite company and get invited back to the cocktail party. They are fighting more vigorously this year, but the form of "the crunch", when and if it comes, is always different and surprising, and that is when we may see if Obama, unlike Gore and Kerry in 2000 and 2004, is a street fighter (or not). Someone should send him an emergency bullhorn. :>

Michael Moore, working for Dem legislature candidates in Michigan expressed some of this: in Friday on Democracy Now:

Michael Moores feeling:

http://www.democracynow.org/2008/10/31/academy_award_winning_filmmaker_michael_moore

MICHAEL MOORE: Right, yeah, I know. It seems that—it seems to feel like the Republicans aren’t going to have a very, very good time on Tuesday night. And she’s, of course, obviously, one of the extreme cases of why they’re in deep, deep trouble.

But I have no sense of optimism, as I sit here. You know, way too many times in the past, we’ve gotten far too giddy way too soon. And I am just not going to succumb to that feeling right now. I mean, I hope. I hope it all looks good on Tuesday, but for many reasons, there is a chance that McCain will win on Tuesday. And we have to operate with that attitude in mind, because—I mean, let’s face it. People on our side usually aren’t as driven to involve themselves in a political process that they view, somewhat cynically, as not having operated in the best interests of the people. And so, they’re not often as—often—not as much as the other side is motivated to go to the polls, whereas the other side, under, you know, strict orders from, they believe, the voice of God that’s in their head telling them that they must go to the polls and vote for these good people or remove the heathens that are in violation of whatever it is they’re listening to in their head. So, I’m telling you, I think that’s pretty powerful. They’ve been very successful at it. They’ve always been well funded. They’re very smart about it. They are committed. They are up at the crack of dawn, and they will be on Tuesday. Trust me. We have not lived under the Republicans for twenty of the last twenty-eight years by their side being a bunch of slackers. That’s not the case. So they will be out in full force. And I don’t think we need to wake up on Wednesday with that feeling that we all know too well, that—you know, “Woah, what happened? What happened?” I just—I think that’s happened one too many times.