Resist the Mayors
author: The Madison Insurgent
 e-mail: resist_the_mayors@yahoo.com
Resist this yucky corporate party in Madison WI. This is a huge deal in Madiosn WI, and we need the support of as many conscientious citizens from throughout the nation as can come. Please consider making the trek. To find out more info go to  http://resist-the-mayors.org or to find out what the buzz in Madison is like go to http://madison.indymedia.org and click on the mayors features link on the upper left hand side.
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Come down to Madison WI mid-june to celebrate a weekend of resistance. At least come for the weekend. Several local groups are planning events, including major demonstrations, a critical mass, and a counter-conference held at our local labor temple. It should be lots of fun, and it would be great for activists from throughout the nation to join together in solidarity. This is reprinted from a local lefty rag in Madison called the Madison Insurgent. Also check out http://madison.indymedia,org for up to date info on the Mayors Conference or
http://madison.indymedia.org/mayors for features about the conference.
Yar matey! Come hither to Ye Olde Towne of Madison to resist those land-grubbing sap-suckers, the U.S.Conference of Mayors on June 13-18.
This summer, the U.S. Conference of Mayors (USCM) will descend upon Madison. THe conference will allow business leaders and U.S. mayors to set the agenda of our nation's cities during an array of high-priced meals and social events closed to the public, but open to corporations. Having been araound for 70 years, the USCM has long played a crucial role in setting a corporate-biased agenda for over 3,000 U.S. cities and has a number of tools available for doing just that.
One such tool is the Mayor's Business Council, a branch of the USCM that allows major corporations to directly influence mayors on key economic issues through a series of meetings and interactions. With a membership fee of $10,000 keeping all but the wealthiest out, the Business Council is one of the least democratic component of the USCM.
Which corporate juggernauts have paid the $10,000 to manipulate local government to serve themselves at this year's conference? The list includes Madison Gas and Electric, Phillip Morris, Daimler Chrysler, Sodexho Marriott, Arthur Andersen, 3COM, Citigroups,DuPont, Ford,Waste Management Inc., Home Depot, Coca Cola, among others (for a full list see http://www.resist-the-mayors.org/buscouncil.html).
These companies are allowed to buy access to local government officials, while the people affected by the policies crafted at theconference are kept out. In fact, according to the council's own website, "Through the creation of the Mayors Business Council, we have transformed our organization to bring corporate America even closer to the mayors of our nation."
With this type of warped agenda-setting institution in place, is it any wonder the myriad problems that exist in our cities? Does the National Association of Realtors care about the severe lack of affordable housing in our cities? Does Sodexho Marriott, the leading investor in the world's largest private prison company, care about the rampant prison industrial complex that is putting millions of poor people of color in jail for minor, non-violent crimes? Is DuPont, the single largest corporate polluter in the United States, at all concerned with urban environmental problems? Is Philip Morris, owner of the notorious genetically modified organism (GMO) user Kraft Foods, concerned about the potentially unsafe use of GMOs in school food programs? We could do this for every member of the Business COuncil, but you get the point.
Along with the conference, a number of social events are planned for the mayors' weekend in Madison. These high-powered events serve as an opportunity for businesses and other private interests to directly interact with the mayors they want to lobby. Business leaders and mayors will go to parties together, go golfing together, hang out at the Union Terrace, and more, all weekend long, so they can develop a sound friendship and basis for future work together. Naturally, these events are closed to the public and only top corporate sponsors can attend, based on their monetary contributions.
While the USCM features a Business Council to bring corporations "even closer" to our mayors, is there a People's Council to do the same for us? Not surprisingly, there isn't. The mayors haven't even opened their corporate/government parties and socail events to the public and press to allow transparency (let alone the actual agenda setting meeting). These types of imbalances and secret gatherings, favoring the powerful monied elites, underscore the undemocratic nature of the USCM.
So, the question becomes, "What are we going to do about it?" Well, a radical response/resistance tot he USCM is already in the works. The Creative People's Resistance (CPR) is a group that has formed specifically to create a radical resistance to the USCM. CPR is making a regional and national call to action for people to converge on Madison from June 13 to 18. Tentative actions include a Critical Mass with bikes and family farm tractors, "pirate golfing," street theatre, a tent encampment, Reclaim the Streets, and a pirate flotilla. It will be a weekend of fun and exciting resistance to the continued efforts by corporationt to control our lives.
The goal of CPR's mobilization is twofold. First, it is part of a larger struggle against the oppressive internal forces of the United States that seek
to brutalize and subjugate people, communities, and the environment. The second is to focus energies toward local issues and radicalize the Midwest to fight corporate control of our lives in our communites, as part of the broader global justice movement. The Midwest needs something to spark a growth in radical activism and CPR is working to provide that spark.
For more information of CPR and the USCM, go to: www.resist-the-mayors.org or www.madison2002.org
If you're interested in helping out, email  resist_the_mayors@yahoo.com or info@resist-the-mayors.org
www.resist-the-mayors.org
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homepage: http://www.resist-the-mayors.org
address: Madison, WI
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"I sincerely believe... that banking establishments
are more dangerous than standing armies, and that the
principle of spending money to be paid by posterity,
under the name of funding, is but swindling futurity
on a large scale."
- Thomas Jefferson
The function of the Time-Energy Accounting (TEA)
system, 100% backed by HUMAN TIME and RENEWABLE
ENERGY, is to:
1. Administer a lawful citizens' currency.
2. Strengthen the liberties and responsibilities of
individual citizens and local communities.
3. Minimize the centralization of power.
4. Balance competition and cooperation in the
marketplace.
5. Minimize public and private bureaucracy.
6. Maximize efficient and equitable utilization of
natural resources.
7. Eliminate the need for personal income tax.
8. Minimize the need for any taxation.
9. Minimize corporate-government racketeering.
10. Stabilize the money supply and price level.
11. Restore full-reserve banking.
12. Remove the primary cause of economic inflation,
deflation, recessions, depressions, warfare and waste
of resources.
13. Enhance life, liberty, tranquility and democracy
for all.
*************
SIMPLICITY IS THE ULTIMATE SOPHISTICATION.
The Time-Energy Accounting (TEA) network issues:
1. Citizens dividends backed by human lifetime ($1 =
one hour = $730 per month) plus
2. Energy dividends backed by harvested renewable
energy ($1 = one kilowatt-hour).
Who can reasonably deny that our lifetime is our most
valuable asset?
Who can reasonably deny that benign renewable energy
is the foundation of a sustainable civilization?
Renewable energy investments produce real dividends in
the universal metric of kilowatt-hours (kWh) measured
by ordinary energy meters.
Human lifetime is itself a natural dividend in the
universal metric of hours measured by ordinary clocks
(unless you endorse slavery).
Producers of renewable energy are free to sell their
energy on a fair marketplace at competitive prices
(ie: below $0.10/kWh) to consumers.
Because the harvesting of renewable energy is rewarded
with TEA dollars, savings/investments are channeled to
productive and sustainable infrastructure rather than
paper money, precious metals, weapons, oil, uranium or
other "barren" (non-renewable) commodities.
TEA dollars are valid for four (4) years from the
month of issuance, then "self-redeem" or
"self-extinguish" like expiring coupons. This stable
monthly demurrage (deflation) rate of approximately
two percent (2.083%) encourages participants to invest
in productive infrastructure. The sooner participants
circulate or invest TEA dollars, the more value their
dollars have, since TEA dollars represent time-energy
value for only four years.
Participants are issued citizens dividends once they
are age sixteen (16) or over so that parents will not
be encouraged to over-populate for money. Citizens may
vote in treasury elections once they are sixteen or
over.
Nuclear power, new large-scale hydropower and
open-loop geothermal power are not benign, sustainable
or cost-effective. Windpower, solar-thermal,
solar-electric, organic biofuels, closed-loop
geothermal and micro-hydropower are sustainable and
cost-effective.
Among other things, renewable energy can desalinate
our oceans to produce abundant fresh water and
eliminating another cause of warfare and environmental
decay.
The issuing of TEA dollars is performed by elected
local treasurers and their staff. Confederated /
cooperative local treasuries co-audit each other on a
randomly selected basis every three months
(quarterly).
TEA dollars are lawful and negotiable currency. TEA
dollars are not so-called "legal tender" concocted by
"our" corporate government(s).
TEA dollars - paper or electronic - bear the following
information:
1. Time-energy value represented.
2. Serial number.
3. Month and year of issue.
4. Month and year of expiration.
5. County or municipality where issued.
6. State where issued.
7. Signature of the local treasurer.
TEA Certificates are inherently more valuable and more
difficult to counterfeit than Federal Reserve Notes,
European Central Bank Euros and other unbacked fiat
currencies. TEA Certificates are redesigned every four
years and bear both universal and local design
elements.
ENERGY = WEALTH. WHAT'S YOUR SHARE?
Energy is the most essential commodity for the
functioning of civilization. All of our lives depend
on energy. All forms of energy on Earth are derived
from the Sun.
Renewable energy (eg: micro-hydropower, organic
biofuels, solar-electric, solar-thermal, windpower) is
abundant and decentralized energy available from the
Sun's present energy flow.
Non-renewable energy (eg: fossil fuels, uranium) is
scarce and concentrated energy stored from the Sun's
past energy flow.
In less than one week, the Earth receives more solar
energy than all fossil-fuel and uranium reserves
combined.
Energy dollars - backed by benign renewable energy -
represent the most valuable commodity civilization
requires to survive and prosper.
Valuing one dollar ($1) per kilowatt-hour (kWh) of
harvested renewable energy provides the foundation for
a prosperous, peaceful, efficient and sustainable
economy.
LOCAL TREASURIES & DISTRICT REPRESENTATIVES
The TEA system's local treasuries maintain records of
their resident population and the renewable energy
harvesting within their locality and issue currency
proportionately.
To ensure that all the TEA system's local branches are
maintaining accurate records, all treasuries are
co-audited by other treasuries every quarter.
To ensure no conflict of interests are established
among local treasuries, the quarterly audits are
performed by the treasuries of other localities
selected each quarter on a random basis by elected
representatives.
The random selection of rotating local treasury
auditors is conducted by manually counted paper
ballots by the elected state, district, provincial and
territorial representatives.
State, district, provincial and territorial
representatives also assist local treasuries in
maintaining accurate and uniform records, and
maintaining consistent universal design elements of
TEA Certificates.
Local treasurers and district representatives are
elected every four years by manually counted paper
ballot.
No electronic or mechanical vote tabulation is
permitted. No bribery is permitted either.
Counterfeiting of TEA dollars - paper or electronic -
is enforced by local treasuries in coordination with
all state, district, provincial and territorial
representatives and law-enforcement officers.
Indicted counterfeiters are tried by jurors in courts
selected by the elected representatives.
The sentence of a first-time convicted counterfeiter
is the ten-year suspension of all such convict's
citizens dividends and energy dividends.
The sentence of a second-time convicted counterfeiter
is the lifelong suspension of all such convict's
citizens dividends and energy dividends.
The sentence of a third-time convicted counterfeiter
is the lifelong exile to an uninhabited iceberg in the
Arctic Zone.
"Those who govern, having much business on their
hands, do not generally like to take the trouble of
considering and carrying into execution new projects.
The best public measures are therefore seldom adopted
from previous wisdom, but forced by the occasion."
- Ben Franklin
TIME + ENERGY = WEALTH. WHAT'S YOUR SHARE?
*************