I Want a Seat On the Bus

A great American Hero, Rosa Parks, has died. When she was 42 she performed an act of informed defiance and nonviolent protest. Despite laws requiring that blacks give up their bus seats to whites, she refused to surrender her seat and was arrested, jailed and fined. Parks said of her action, “I felt I had a right to be treated as any other passenger. We had endured that kind of treatment for too long.”

Parks didn’t know that her solitary act would add momentum to a movement that would result in the 1964 federal Civil Rights Act, which made racial discrimination in public facilities illegal. She didn’t know that she would one day be heralded as the “mother of the civil rights movement.” Rosa said looking back, “At the time I was arrested I had no idea it would turn into this. It was just a day like any other day. The only thing that made it significant was that the masses of the people joined in.”

America is experiencing a similar environment of discrimination and exclusion today. Millions of Americans want a seat on the bus of democracy, but we are told that we have to give up our seats to rich individuals and corporations that have claimed our democracy and our representatives as their own. The rich and the powerful have everything on their side. They control the media. They write the laws. They flood the courts with their representatives. They choose the Tweedle-Dee and Tweedle-Dumb candidates that we are expected to give our rubber stamp of approval to. And we are supposed to ignore the fact that these “candidates” either are already millionaires or quickly become millionaires by playing along when they get to Washington. Republican or Democrat doesn’t matter any longer, they are all on the payroll of these large corporations.

The capitalist elites and their corporate entities sneer when simple people like Cindy Sheehan demand their seat on the bus of democracy. After all, what can a simple citizen do against such a juggernaut of power? But Rosa Parks was just a simple woman. Martin Luther King Jr. was just a simple man. The Civil Rights Movement was made up of millions of simple citizens who resolutely resisted the tyranny of the power elite and demanded their seats on the bus of democracy.

We can do the same. The promise of democracy is a government of the people, for the people, and by the people. What we have now is a government of the rich, for the rich, and by the rich. We must resist this tyranny. We must demand our seat on the Bus of Democracy. We the People must reclaim our government.

Wednesday, November the 2nd, 2005 is the one-year anniversary of the reelection of George W. Bush, the self proclaimed CEO President who has used lies to send our sons and daughters to invade a country that was no threat to the security of America so that his constituency, the capitalist elite and the corporations, could make billions of dollars while bankrupting the U.S. Treasury and handing the tax bill to future generations of tax payers. Bush, the self proclaimed compassionate conservative, orders the dropping of cluster bombs on residential neighborhoods and says that torture is a justifiable treatment of prisoners.

Wednesday, November 2nd, 2005 can be the beginning of the new civil rights movement. Even a simple action can add momentum to a movement. Do not go to school or work next Wednesday. Do not bank or shop. Do not buy gasoline. Do not watch mainstream media. 66% of Americans say they do not approve of the Bush Administration’s war in Iraq. Imagine the message it would send if 66% of Americans did not go to Wal-Mart or report for work. Resist this government of the elite and demand a government of the People and for the People.

Demand your seat on the Bus of Democracy, everyday.
We are just people, but that is what democracy is all about, people.
People like you and me.

http://www.worldcantwait.org/
http://wcwhookup.blogspot.com/2005/10/letter-to-friend-about-nov-2nd.html