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KENNY BRUNO & DEFCON FOR DEMOCRACY

 

The Grassroots Emergency Election Protection Coalition zoom #75 headlines the great long-time activist KENNY BRUNO in a devastating 90-minute discussion of what we need to do to save our democracy.

 

We start with a brief report from HEDY TRIPP in Minnesota who organized our GREEP #74 call with KEITH ELLISON, the state’s Attorney-General.

 

Kenny’s bio includes important work with Greenpeace USA, Pipeline Fighters Hub, the Ruckus Society, EarthRights International and more.  He is co-author with Beth Handman and their daughter Antonia Bruno of a number of very cool children’s books.

 

Kenny’s current article “Trump Has Already Laid the Groundwork to Subvert the 2024 Election” appears at Truthout (https://truthout.org/articles/trump-has-already-laid-the-groundwork-to-subvert-the-2024-election/) with an overview of what we face to preserve what’s left of our democracy and protect ourselves from a devastating dictatorship.

 

Kenny is joined on the zoom by co-convenor JOEL SEGAL, radio host LYNN FEINERMAN, legendary organizers RAY MCCLENDON, JULIE LEVINE, RAY LUTZ, JULIE WEINER and MYLA RESON,Green Party Presidential candidate HOWIE HAWKINS, indigenous activist TATANKA BRICCA, LCV Founder MARION EADY and many more.

 

This is a truly unique and moving meeting.  JOIN US!

MINNESOTA ATTORNEY-GENERAL KEITH ELLISON ON SAVING OUR DEMOCRACY

 

 

Our 74th GRASSROOTS EMERGENCY ELECTION PROTECTION COALITION Zoom features the great KEITH ELLISON, Attorney-General of Minnesota in a riveting All-Star gathering that gets to the core of to save our democracy under fire.

 

Keith was the lead prosecutor in the GEORGE FLOYD case and has been at the heart of the Black Lives Matter movement and much much more.

 

He is a brilliant, personable, deeply dedicated grassroots politician who helped found the Congressional Progressive Caucus.  Today he works to preserve the right of our citizens to safely cast ballots and have them reliably counted (what a concept!).

 

Keith is joined by ANDREA MILLER of the Center for Common Ground, whose work in Georgia and elsewhere on voting centers and computerized mass mobilization has been pathbreaking and essential.and getting ever moreso…

 

RAY MCCLENDON of the Atlanta NAACP tells us how the GEORGIA WAY of grassroots organizing is key to fighting off the fascist right-wing assault bearing down on our nation.

 

HEDY TRIPP of St. Cloud, ALAN MINSKY of the PDA, JOHN BRAKEY of Audit USA, JAMES FUKUDA of LULAC, Indigenous organizer TATANKA BRICCA, voting rights pioneer LORI GRACE, REV. RODNEY SADLER, journalism ART LEVINE, GREEP’s great JOEL SEGAL and many more join in with AG Ellison to make this a truly critical gathering.

 

Don’t miss it!!!

A GRASSROOTS MOVEMENT TO WIN THE VOTING RIGHTS ACTS & STOP FASCISM

 

We’re joined at session #73 of the Grassroots Emergency Election Protection zooms by ANDREA MILLER of the Center for Common Ground and RAY MCCLENDON of the Atlanta NAACP.

 

We face a crisis in the rise of fascism that can only be defeated with the restoration of voting rights and the defeat of Gerrymandering, facilitated by two major bills now before Congress.

 

Long-term victory demands establishing DEMOCRACY CENTERS and meaningful, sustainable pro-democracy campaigns wherever possible.

 

That means moving the millions of donor dollars that are wasted on TV ads into on-the-ground organizing that can restore our democracy.

 

Thus the slogan NO MORE TERRY MCAULIFFEs as a reminder that boring, mid-road campaigners clog the arteries needed to deliver real public input.  

 

As JOEL SEGAL makes clear, these voting rights bills MUST be made law either by passing Congress, which will require defeating the filibuster, or by Executive Order.

 

JAN BEN DOR joins us from Michigan to describe the grassroots efforts there to win back voting rights through a Constitutional Amendment proposed via referendum.

 

And HEDY TRIPP sets the stage for January 29th’s special session with KEITH ELLISON, Attorney-General of Minnesota and a power in the Democratic National Committee.

 

With our Republic and way of life under intense fascistic attack, these sessions are absolutely essential.  JOIN US!!!

‘’I WILL NOT KILL”; OUR VITAL VOTER RIGHTS BILL; SAVING THE EARTH

 

Our 72d Grassroots Emergency Election Protection zoom begins with FRANCESCO DA VINCI whose “I Will Not Kill” is an account of a lifetime of peace activism and of his resistance to the draft during the Vietnam War.  

 

He features photos of Jack and Robert Kennedy, Muhammed Ali, Dr. King and many more notables in his remarkable exposition on the need to stop military violence.

 

JOEL SEGAL then plunges us into the deep intrigues surrounding the John Lewis Voting Act and the desperate need to protect what’s left of our electoral system.

 

Evaluating such steps as an Executive Order, filibuster cut-out, reconciliation bill and more, Joel issues a call to action for a national, unified campaign to win this campaign and protect our elections.

 

Nothing could be more vital.

 

Except…the global environment.  Solar industry expert RON LEONARD fills us in on the latest from the COP meeting in Europe, and on the embattled solar panel industry that holds the key to human survival.

 

We note that President Biden is actually meeting with Chinese leader Xi.

 

Finally we hear from Orlando, Florida, where CHUCK O’NEAL gives us an astounding tour of his pathbreaking work on winning legal rights for our Planet Earth.

 

This must-hear exposition could re-define our ability to save our only home.  Don’t Miss It!!!

In the Grassroots Emergency Election Protection Zoom #70, with up to 80 people present, we’re led by the great JOEL SEGAL as we confront what’s happening with the premier voter protection Acts of our time. 

Without federal legislation to guarantee the ability of our citizens to cast ballots and have them reliably counted, the future of our democracy is in the tank. 

But the possibility that a single Republican—Lisa Murkowski of Alaska—might join the Democrats gives our fragile democracy a glimmer of light. 

We also visit the fearsome Kyle Rittenhouse murder trial (he’s the kid who killed two demonstrators in Kenosha, Wisconsin) the soon-to-be catastrophic Virginia governor’s race, the “Georgia Way” project and much more.

Then we dive deep down into the issue of recounts and audits.  With Trump calling “stolen” every election he loses, the certainty is that all future elections will be recounted and audited.

With RAY LUTZ, ERIC LAZARUS, SUSAN PYNCHON and many more, we delve to the core of how our future electoral contests will be certified and/or denied.

The need for uniform federal standards and enforcement could not be greater.   We will be dealing with critical issue for years to come. 

DISSECTING THE “GEORGIA WAY” FOR FUTURE GRASSROOTS ORGANIZING

Grassroots Emergency Election Protection Zoom #69

First we’re filled in by CYNTHIA PAPERMASTER of Code Pink on the efforts to free JULIAN ASSANGE from his unjust captivity and torture in the UK.

Then we hear for the bulk of the zoom from the great RAY MCCLENDON on how grassroots organizing in Georgia helped put Joe Biden in the White House and, truly miraculously, send a black and a Jewish Senator to the US Capitol.

Those two Senators gave the Democrats a 50-50 split in the Upper House and put the decisive vote in the hands of Vice President Katherine Harris, changing everything.

But how it was done also changed everything, as we hear from the Political Director of the Atlanta NAACP, who helped coordinate one of the most successful grassroots campaigns in US history.

This “Georgia Way” is now the subject of a major upcoming book and documentary film that will serve as a national paradigm for confronting the Trump-Bannon fascist assault on our democracy.

We also discuss with STEVE ROSENFELD, RAY LUTZ, JOHN BRAKEY and others the preliminary realities of a definitive guidebook on election protection recounts and audits.  This will take up the bulk of our upcoming zoom #70.

In the meantime, we watch with a combination of hope and horror as the Democrats try to pass some kind of compromise legislation while 50 Republicans watch on in brain-dead uniformity.

DISSECTING THE 14 PILLARS OF THE AMERICAN FASCIST INFRASTRUCTURE.

 

In this special overview edition #68 of the Grassroots Emergency Election Protection Coalition Zoom, we take on the structural realities of the US fascist state. 

 

 It is the institutional core of the Trump/Bannon dictatorial fortress.  

 

We do this holistic dissection to link the critical analyses of what we face and how we must dismantle the roots of autocracy to let our democracy breathe.  

 

The definition of fascism, as coined by Mussolini, is “corporate control of the state.”

 

The 14 pillars of fascism in general were codified by Lawrence Brill.

 

The 14 pillars of American corporate/fascist state are:  THE SUPREME COURT, THE ELECTORAL COLLEGE, GERRYMANDERING, THE 2010 REDMAP COUP, THE SENATE, THE FILIBUSTER, DISENFRANCHISEMENT OF NON-MILLIONAIRES OF YOUTH & COLOR, FASCIST CONTROL OF THE ELECTORAL APPARATUS, RIGGED RECOUNTS/AUDITS, THE DRUG WAR, MONEY IN POLITICS, THE MEDIA, ARMED VIOLENCE, THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY.

 

Join us to here how all this is tied together….and can be defeated..

 

 

We confront the insane reality that these Biden bailout bills include huge sums—tens of billions of dollars—to once again subsidize the nuclear power industry.

 

We’re joined by No Nukes legends PAUL GUNTER and KEVIN KAMPS of Beyond Nuclear to rip through the insanity of spewing ever more of our public money on this insanely dangerous, expensive failed technology.

 

Long-time House staffer JOEL SEGAL now working nationally on the issue of homelessness also speaks.

 

The forever whining of atomic proponents that they can’t compete in the marketplace and therefore must be perennially handed huge sums of cash has come home to roost amidst the fierce national debate over the various Biden plans to rebuild our nation.

 

But any atomic reactor could in an instant destroy our national ecology and economy while killing millions of Americans.  And there are 93 of them currently operating in the US, all of them old, embrittled and poised to blow.  

 

It’s time to forever bury this insane parasitic industry.  Nobody says it better than these guys.  Join us!

 Women making peace in the Middle East is the subject of a new movement brought to us by LYNNE FEINERMAN and FATIMA ARGUN who announce a new series of zoom gatherings that could make a HUGE difference.

 We then talk with JOEL SEGAL about the hard realities of the Biden infrastructure and remake America bills, including in-depth analyses of where we’re really at with Manchin, Sinema and the rock-solid McConnell Republicans who give no signs of budging. 

 We embrace the acknowledgement by the New York Times that the great work done by JOHN BRAKEY, STEVE ROSENFELD and RAY LUTZ in Arizona save the nation from a bogus, misleading and destructive   fake recount set to be duplicated throughout the US was absolutely essential to the survival of the Republic. 

 We then take the deep dive into the diabolical plans of Steve Bannon and the possibility of turning the US into an actual dictatorship.  Hint:  the Constitutional highway is totally open, it could be done by 2024 and Bannon is clear on his intention to do it.

 We begin the dialogue on this horrifying prospect and will continue it in two weeks, so DO YOUR HOMEWORK, because if you don’t we could all wind up at Guantanamo.

VICTORY IN ARIZONA, BATTLES FOR NATIONAL ELECTION PROTECTION & ACTION   

Amidst the spectacular collapse of the absurd cyber-Ninja Arizona recount scam, we hear from JOHN BRAKEY, STEVE ROSENFELD  and RAY LUTZ on how it happened.

It’s now clear that without their on-the-ground scrutiny and EP activism, Team Trump could easily have conjured up a “revised outcome” very different from what AZ’s voters actually wanted.

Instead Brakey’s insider contacts with honest brokers like Ken Bennet, Rosenfeld’s reporting and Lutz’s techno-audits made it impossible for the thugs and thieves to flip the outcome.

What comes next will be critical as Team Trump attempts to spread fake audit/recounts to whatever states they want to flip.  A handbook/lessons-learned document now becomes crucial from these three great EP pioneers.

Meanwhile, JOEL SEGAL fills us in on the critical growth of the new Progressive Action Coalition and SmartALEC which will be coordinating more on-the-ground campaigns and authoring more legislation as we move forward.