My grandfather died.

Robert H. Gravatt 1925 - 2009 Basehor

Robert H. Gravatt
1925-2009
Services for Robert H. Gravatt, 83, Basehor, will be 10 a.m. Saturday, Jan. 17 at Holy Angels Catholic Church, Basehor.
Visitation will be from 6-8 p.m. Friday at the church. The Rosary will be said at 7 p.m.
Burial will follow the funeral at Holy Angels Cemetery.
Mr. Gravatt died Thursday, Jan. 15, 2009, at Tonganoxie Nursing Center.
He was born Oct. 18, 1925, in Lenexa, the son of Homer and Leona Mollett Gravatt. He served in the U.S. Navy during World War II. Mr. Gravatt married Edith Winterscheidt on Oct. 29, 1949 in Kansas City, Kan.. Mr. Gravatt was a machinist for Sealright Packaging Company and Owens-Corning Corp., both of Kansas City, Kan. He was a member of the Holy Angels Catholic Church, Basehor.
Survivors include his wife, Edith, of the home; one son, Robert H. Gravatt, Jr., Tonganoxie; four daughters, Roberta Brown, Kansas City, Gail Willits, Fayetteville, Ark., Marian Pant, Basehor and Anita Hay, Huntington, W.Va.; two sisters, Evelyn Cook, Lee’s Summit, Mo., and Shirley Suman, Kansas City, Mo.; 20 grandchildren; and 12 great-grandchildren.
Memorials are suggested to the Alzheimer’s Association or to the church building fund, care of Quisenberry Funeral Home, P.O. Box 993, Tonganoxie 66086.

History does not remember it as a revolution.....

until it has won...otherwise it is known as an insurgency, or a rebellion.

This is in response to someone saying how Obama's movement is basically a revolution in America. While I agree with the sentiment and see how vast numbers of people are stepping up in ways they haven't previously, I am cautious and picky about the terms.

So until we win, we are just a potential side note in history.

For instance, the youth voted in 2004 at rates basically not seen since 1972, and they voted for Kerry at rates that NO age demographic had done for Democrats lately. Yet we get told that Kerry didn't inspire and we don't consider it a revolution.

To those who say Kerry didn't achieve anything, I kindly say "up yours". The youth (me at age 22 then) made a huge movement towards the Democrats. We followed that up with 2006, where we again showed up for a mid-term at rates not seen in quite a while. That was not yet Obama time, remember?

Some of those new young party activists and caucus-goers this time around found their inspiration in their loathing of Bush in 2004 and their first political acts were getting behind Kerry. If Kerry had won then, it would have been called a revolution. Considering that the election practices in Ohio were as fishy as they come in America, I think the revolution has already started, but history will just have to catch on to it when we score a more visible win.

Tales from the Campaign 1

Encounter 1:
Fifty-something, white woman, supervisor of elections for a small, rural county in Georgia. I am in her office and she finally directly asks me which campaign I am on. I show her my shirt, to which she replies that she is probably going to vote for Obama. She says she doesn't like McCain and DEFINITELY won't vote for him. "But if Huckabee had won I would be voting for him. I really like Huckabee." Then when we talk VP candidates she says that if Sam Nunn would have been the candidate she definitely would have voted for him! This woman was all over in her preferences.

Encounter 2:
I am basically ran out of clean clothes, so I decide that my dad's old cowboy shirt (brown and blue) will have to do for today. I put my little button on my chest as always though. I head to lunch at a burrito place and when I am paying the mid-twenties white guy messes up my change. I mention it and he says "I was just making sure you were paying attention." The other early twenties white guy who actually made my burrito leans over to his coworker and says "Look at the button on his shirt: he IS paying attention."

Encounters 3,4,5:
I pull into a gas station to clean up the evidence of a week of eating out. It's raining, but I am covered, and its 11:00 pm. The black womanl in the booth: thought she registered a few months ago, but never got her card. Registration 1. Another black woman comes up for gas: she has moved since she registered. Registration 2. Another black woman comes up to pay for her gas: she doesn't vote, never has registered, doesn't care to do it. I tell her it's important to me because I don't want my brother to be in danger in Iraq again. Registration 3.

Obama wants to raise taxes??

I don't know if I can be more clear about the difference in the tax plans of McCain and Sen. Obama.  Every family that makes less than 112K a year would benefit more from OBAMA's plan.  Who wants to help you be able to afford health care? OBAMA.

The Democrat's just closed a huge ENRON loophole in the oil law that previously allowed companies to do WAY TOO MUCH speculation in the oil markets.  Since they closed the loophole, gas has dropped nearly 30 cents where I live.  World supply has not increased and world demand has not decreased.  Go figure.

Democrats lowered your gas prices this summer...

Sen Obama wants to lower your taxes (if you make less than 600K a year). 

See for yourself:


..

99 days, rural Georgia

I have been here for three weeks now and I feel like I have done so little to get towards the very large goals they have put before us. I had an interesting experience this week though, that made me realize that this organizing is a little different from what some people imagine it is supposed to be. When we trained how to do a good one-on-one they always said we should meet our people somewhere they are comfortable. We tended to say something like "Can you meet me for about thirty minutes for a cup of coffee so we can talk?" But in rural Georgia in the summer, a coffee shop is not a very likely thing to exist let alone to go to for this kind of activity.

Instead, I had my last one-on-one sitting in a plastic chair out on the lawn of a small house in very rural Liberty County. We sat under some shade trees in the evening and tried to not let the bugs eat us alive. We had a great talk. It was frequently interrupted by a honking car passing on the small country road that ran in front of the house. Every car that passed must have belonged to someone she knew because my volunteer waved at each one and usually recalled the name of the person driving as well. Her house was situated at what I would call a country crossroads. It had a flashing red light and a small, old church on one corner. Two houses on the other corners completed it. A few miles to a filling station in the middle of nowhere and 15 miles to town.

It's not unheard of for people to live fifteen miles from town, especially a larger city with good, high paying jobs, but this small town has very little besides a military base. At points in history where wealth was more evenly spread and transportation was accessible and affordable, this living in the country might be a very pleasant thing. If you actually farming your land that provides you work and occupation there close to home. But that isn't the case for all, dare I say most of the people living out in some of these rural places. They are there because maybe it's old family land that someone built a cheap house on in the 1950's. They may have moved there when they had a good job and when gas was cheap. All of this changes when folks get older, or lose their good job, or get sick, or have kids, or have to start watching their grandchildren. Now that gas is more expensive, those fifteen miles starts to really feel more like a million. Rising transportation costs hurt rural families a lot. Indeed, recent articles have discussed how rural people, especially in the poor South, spend a disproportionate amount of their income on just gas and transportation.

These are the folks that need a comprehensive energy plan to be implemented in this country. Sure, people should maybe live in denser settlements where they are close to what they need and where they might have access to public transportation. But that alone is not a comprehensive policy. All good solutions should be put in place, especially solutions that solve multiple problems. In particular in Georgia, advances in cellulosic ethanol would open up the possibility of utilizing the abundant timber resources to drive local energy economies.

I have met some great Americans and Georgians so far, and I am sure I will meet many more as I really get out into my area. These people are citizens, whose opinions should matter. They have the right to vote, and they deserve to be asked for their vote. I believe the politics of cynicism intentionally discourages these people from participating in the political process. I think they are disenfranchised by a lack of being involved in the political culture. And I think it hurts America.

What it's all about

Contact with voters.

(Picture: Me registering a new young voter in Hinesville, GA)

Every voter that supports Barack needs to be reached. They need to be registered. They need to be asked. They need to be empowered. They need to volunteer. They need us to have the courage to ask and the stamina to keep asking until they help Barack win Georgia.

We need to help THOUSANDS of folks register. Not just in Atlanta, but in smaller counties like Bryan, Liberty, and Long. Atlanta is not an endless well of voters. We must increase Democratic performance in every single county of Georgia if we want Barack to Win.

How bad do we want it? Bad enough to give up a Saturday to walk the town registering voters? Bad enough to come straight from work to the campaign office to make phone calls one night a week? Bad enough to take time off of whatever we are doing the week before the election and on election day to ensure that every voter who already supports Barack gets to the polls?

You ain't seen nothing yet!

"Haha I'm just making the case that our generation doesn't have it as bad as the 1960's and 70's generation so there isn't as much protest. "

This set this off. This was a response to a long note about Arkansas politics and the actions of the youth and progressive populations. Here is my response:"

The protest generation may have been faced with the draft, so it may have seemed like the threat loomed more closely, but Gen Y faces the complacency of Gen X and problems that don't seem to be as serious as the draft. But lets get real about the soon to come disasters of our time.

Peak oil is going to RAPIDLY transform our world and Americans are going to feel the pain (perhaps mainly culturally) of a messy shift in energy consumption patterns through ALL aspects of production and consumption.The huge public debt of the last two generations is going to catch up to us. It will catch up at a time when Americans have greater personal debt than at any other time in our nation. Combine this with a sour economy triggered in part by the ever growing demand for oil, and economically MILLIONS of Americans will be stressed. As this hits the fabled millions of Boomers will be retiring (the first boomer just retired early this year, did you see the story), coming into Social Security, and their strongest VOTING years! They will demand full funding of Social Security with not only NO changes, but probably increased benefits for things like Part D, etc.

And what if perhaps we do want to limit carbon emissions? Who will feel that pain? For sure Gen X, but most accutely will Gen Y feel it.

I argue though, that Gen Y is a greater protest generation than the Boomers and Co. Only about 25% of Gen Y could vote in 2004, yet we saw a huge increase in their numbers voting and they solidly voted a PROTEST vote against Bush. In 2006 it strengthened. They protested with their vote and by getting their fellow Gen Yers to vote. Just wait until November. Even more of us are eligible to vote, and the trend will be huge to protest the policies of the past and putting Obama in office.

Just wait. Fine.. here you go. I propose the largest youth protest in the history of the US. Tuesday November 4th. Be there or be square.

A great story on how the Millenials (Gen Y) may affect politics: http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/6/16/102625/574