STEPPING UP … In a democracy real change is supposed to start from the bottom, the grassroots. And then work its way up to the national. Grassroots democracy is one of the American Green Party’s ten key values. As an elected representative answerable to all in this county, especially our most active citizens, I strongly believe in speaking up on issues local, regional, national and international. It’s time to take back the helm and redirect of our federal government from out of the pockets of corporate Beltway lobbyists. I think we can never be reminded too much that power resides in the people. I know that’s not what we’ve been taught. That’s not what we see on TV. The people are rarely in control in the movies. But in the gestalt of the real universe we live in, let me repeat – power resides in the people … That was the message I learned in 1980 at the Survival Gathering that the American Indian Movement held in the Black Hills, when John Trudell spoke about power. Not the instruments, not the executive committee, but the full membership of the human family  … Abe Lincoln, a Republican (back when that was an honorable word), said it best when he ended his famous speech at Gettysburg, promising “that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth” … Everyone likes to shout about their “rights” – a right to work, a right to bear arms, Ouray County even enforces a “right to farm.” But few remember that with rights come responsibilities. Something that Oren Lyons of the Onondaga Nation Haudenosaunee of upstate New York used to love to point out. To be a responsible citizen of a nation that guarantees us the rights of free speech, life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness I think we ought to exercise those rights and give our elected representatives a clear understanding of what we believe … That’s why the commissioners have been taking some (I think important) stands on issues far outside our boundaries … On the international level, the United Nations passed the U.N Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples this past fall, 144 to 4. The U.S. under the Bush administration was one of the four nays. I believe most Americans would not have endorsed that administrative vote by the executive branch of our current government if they had known about it, or had the chance to participate. I know citizens of San Miguel County would not have endorsed that vote. So, I drew up a simple resolution that calls on the Congress, and more specifically our state congressional delegation, to vote a resolution endorsing the U.N. vote … The County resolution should be loaded soon onto the News tab on the newly redesigned county web site <www.sanmiguelcounty.org> along with some links to sites that explain more about the Declaration … I’ll speak of other county actions we’ve taken beyond our boundaries in subsequent columns.

SPEAKING OF OREN LYONS … Back in 1997, Chief Lyons gave a landmark speech to open the 15th session of the U.N. Working Group on Indigenous Rights – the source of the U.N. Declaration on Indigenous Rights that was recently adopted. You can find a copy of Lyon’s word at the Indigenous Peoples’ Center for Documentation <www.docip.org/anglais/update_en/up_en_19_20.html#opst> And I urge every local citizen to read this eloquent plea for utilizing native wisdom for our continued survival on this planet … But what I wanted to share here was his invocation to his speech, words that came from opening remarks he made in 1977 from an earlier talk to a U.N. gathering in Geneva, Switzerland , which speaks to an understanding of Gaian complexity and symbiotic interaction that our science is just beginning to explore. And it is the foundation for the deep ecology thinking of Dolores Lachapelle – her Way of the Mountain … “I do not see a delegation for the four-footed. I see no seat for the eagle. We forget and we consider ourselves superior, but we are after all a mere part of the creation. And we must continue to understand where we are. We stand between the mountain and the ant, somewhere and only there, as part and parcel of the creation” … It’s this attitude towards the world, a more inclusive embrace than the solely human, that has become the basis for my own personal earth-based spirituality.

WEEKLY QUOTA … “Corruptisima republica plurimae leges.” – Tacitus (The more corrupt a republic, the more laws there are.)

THE TALKING GOURD

the grace of going

-for caroline stoufer

december snow settling in

crunching & collapsing

crystalline underfoot

on the walk to my studio

out back of Cloud Acre

icicles elegant as buckskin

drip their silver sparkles

from the eaves

in my dream

you are surrounded

by books rare ores

walls begin to burn

rock turns molten

cools to crystal

backlit by sunlight

like these San Juans of ours

you taught us

the grace of going

flesh to ash heart to stone

GoodtimesGoodtimes: Thinking Globally and Acting Locally