Michelle,
I doubt if this will ever get to you, but here goes. If it does, you will understand my point and can help Barack win. My contribution to his campaign will be far more than any money I donate.
I was inspired by your talk last Tuesday, but could not have been more disappointed in Barack's acceptance speech last night. If Barack is for "hope", he did nothing to raise my hope and convince me that he's for real change.
I was sorry that Barack knocked the "ownership society" and made fun with the word "own" in his speech (i.e., "you're on your own."). He could have attacked Bush's Wall Street version and offered a truly new way to spread ownership, profits and economic power to the people, from the bottom up. If he read my "Just Third Way" paper I sent you and to Barack (which also was handed to him last week by Ralph Paige, the head of the Federation of Southern Cooperatives), then he was rejecting the idea of changing the system to spread future ownership opportunities in a synergistic fashion. If he read my paper, he would have understood the artificial legal and institutional barriers that limit green growth and shackle most Americans to wage and welfare dependency, while the Wall Street crowd continue to accumulate obscene amounts of income-producing capital.
Barack's version of change, if you think about it, would make most Americans "owned" by the government, and increasingly dependent on the elite in charge of the state and their Wall Street cronies for their incomes, their jobs, their health and and their well-being. This vision of the future is totally opposite to the American Dream, where the state (civilization's exclusive monopoly with coercive powers) was supposed to be totally dependent on economically independent and empowered citizens.
What an irony of history if the first African-American President was to stand in the way of capital homesteading for every man, woman and child. His would be a sure-fire formula for creating a nation of economically disenfranchised citizens. Lincoln, Martin Luther King and my old friend Medgar Evers must be turning over in their graves.
Who's going to have the guts to wake up Barack, before he delivers us an economic nightmare?
Own or Be Owned,
Norm
Center for Economic and Social Justice
www.capitalhomestead.com
Michelle Obama wrote:
> Norm --
>
> The first time I ever heard Barack speak was at a community meeting on the South Side of Chicago.
>
> He won me over with the same message that inspired millions last night.
>
> He told people who'd been knocked down that, despite everything, we need to set our sights on a better place around the bend -- and that it's up to each one of us to fight for it.
>
> That's where you come in.
>
> More than two million supporters already own a piece of this extraordinary campaign. Will you join them by making your first donation right now?
>
> Make a donation of $5 or more today:
>
> https://donate.barackobama.com/lastnight1
>
> Now that the convention is over, time will fly between now and Election Day.
>
> And the next two days are especially important.
>
> The August fundraising deadline is this Sunday at midnight, and we can prove that a campaign funded by grassroots supporters can compete with John McCain and the Republicans.
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> The past four days in Denver -- and the amazing event last night -- showed the country that Americans are ready for change.
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> Now it's up to each of us to make it happen.
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> Thanks for everything you're doing,
>
> Michelle
>
> Donate: https://donate.barackobama.com/lastnight1
>
>
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