Hello everyone, and welcome 2009 Class of YP4-- you've almost made it through your first day of the Summit!

I just attended the Grassroots Media Justice Tour in Denton, Texas, the last stop on this nationwide tour. This exciting event showcased the following speakers:

Maybe you've heard of it?

www.Kiva.org is a social change non-profit that empowers individuals with internet access and a paypal account with the capacity to microfinance directly to borrowers in the developing world through no-interest loans. It's the same basic principles of microfinance that Bangladeshi economist Muhammad Yunus won the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize.

After easily raising over $450 online for St. Jude Children's Research Hospital through the elementary school where I have been a teacher's aid through AmeriCorps *NCCC, I was on a high. Not long after, I spoke with my sister's boyfriend (who also happens to be an Adam) and he reminded me about a site that we had talked about before, but that I had since forgotten - www.Kiva.org.

Hey all. I hope that you've made it safely back to your hometowns and are getting ready for a productive year. I wish that I had been able to meet more of you and talk more extensively with those whom I did. I actually run my own little blog, some of it is political, some of it is not. This entry actually comes from my personal blog, but I thought it might be of interest to some of you. Let me know what you think...

We've heard it all before.

It's the story of a big company that desperately wants you to know about something good it's doing -- and how you, too, can get in on a little of that karmic ju-ju through purchasing their product and, in this case, "use your period for good" (funny, I prefer to use my period for evil...).

truth reflects reality

but what is reality

& what is then true?

knowledge implies truth

& who can claim to possess knowledge that

is purely true to reflect the real?

- Alex B. Hill (date written unknown)

Whether we all know it or not we are enslaved by a great system, a system that propagates discrimination based on race, division rooted in the ideas of economic class, military control bent on power, and a political will lacking the necessary passion to stand up for what can easily be perceived as right (as opposed to wrong). Right: equal rights for all people of the world, equal opportunity, fair wage and living standards, a smile from a stranger, an atypical helping hand when it may seem uncouth, truth spoken from the mouth of a fellow on the misdeeds of a few who would wield a vast power in the name of many, not denying people their basic needs. Wrong is spewed from the system in many ways, most are unrecognized and more unknown to the general populace than one might think.

From the so called great scramble to the new scramble, I believe that there never really is any difference or change in scrambling. The imperialist tendencies and actions towards Africa have been concentrated in one continuous scramble - for resources: land, people, minerals, diamonds, timber, markets, etc. A continuous scramble and a systematic exploitation and looting of the African continent. Globalization and the global political economy are generally not looked at through the African perspective. While I can hardly offer that perspective, I work to understand.

According to National Geographic, "Every 14 days a language dies. By the year 2100, over half of the more than 7,000 languages spoken on Earth -- many of them never yet recorded -- will likely disappear, taking with them a wealth of knowledge about history, culture, the natural environment, and how the human brain works."

It has always been my opinion that language is free and language is fluid, but those two conditions cannot be met if a language dies. But why are languages dying? Both a difficult and nearly obvious answer exists. Earth is slowly developing into a single civilization. Traditional societies and languages are dying; disappearing and waves of rapid modernization aid in the erosion of tradition. The answer cannot be left at just that however, because there are many reasons, effects, and causes intertwined in the death of a language.

Upton Sinclair once said that fascism will come to this country draped in the American flag, and carrying a Bible. Little did he know that its sincerest agents of apologism would come from mainstream academia instead.

In a previous post, I made the argument that one of the Christian Right's greatest achievements has been its mainstreaming of extremist views. I would make the same argument for neoliberal economics. Namely, that market fundamentalists use the ideological cover provided by mainstream economic theory to safely advocate extreme, anti-democratic ideas.

Read more below.

There is a great class war in our society. Globalization, capitalism and other forces have managed to further the gap between the rich and the poor.

458 Billionaires control over half the world's wealth. 3 trillion people earn less than $3 a day. The abject conditions of the working poor continue to disintegrate each day around the world and in our own country.

A man once wrote about this class struggle. His name is Karl Marx. His teachings and communism have been dragged through the dirt by many intent on making sure the current system is eternal.

Please take a minute and watch the video in this entry. Listen to the words and enjoy the cartoons :-)