Death of a Thousand Cuts

It seems overwhelming. They own the banks. They own the media. They own the government. Soon they'll own the internet. We're not even sure who "they" are. We watch in horror as one state passes a law allowing their governor to dissolve local government and hand towns over to corporate ownership - conspiracy theories are so quaint compared to actual law. We're nauseated when the man we elected with the hope he'd change everything attacks civilians with unmanned killer drones, declares his right to assassinate citizens on his command and indefinitely detain suspects without trial. What can we do?

National Boycotts? Take a look at Koch Industries product list. There's hundreds of them, and no big banner on the packaging saying "Koch - The Fascist Brand." Every napkin you get at a fast food restaurant may be putting pennies in their pockets. How do you keep people motivated dor something like that?

Stay at Home Day? Great, emulate a three day weekend. Withhold votes from Blue Dogs? Wonderful, get Rand "The Toilet" Paul elected. Vote straight party line? Take a look at 2009. Besides, it's not really elected officials that are the root problem - it's the money underground that's fertilizing this crop of noxious weeds.

A real General Strike? Are we really ready for all out war in the streets against such gargantuan opponents?

But maybe there is a way. The dust-up between Madison firefighters and M&I bank gives me hope, and an idea. To hit them where it hurts, and maybe get some attention and engender some fear without being mown down in the streets.

A Thousand Cuts. Flash mobs that don't go away. Pinpricks to deflate the zeppelins. Pebbles to start an avalanche.

Here's the deal: firefighters charged that M&I helped finance Walker and thus the overthrow of public union bargaining. So they started an action to withdraw $600k in savings from one branch. After $192k was withdrawn, the branch closed to avoid a run, and M&I came out with a statement that the bank itself doesn't engage in politics and its employees are free to contribute to whomever they want. My point is, so what? M&I is probably no worse than Bank of America or Chase or any other bank. But we can't bring down the whole industry at once (we need it in some form.) Maybe we can't even bring down a whole bank. But we can close one branch. And that hurts. A little. Especially if it never comes back.

So my advice to the firefighters is to stay at the one highly visible branch. If it tries to open, go back in and withdraw those funds. From that branch. Don't go into other branches at all - for any kind of business. But keep the focus on one point. And when that branch closes permanently, pick another. Don't even ask for concessions to stop it - who cares if they fire their chairman, the next guy in line is exactly the same. Public apologies or admissions are not enough. Keep it up until real change starts to happen.

Now, let's expand on that. It's really hard to boycott Koch. Because it's hard, less people manage it. So the boycott is ineffective. So less people stay with it. But what if we picked one product, until it disappeared from the shelves forever? Let's say Brawny paper towels. It' easy - plenty of alternatives out there, whether its a competing brand or just using washcloths. The effect will be obvious immediately - imagine every supermarket carrying a glut, slashing prices to dump the stuff, warehouses in Georgia filled with excess capacity. A measurable reduction in inventory. People urging their local grocers to take it off the shelves and replace it with something customers want.

And then, when it's gone from the shelves, pick another one. It' good to target companies that have been most egregious, but it doesn't even matter. They are so interconnected, almost any product from any company will do. It's partially the uncertainty that might just get some of the crime bosses to lean on the one that went too far.

Turn off Fox News? Nah, they just turn it on in every hotel lobby and sport bar. Better, pick ONE upcoming movie from Fox Searchlight or 20th Century and don't see it. Don't go to the theaters, don't buy the DVD. It doesn't matter which movie or what it's about. As long as the one picked has already been made (and therefore paid for.) Sure, it's a sacrifice, but we can handle it - we'll get to see Paul Rudd in his next movie, they're all the same anyway.

Pick a stock. Any stock (ok, probably not an oil company, but any other stock.) Dump it. For whatever we can get. Let the wealthy pass it back and forth amongst themselves and a far lower value. Kill a company - if it was doing anything worthwhile, someone else will step in and recreate the jobs, eventually. This one will hurt a little more, but we can stand it. Suck it up.

It can be done. The hardest thing will be finding a central place to announce the actions and some mechanism of picking the next target. But if we could pull it off, and if we don't give up, we might actually be able to apply pressure to the right points and be rewarded with some movement.

Because if we don't, we're headed towards a massive breakdown of everything.