It all starts with Nominating Petitions

So, you visit the Secretary of State's Election Division office on the 17th floor of One Ashburton Place, tucked behind the State Capitol building annex, or extension.

You sign for a 10-pound (so it seems) shrink-wrap ream or so of Nominating Petitions, color-coded (I think--but I only got yellow ones), and a little red booklet entitled "Don't Just Stand There — RUN!

Which is what finally got me to make the trek downtown (you can find a copy on the web). To get on the ballot as an independent for Congress, you need only get some 2,200 or so signatures from registered voters in "every Middlesex village and town" (or whatever your relevant, target-collection of geo-political clumps happens to be). 

After working phone-banks in 2006 to change the majority in Congress, seeing the majority shift to the Demicans. And watch nothing happen about the Iraq war except both parties now seeming to agree that the US is going to be an Army of Occupation for many years to come--protecting our never-defined "national interests" (everyone in the world except Americans seem to understand that America's "national interests" are Oil, Natural Gas, and prmanent Military Bases from which to launch more invasions to "secure our National Interests "(whether those military bases — and one humongous "Embassy City" in Baghdad — are "enduring" or permanent — pick your propaganda euphemism word or "reality based" word) in the oil- and natural gas-rich Middle East....

After participating in "vigils" and "seminars" and meetings with MoveOn folks and meetings with Congress-folk and attending congress-folks' Town Meetings....

After trekking down to the US capitol and meeting with congress-folk in Senate and House, and listening to their speeches on the subversion and sabotage of the Constitution...

And seeing nothing happen...

It became time to "Don't Just Stand There! RUN!" as Bill Galvin's gang exhorts. 

Reminds me of the September weekend in 1968 when hundreds of thousands of citizens descended upon D.C. to protest the continuation of the Vietnam Misadventure. This "March On the Pentagon" received wide attention in the MSL (mainstream large, rather than mainstream medium), and supposedly in the nooks, niches and cloakrooms of the Capitol.

And the Vietnam Misadventure continued on for another eight (8) years, essentially.  So much for petitioning the government for redress of grievances.

Now it's time for us to Restore the Balance of powers, rights and duties spelled out in the US Constitution, about which, sadly, it can currently be said, is "more honored in the breach than in the observance."