::::::::
December is the biggest shopping month of the year. If we buy all necessary gifts and presents right now so that we don't have to buy them in December, we can force Bush and Cheney to resign. Wouldn't that be a lovely holiday gift to ourselves? What could we possibly want more than that?Don't worry about Hastert taking their place -- he's in too much trouble right now. Let's just get Bush and Cheney out. For background on exactly how this works, please see Joel Hirschhorn's article on Progressive Civil Disobedience. Here's the plan:
Make personalized holiday cards for your family and friends that say: As my gift to you this holiday season, I am doing everything in my power to remove Bush and Cheney from office. I hope you will do the same for me. Here is what I am doing:
I have cancelled my cable TV subscription and I will not renew it until Bush and Cheney resign.
I have already purchased those consumer items I need to buy as gifts, so that I won't have to buy them in late November or in December. But I may have misjudged some of my friends and family, and they may prefer the same gift that I want, the removal of Bush and Cheney from office, to consumer goods. If so, I hope that they will send me a version of this card as soon as possible so that I can return their gifts to the stores for a refund. I promise to purchase those gifts for them immediately upon Bush and Cheney stepping down.
During the holiday season I am going to withhold as much of my discretionary spending power as possible. I will not shop at big box stores. I will try to reduce my fuel and energy consumption as much as possible. I'll try to buy as much of my family's food at farmers' markets and locally owned small businesses as possible to avoid shopping in supermarkets.
I have sent the following letter to the CEO of a large corporation, to the media, or to one of my elected representatives:
To Whom It May Concern:
You may soon notice a sharp drop in the consumer confidence index. I am one of millions of consumers who have no confidence whatsoever in the present administration.
I will return to my previous spending patterns as soon as George Bush and Dick Cheney resign from office.
Respectfully,
Mary and/or Joe Citizen
That's it. Nothing to it. We withdraw at least $250 billion from the economy during the busiest shopping season of the year, and the big corporations who were counting on that money, had already figured it into their profit estimates, and whose stocks will go down when they don't meet their quarterly earnings, will do the rest.
So let's make this the happiest holiday season in many years. Let's give ourselves a present that our children and grandchildren will remember and thank us for. Cancel your cable TV subscription right now. It will be a temporary hardship, but sometimes we have to make sacrifices in order to get what we want. Do your necessary shopping right now instead of waiting. And start writing those holiday cards. Send them out immediately to everyone you can think of.
And post this or your own version of it (Christmas, Hannukah, Kwanzaa, whatever) everywhere you can.
This year, let's give ourselves what we really want.
Happy holidays, America!
