Melinda Pillsbury-Foster
Friday, May 24, 2007, 4 pm PST
This Week's Show
Guest: Brett Kinderlin
In the 60's we were fighting to bring the boys home from a war that was destroying the soul of America; today we are fighting not only to bring them home but to have a home for them to return to. The music that the 60's and 70s generation heard, that resonated deeply into mind and soul has become a part of that generation. At each time in our history the music has been point, giving us direction and disseminating the ideas of freedom, justice, and peace.
Today the music is rising and one of those who is creating that music is Brett Kimberlin, Director of Justice Through Music (JTM), a non profit org that works with famous bands to inspire young people to vote and support civil rights. JTM has helped to register tens of thousands of people to vote over the past five years through its website, text messaging software and on the ground campaigns at colleges and music events.
On the show we will be talking about the music, the music Brett is creating, the movement it is powering, and all the music that is rising to challenge our present direction politically and consciously.
Every national election season, JTM produces a ROCK YOUR RIGHTS DVD featuring interviews and concerts of 25 bands discussing important issues of the day. JTM gives away tens of thousands of the DVDs to voter registration orgs around the country to educate youth and urge them to get involved with the political process. Recent artists include the Indigo Girls, Dar Williams, the FIXX, Yellowcard and Ministry.
JTM has also given voice to artists and bands that need an outlet to express their protest music. The JTM website, www.jtmp.org, has scores of protest videos and songs from bands of all genres. JTM was the first online site to stream Neil Young’s Living With War CD, and JTM is helping to promote Al Gore’s Live Earth concert on July 7th.
Two years ago, JTM co-founded VelvetRevolution, a non-profit org that focuses attention on election reform, media reform, conflict resolution and government accountability. VR reaches millions of people each month and now has over 150 organizations affiliated with it and it has become a leader on many of these issues.
Brett is a seasoned musician and songwriter, and leads the band, Op-Critical . The band works closely with JTM to create protest songs and videos. Recently, he wrote new lyrics for the John Lennon song, Happy Xmas, War is Over. It is now called Happy Springtime, Bush is Over. JTM produced a video of the song featuring the Harmonic Angels children’s choir singing the chorus. In the first two weeks on YouTube and MySpace, the song and video have been played over 100,000 times.
What the Show is about and being a Spiritual Politician
Bringing government into alignment with the Lessons of Jesus:
The focus of our show is how to bring government into alignment with truth of our spiritual nature. So America started with the idea we are all, inherently free. We are free to choose, free to live, to breath, and to live our lives as we see fit. Government does not own us; government is just a contractor, providing service.
That framework is in alignment with the spiritual truth that each of us connects to God directly, needing no agency as an intermediary. To be free is to be free in the spirit and so in the flesh that temporarily holds the spirit.
When Thomas Jefferson said we were all possessed of inherent rights, existing before government he was extending a spiritual truth into a civic form. It is that Mission Statement from the Declaration of Independence we need to keep in mind.
Because we are free and reject, as did Christ, the use of deceit, manipulation or violence we need to be conscious about our relationships with others and find ways to grow into the sense of connection and community that makes us One in Him.
This is especially true for Christians but it is true for everyone else as well.
Nearly every major spiritual viewpoint enunciates the idea that we are connected to each other and should be good to each other. Christians just have an even more exacting mission. Christians are to love every one, treating them as they would Jesus.
Jesus was very clear about how we were to treat others. He did not say that it was alright to be abusive, deceitful, and violent if we used government as our tool and agent. There was no exception, He wanted all of our hearts, minds and souls. Christ did not lay out any plan of government, but left it to the conscience of the individual, the same way He connects to each of us.
We are Americans but we are also members of a human family that connects us to something truly wonderful and immense.
So our job here at the Spiritual Politician is to look at Government as a human tool we use every day. We need to consider if government is working in a way that speaks that common understanding about our connections to each other and, if it is not, we need to change it.
Americans have had many successes over the last 231 years since our founding and, learning from both mistakes and successes we can consider that question. So here at the Spiritual Politician we look at the truth behind of rhetoric.
Given what is going on today in Government what we may decide to do it reboot the whole system.
To provide the examples of what has gone right and what has gone very wrong we here at the Spiritual Politician have put together several different kinds of segments you will hear on our show from time to time.
Founder and president of the Arthur C. Pillsbury Foundation
Books by Melinda: Links to Melinda's sites:
How the NeoCons Stole Freedom
Shards of Verse Melinda's Poetry
Greed: The NeoConning of America
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