State of the Squish

Room of Remembrance, Monotype, 15x22"

I'm going to wrap up a few odds and ends as I gear up for Spring. I've spent most of January spamming people. Or hopefully, bac'ning them. Bacn being the kind of spam that you voluntarily sign up for because you have a genuine interest in the subject matter.

As outlined in my last post, I've been trying to upgrade my presence on the web, and also took on social media duties for a couple of groups I'm a member of. I have a ton of workshops and shows coming up this year, and social media can really help one get the word out. Here are a couple of examples:

As you may know, I've joined Zip 37 Gallery in Denver, and will have work hanging there at all times, in their wonderful back room gallery. Each member has a little space for mostly small work, and many people already use it for one-stop art shopping. I'm handling their Twitter account, too, as well as my own.

I'll be starting my next workshop in early March, and it is registering now. It's designed to be a good introduction to Monotypes, but I also have return students who like to continue their explorations, and I try to accommodate both. It is a great way to start off a Tuesday morning; bring your coffee!

I've also posted a few images from 2010 ( including the one above) on my Facebook page as a review of sorts, with my commentary. Check it out, and if you'd like regular updates on shows and workshops, as well as new work, click "Like".

I also need to briefly update the post on the Tea Baggers' ironic ignorance of history in the light of recent events. I don't intend this to be a solely political blog, but the querulous effort to repeal Health Care reform, definitely affects those of us in the creative and small business economy, and so is relevant to what I am trying to do.

The GOP right's insincere promise to abandon their characteristic vitriol after the Tucson shootings went quickly up in smoke as they moved to reward their health industry sponsors with a "repeal" of the Health Care Reform Law.

This legislative charade has no chance of success, but offered a nice opportunity to go back to the name calling ("Obamacare") and outright lies they'd used to scare up the Faux News crowd originally. Even the name of their repeal bill ("Jobs-Killing-Health-Care") is a proven lie.

The numbers cited (650,000) link it to a non-partisan CBO report which actually notes the potentially POSITIVE effect of people leaving their jobs when they are no longer tied to corporate-offered Health Care. For example, to start businesses; or enter the creative economy. To innovate; to follow the American Dream. There is, to be fair, also a slight effect on the McJobs portion of the economy, which look good in Government reports, but do nothing to narrow the quickly widening wealth gap.

Having paraded that dog through the House of Representatives, the right then ponied up for their ultra conservative base by announcing that next on the agenda would be yet another attempt to erode Americans' right to reproductive choice. Not only is this narrow-minded and vindictive, it's plain stupid. At a time when the American public has sent a clear message in recent polls that the bi-partisan progress late in the 111th Congress met their approval, the GOP insists on revisiting past defeats in the Culture Wars. It's as if the Buffalo Bills demanded a replay of all their Superbowls.

This is a party that has completely "lost the plot". As we are reminded on Martin Luther King Day (the conservative's least favorite holiday), you cannot redeem the promise of American freedom without progress, and change. The Tea Baggers actually do have ways they can contribute to progress, such as in deficit reduction, which they have completely ignored when there are no elections in sight. The last President to balance the budget? a Democrat. His successor, the Deciderator, went "nuculer", and set a record for deficits. And their only substantive response to the Tucson tragedy has been shrill screeching about proposed common sense limits on high capacity clips for automatic weaponry.

The State of the Union rebuttals? Just a photo op for every Palin wanna-be that wants to tap into the anger of Tea Bagger booboisie. The deficit will never be eliminated without tax reform that includes increased revenues from the very rich, period. Targeting discretionary spending on already stripped-to-the-bone programs for arts, NPR and education are a straw man for GOP 2012 ambitions, and Obama has beaten them to the punch, anyway, as past grudges are vented in the House.

The right wing GOP/Tea Baggers continue to be the party of fear, demagoguery and narrow self interest. Their biggest lie of all? Calling themselves "patriots". Real patriots would get down to work on real problems, not be staring into space on Faux News, trying to cover talking points for the next election.