BuzzFlash Review

By BuzzFlash
original here, and signed copies of the book available

David Swanson is the most prolific, indefatigable advocate and activist that BuzzFlash knows of. He is equally at home writing countless persuasive commentaries on the Internet about the urgency of upholding the Constitution and making those in power accountable under the law on his main site AfterDowningStreet.org. and with being a ubiquitous grassroots activist.

Swanson is a young father, but his personal actions echo the mobilization protests of the '60s. Unlike so many of us creatures of the Internet who make our logical arguments for principle and social justice on the net and feel that we are doing our job, Swanson doesn't miss an opportunity to hit the streets, Congressional offices, protests in front of the White House, organizing advocacy marches -- whatever it takes.

As a result many "mainstream" progressives regard him as "unruly" and violating "decorum." Meanwhile, the right wing shouts, screams, and engages in the most vile, hateful and violent behavior and the same Congressional progressives and "centrists" run scared and capitulate. All David Swanson asks for is justice and is spurned.

A lot of the new Internet left doesn't have room for the likes of a true grassroots activist and "pamphleteer" like Swanson. No, he's not a radical of any sort, just someone who would have been riding with Paul Revere or penning protest broadsides against King George, or organizing protests for American Independence.

He speaks truth to power, and for that he has irritated some progressive Capitol Hill Democrats because he has the "audacity" to hold sit ins and corner Dems who are trying to weasel out of standing up to injustice.

Unlike many progressive net advocates, Swanson is not about to be co-opted by lofty rhetoric about the Constitution by Dems who continue the status quo of letting entrenched power remain above the law. He's not someone who will appear on the media as a pundit (with rare exception), because he does more than talk in sound bites and challenges the acceptable range of being a "Democratic seat filler" on talk shows. So the corporate media knows he won't stick with the corporate news "script" of the day.

David Swanson is what we all need to be if we are to defeat the powerful and unlimited financially backed forces of corporate control over our nation; he takes his case to the streets, to the Halls of Congress, to churches, to colleges, to anyone who will hear him out. He believes that when all you get from the Democratic elected officials is rhetoric without follow through, you sit in their offices until they come out -- and sometimes get arrested.

David is a man who hits the keyboard, but never forgets that it is hitting the streets that makes the difference: that is how we achieved gains in Civil Rights, in ending the Vietnam War, in gaining the right of Women to Vote, in stopping a reactionary anti-immigration movement.

Buy and read David Swanson's 360 page book. If we are to win back the momentum of the '60s, David is one of those who will be there leading us in a protest march for justice.

David knows that the only way to counter big money is sore feet, a hoarse throat, and hundreds of thousands -- even millions -- taking the strength of their convictions directly to the sources of power in America.