short posts, too

A friend on the program who is a writer is sending out weekly emails to her friends back home. She read my post summarizing the first week and said it was a little sparse. She´s right. Summarizing all we did left little room for description. So, my plan is to try to summarize each week very briefly and then--as the mood strikes me--do short posts reflecting on particular aspects of my experience here.

An Open Letter to My Infant Nephew (my op-ed)

Dear friends,

I wrote the following op-ed around the time we were getting our stimulus checks. I have submitted it to a couple places for publication but had no luck, so I thought I would simply post it here and email it to people I know since it is losing its timeliness. Please forward it to others you think would like it. Obviously people who read this blog know the information in the bio at the bottom, but I put that there in case you forward it on to others.

Peace,
Russell
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An Open Letter to My Infant Nephew

Dear Carson,

I really enjoyed meeting you over spring break--you are an amazing little person and few things help bolster a guy’s feminist credentials like learning to change a diaper. I look forward to watching you grow up all too quickly and will try to be there to see as much of this as possible.

I know it’ll be a few years before you will be able to read this, as much as your mother may brag about your above average development. Still, I want you to know why I’ve decided to use my $300 stimulus check to open a socially conscious mutual fund to help you save for college.

Its not about being a nice uncle (like the Carolina bib and so many gifts yet to come). I’m giving you this money because it’s rightfully yours--paid for by a debt you will have to repay.

This really is your money, borrowed in some odd time-travel economics from your future earnings. This is not just deficit spending. Deficit spending is a good idea if it lets a family buy a car to get to work, or buy a house to live in, or let a business expand. Governments often need to borrow money to build schools or roads. Even those these borrowings create debt, the debt lets us educate our people, lets them travel in safety, and creates a better society. What all these things have in common is that their benefits exceed their cost.

But this time, the government is borrowing your money not to invest in repairing deteriorating bridges and levies, nor to research alternative energy. It will not go to improving healthcare or to create new jobs. It won’t even give people new job skills, the way the Civilian Conservation Corps gave jobs to at least two of your great-grandparents during the Great Depression.

Instead, President Bush is sending me your money to try to stimulate the economy. He thinks that I should use it to buy half a dozen games for my Wii (a video game system that was popular around the time you were born which your mom forbade me from buying you) or improving my wardrobe. He thinks that, if I buy things, it will help our country. But most of the things in our stores were made in other countries like China, so that won’t help our economy that much (though the Chinese are kind enough to loan it right back to us so we can buy even more of their stuff). And encouraging me to keep on buying more and more consumer stuff I don’t need seems economically irresponsible and ecologically unsustainable. This kind of spending obviously isn't going to get us out of debt. It just adds to the huge debt the President borrowed to give massive tax cuts for people who already have too much money and to illegally invade and occupy a country that never attacked us (which, incidentally also made the world to be a less safe place for you). This kind of spending isn’t going to address the reasons the U.S. economy is less competitive (which, surprise, include education, health care, and infrastructure)

So it seems like a small thing, Carson, saving that $300 for you. I’m sorry I can’t offer you more right now, and I’m even sorrier that the world you were born into is less just and more brutal than it should be. But my love for you, my new nephew, is another reason to work harder than before to make it fairer and more humane. Some day, I hope, we’ll work on it together. This repayment of your money is a small act of resistance, but we have to start somewhere.

You see, I still I have faith--a belief without sufficient evidence--that I will leave you this world a better place than I’ve found it. I’ve recently come to the conclusion that it is the culmination of small things that changes the world. Even seemingly big things (MLK giving a speech in front of the Lincoln Memorial) are only possible because of the countless actions of others (the people who organized the march and took the time to attend). In our small acts of hopeful resistance we quietly proclaim that another world is possible and take small steps toward making that world a reality. And that is why I’m giving you this money.

Love,

Uncle Russ

Russell Bither-Terry is a Ph.D. student in Political Science at the University of North Carolina, studying Latin American politics. He keeps blogs about U.S. policy in Latin America and solidarity activism at www.bither-terry.org/latinamerica. He is also a singer-songwriter and recently released his first album, Going Away. See www.bither-terry.org/goingaway for more information.