Below is a poem I wrote yesterday about the Shiite rebellion but I wanted to preface with very critical commentary. We should be ready to take the streets and/or take Washington when the first all-black infantry unit defects and joins the Iraqi resistance. Mayday '04 Washington may well be what Mayday '68 Paris was.

We must RIGHT NOW create the community relationships that will enable a nonviolent transfer of power in November, electoral or otherwise. Bush is screwed but that means he'll cheat and he may find a way to go the Hitler route. We must be ready.

Some things to consider:
1) Unless we are absolutely nonviolent, we can be Al-Quaeded in the fascist narrative of the "Other" and thus become a backdrop that legitimizes the Bushies' ridiculousness. Anything which Bush's PR team can use, they will; they're desperate. They need images of "out of control masked teenagers breaking things" very badly right now to recover their credibility.
2) We (as white and/or digitally-privileged activists) must focus 100% on building community w/ non-digitally-privileged working class folks and/or people of color. As much as it may make punkarchists want to puke, the two easiest ways of doing this are A) participating in voter registration and/or voter protection (i.e. Freedom Summer '04) and B) supporting the rank and file of local unions no matter how corrupt they are.
3) Do not be ideological but instead be completely pragmatic about what you say, do, and wear around people with different values you need to form relationships with UNLESS it undermines the revolution to compromise. This may mean that we need to let our eyebrow and tongue piercing holes close up and let our hair grow normally for a few months this summer as well as buying some civilian thrift store clothes. It also means not dissing someone we need to work with if they start talking about Jesus, even if they're patriarchal or homophobic, and thinking strategically about how to educate them when you have enough trust to do so rather than just reaming them or walking away.

Our country may be at the same crossroads Germany was at but Germany didn't have as many self-identifying anarchists and Stalin defeated Trotsky's effort to get the German commies to be pragmatic and ally with the liberal-democrats. Thus Hitler won the election, made himself dictator, and the rest is history.

We can pick up the ball and become cultural chameleons or whatever else we need to do to make sure that in the event of election theft, a general strike occurs. Or we can be punker-than-thou and flick people off who don't understand us instead of trying to strike up conversations and liberate them. Here's the poem about the day that Saigan fell again. @gent Starchild

Tet ‘04

I find out on Yahoo:
an editor had made a career mistake
(he didn't Sunni-
triangulate
the Shiite Rebellion).

50 dead as Iraqis riot –
just like South Central,
brown people breaking things
God knows what for.

But Bremer knows
as do the four horsemen –
Colin, Rummy, Connie, and Dick -
Magog has risen.

No one lets the Cowboy surf the web today:
he sits in his ranch
with a smile
so many liberals call a smirk

Unfairly.
Were they there for the family pictures?
Were they there for tryouts?

He carries the square jaw
of those who never made varsity.

His thumb starts to itch
as he rubs the football,
knowing he can hit anyone
no matter how deep.

He’s crying as he prays,
knowing that every Messiah
can just as quickly turn Lucifer.

Coach will not leave him alone -
his earpads are ringing:
“Are you throwing that God-damn thing
Or am I going to have to take it from you?!!!”