The Model

Good Morning Friends and Neighbors!  The Reverend wishes all of you peace and financial freedom on this rain-soaked GreyNorWet morning.

I come to you today, My Brethren, in the brief pause between the sham of Black Friday and pernicious touting for excess spending on Cyber Monday.  I come to you to lay it down on the creeping malaise of consumer over-spending and the consumer debt that follows on the heels of spending like an egg-sucking dog.

On this fine morning, the Rev is setting aside the issue of consumer debt to focus on the single biggest cause of that debt:  over-spending by consumers.  And, my Brothers and Sisters, we are those consumers.  Just as we are, truly, the 99% who can take back the power from the Down-Pressor, we are also the 99% of consumers who provide the capital for the 1%.  

The Corporate Devils, using their lackeys the Down-Pressors, wail and moan that the only way to get our fractured economy "back-on-track" is a return of consumer confidence, and an increase in consumer spending.  Brethren, the "track" that the Devils want to return to is the track of unbridled profits with which to line their pockets.  Sisters and Brothers, the Down-Pressors do not care anything about the fractured economy, except with how it directly relates to the corporate bottom line.  The Down-Pressors will tell our Brethren that it is almost a patriotic duty to spend money on consumer goods.  The Devils, through their talking-head mouthpieces, spread the lie of a sustainable economy based on continually increasing consumer spending.  The Reverend is here to tell you, it is mathematically impossible to have any system that is based on continuous and exponential growth.  The lie of an economy based on consumer spending growth flies in the face of logic, common-sense, and Newtonian physics.  

In future blogs entries, we are going to talk about the fundamental flaws of an economy modeled on continually growing consumer spending.  For now, the Rev would like to bring it back from the theoretical to the get-down of the day-to-day.

I know that all of us, including the Reverend, have to consume goods to survive.  We, all of us, need to eat healthy food, clothe ourselves, and provide our families with shelter.  The Rev is not preaching the gospel of non-consumption.  The power that we have, my Brethren, is the power of using our hard-earned dollars to consume carefully, in ways that are the most beneficial to our family, friends, and community.  So let's get down to it and talk about how we can become wiser consumers, consumers more in control of the impact of our spending habits, both as how our spending effects our own financial freedom, and how our spending effects our community.

"Hey Rev, how can I keep the hard-earned dollars that I spend in my community?"

This is a most righteous question and touches on one of the Rev's favorite things to do.  Keep it local, Baby!  That's right!  I'm not talking about just spending your money on things that are "Made in the USA" which, anymore, are probably just assembled in the USA.  Yes Brethren, that car that you think is made here?  Look at the components!  Digression aside, as the my giant genetic envelope will tell you, "If you shop at the big box stores, eventually all you will have is big box stores."  Wal-Mart is the scourge of communities everywhere, offering the seduction of cheap prices in exchange for oppressive wages to its employees and limited or no health-care coverage for its workers, the workers who are our friends and neighbors.  Wal-Mart, and the other big box stores, directly contribute to the decline of main-street businesses in our fair communities.  

Keeping it local means doing business with the people behind the counter in your neighborhood.  These are the faces of the people that you see everyday, whose children go to school with your children, the folks at the farmer's market who are there every week, selling their healthy goods out of a truck on a cold wet day.  Now, my Brethren, we have a choice to buy local produce instead of pre-packaged and GMO infused junk on a corporate shelf.  That is the key, Brothers and Sisters!  We have a choice!  We need to think of who benefits from the dollars that we spend.  Are we padding the pockets of some parasitical corporation or are we supporting a local business person in our community.  Each purchase has power, people!  The Rev is imploring all of us to make that power count!

"Hey Rev, How can I make my dollars go further in my neighborhood?"

Now we are talking, Brethren.  One great way to make our dollars go further is to buy from a local used book store, used CD store or thrift store in our neighborhoods.  The benefits of this type of shopping are three-fold.  When our good Sisters need some new ensembles, they are saving money by shopping at the local thrift or consignment shops.  When our enlightened Brothers haunt the local used book stores, they are re-using resources and ideas, neither of which should go to the landfill.  When our Brethren need some new tunes, buying used CD's, or vinyl for our audiophile Brethren, they are re-cycling old grooves and turning them into new moves.  

There are many, many, more ways that your consumer choices can have a beneficial effect for both our families, my Brethren, and our communities.  The Rev will do his best to lay them down for you as well as relaying the many great ideas that are coming in from our powerful community.  Meanwhile, I urge all of us to spend wisely when we spend and to conserve where we can.  The power, my Brothers and Sisters, is in our pocket books, purses and wallets.  We have only to wield that power to effect change!!

The Rev would like to leave you with some great links for tunes and tidings.  Keep the Faith My Sisters and Brothers!!

Here is the great prophet, Peter Tosh, laying it down:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4oD63-EJW5Y

Here is a link to a very informative article in Democracy Now:


http://www.democracynow.org/2011/11/25/occupy_everywhere_michael_moore_naomi_klein