Damned If You Do, Damned If You Don’t

Writes Craig Seeman . . .

For decades, the Democratic establishment has given the Green Party the exact same lecture: “Stop wasting your time outside the system! If you want real change, you have to work to reform the party from within!” 🙄

So, what happens when our friends in the DSA (Democratic Socialists of America) actually take that advice? They roll up their sleeves, work within the system, run as Democrats, and – heaven forbid – actually start winning elections.

And what is their reward from the centrist gatekeepers? . . . “Hey, wait a minute, you’re not REAL Democrats! Get the hell out of our party!”

You literally cannot make this stuff up. The corporate political machine doesn’t actually want you to reform them from the inside. They just want you to stop bothering them from the outside. The moment anyone tries to bring actual working-class policies into their house, they are pointed straight toward the “Party Exit” under a banner of “Party Unity.” 🎪🤡

The moral of the story? The Democratic establishment is a fortress designed specifically to reject reform. They don’t want change; they want compliance. The Green Party was right from the very beginning: you cannot use a corporate-backed vehicle to drive a working-class revolution.

Stop playing a rigged game where the rules change the second you start winning.

👉 Ditch the gatekeepers. Join the Green Party today and help us build a real alternative. 🌻

Related Off-site Links:
Backlash from Centrist Democrats as Democratic Socialist Candidates Sweep Primaries – Joseph Gedeon (The Guardian, June 29, 2026).
Can You Be a Socialist and a Democrat? – Corbin Trent (A Fight Worth Having, June 28, 2026).
Will the Mamdani Effect Make 2028 the Year of the Leftwing President? – David Smith (The Guardian, June 28, 2026).
The GOP and the Corporate Dems Can’t Red-Bait Their Way Out of a Reckoning – Thom Hartmann (Common Dreams, June 26, 2026).
Corporate Democrats Mobilize to Counter Rise of Democratic Socialists Within the Party – David Smith (Common Dreams, June 26, 2026).


See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
• Butch Ware and the Gatekeepers Within the Democratic Party
• Quote of the Day – June 24, 2026
• Oliver Kornetzke’s Epic Takedown of the Liberal Tactic of Blaming and Shaming Leftists • Butch Ware on the Democrats’ “Lawfare” to Keep Greens Off the Ballot
• Centrist/Corporatist Democrats Have Just Launched “Left Punching” Season
• Authoritarianism With a Blue Sticker
• The Time for Illusions Is Over: Henry Giroux on the Democratic Party
• David Norton: “The Democratic Party Serves Capital, Not You”
• Mike Figueredo: “Elected Democrats Have No Real Interest in Doing What the Base Wants”
• Tony Pentimalli on the Fallacy of the “Safe Political Center”
• “It Is Our Responsibility to Make a Third Party Viable”
• Hey, Liberals! We Need to Talk
• Butch Ware: “People Really Want New Options in Politics”
• Jill Stein: “Americans Deserve Choices”
• Butch Ware on His Run for California Governor and the Wider Goal of Disrupting the Duopoly
• “The Moment Is Ripe”: Butch Ware on Building a “True Oppositional Alternative” to the Duopoly
• “We Have the Power to Stop the Flow of Money and the False Legitimacy Upon Which Empire Depends”
• Butch Ware: “You Can Actually Vote Your Conscience”
• The “Green Smoothie” Option
• Elise Labott on How Third Parties Can Revitalize Democracy
• Third Parties and the Historical Record
• Something to Think About – August 15, 2024
• Howie Hawkins: “The Democrats Are Not the Answer to the Trump/Fascism Problem”
• Progressive Perspectives on Where Democrats Went Wrong in 2024
• Why the Democratic Party Is Not Going to Save Us From Fascism
• David Sirota: Quote of the Day – January 26, 2021
• Progressive Perspectives On an American Coronation
• Marianne Williamson: “‘Vote Blue No Matter Who’ Is Not Enough to Win”
• Nick Cruse: “‘Vote Blue No Matter Who’ Is the Privileged Position”
• Carlos LeMar Dixon: Without Revolutionary Action, We’re Just “Entertaining the Kings”
• Campaigning With the Green Party of Minnesota
• Voting Green: Hope Over Fear

Welcome to the U.S.A. . . . Officially

The Warren E. Burger Federal Building and U.S. Courthouse in downtown St. Paul was recently the site of a protest against the federal government’s arrest and charging of 15 people accused of conspiring to impede immigration enforcement operations earlier this year in the Twin Cities.

At one point during this protest, law enforcement deployed chemical irritants and flash bangs against the citizens who had gathered to voice their concern and opposition to what Steve Young, Green Party candidate for Minnesota Governor, identifies as a sign that “the fascist fist is tightening because it knows that it is losing its grasp on us.”

For many of us, Young’s words are an accurate description of what is happening across the U.S.A., even as its citizens prepare to celebrate how 250 years ago a band of revolutionaries declared their independence from a king.

Yet as John and Nisha Whitehead write for The Rutherford Institute, “Now, as America prepares to celebrate 250 years of independence, we are confronted with a bitter irony: the republic born in rebellion against empire has become an empire in everything but name.”

“Worse,” the Whiteheads continue, “the U.S. government is violating the very principles that justified the American Revolution. Emergency powers, mass surveillance, endless wars and executive authority have become embedded in the architecture of government. What began as a response to [the September 11, 2001] crisis has become a permanent way of governing. The question is not whether America survived 250 years. The question is whether the principles of 1776 can survive the American police state.”

In the shadow of such a sobering question, I visited the Warren E. Burger Federal Building and Courthouse yesterday for the naturalization ceremony that officially made me a citizen of the United States of America.

Yes, after 32 years of living and working in the U.S. – first on a Student Visa, followed by a Religious Worker Visa, and then a Green Card – I now have all the rights and duties of a citizen.

During the last two years of so, I came to realize that I had three good reasons for becoming a citizen, one of which is being able to vote. I’ve long been interested and involved in U.S. politics, and have supported and/or campaigned for a number of candidates over the years – Ralph Nader and Winona LaDuke, Bernie Sanders, Marianne Williamson, Omar Fateh, Nina Turner, Elijah Manley, Ilhan Omar, Jill Stein and Butch Ware. Currently, I’m supporting and working on a number of local Green Party campaigns, including those of Steve Young & Jane Kirby for Governor & Lieutenant Governor and Seth Kuhl-Stennes for Secretary of State. I’m glad to know that I can now actually vote for the candidates I put so much time and work into supporting. And in so doing, I’ll be doing my bit to help the principles of 1776 survive the current American fascist state.

On a decidedly lighter note, on Thursday my work colleagues threw a little “citizenship party” for me; while following yesterday’s naturalization ceremony two dear friends hosted a lovely afternoon soirée for me in the backyard of their St. Paul home. Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!

Related Off-site Links:
Empire at 250: Can the Principles of 1776 Survive the American Police State? – John and Nisha Whitehead (The Rutherford Institute, June 24, 2026).
The American Revolution and Its Place in History: From the War Against Monarchy to “No Kings”: A Conversation with Five Historians – World Socialist Web Site (June 25, 2026).
“America, U.S.A.”: Eddie Glaude on the 250th Anniversary, Race, and “The Madness at the Heart of the Country” – Democracy Now! (June 29, 2026).
Celebrating What Exactly? – Marianne Williamson (Transform, May 29, 2026).


See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
• Campaigning With the Green Party of Minnesota
• Carlos LeMar Dixon: Without Revolutionary Action, We’re Just “Entertaining the Kings”
• No Kings 3.0
• “Organized Sustained Systemic Resistance and Self-Defense Are Our Only Options”
• Maha D. Blackfeather’s Message to the American People: “We’re Finally Seeing the Truth”
• And So Here We Are
• Chris Hedges on the End of the American Empire
• Inauguration Day Thoughts (2025)
• Something to Think About This Election Day (2024)
• Election Day U.S.A. (2020)
• “The Next Step Is a Green Step, a Progressive Step”
• Bernie Sanders and Jill Stein: Is a “Historic Collaboration” in the Making? (2016)
• Progressive Perspectives on the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election • Demolishing the False Narrative About Jill Stein and the 2016 Election
• 20 Years Stateside (2014)
• The Australian Roots of My Progressive Catholicism
• Thoughts on Tomorrow’s Presidential Election (2008)
• Both “Marriage Amendment” AND “Voter Photo ID Amendment” Rejected by Minnesota Voters (2012)
• Thoughts on Tomorrow's Presidential Election (2008)
• “Change Has Come to America” (2008)
• A Night of Celebration
• The Challenge for Progressives with an Obama Presidency
• Voting Green: Hope Over Fear

Memes of the Times

– Marianne Williamson

See also the previous Wild Reed posts:

ISRAEL AND GAZA
• Chris Hedges: “The Genocide in Gaza Is the Beginning. Welcome to the New World Order”
• The Architecture of Settler Colonialism
• Kym Staton: Quote of the Day – March 3, 2026
• Thomas Fazi on How Western Hegemony Has Entered a Phase of Irreversible Decline
• Omid Safi: Quote of the Day – March 7, 2026
• The Lamentable Legacy of the Biden Administration


THE EPSTEIN FILES
• Something to Think About – February 28, 2026
• Anand Giridharadas: “The Epstein Class Is Defined by Amorality”


THE FAILURES OF THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY
• The Time for Illusions Is Over: Henry Giroux on the Democratic Party
• Jacob Crosse: “The Obama Presidential Center Is a Monument to Hypocrisy”
• Dorothy Lennon on What We Won’t Hear Today at the Opening of the Obama Presidential Library
• Adam Bates: Quote of the Day – June 9, 2026
• When the “Blue Wave” Is a “Blue Crackdown”
• Carlos LeMar Dixon: Without Revolutionary Action, We’re Just “Entertaining the Kings”


BEYOND THE DUOPOLY
• Third Parties and the Historical Record
• Hey, Liberals! We Need to Talk
• How the Green Party Gained Power in the U.K.
• Butch Ware on Why Third Parties Are Crucial
• Campaigning With the Green Party of Minnesota


ZACK POLANSKI
• How the Green Party Gained Power in the U.K.
• “Green Wave 2026 is Global”
• The Rational National’s Take on U.K. Green Party’s “Brilliant” New Ad


MARIANNE WILLIAMSON
• Christopher Schoenherr on Marianne Williamson’s Politics of Love
• “A Very Insightful and Constructive Discussion”
• Marianne Williamson on Staying Grounded Amidst the Chaos


SIGNS OF HOPE
• Chris Smalls: The Working-Class Revolution Is Coming
• Pope Leo XIV: Quote of the Day – June 11, 2026
• Aligning With the Divine
• Kadeem
• A Message in Dance That Challenges, Inspires and Liberates


See also:
• Memes of the Times – May 15, 2026
• Memes of the Times – February 11, 2026
• Memes of the Times – November 23, 2025
• Memes of the Times – September 21, 2025
• Memes of the Times – July 27, 2024
• Memes of the Times – May 21, 2020
• Signs of the Times – April 25, 2017
• At the Minnesota Capitol, Signs of the Times (May 16, 2011)

Quote of the Day

I see folks are continuing to celebrate a handful of democratic “socialists” being elected into office and . . . ehh. The way that leftists and “progressives” REFUSE to accept that the Democratic Party is a road to nowhere. The DNC has been at this for decades and have their co-opting methods down to a science, and the resources to enforce those methods. Y’all are not gonna change the party via electing a few “progressives” (who can/will be co-opted, eventually pushed out of their seats or rendered so ineffective by the rest of the party that they have little to no impact anyway).

This is all time and energy that could be used towards building up alternatives. But, just like your liberal counterparts, y’all continue to limit your own political visions by prematurely deciding that radical change isn’t possible or practical.

Another issue that I have with this is, as soon as y’all do get your “progressive” politicians into office, many of you go full liberal and act like said politicians are infallible; sacred cows who can’t be critiqued on anything (just like liberals do with figures like Obama, Harris and Biden). I’d have less trepidation over electing Democrats, in general, if y’all were willing to understand them as political opposition that should always be engaged critically, like we do with Republicans. But you don’t. You get so attached to the “win” of having a "socialist" (lol) in office that you turn your brains off and go to brunch (again, just like typical liberals). I’ve watched this play out enough times that I just can’t be bothered to assume that this time would go any differently. 🤷🏾‍♂️

And reminder that W. E. B. Du Bois was talking about this back in the 1950s. None of what I’m observing is new. If the Democratic Party could be reformed, it would’ve happened by now.

– Angry Black Hoemo
via social media
June 24, 2026

Related Off-site Links:
Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) and Mamdani-Backed Pro-Palestine Democrats Sweep New York Primaries – Democracy Now! (June 24, 2026).
“Seismic Victory” in New York as Mamdani-Backed Progressives Trounce Establishment Dems and AIPAC Cash – Jake Johnson (Common Dreams, June 24, 2026).
The Left Is Rising – Nathan J. Robinson (Current Affairs, June 24, 2026).


See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
• Authoritarianism With a Blue Sticker
• The Time for Illusions Is Over: Henry Giroux on the Democratic Party
• David Norton: “The Democratic Party Serves Capital, Not You”
• Mike Figueredo: “Elected Democrats Have No Real Interest in Doing What the Base Wants”
• Tony Pentimalli on the Fallacy of the “Safe Political Center”
• “It Is Our Responsibility to Make a Third Party Viable”
• Hey, Liberals! We Need to Talk
• “People Really Want New Options in Politics”
• Butch Ware and the Gatekeepers Within the Democratic Party
• Butch Ware on His Run for California Governor and the Wider Goal of Disrupting the Duopoly
• “The Moment Is Ripe”: Butch Ware on Building a “True Oppositional Alternative” to the Duopoly
• “We Have the Power to Stop the Flow of Money and the False Legitimacy Upon Which Empire Depends”
• Butch Ware on the Democrats’ “Lawfare” to Keep Greens Off the Ballot
• Butch Ware: “You Can Actually Vote Your Conscience”
• The “Green Smoothie” Option
• Jill Stein: “Americans Deserve Choices”
• Elise Labott on How Third Parties Can Revitalize Democracy
• Third Parties and the Historical Record
• Voting Green: Hope Over Fear
• Something to Think About – August 15, 2024
• Howie Hawkins: “The Democrats Are Not the Answer to the Trump/Fascism Problem”
• Genny Harrison on Brian Tyler Cohen’s Interview with Obama
• Progressives and Obama
• Jeff Cohen on How Obama’s “Corporate Liberalism” Led to the Rise of Trump
• Progressive Perspectives on Kamala Harris’s Book, 107 Days
• Adam Bates on the Team Blue / Kamala “I Told Ya So” Smugness Tour
• The Lamentable Legacy of the Biden/Harris Administration
• Progressive Perspectives on Where Democrats Went Wrong in 2024
• Why the Democratic Party Is Not Going to Save Us From Fascism
• David Sirota: Quote of the Day – January 26, 2021
• Progressive Perspectives On an American Coronation
• Marianne Williamson: “‘Vote Blue No Matter Who’ Is Not Enough to Win”
• Nick Cruse: “‘Vote Blue No Matter Who’ Is the Privileged Position”
• Centrist/Corporatist Democrats Have Just Launched “Left Punching” Season
• Carlos LeMar Dixon: Without Revolutionary Action, We’re Just “Entertaining the Kings”
• Oliver Kornetzke’s Epic Takedown of the Liberal Tactic of Blaming and Shaming Leftists

Australian Sojourn – April-May 2026

Part 9: Last Days in Australia

It’s been well over a month since my return to the U.S. from my Australian sojourn of April-May. High time, then, to conclude my series documenting my time in the Great South Land. (NOTE: To start at the beginning of this series, click here.)

After spending two-and-a-half days visiting Mum and my brother and his family in Guruk (Port Macquarie), I returned to my friends Mike and Bernie’s place in Gulmarrad. I’m very fortunate to now be possession of Mum’s car (as she’s no longer driving), and extra fortunate to have Mike and Bernie be willing to take care of it while I’m in the U.S. Of course, how much longer I’ll be in the States is a question I continue to ponder.

Above: The McFarlane Bridge in nearby Maclean. This historic bridge opened in 1906 over the South Arm of the Clarence River, providing access between Maclean and Woodford Island. It last opened to allow boats through in 1962.

Above: A view of Maclean with St Mary’s Catholic Church at right.

Above: Gulmarrad sunset – Thursday, May 7, 2026.

Above and left: Early on Sunday, May 10, Bernie drove me to the Grafton railway station where I caught the southbound XPT to Sydney.

Above: My reading material on my 10-hour train trip from Grafton to Sydney.

Last June when I was in Australia, my nephew Brendan, who was visiting from the U.K., shared with me that his favorite novel is The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath. He even gifted me with a beautiful hardcover illustrated edition of the book (right) toward the end of my 2025 visit.

Here’s what I texted Brendan on the last night of this year’s visit.

Hey! I just read The Bell Jar in one sitting – on the train from Grafton to Sydney! 👍🏼😁

I didn’t bring with me to Australia the beautiful edition of the book that you gave me as I didn’t want to risk damaging it in my travels. Instead, I brought a paperback edition that I picked up for $5 in a bookstore in Minneapolis just before my visit home.

It’s an engrossing and powerful novel for sure. And such great writing. Sylvia had a real way with words and with creating vivid scenes and moods.

Thanks for recommending it to me. I’m glad I (finally) read it.

Above: Sydney Airport – Monday, May 11, 2026.


NEXT: May Vignettes

For the previous posts in the Australian Sojourn – April-May 2026 series, see:
• Sydney and Newcastle
• Gulmarrad
• Guruk
• Gunnedah
• Armidale
• Gulmarrad, Maclean, and Brooms Head
• Brisbane, Montville, and the Sunshine Coast
• Return to Guruk

Images: Michael J. Bayly.

The Wild Man

The following recently appeared in my Facebook feed. Given my interest in the mythological figures of both Pan and Cernunnos, it feels natural to share here at The Wild Reed this piece on the folklore figure of the Wild Man.

_____________

Long before modern stories of monsters in the woods, there was the Wild Man.

He appears across European folklore again and again. Covered in hair, carrying branches or a club, living far beyond villages and roads.

He was called by different names in different places, yet the image remained strangely familiar.

Not animal.

Not human.

Something in between.

The Wild Man lived where rules ended.

He slept beneath trees, drank from rivers, and answered to no king, no church, and no society. To settled people, this made him dangerous.

But the old stories rarely describe him as evil.

He was unpredictable.

Sometimes he kidnapped travellers.

Sometimes he offered wisdom.

Sometimes he tested those who entered his forest and punished arrogance.

Other times he guided people toward hidden truths.

Over time, the Wild Man became more than a creature.

He became a symbol.

He represented the untamed parts of human nature, instinct, emotion, freedom, anger, sexuality, survival, and the side of ourselves that exists beneath manners and expectations.

Civilization depends on control.

The Wild Man asks what happens when control disappears.

This is why old stories placed him at the edge of the forest.

The forests represented the unknown.

And the deeper you walked into them the closer you came to parts of yourself that ordinary life kept hidden.

The Wild Man reminds us of something ancient.

Not everything wild is dangerous.

Some things are wild because they were never meant to be owned.

And sometimes what we fear in the forest is the part of ourselves still waiting to come home.

~ Source

Related Off-site Links:
The Winsted Wildman ~ Ray Bendici (Damned Connecticut, August 2014).
“Wild Man” ~ A song by Kate Bush (2011).


See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
• Cernunnos and Pan: “Witch-Fathers of the Wild”
• Beloved and Antlered
• Cernunnos
• Integrating Cernunnos, “Archetype of Sensuality and the Instinctual World”
• Cernunnos in Autumn Light
• The Devil We (Think) We Know
• Biophilia, the God Pan, and a Baboon Named Scott
• The Piper at the Gates of Dawn
• Pan’s Labyrinth: Critiquing the Cult of Unquestioning Obedience


Image 1: Wild Man sculpture over the porch of St Mary's Church in Burwell, Cambridgeshire, England. (Photographer unknown)
Image 2: The Winsted Wildman. (Artist unknown)

The Fatherly Heart

On this Fathers Day, some words of wisdom from Matthew Fox . . .

The fatherly heart is so important that we must all learn to embody it, whether male or female, young or old, parents or grandparents.

. . . [A] fatherly heart brings hope, promise and possibility into one's life, while the lack of a fatherly heart often brings hopelessness and despair and the violence that follows.

A fatherly heart gives us wings, providing us with ambition, empowerment, and strength. The fatherly heart also provides boundaries and contains us, grounding us like the Green Man. A good father encourages personal and individual responsibility. A fatherly heart does not foster dependency or co-dependency but healthy individuality.

An authentic fatherly heart is in love with life, and is a nourisher and supporter of [this love of life]. . . . An authentic father is a caretaker for Mother Earth, working to make sure her creatures, soil, water, air and forests are healthy. A fatherly heart goes out of its way to foster mutual communication within a family and a community: a communication that flows both ways, listening and speaking, teaching and learning.

~ Matthew Fox
Excerpted from The Hidden Spirituality of Men:
Ten Metaphors to Awaken the Sacred Masculine
New World Library, 2009

See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
• A Warrior’s Heart
• Cernunnos and Pan: “Witch-Fathers of the Wild”
• A Fresh Take on Masculinity
• Flexibility and Flow
• Quote of the Day ~ February 21, 2025
• Vulnerability Is Power
• Beloved and Antlered
• Remembering and Celebrating Dad

Image: Margarita Sikorskaia

A Solstice Eve Walk Through the Neighborhood

See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
• Solstice Dawn
• On This Summer Solstice, A Call for Unity Through the Divine Fire Within
• A Summer Sunset Psalm
• Say Yes to the Light
• Summer Garden
• Beneath the Solstice Sun
• On This Summer Solstice, A Proclamation of the Power of Fire
• A Summer Solstice Reflection
• Celebrating the Summer Solstice
• O Breath of Summer
• Summer Blooms
• Thomas Moore on the Circling of Nature as the Best Way to Find Our Substance
• The Guidance of Higher Forces
• Balance: The Key to Serenity and Clarity
• The Dance of a Summer Day
• The Summer of My Wildebeest-of-a-Bike
• June Vignettes
• Eternal Summer

Images: Michael J. Bayly.