[* Read Our Holiday Letter in PDF Format *]

To Our friends, family, and community,

Wow, what a year! 2008 showed us that the story of what is possible for our country can change.

Outdated stories were shattered: the story of racial inferiority, the story of market fundamentalism, the story that young people don’t participate. Obama’s campaign proved the power of a hopeful new story to drive progressive political change.

Now is a moment when grassroots leaders can seize the day to change the story and change the world. The cultural currents are ripe. America is ready to shatter old assumptions and embrace new ideas. Are you?

This is one of the most important political moments of our lifetime, and with your support smartMeme is ready to lead. Our mission of holistic social change and our model of story-based strategy have never been more urgent, but we need your generous donation now more than ever.

We’ve got gifted people, a diverse network, the right programs, and the right ideas. We are celebrating the long-awaited release of Re:Imagining Change, our new activist guide to storytelling strategies. We are toasting a year chock full of successful smartMeme interventions that:

• Called for Economic Justice and a Green New Deal for Main Street. SmartMeme convened a rapid response story-based strategy session on the Wall Street meltdown and the bank bailout.

• Protected Water from Privatization. SmartMeme helped a community at the base of Mt. Shasta safeguard one of the country’s most important watersheds from Nestlé’s water profiteering, and halt construction of (what was to be) the largest water bottling plant in the US.

• Built the Peace Movement Inside the Military. SmartMeme partnered with Iraq Veterans Against the War (IVAW) to support Winter Solider: Iraq & Afghanistan – Eyewitness Accounts of the Occupations, and earn international media coverage of the stories of young veterans. IVAW doubled their membership in 2008, and is poised to meet with the new Administration’s Veterans Affairs staff.
SmartMeme does not get funding from corporations, the government, or even large foundations. Because of the financial crisis, our already limited family-foundation funding has been cut by 60%. SmartMeme –along with the nation—is facing tough economic times. We are optimistic, totally committed, and ready to seize the promise of progressive change. But we must do it together, as a community.

We cannot let this political moment pass us by. Our goal is to raise $50,000 this holiday season. Please, make a bold gift today: $5000, $500, $100, $50…or a smaller amount each month as a smartMeme sustainer.

Ask your self, what is it worth to have smartMeme in the world? How much do you value our unique community of passionate innovators and savvy strategists? What would you give for a better future?

Together, we will not go back to the way things were– we will keep moving forward to meet the challenges of our time: war, global warming, economic crisis, social injustice. People power makes it possible. You make it possible.

The world needs new stories, needs smartMeme, and needs you.

Please join us now in making a generous gift to support smartMeme’s important mission, and change the story for a better future. Thank you for your support, and for all you do.

With Gratitude and Good Tidings of the Season,

Doyle Canning & Patrick Reinsborough

PS: Have you seen our new strategy manual and online video Re:Imagining Change?! Your donation will help us print this critical resource and get story-based strategy into the hands of activists across the country — You can download the doc and give secure online today: smartmeme.org/change

THANK YOU – AND HAPPY NEW YEAR!

The NY Times is reporting an interesting shift in the Democrat’s messaging around the economic crisis. Apparently “stimulus” is out and “recovery” is the new meme of choice. Obama’s chief of staff Rahm Emanuel is quoted as saying “Stimulus is Washington talk and ‘economic recovery’ is how the American people think of it.” Nancy Pelosi apparently even clarified at a press conference that “We’re not using the word ‘stimulus’.”

It’s always worth paying attention to coordinated efforts to shift the framing of a critical issue but particularly in this case what does it mean? Will the Democrats start getting to the real roots of the problem or is it just new language for the same polices of denial and distraction?

The financial crisis provides us a unique opportunity to fundamentally change the way we conceptualize our economy and what makes an “economic recovery”. We are long overdue to recognize that the economy is merely a sub-system of an even more important and threatened system — the planet’s ecological operating system. Just as our economic system is sagging under the weight of toxic debt, our global environment is suffering from the debt industrialized nations have run up on the planet’s life sustaining natural systems. This uncalculated natural debt stems from the destruction of ecosystems, over-consumption by the wealthy, over extraction of limited resources and the dumping of massive amounts of pollution into the air, water and bodies of all living things. By continuing to ignore the true ecological foundation of our economy we are jeopardizing not only our economic well being but our entire global civilization.

Collectively, we must be very clear that whatever the Democrats mean by “economic recovery” it can not be the same-old, unfettered and indiscriminate “economic growth” that has created so many of our problems. It’s time to let our values and our common sense guide our economic policy. What do we want to grow? More billionaires or more organic vegetables? More strip malls selling disposable plastic crap or more just, resilient communities? More coal fired power plants or more local, renewable energy solutions? It’s time to change our thinking and change the story about what defines a healthy economy. Our movements need to demand that this economic recovery is part of a broader transformation of our economic system away from unlimited economic growth based on extraction, destruction and exploitation and towards a steady state economy based on ecological restoration, justice and equality.

There are lots of great resources out there for folks looking for the roots of this crisis and for real solutions. One of the best compilations has been put together by YES! magazine. You can also check out the new report from the Institute for Policy Studies Skewed Priorities: How the Bailouts Dwarf Other Crises which documents how that the U.S. and European governments are spending over 40 times on bailing out the financial system than they are on fighting global warming or poverty. Another resource is Break the Bailout an emerging “transpartisan coalition” that is challenging the massive taxpayer hand out to Wall Street and proposing alternatives.

Movements are the world are rising to the challenge of not only reframing the policy debates around the bail out of the financial industry but also questioning the underlying assumptions that are driving our current pathological economic system. At the recent G-20 meetings, hundreds of civil society organizations from around the planet produced a statement outlining an agenda to create an economic system that works for both people and planet. But this is just the beginning — there’s lots more work to do to make sure that the power of money works in the service of life. What are you doing to change the story around unlimited growth and create a more just, ecologically sane economy? Leave us a comment or drop us a line and let us know.