Public Comment

Hi, I’m Christian “The Kid” Pecaut. At Stanford University in 2003, I created a class called “The Science of Social Problem Solving.” The main lecturer was Neil Robert Miller, a San Francisco public high school teacher, who passed away early in 2005. In late 1984, he and a team of dedicated student researchers completed the Paradigm from California, www.imaginenine.com, a full-scale scientific understanding that describes why things have gone so badly for 10,000 years, what a world-going-well looks like, and how to put things right, world-wide and forever. Since he died, I have been working tirelessly to share this discovery with the leadership of the Democratic Party, particularly the Clintons, who received exclusive ownership of the copyrights in accord with Neil’s explicit last wishes. 

So what does the Paradigm prove that is relevant to the citizens of Berkeley?  

1. Nature, and basic human behavior within it, are geared for work out well for every person.  

Implications: human-harming problems, such as poverty, violence, rape, deception, and homelessness, can and must be solved, for everyone, permanently; claims otherwise (such as “It is inevitable within nature that things will work out poorly for some, most, or all people”) are inaccurate, harmful, and deliberate lies. 

2. Protection is supposed to flow mainly downwards in hierarchies, and anxiety mainly upwards.  

Implications: Principled behavior involves primarily focusing our attention and resources on the more vulnerable—downwards in a hierarchy. Anxieties are absorbed by the powerful, combined with resources, and solved for everyone. It is unprincipled, deadly, anti-nature theft to primarily serve more powerful people, while blaming and punishing those with less power than you have. 

3. This bioecosystem works on a singular reality system, fully knowable to every human being. Implications: the difference between those who accurately report and those who deliberately misreport what they perceive or understand, is an absolute, same-for-everyone, distinction. Widely held, inaccurate ideas such as No Real Truth, Multi-Truth, or Unknowable Truth are the primary means that deceptive people remain influential and believed. 

Sounds philosophical? Well, let’s look at the City of Berkeley in this light. UC Berkeley has its claws so far into Tom Bates and the Planning Department, they are a fused unity. And that means your mayor, and a substantial portion of your city government, take direct orders from a consortium of developers, corporations and financiers—headed up by U.S. Republican Party tacticians. Sure, they’ll let Tom choose who to commemorate at the beginning of every council meeting (maybe), but for the real decisions (downtown, taxes, People’s Park, 9/11) the big boys up top know they’ve got a mayor who will “play ball” when instructed.  

Not Christian “The Kid” Pecaut. I saw with my own eyes at Stanford University exactly how the highest-level finance capital spooks get what they want: fake “environmental” groups that mask real estate speculation, “psychology” courses that dupe cure-seeking young girls into testing and marketing suicide-creating psychotropic medications, “technology innovation competitions” that coerce young boys into engineering unmanned U.S. military vehicles for Iraq. And worse. UC Berkeley, I regretfully report, is almost no different. So, what can we do? Well, once you read the Paradigm, and begin looking at your environment with an accuracy-based, solving-human-harm framework, the power of participatory democracy comes into focus. 

You see, the only way these deceivers maintain power is through the unnecessary and tragically mistaken protection they receive from caretakers at every level of society. The caretakers, the liberals, the good guys, make up 90 percent of every human group. The bullies, the reactionaries, the bad guys, are less than 10 percent of every human group, and yet they rule, everywhere—even here in Berkeley. To see this 90/10 Law in effect, a citizen needs look no further than DAPAC, the Landmarks Preservation Commission, or the Ashby Transit Village Task Force. It is the same cohort of real estate flunkies, paid planning stooges, and fake democracy “facilitators” that run every group. And it is the well-meaning but naively compliant general public that ends up helping them to steal, bleed, and kill our livelihood, intelligence, and dignity. 

These 10 percent tyrants require the 90 percent general public consent to carry out their hidden designs. Between the Fair Representation Ordinance and the Brown Act, we have the power to bind the City of Berkeley in a standstill whenever its officials, elected or otherwise, violate the public trust. We must pass strong, unequivocal motions in our appointed commissions, and force the City Council and mayor to obey our will. 

Don’t fall into the trap of respecting the carefully guarded expertise of the Planning Department or city attorneys. The law is for the people, not the lawyers. Propose daring, intelligent motions, and then sway your more timid and subservient peers into decisive, correct votes. Demand what you want, and let our elected representatives and staff figure out how to get it done. That’s why we pay them. During the recent public hearing on the budget, I rose to speak against a proposed increase in sewer fees. I explained how Tom Bates had negotiated a discounted sewer fee, in secret, with UC Berkeley last year. To my surprise and delight, the City Council resoundingly rejected the residential fee increase 5-0-4. (The mayor quickly changed his vote from “No” to “Abstain” once he realized he was the only vote against the now popular tax relief). 

This $300-$500 victory for every Berkeley household encouraged me to look even more closely at the city manager’s plan to spend our citizens’ hard-earned tax money. Thanks to the common sense insight and hard work of my volunteer staff, we uncovered the core of the financial-political control in the city: shadow appropriations. As I explained to the City Council and viewing public last Tuesday, “the way it works is that the city manager and their staff, they don’t do the job they are paid to do; and then, after not doing the job, they appropriate more money in order to pay other people to do their job.” The example I provided was street maintenance, where the painted markings were allowed to deteriorate, over years, under the paid watch of 200-plus assistants and supervisors in the Public Works Department. Then, a private contractor was hired at $400,000 per year, for three years, in order to do the same job that we, the citizen tax payers, have already paid for. 

If your head starts to spin when you try to understand how these “shadow appropriations” work, don’t be dismayed; the whole technique was designed to confuse, mislead, and steal from the public. And we’re not just talking about faded curbs. Look at Telegraph. Look at the Housing Authority. Look at the (please, don’t shoot) Police Department. The city budget is glutted with double appropriations, double spending, and triple talk—costing $10 million, cumulatively, every year. 

Tom Bates has a “winning” plan: buy his way back into office, stay quiet about his friends’ kickbacks, and lie a whole lot about what he understands. 

Unfortunately, the current City Council doesn’t yet have the courage or the confidence to point out these high-level financial schemes. “Just get along…” they whispered with their smiles, when they approved another year of unnecessary theft last Tuesday, right before approving an impeachment resolution that conceals the president’s deliberate mass murder of thousands of U.S. citizens at the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. 

Not Christian “The Kid” Pecaut. And not Berkeley. 

All you silent citizens, overflow the halls of government with your public comment—and insist on being heard! Almost alone I forced the City Council to reject Tom Bates’ proposed residential sewer hikes. Almost alone I exposed the hidden developer cabal pulling the strings behind DAPAC, thereby swaying the commissioners to demand transparent, public meetings. The human voice, spoken with determination and righteousness in a public forum, is the most powerful force on Earth. We can seize power in Berkeley—legally—and forge the charter along with our $300 million budget into a city that can solve the problems of its citizens, and serve as a model for the United States and the world. Vote for “The Kid,” the next mayor of Berkeley, in November.  

Hi, I’m Christian “The Kid” Pecaut. At Stanford University in 2003, I created a class called “The Science of Social Problem Solving.” The main lecturer was Neil Robert Miller, a San Francisco public high school teacher, who passed away early in 2005. In late 1984, he and a team of dedicated student researchers completed the Paradigm from California, www.imaginenine.com, a full-scale scientific understanding that describes why things have gone so badly for 10,000 years, what a world-going-well looks like, and how to put things right, world-wide and forever. Since he died, I have been working tirelessly to share this discovery with the leadership of the Democratic Party, particularly the Clintons, who received exclusive ownership of the copyrights in accord with Neil’s explicit last wishes. 

So what does the Paradigm prove that is relevant to the citizens of Berkeley?  

1. Nature, and basic human behavior within it, are geared for work out well for every person.  

Implications: human-harming problems, such as poverty, violence, rape, deception, and homelessness, can and must be solved, for everyone, permanently; claims otherwise (such as “It is inevitable within nature that things will work out poorly for some, most, or all people”) are inaccurate, harmful, and deliberate lies. 

2. Protection is supposed to flow mainly downwards in hierarchies, and anxiety mainly upwards.  

Implications: Principled behavior involves primarily focusing our attention and resources on the more vulnerable—downwards in a hierarchy. Anxieties are absorbed by the powerful, combined with resources, and solved for everyone. It is unprincipled, deadly, anti-nature theft to primarily serve more powerful people, while blaming and punishing those with less power than you have. 

3. This bioecosystem works on a singular reality system, fully knowable to every human being. Implications: the difference between those who accurately report and those who deliberately misreport what they perceive or understand, is an absolute, same-for-everyone, distinction. Widely held, inaccurate ideas such as No Real Truth, Multi-Truth, or Unknowable Truth are the primary means that deceptive people remain influential and believed. 

Sounds philosophical? Well, let’s look at the City of Berkeley in this light. UC Berkeley has its claws so far into Tom Bates and the Planning Department, they are a fused unity. And that means your mayor, and a substantial portion of your city government, take direct orders from a consortium of developers, corporations and financiers—headed up by U.S. Republican Party tacticians. Sure, they’ll let Tom choose who to commemorate at the beginning of every council meeting (maybe), but for the real decisions (downtown, taxes, People’s Park, 9/11) the big boys up top know they’ve got a mayor who will “play ball” when instructed.  

Not Christian “The Kid” Pecaut. I saw with my own eyes at Stanford University exactly how the highest-level finance capital spooks get what they want: fake “environmental” groups that mask real estate speculation, “psychology” courses that dupe cure-seeking young girls into testing and marketing suicide-creating psychotropic medications, “technology innovation competitions” that coerce young boys into engineering unmanned U.S. military vehicles for Iraq. And worse. UC Berkeley, I regretfully report, is almost no different. So, what can we do? Well, once you read the Paradigm, and begin looking at your environment with an accuracy-based, solving-human-harm framework, the power of participatory democracy comes into focus. 

You see, the only way these deceivers maintain power is through the unnecessary and tragically mistaken protection they receive from caretakers at every level of society. The caretakers, the liberals, the good guys, make up 90 percent of every human group. The bullies, the reactionaries, the bad guys, are less than 10 percent of every human group, and yet they rule, everywhere—even here in Berkeley. To see this 90/10 Law in effect, a citizen needs look no further than DAPAC, the Landmarks Preservation Commission, or the Ashby Transit Village Task Force. It is the same cohort of real estate flunkies, paid planning stooges, and fake democracy “facilitators” that run every group. And it is the well-meaning but naively compliant general public that ends up helping them to steal, bleed, and kill our livelihood, intelligence, and dignity. 

These 10 percent tyrants require the 90 percent general public consent to carry out their hidden designs. Between the Fair Representation Ordinance and the Brown Act, we have the power to bind the City of Berkeley in a standstill whenever its officials, elected or otherwise, violate the public trust. We must pass strong, unequivocal motions in our appointed commissions, and force the City Council and mayor to obey our will. 

Don’t fall into the trap of respecting the carefully guarded expertise of the Planning Department or city attorneys. The law is for the people, not the lawyers. Propose daring, intelligent motions, and then sway your more timid and subservient peers into decisive, correct votes. Demand what you want, and let our elected representatives and staff figure out how to get it done. That’s why we pay them. During the recent public hearing on the budget, I rose to speak against a proposed increase in sewer fees. I explained how Tom Bates had negotiated a discounted sewer fee, in secret, with UC Berkeley last year. To my surprise and delight, the City Council resoundingly rejected the residential fee increase 5-0-4. (The mayor quickly changed his vote from “No” to “Abstain” once he realized he was the only vote against the now popular tax relief). 

This $300-$500 victory for every Berkeley household encouraged me to look even more closely at the city manager’s plan to spend our citizens’ hard-earned tax money. Thanks to the common sense insight and hard work of my volunteer staff, we uncovered the core of the financial-political control in the city: shadow appropriations. As I explained to the City Council and viewing public last Tuesday, “the way it works is that the city manager and their staff, they don’t do the job they are paid to do; and then, after not doing the job, they appropriate more money in order to pay other people to do their job.” The example I provided was street maintenance, where the painted markings were allowed to deteriorate, over years, under the paid watch of 200-plus assistants and supervisors in the Public Works Department. Then, a private contractor was hired at $400,000 per year, for three years, in order to do the same job that we, the citizen tax payers, have already paid for. 

If your head starts to spin when you try to understand how these “shadow appropriations” work, don’t be dismayed; the whole technique was designed to confuse, mislead, and steal from the public. And we’re not just talking about faded curbs. Look at Telegraph. Look at the Housing Authority. Look at the (please, don’t shoot) Police Department. The city budget is glutted with double appropriations, double spending, and triple talk—costing $10 million, cumulatively, every year. 

Tom Bates has a “winning” plan: buy his way back into office, stay quiet about his friends’ kickbacks, and lie a whole lot about what he understands. 

Unfortunately, the current City Council doesn’t yet have the courage or the confidence to point out these high-level financial schemes. “Just get along…” they whispered with their smiles, when they approved another year of unnecessary theft last Tuesday, right before approving an impeachment resolution that conceals the president’s deliberate mass murder of thousands of U.S. citizens at the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. 

Not Christian “The Kid” Pecaut. And not Berkeley. 

All you silent citizens, overflow the halls of government with your public comment—and insist on being heard! Almost alone I forced the City Council to reject Tom Bates’ proposed residential sewer hikes. Almost alone I exposed the hidden developer cabal pulling the strings behind DAPAC, thereby swaying the commissioners to demand transparent, public meetings. The human voice, spoken with determination and righteousness in a public forum, is the most powerful force on Earth. We can seize power in Berkeley—legally—and forge the charter along with our $300 million budget into a city that can solve the problems of its citizens, and serve as a model for the United States and the world. Vote for “The Kid,” the next mayor of Berkeley, in November.  

Christian Pecaut is a candidate for mayor of Berkeley (www.BerkeleyMayor.org). 

EDITOR’S NOTE: 

The Daily Planet encourages all mayoral and City Council candidates to send commentaries to opinion@berkeleydailyplanet.com.