Mary Berg Candidate Statement

I believe that the commitment to achieve the most equitable and functional working balance of all our differing needs and intentions is the very heart of the progressive struggle of our time. It is real work, and I believe it is the only work capable of giving us the clarity and the coherence needed to successfully oppose the rightwing forces destroying this nation and threatening the entire planet.

I can provide an exact history of our ongoing struggles and dialogues that I believe will be vitally important on the board as we —the staff, the listeners, the "Pacifica community" - continue the substantial but not impossible effort to achieve a deeper unity even as we celebrate the myriad perspectives we each bring to the table.

There is tremendous power in realizing that just beneath all our arguments and exasperations is an extraordinarily powerful interdependence, a breathing knowledge that what we have in common is infinitely stronger than our differences, a latent but growing power that can provide the pure energy and love and dedication needed for us to take our places at the table and truly overcome the obstacles that threaten to pull us apart.

I believe in this. I have believed in this for a long time. And I am loyal to my beliefs. Discouragements come, of course, but they can't stay. They interfere with the work. For all the messy frustrations and difficulties involved, this democratic experience of ours is finally, to me, what poet and environmentalist Gary Snyder called "the real work." And I want to be part of that work. Elect me again and I will continue to show up, as I have since the beginning, and to present your concerns to the LSB.