Art Goldberg
By Ron Garmon
We’re five years and change into war in Iraq, and U.S. public opinion finally coos for peace. Looking back, one is impressed with the ease the same oft-surveyed “folks” swallowed the WMD, the dirty bomb, the “cakewalk” impostures, each going down as if bullshit were bouillabaisse. This bent toward extreme credulity has been the sport of public-minded folk from Barnum to Chomsky, but has nothing to do with Art Goldberg, a man who seems to believe that when deception is wholesale, the wising-up has to start retail.
Art is an attorney, a longtime activist (an original Free Speech Movementer), and the cheerful, stork-like fellow seen waving a “STOP THE WAR” sign every Friday afternoon at the corner of Sunset and Echo Park boulevards. Which was where I found him, grinning happily in the heat and smog, collecting horn-hoots and “Fuck yeahs!” from commuters only too eager to yell at quitting time. We spoke while 6-foot-4 Art ran from car to car, with 5-10 me waving my tape recorder in pursuit. Some onlookers regarded the scene as comic.
–Ron Garmon
L.A. CityBeat: You get a lot of play from pedestrians, leaning on the horn, yet people on the sidewalk pass you by stony-faced.
Art Goldberg: That’s true of some people. I’ve been out here for five years, and people do stop and talk. But you’re right, the people who won’t, who refuse eye-contact, are the kids. The younger, hip people. They’re too hip to be involved. I think they think it’s just not cool. They didn’t grow up in any political culture, so they don’t know how to acknowledge anything political.
Their earliest political memory is probably the Clinton impeachment, which is enough to put anyone off politics. How long have you been at this?
Well, we started about five-and-a-half years ago over on Glendale Boulevard, but we get to interact with more people on the sidewalk here.
There are about six of you all out here. What’s the name of your group?
Right now, we’re just an ad-hoc group, but we used to be Neighbors for Peace & Justice.
Now it’s a do-ocracy of anyone willing to show up?
Yeah. We have anywhere from five to 10 people who show up every Friday for five-and-a-half years. That’s good!
Well, “good” in only a narrow sense.
Right. [laughs] We went through all the different stages. The first six months we were popular, then the next six months people used to throw things at us and call us “traitors” and the next six months it was kinda neutral, until now 70 percent of the people in this neighborhood support us. Latinos are probably the most vocal antiwar community in the country right now.
Why?
The stories they tell me: of joining the Army to get documented and lots of the parents coming out and crying and thanking us for being out here. They’re the underclass and have suffered the most.
You look around at the faces and there’s considerable consciousness of having been used.
I think that’s true. The pro-Obama sentiment around here has grown by leaps and bounds.
Do you think he’ll win this?
He has more chance of winning than losing. If he loses, it’ll be because of racism and people’s fears of dealing with anything that’s perceived as different from them. L.A. isn’t the world, but I wish it was.
How long have you been in the protest biz, Mr. Goldberg?
Since 1961. I grew up in Inglewood and my parents weren’t very political, but really decent people. The ’60s caught up with me and I helped start a very important movement, the Free Speech Movement at Berkeley. Out of school and almost every day ever since. My kids are active, and they’re bringing up my grandkids to be active. How’s your paper doing? I hope you guys make it. Every time there’s a really good independent newspaper in the town, it gets bought out or shut down.
Are things comparable now to the early 1960s, when you started?
That’s a good question. Back then we were just coming out of a very reactionary period as well. I think it’s more difficult today because people are more beaten down by corruption, cynicism and hopelessness. They’re comparable in the sense that there’s beginning to be a political culture again. Everyone everywhere is talking about the election and that’s all to the good.
[At this point a surly passerby sneered, “Why don’t you two kiss?” Art responded with a friendly wave, while I yelled an invitation for him to suck my dick.]
There was something very generational in our responses to that. What has to happen for the war in Iraq to end?
I think if Obama wins, it will end. Not right away and not the way I’d do it, but it will end. I think maybe even if he doesn’t win, it’ll end, since the nationalist Shia government has to get rid of us because Iran has ordered them to. I don’t have great faith in [Obama] as a capitalist politician, but I do think his election would go a long way toward fighting racism in this country.
Published: 09/10/2008
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