Peace Blog Archive

[Ed. Note: This writer (Charles Jenks) fully agrees with Cindy Sheehan about the peace movement. It too often works at cross purposes, and is beset by turf defending and sectarianism. I also believe that partisan politics has failed the American people, the Iraqi people and the people of the world. The Iraq War is a bi-partisan war. It was bi-partisan before the invasion - via the horrendous and genocidal sanctions - and continues through this day, as both parties voted for the war resolution and have continued to fund the war. Recently, some Reps have touted their voting against war funding. Well, these same Reps voted to advance the bill for voting, a bill they knew would pass. The procedural vote was the important one here. If Reps had declined to vote on funding the war, Bush would have to use existing funds to withdraw the troops.

As for our beloved Cindy, we pray that she gets some good R and R. Heaven knows she deserves it. Then, we need her back.]

“Good Riddance Attention Whore”
Cindy Sheehan

I have endured a lot of smear and hatred since Casey was killed and especially since I became the so-called “Face” of the American anti-war movement. Especially since I renounced any tie I have remaining with the Democratic Party, I have been further trashed on such “liberal blogs” as the Democratic Underground. Being called an “attention whore” and being told “good riddance” are some of the more milder rebukes.

I have come to some heartbreaking conclusions this Memorial Day Morning. These are not spur of the moment reflections, but things I have been meditating on for about a year now. The conclusions that I have slowly and very reluctantly come to are very heartbreaking to me. (more…)

Where have all the Giants Gone?
Cindy Sheehan

We have an old saying in my adopted state of Texas and you may have it in your own state too: “Those who don’t learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” America is not unique for perpetuating a history that was founded on genocide and where violence is constantly relied upon for problem solving, but this is our country and how can we finally learn the lessons of war and corrupt regimes?

Our history is also rife with giants who have gone before us who either affected true and relevant change, or who have at least alleviated temporary suffering. Women now have the right to vote and participate fully in our government due to giants such as Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony and Jeannette Rankin. Slavery was abolished because of the brave efforts of some like Harriet Tubman, Bronson Alcott, Harriet Beecher Stowe, and Frederick Douglas. The Civil Rights movement was enriched by the presence of ministers like Martin Luther King, Jr. and Joseph Lowery among many others. Active duty soldiers joined with the anti-war movement during the Vietnam conflict to help bring a close to that other most recent illegal war of aggression. (more…)

Street Heat
Cindy Sheehan

When we left Lafayette Park yesterday there were 3396 Americans dead in Iraq. When we got to the Capitol about 45 minutes later, the count was up to 3498 and when we got out of jail 8 hours later, 3401 were gone.

Three-hundred amazing Americans joined us yesterday in The Mother of a March which was sponsored by The Camp Casey Peace Institute and supported and co-sponsored by many other peace groups. (more…)

Needless Carnage
(And the Beat Goes On)
Cindy Sheehan

“My son, Jon Michael, is the best son a dad can have. He will always be my pride and joy.” – George Tenet: Former Director of Central Intelligence; page 520 of his book:

At the Center of the Storm

I had difficulty making the purchase of George Tenet’s new book. With a multi-million dollar advance already, I didn’t want to contribute to someone who has already profited so obscenely from other people’s dead children. This self-congratulatory, buck-passing book was even more difficult to read. But when I came to the last paragraph and read the above quote about Tenet’s precious son, Jon Michael, I began to cry in my uncomfortable airplane seat. (more…)

*** Please forward widely ***

May 8, 2007

Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi:

We are students from Bay Area colleges and universities and part of the Campus Antiwar Network. We are concerned about the state of the war and occupation in Iraq as well as the effect that this is having on our schools and our communities. We are furthermore concerned that the debate about the war has been hamstrung by political maneuvering rather than principled commitments to peace and justice. In that vein, we believe that any meaningful solution in the Middle East requires the following:

1) Immediate withdrawal of all US forces, personnel, and contractors from Iraq
2) Iraqi control over Iraq: no permanent military bases, no control over Iraqi oil, no US intervention in their political process
3) Full funding of veterans’ benefits and health care, including mental health care
4) Reparations to the Iraqi people
5) Ban on the use of depleted uranium munitions in Iraq
6) Redistribution of the war budget towards jobs and education (more…)

Kent State 37 Years Later
Cindy Sheehan

This is the keynote address Cindy gave on May 04, 2007, at the commemoration of the Kent State Massacre.

First of ail, I would just like to say that I am not only in favor of impeaching George Bush and Dick Cheney, but of trying them for war crimes and locking them both up in Guantanamo for the rest of their lives! I also agree with Tom (Hayden) that an “anti-war” movement is basically a self-destructive movement, because when our objectives are achieved, the movement is over. That is why we must call ourselves a “peace” movement so our movement will never end. There will always be a need for people who commit their lives to peace as strenuously as they commit their lives to the anti-war movement. (more…)

Get Off it Bill O’Reilly
Cindy Sheehan

A recent Harris Poll indicated that only 22% of Americans support George’s war of terror. I suspect that the less than one-fourth of our country who are still in favor of the hopeless mess BushCo has tragically involved the USA in get all of their “news” from Fox News. (more…)

Four Dead in Ohio
Cindy Sheehan

May 4th, 2007 will be the 37th year since the Kent State, Ohio, massacre where four anti-war protesters were killed by Ohio National Guardsmen during a protest against Richard Nixon’s announced escalation in Vietnam.

On that day in 1970, anti-Vietnam war sentiment in the entire nation was high as hundreds of soldiers were coming home in flag-draped coffins every week and we were bombarded daily with images of burning villages and screaming Vietnamese children. The images were harsh, but what was even harsher was the Nixon regime escalating a war in a Johnsonian way when he had promised that he would end the quagmire in Vietnam if elected. (more…)

THE GRINDING MACHINE:
TERROR AND GENOCIDE IN RWANDA

keith harmon snow talks with Paul Rusesabagina, the ordinary man who inspired the film Hotel Rwanda.

keith harmon snow
http://www.allthingspass.com
20 April 2007

“The nickname for my country is ‘the land of thousands of hills,’” writes Paul Rusesabagina, in his autobiography, An Ordinary Man, “but this signifies a gross undercount. There are at least half a million hills, maybe more…we are the children of the hills, the grassy slopes, the valley roads, the spider patterns of rivers, and the millions of rivulets and crevasses and buckles of earth… In this country, we don’t talk about coming from a particular village, but from a particular hill.”

Paul Rusesabagina was born into a family of nine children, farmers, on the side of a steep hill, in a home made of mud and sticks. The Rwanda of his youth was green and bright, full of cooking fires and sisters murmuring and drying sorghum and corn leaves in the wind and in the warm arms of his mother. But this image of a happy, quiet youth spent in the quaint hills of some far-off place is not one the western world holds in its modern memory of Rwanda. Instead we are confronted by horror. (more…)