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Cindy Sheehan became a leader of the antiwar movement after her son, Casey, was killed in Iraq. Her efforts to get answers from President Bush, including a vigil in Crawford,Texas, have received national media attention. She has a website, is the author of Peace Mom: A Mother’s Journey through Heartache to Activism and wrote the introduction to 10 Excellent Reasons Not to Join the Military.

No matter what we’re led to believe, the world’s worst polluter is not your cousin who refuses to recycle or that co-worker who drives a gas guzzler or the guy down the block who simply will not try CFL bulbs.

“The U.S. Department of Defense is the largest polluter in the world, producing more hazardous waste than the five largest U.S. chemical companies combined,” explains Lucinda Marshall, founder of the Feminist Peace Network.

Pesticides, defoliants like Agent Orange, solvents, petroleum, lead, mercury, and depleted uranium are among the many deadly substances used by the military.

What does this mean for us? To start with, it can help illustrate how to best foment a green revolution. As Derrick Jensen reminds us: “Even if every single person in the United States were to change all their light-bulbs to fluorescent, cut the amount they drive in half, recycle half of their household waste, inflate their tire pressure to increase gas mileage, use low flow shower heads and wash clothes in lower temperature water, adjusts their thermostats two degrees up or down depending on the season, and plant a tree, it would result in a one time, 21% reduction in carbon emissions.”

For those of you scoring at home, that’s a one time, 21% reduction in carbon emissions. We compost, we drive hybrids, we bring our own bag to the market but meanwhile, the U.S. military and its fellow polluters—trans-national corporations—treat the planet like it’s a porta-potty…with little or no opposition from the general population.

In fact, the military typically enjoys unconditional support even from those who identify as “anti-war.”

Keep this in mind the next time you hear the phrase “war on terror”: Our tax dollars are subsidizing a global eco-terror campaign and all the recycled toilet paper in the world ain’t gonna change that.

In other words, if we don’t want our legacy to be one of inaction and shame, we must create drastic, permanent change very, very soon…because here’s the most inconvenient truth of all: it’s time to embrace a much darker shade of green.

Mickey Z. is the author of two upcoming books: Self Defense for Radicals (PM Press) and his second novel, Dear Vito (The Drill Press). Until the laws are changed or the power runs out, he can be found on the Web at http://www.mickeyz.net

We understand that the May 2004 Inspector General’s report from the CIA to be released today reveals that the techniques called “enhanced interrogation” by the Bush regime were used prior interrogators receiving legal authorization. The techniques used on detainees went beyond what was authorized, scurrilous as the legal opiniona by John Yoo, Jay Bybee, and other Bush appointees were.

These techniques, the Inspector General reported, did in fact violate the Geneva Convention Against Torture, and in some cases torture was used for purposes other than obtaining information.

This calls into question President Obama’s remarks to the CIA on April 22, 2009, when he stated that there were be no prosecution of agents who used “enhanced interrogation” on good faith on orders from their superiors. This information further calls into question the Obama administration’s refusal to prosecute Bush era officials for the war crime of torture.

From the time it became known that torture was being used and authorized by those at the highest levels, World Can’t Wait has demanded that the torture be stopped, and those responsible be held accountable and prosecuted.

For our part, we are working to bring forward a mass movement of the people demanding these prosecutions.

Stay tuned for more on worldcantwait.org and warcriminalswatch.org

“How much can you know about yourself if you’ve never been in a fight? I don’t wanna die without any scars.”

- Tyler Durden (Fight Club)

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William Burroughs once wrote about how we humans—like the bull in a bullfight—tend to focus on the elusive red cape instead of the matador. Indeed, we are all-too-easily distracted from real targets by an attractive image or illusion.

Of course, some bulls see right through the red cape, uh, bullshit…and quite justifiably introduce the matador to the business end of their horns. Before you mistake that for a lesson and/or inspiration, don’t forget that such bulls are promptly killed while the matador is mourned as a brave hero.

Here’s my question: If every bull in every bullfight were to gore every matador, how long would it be before bullfights were a thing of the past?

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Malcolm X sez:

“It is criminal to teach a man not to defend himself when he is the constant victim of brutal attacks.”

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In the late 1960s—thanks to Cesar Chavez and the United Farm Workers (UFW)—deciding whether or not to buy grapes became a political act. Three years after its establishment in 1962, the UFW struck against grape growers around Delano, California…a long, bitter, and frustrating struggle that appeared impossible to resolve until Chavez promoted the idea of a national boycott. Trusting in the average person’s ability to connect with those in need, Chavez and the UFW brought their plight—and a lesson in social justice—into homes from coast-to-coast and Americans responded.
“By 1970, the grape boycott was an unqualified success,” writes Marc Grossman of Stone Soup. “Bowing to pressure from the boycott, grape growers at long last signed union contracts, granting workers human dignity and a more livable wage.”

Through hunger strikes, imprisonment, abject poverty for himself and his large family, racist and corrupt judges, exposure to dangerous pesticides, and even assassination plots, Chavez remained true to the cause…even if meant, uh…”stretching” the non-violent methods he espoused:

Once in 1966, when Teamster goons began to rough up Chavez’s picketeers, a bit of labor solidarity solved the problem. William Kircher, the AFL-CIO director of organization, called Paul Hall, president of the International Seafarers Union.

“Within hours,” writes David Goodwin in Cesar Chavez: Hope for the People, “Hall sent a carload of the biggest sailors that had ever put to sea to march with the strikers on the picket lines…There followed afterward no further physical harassment.”

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To me, the following quote reads like a poem…so that’s how I’ll present it:

You’ve got to learn
that when you push people around,
some people push back.
As they should.
As they must.
And as they undoubtedly will.
There is justice in such symmetry.

- Ward Churchill

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When early American revolutionaries chanted, “Give me liberty or give me death” and complained of having but one life to give for their country, they became the heroes of our history textbooks. But, thanks to the power of the U.S. media and education industries, the Puerto Rican nationalists who dedicated their lives to independence are known as criminals, fanatics, and assassins.

On March 1, 1954, in the gallery of the House of Representatives, Congressman Charles A. Halleck rose to discuss with his colleagues the issue of Puerto Rico. At that moment, Lolita Lebrón alongside three fellow freedom fighters, having purchased a one-way train ticket from New York (they expected to be killed) unfurled a Puerto Rican flag and shouted “Free Puerto Rico!” before firing eight shots at the roof. Her three male co-conspirators aimed their machine guns at the legislators. Andrés Figueroa’s gun jammed, but shots fired by Rafael Cancel Miranda and Irving Flores injured five congressmen.

“I know that the shots I fired neither killed nor wounded anymore,” Lebrón stated afterwards. With the attack being viewed through the sensationalizing prism of American tabloid journalism, this did not matter. She and her nationalist cohorts became prisoners of war for the next twenty-five years.

Why prisoners of war? To answer that, we must recall that since July 25, 1898, when the United States illegally invaded its tropical neighbor under the auspices of the Spanish-American War, the island has been maintained as a colony. In other words, the planet’s oldest colony is being held by its oldest representative democracy—with U.S. citizenship imposed without the consent or approval of the indigenous population in 1917. It is from this geopolitical paradox that the Puerto Rican independence movement sprang forth.

This movement is based firmly on international law, which authorizes “anti-colonial combatants” the right to armed struggle to throw off the yoke of imperialism and gain independence. UN General Assembly Resolution 33/24 of December 1978 recognizes “the legitimacy of the struggle of people’s for independence, territorial integrity, national unity and liberation from colonial domination and foreign occupation by all means available, particularly armed struggle.”

Prison did not dampen Lebrón’s revolutionary spirit as she attended demonstrations and spoke out to help win the long battle to evict the US Navy from the tiny Puerto Rican island of Vieques in 2003.

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Emma Goldman sez:

“No great idea in its beginning can ever be within the law.”

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In her excellent 1995 book, Bridge of Courage, Jennifer Harbury quotes a Guatemalan freedom fighter named Gabriel, responding to a plea to embrace non-violent resistance: “In my country child malnutrition is close to 85 percent,” he explains. “Ten percent of all children will be dead before the age of five, and this is only the number actually reported to government agencies. Close to 70 percent of our people are functionally illiterate. There is almost no industry in our country—you need land to survive. Less than 3 percent of our landowners own over 65 percent of our lands. In the last fifteen years or so, there have been over 150,000 political murders and disappearances… Don’t talk to me about Gandhi; he wouldn’t have survived a week here. There was a peaceful movement for progress here, once. They were crushed. We were crushed. For Gandhi’s method to work, there must be a government capable of shame. We lack that here.”

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Huey P. Newton sez:

“In the spirit of international revolutionary solidarity, the Black Panther Party hereby offers … an undetermined number of troops to assist you in your fight against American imperialism. It is appropriate for the Black Panther Party to take this action at this time in recognition of the fact that your struggle is also our struggle, for we recognize that our common enemy is U.S. imperialism, which is the leader of international bourgeois domination. There is no fascist or reactionary government in the world today that could stand without the support of United States imperialism. Therefore our problem is international, and we offer these troops in recognition of the necessity for international alliance to deal with the problem … Such alliance will advance the struggle toward the final act of dealing with American imperialism. To end this oppression we must liberate the developing nations … As one nation is liberated elsewhere, it gives us a better chance to be free.”

(Excerpted from an October 29, 1970 letter to the National Front for Liberation and Provisional Revolutionary Government of South Viet Nam)

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Arundhati Roy sez:

“People from poorer places and poorer countries have to call upon their compassion not to be angry with ordinary people in America.”

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In his book Endgame, Derrick Jensen tells of a discussion he had with a longtime activist. “She told me of a campaign she participated in a few years ago to try to stop the government and transnational timber corporations from spraying Agent Orange, a potent defoliant and teratogen, in the forests of Oregon,” Jensen writes. All too predictably, the dedicated demonstrators assembled to protest the toxic spraying were, “like clockwork,” ignored by the helicopter pilots. Both humans and landscape ended up thoroughly doused with Agent Orange—time and time again. The protest campaign obviously had no effect, so a different approach was taken. “A bunch of Vietnam vets lived in those hills,” the activist told Jensen, “and they sent messages to the Bureau of Land Management and to Weyerhauser, Boise Cascade, and the other timber companies saying, ‘We know the names of your helicopter pilots, and we know their addresses’

“You know what happened next?” she asked.

“I think I do,” Jensen responded.

“Exactly,” she said. “The spraying stopped.”

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MLK sez:

“When you’re right, you can never be too radical.”

Until the laws are changed or the power runs out, Mickey Z. can be found on the Web at http://www.mickeyz.net

The stunning plan Barack Obama slipped into his speech Thursday, a speech filled with “the rule of law” is PROLONGED, or PREVENTIVE DETENTION.

The President said he will “develop an appropriate legal regime” to indefinitely imprison people without charges based on what he thinks they might want to do, on their speech, or their associations.  He admitted that there are people now detained who cannot be prosecuted because evidence against them is tainted by torture, or because there simply IS no evidence against them.  He implied this could go on for a decade or more.

The Bush regime thought about this, but never tried it.  This has never been done by the US in its history.  What does it mean that Obama stated flatly that habeas corpus — the right to know charges against you, and be able to defend yourself – will be indefinitely denied to a class of people.

Here are 2 key paragraphs of  Glen Greenwald’s piece: Facts and myths about Obama’s preventive detention proposal.

“It’s important to be clear about what “preventive detention” authorizes.  It does not merely allow the U.S. Government to imprison people alleged to have committed Terrorist acts yet who are unable to be convicted in a civilian court proceeding.  That class is merely a subset, perhaps a small subset, of who the Government can detain.  Far more significant, “preventive detention” allows indefinite imprisonment not based on proven crimes or past violations of law, but of those deemed generally “dangerous” by the Government for various reasons (such as, as Obama put it yesterday, they “expressed their allegiance to Osama bin Laden” or “otherwise made it clear that they want to kill Americans”).  That’s what “preventive” means: imprisoning people because the Government claims they are likely to engage in violent acts in the future because they are alleged to be “combatants.”

Once known, the details of the proposal could — and likely will — make this even more extreme by extending the “preventive detention” power beyond a handful of Guantanamo detainees to anyone, anywhere in the world, alleged to be a “combatant.”  After all, once you accept the rationale on which this proposal is based — namely, that the U.S. Government must, in order to keep us safe, preventively detain “dangerous” people even when they can’t prove they violated any laws — there’s no coherent reason whatsoever to limit that power to people already at Guantanamo, as opposed to indefinitely imprisoning with no trials all allegedly “dangerous” combatants, whether located in Pakistan, Thailand, Indonesia, Western countries and even the U.S.”

There was also plenty to be outraged about in Dick Cheney’s blood-thirsty, fascist speech at the American Enterprise Institute.  He meant to have the final word, clearly acts as if he’s still in power, and is determined to set terms for Obama.  While in California this week, I’ve talked to a number of people who heard Cheney’s raving, and were relieved to hear Obama uphold the “rule of law”.  But check out the Utube of Rachel Maddow on Obama’s “two speeches.” And David Swanson in: Does Cheney Make Obama Look Good?

The debate cannot be between Cheney’s vision of permanent war for empire, unbound by constitutional niceties like due process, and Obama’s “re-branding” of the same.  But I don’t buy the argument that those of us who opposed the Bush program should now accept the Obama proposals, and not fight them, because Cheney is waiting in the wings.

The people, represented now by relatively and admittedly small numbers of us who are outraged, and see where this is going, have to come into the argument by taking a stand against US torture, indefinite & preventive detention, and soon, visibly. We need to bring more people with us, and not stop, given the stakes.

Right now, the demand to Release the Torture Photos and Prosecute the War Criminals is right on time.  Where the US goes on torture is not yet decided, will be a central issue in the Obama presidency and the conduct of the “war of terror” occupying the people of the Middle East. We cannot depend on the courts to do the right thing.  The US Senate has entered in, profoundly on the wrong side.  See Dennis Loo: Senate Votes to Block Release of [Torture] Photos for 5 Years

But there’s a lot more here than the fate of the Guantanamo detainees, as profound a moral question for humanity as that is.  I wrote about the appointment of Stanley McChrystal to lead the US occupation of Afghanistan.  More and more is coming out on him.  See Tom Engelhart,
Obama, McChrystal, and Expanding the War in Afghanistan and Pakistan

1. He’s a protege of Rumsfeld, protected by Cheney, heading an assassination squad under the Joint Special Operations Command, which Seymour Hersh says is the shadowy assassination squad operating in Iraq as part of the surge.
2. When McChrystal was brought into Afghanistan two weeks ago, he was at an Oval Office meeting was held where Obama agreed not to release the torture photos.
3. It’s thought some of the photos being covered up are of abuse directly under McChrystal’s command.

And the war criminals are on parade.  Dick Cheney is leading the argument for the open, justified use of torture. On Face the Nation Sunday, he said that what the Bush regime had done is not torture.  CBS reported, “Cheney still bristled at the suggestion that what President Bush authorized constituted torture, saying they weren’t in the “torture business…I think it’s very, very important that we have a clear understanding that what happened here was an honorable approach to defending the nation, that there was nothing devious or deceitful or dishonest or illegal about what was done.”

And, the clincher: Cheney, when asked if Bush knew about the interrogation program: “I certainly, yes, have every reason to believe he knew — he knew a great deal about theprogram. He basically authorized it. I mean, this was a presidential-level decision. And the decision went to the president. He signed off on it.” World Can’t Wait and other groups are putting together events around the country where herever the Bush era war criminals are appearing this month, raise the cry “Torture is a War Crime! Prosecute!”  They’re speaking at graduations and getting regular columns published (John Yoo in the Philadelphia Inquirer).  All this is beginning to be challenged publicly, including a scorchingly critical column in the Philadelphia Daily News against Yoo’s column, and thanks to students at Stanford (Condi Rice), the Fire John Yoo Coalition, and other people of conscience who know this matters.

Please participate in the actions this month, and set up your own if you need to.  So far, they are:

• CHICAGO: Saturday May 16 Help greet patrons outside the Modern wing of the Art Institute with blown up images of the paintings of Fernando Botero, artist of the infamous Abu Grahib paintings. 9:00am on at the Millennium Park entrance.  Chicago@worldcantwait.org 773-227-2453
• SF BAY: Saturday May 16 8 am, UC Berkeley Boalt Hall Law School Graduation, UC Berkeley Greek Theater (commencement) and Great Hall and Clark Kerr Courtyard (gala reception). Protest denouncing the continuing presence of former Bush administration lawyer John Yoo on UC’s tenured faculty. sf@worldcantwait.org 415-864-5153
• ORANGE CO, CA: Friday May 22 Chapman University Law School Graduation where war criminal John Yoo has been teaching this semester (plans will be made on Sat., May 16th, noon at Rutabegorz Restaurant in Orange).
• LOS ANGELES: Saturday May 23 3 PM - Michael Haas will discuss and sign his book, “George W. Bush, War Criminal? The Bush Administration’s Liability for 269 War Crimes” at Libros Revolucion bookstore, 312 W. 8th St., LA 213.488.1303
• NYC: Sunday May 24 1:15pm Film: “Taxi to the Dark Side” Resistance Cinema at Community Church of NY, 40 East 35th St.866 973 4463
• NYC: Tuesday May 26 6 pm, Radio City Music Hall, 1260 6th Avenue, NYC. Karl Rove appearance will be protested. Warcriminalswatch.org 866-973-4463
• NYC: Thursday, May 28 John Negroponte, Bush intelligence czar, presents an award to General Petraeus, architect of the Iraq surge. Union League Club, 38 E. 37th Street (between Park & Madison), NYC. Orange jumpsuit gathering at Grand Central Station, 5 pm; march to Union League Club. Warcriminalswatch.org 866-973-4463
• BOSTON: Thursday May 28 Harvard Square, Cambridge MA 2 pm – 4 pm. Protest Douglas Feith, a visiting scholar at Harvard, who admits he played a “major role” in Bush’s decision to suspend Geneva Convention rights for detainees at Guantánamo. Warcriminalswatch.org 866-973-4463
• CHICAGO: Thursday May 28 Karl Rove at the Chicago Theater, 175 N. State Street, Chicago. 6 pm. Chicago@worldcantwait.org 773-227-2453
• SEATTLE: Thursday May 28 Protest at CIA recruiters office, University of Washington.  12:00 noon at Red Square.  Plans underway for protests June 13 when Defense Sec’y Robert Gates speaks at commencement, June 13.
• SF BAY AREA: Thursday, May 28 The Bay Area has five Bush war criminals (Yoo, Bybee, Haynes, Rice, and Pelosi) . An evening program on the demand to prosecute.  Details TBA sf@worldcantwait.org 415-864-5153
  

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Torture is part of the US global “war on terror,” not an aberration, and not used to keep the US safe. While focusing this month on protesting the torture, we take notice of the outrageous escalations of war on civilians in Afghanistan. Reports that the US forces used white phosphorous are coming because doctors are reporting “unusual burns” on the civilian victims.

Read Chris Hedges in Becoming What We Seek to Destroy reporting that the US occupation forces have killed twice as many civilians as Taliban in 2009.  Thousands of Afghanis, including many students in Kabul, have been protesting the massacre last week, and demanding an end to US occupation.

Featured Post for 05/08-05/14 I wrote this to Mr. Obama after reading the following article. I guess we’ve got to keep trying.

Red Cross Confirms Dozens Dead in Afghan Air Strikes

Mr. Obama,

I do not understand what is going on. When you inherited the White House, did you also inherit the bubble that your predecessor lived in?

You campaigned for change. We the People, after eight years of Cheney/Bush flouting the Constitution, causing a million or more deaths in their endless search for oil, thought we might have a new broom in Washington that would sweep these people into the dustbin of history and reverse the draconian laws that were put in effect.

Instead, what do we see? On the home front, the billionaires get richer and the poor, the retired, the workers whose jobs have been outsourced are winding up living in the streets. There is more surveillance, more restrictions on our individual lives. Habeas corpus is still a corpse, NorthCom’s combat brigades are still getting intensive training on suppressing civilian unrest. Now you want to keep the Military Commissions for Gitmo because, apparently, the fear is that the civil courts might not allow hearsay evidence, and evidence obtained by torture into their courts, and that the attorneys might have the right to cross examine witnesses, or actually see the evidence!

Our endless wars, which we thought would finally end, are expanding. Iraq gets a change of occupiers from combat troops to “advisors.” Same troops, different name.

We are upping the killing in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Every time we bomb a village full of civilians on the off chance of killing what we term insurgents, we create still more Afghan and Pakistani patriots yearning for the end to occupation, as I hope we would if we were occupied. What we consider insurgents, they consider freedom fighters trying to rid their country of yet another foreign invader,

Look at the number of bases we have worldwide. We cannot spread ourselves over the earth like peanut butter on a slice of bread. Especially if the jar is getting moldy.

We have horrible problems here in the US to deal with, yet you sidestep any suggestion that those who committed unconstitutional actions such as violating the treaties which we have signed and which are therefore the Law of the Land (read the Constitution) against torture, indefinite imprisonment, and treatment of prisoners, should be tried and punished. These people were not ignorant, they knew what they were doing and that, if the United States ever became a Constitutional Republic again, tthey would face trial and punishment. According to you, they will not, but their victims, here and abroad, will continue to suffer.

We are still dealing ineffectively from the effects of Katrina, yet we can continue to allow misappropriation of funds and no-bid or fixed contracts with the big money contributors. Veterans, destroyed mentally or physically, and their families, are living in the streets. Runaway inflation and the depression are destroying the lives of retirees.

The Military Industrial Complex has billions and billions in war profits. Can’t you stop feeding them and start caring for We the People who elected you? So far, all that those of us below the rank of Congressman or CEO have seen is Bush Lite and Bush style lies.

Please! Show enough gumption to get rid of these old parasites and turn the country around. We the People will be glad to help. That’s what we elected you for!

Sincerely,

Steve and Adrienne Osborn

From the Editor: Please watch the following video – Ron Paul questioning Richard Holbrooke on war, empire and foreign policy

The irony regarding conspiracy theories is that, for the most part, they do have more than a grain of truth in each of them. What comes to mind is the 1950s film Invasion of The Body Snatchers. Who could forget Kevin McCarthy running up the interstate, sweat pouring from his brow, screaming ‘They’re here!’

Of course, that film was supposed to be about the ‘invasion’ of the Commies , pods that would take over our very souls….. Leaving us with no emotions, no character…. All of us becoming one big nation of nothingness. Yet, as dear old Kevin ran up that interstate, and another truckload of pods passed him by, few if any would believe him. He was…… A …… Conspiracy nut!

Well, another set of pods landed in America….. Years and years ago. If one would read Christopher Simpson’s Blowback , one would learn about ‘Operation Paperclip.’ Briefly, the United States , soon after the last battles of WW2, brought into America ( in some instances, illegally ) many Nazi scientists and intelligence officials. They felt that this planet was replete with masses of humanity fit only for service to the elites; bottom feeders with no destiny but to be become serfs or even slaves to the 1% or 2 % of the population that would rule. These former Nazis went on to help advance our weaponry, our space travel, our covert intelligence ( CIA, NSA amongst others ) and even our foreign policy decisions. After all, we had the bogeyman lurking out there in the form of Kevin McCarthy’s Pods, ready to paint America Red.

That was 50 some odd years ago. You can find countless well researched investigative books and articles on how this Storm trooper mindset has inculcated America.

Look around you. Our nation is in the grips of another Great Depression, not seen for over 70 years. Oh yes, they will blame it solely on the Wall Street scam artists and the sub prime con jobbers. Look beyond that if you will.

Remember the words that a republican conservative president used to warn us in 1961: Military Industrial Complex. A system, full of ex Nazis and , more tragically, Nazi sympathizers , that has induced every Congress and every president…. Including Eisenhower….. To spend a ( much too great ) % of our federal budget on weapons systems and a War Economy.

Create an enemy and then spend spend spend to defend against him.

Mark Twain must have been clairvoyant , because almost 100 years ago he wrote:

“Next, the statesmen will invent cheap lies, putting the blame upon the nation that is attacked, and every man will be glad of those conscience- soothing falsities, and will diligently study them, and refuse to examine any refutations of them. Thus he will, by and by , convince himself that the war is JUST, and will thank God for the better sleep he enjoys after this process of grotesque self- deception. ”

We know , from even the high tech films we see, that our government has the most elaborate satellite spy technology that can , at any time chosen, focus in on you and me taking out the garbage. It could even tell them what was in the pail for goodness sakes! Yet, the world’s number one bogeyman of the moment, Mr. Osama Bin Laden, him we still cannot track. Why? You know why. The bogeyman can only scare the little kiddies if he is still out there….. Somewhere.

Let’s listen to Mr. Hermann Goering, number two man under Adolf Hitler:

“It is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, a fascist dictatorship or even a parliament. The people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and for exposing the country to danger. ”

So, the Bush/ Cheney cabal created a phony war on Iraq, over dramatized this so called War On Terror , and sunk almost one trillion ( that’s one thousand billion ) dollars of our tax money into the bottomless pit.

To date, America has over 750 military bases in over 100 countries! Anyone wish to know why the ‘man and woman on the street’ worldwide has no use for us?

How about every nation that has American military installations hold a referendum? Allow the populace to vote as to whether they want foreign military bases on their sovereign land. Cut and dry, vote and decide. Isn’t that what Bush and his crew meant by ‘bringing democracy to (enter country here)?’

If we study the history of Germany under the Nazi regime, we find many similarities to our own current state. One of the most frightening things is the SS , and its earlier counterpart, the SD. These were private armed groups that did the bidding of Hitler and his gang.

The only thing that can stop this trend is for the good folks throughout America to ….. Wake up! Speak out against this overemphasis on the Military Industrial Complex. Read the investigative books on how this all is going down, and has gone down. Study the Nazi movement in Germany, from the mid 1920s right through its demise in ‘45.

Most importantly, get educated and get involved. Remember what Plato said: “How fortunate for governments that the people they administer don’t think!”

You see, each Tuesday, for one hour during rush hour, I go, with but a handful of others, and I stand on a busy street corner in my town.  We stand to publicize our dissent of many things, primarily the US invasion and occupation of Iraq.

This becomes an umbrella that opens into many other consequences of that action. It encompasses some of the current economic free fall we find America in, that being the almost one trillion dollars that the Iraq invasion/occupation has cost.

Our protest includes the need to prosecute those who initiated the lies and misinformation that caused this phony war, and those who ordered and conducted the use of torture. Need I go on? So many things to stand up and speak out against.

Mark Twain, as quoted by this writer in other of my columns, said it best. He stated that the primary purpose of government is “To protect us from the crooks and scoundrels.”

Well, so many scoundrels have inculcated our governments, whether they be in Washington or in our locales. Mix in the assorted crooks who feed these scoundrels and you have quite a pot of muck and mire. Perhaps the general public, which does not hear or see the true voices of dissent via the mainstream media, needs to see it alive and well in the heart of their own communities.

Thus, we stand…. Or rather…. I stand. Not for some ego boost, because it can be downright embarrassing to be standing on some street corner with a sign in hand. The looks that some of my neighbors shoot at me, whether in dismay or in disbelief, can sometimes be hurtful. Or at least they were when first I stood out there.

After four years one becomes numb to most of the negativity or apathy. Yet, to do nothing would be the greater sin one could commit in these troubling times. If we are truly ‘ Our brother’s keeper ‘ , maybe then one needs us to keep another informed…. Even with some sort of shock and awe ( no pun intended, Mr. Rumsfeld – may your indictment be forthcoming for the shock and awe you helped initiate ).

Many nights, after another afternoon of only seeing 3 or 4 of us on that corner, with no converts coming to join us, I begin to lose faith. I ask myself ‘Is this worth it’ to continue out there, week after week ? I asked my compatriots from the street corner why they have chosen to come down each week for years on end.

Walt D. , from New Smyrna Beach, at 80, the oldest of this group, gave his reason. “It’s the proper thing to do in a democratic society. When Dr. King was jailed for civil disobedience, he was asked why he went to jail. He responded to the questioner ‘ The real question should be why you are not with me? ‘ So, I stand. ”

I then asked Jim R. , also from New Smyrna Beach, a 70 something former teamster. Jim was blunt. “Somebody has to take the initiative, and do this. The truth is being buried and people have been propagandized by the mainstream media, who serve the interests of those who profit from war. ”

Finally, I asked Charlie B., 70 something, from Port Orange, my town. “I stand to be a witness to the idea of peaceful solutions. In addition to reaching the passers by with this message, I want the news to filter up and reach our political leaders as well.”

How many weeks turning into months, and then years, before my neighbors begin to get it that we are not out there representing them….. We are them and they are us? When will they realize, those who at least agree with us, that we are not some band of performers that are speaking for them?

No, on the contrary, honking a horn or waving in support of us is not productive anymore. If these three senior citizens, some with acute ailments, can find one hour per week to stand for things as important as saving our Constitution and our very Republic, well…… What about those who pass by in their cars?

This is not the time to simply trust our elected leaders. Rather, this is the time to tell our elected officials what we want! After all, if you look at their job descriptions , it states public servant. Websters defines servant : ‘ One employed to perform services.’

So, each time I have second thoughts about what I am doing on that street corner, for Justice, Truth and of course Peace, I remember others. I remember Sophie Scholl , in Nazi Germany, who also saw injustice and spoke out, under much more dire circumstances than me. It literally cost Sophie her head , but not her soul.

Many others throughout the history of our great nation have stood in public and went against the grain of power. It seems to me, that to not do such would be to negate the very essence of what Twain meant by the purpose of government. It would actually give more value to those crooks and scoundrels by ignoring their dirty deeds.

So, I continue to stand, not from pride or ego. Rather, in a much more mundane manner, to realize that the alternative to my speaking out is a terrible choice…… ‘Silence in the face of tyranny gives it license.’