Yowza -- Laura Bush MOVES OUT and MTV goes beyond pablum.

There is some sort of sea change going on here.

WMR (Wayne Madsen Report) is tracking the Laura Bush story: First Lady reportedly discovers that "The Decider" decided to violate his marriage vows -- moves out.

---

An MTV 2 show made South Park look like Sesame Street in "Wonder Showzen" a show created by Augenblick Studios, augenblick means blink of an eye for you monoglots. Anyway the Comedy Channel has now picked up the reruns and at least in my time zone on my cable company's lineup "Wonder Showzen" follows "The Daily Show" & "The Colbert Report."


-------

Today is shaping up to be a different sort of day. The first blog search of the day turned up the Bush/Rice/Laura story. The first email I opened today had the Augenblick pic in it. Synchronicity of some sort I suppose.

[rice]
[laura bush]
[mayflower]
[affair]
[george bush]
[sex]

It's Starting To Get Personal.

Some military men are coming around to an anti-Iraq War perspective, while some not in the military but like to pretend they are are hoping to bring the fight into the streets of America.

From gulfnews.com

'In an interview with The Sunday Telegraph, Major General John Batiste, who resigned last year after 12 months stationed in Iraq's Sunni Triangle, said the Pentagon chief [Rumsfeld] had caused "unnecessary deaths" by committing "strategic blunders of enormous magnitude".'

From poughkeepsiejournal:

(Per protest at West Point graduation)
Wearing sergeant chevrons and shouldering a large American flag, Jason Peterson of Albany said he believes Bush intentionally lied about the reasons for the war, betraying service members who signed up to defend their country. ‘‘That sort of thing is not what people should be sacrificing their lives for,’’ said Peterson, a former Marine who served in the first Gulf War.
And Peterson expressed concern for soldiers and Marines returning from combat not only with physical injuries, but the psychological trauma associated with deployment to a war zone: ‘‘You can’t just switch it off.’’

We need some of these brave and gallant officers to come to Tucson to protect our protestors from the Freeper Goon Squads whose behavior here is getting more and more and more threatening and aggressive with each passing day. Today I went down to the main recruiting office on Speedway to participate in the weekly peace demonstration (okay, anti-war), and, as has been the case since last summer, the counter protestors were there with their huge flags, and their expensive professionally printed banners, foul mouths, personal insults and generally reprehensible behavior. They purport to be patriotic Americans who are just "counter-protesting" but interaction with them has proven that this is not the case. Whenever there is not a police presence these purportedly patriotic individuals that I choose to call "pidiots" (cause they sure as hell aren't patriots) surround peace protesters, step on toes, push and bully them. Today individual thugs threatened women protestors by saying that the peace protestors' time "was comin'" and that he and others (the militia type thugs) were going to clean up the border and rid it of traitors on both sides of the border. They have been escalating their aggression and rather suspiciously police have chosen to stay away. These pidiot bullies jab the sharp metal ends of their 10 ft. flag poles within a couple inches of the faces of elderly women. They get within inches of protestors and come from "their side" of the street to stand literally over them (these thugs are much larger than the women and elderly men protestors) and cover the peace signs and placards with their flags. This morning at least one of the "pidiots" was using such lewd and liscientious sexually explicit language and graphic insults and threats that it was nauseating and frightening to those who could hear.

We need calm matriotically inclined people to join with us to document these attrocious threats.

The police will do nothing. They have chosen to advise the peace protestors that until someone is hurt, that they can do nothing. They are clearly buddies of the recruiters and the lines between police and military are very blurry here near the border. Remember this is the same police department that ordered the Raging Grannies onto private property so they could arrest them.

The zeitgesit here in Tucson is weird to say the least. We are in the heart of the battle zone that is being created by the campaign to create an "other" from the migrant laborers so that the uniformed and easily influenced people of the US have someone to label as "enemy." Activism here has been such a staple in the community for so long that people who might be out in the streets if they lived in other places think that others here in Tucson are "already taking care of it."

The disturbing things about these "Freepers" is that they attack individuals, have come to people's homes, gang up on individuals, take encouragement from the neo-nazi element of the vigilante groups on the border and are bouyed up by the fervor of Memorial Day weekend, and the knowledge that the Tucson Police will be conveniently absent on Wednesday mornings although they were there almost every Wednesday before the Freepers started showing up. These for the most part are powerless males (mainly white) who feel that the power they were raised to believe they would have as adult white men in America has been unjustly denied them. These are the folks who grasp at and gobble up the rhetoric of the rulers of the government, media, and such. They believe they have a right (possibly grant by the Divine) to power, and will attempt to assert dominance over anyone they see as weaker than themselves or who just happen to be in vulnerable or physically isolated at the moment. These folks are potentially very, very dangerous.

Remember Greensboro, NC -- Nov 3. 1979? If not you should look it up. Start here. Or just read this excerpt:

Police - who had left the demonstration at 10:30 a.m. to take a "lunch break" - arrived only after the shooting had stopped, even though an informant for the Greensboro Police Department and a federal agent were with the Klansmen and knew their plans.

One of the first things police did after their arrival was to arrest demonstrators - including Willena Cannon, who tried to stop their frenzied attack on Nelson Johnson, a fellow organizer, who had been stabbed in the shoulder by a Klansman. "I knew if I didn't do they'd kill him," she said. She was arrested and charged with interfering with arrest; then she was taken to jail and interrogated. "They'had me in this little room," she said. "I didn't know where my children were. My body literally shut down."

When did this happen? Not in the 1940s, '50s or '60s, but in 1979. Emily Mann's new play, "Greensboro: A Requiem," now playing at McCarter Theatre tells the story of that day, Nov. 3, 1979, and the events leading up to it.

Klansmen and American Nazis shot 13 people that day - several of them right between the eyes. Five died. Others - including Paul Bermanzohn, who was paralyzed - were permanently injured.

Even though the video coverage showed the murders clearly, an allwhite jury acquitted the Klansmen and Nazis of all charges. A civil trial eventually determined collusion between the Klan and Greensboro police in the slayings and ordered the City of Greensboro to pay damages to the widows and children of the victims.

But no Klansman ever paid a penny in damages. Nor did any Klansman ever spend a day in prison for the murders - not even Dave Matthews, who admitted to police that he thought he had shot three people. "There were some innocent people shot, I reckon," he said. "But I was shooting at the niggers."

Any ideas how to disarm these pidiots?

Negroponte Afraid of Protest

I received an email this morning that got me to thinking about the lily livered cowards who are responsible for the deaths and torture of hundreds of thousands of my co-habitants of this planet and how we all need to be protesting in front of the houses of the slime who "rule" here in the U.S. Unfortunately many of the fascists who live in AZ live in gated communities, so you really can't get very close and the rent-a-cops who guard such secure palatial estates are often inexperienced, untrained, and far more likely to shoot.... but we still need to be doing these actions all over the country. The comfort these war criminals enjoy must be ended.

Isn't it amazing how quickly Negroponte screams that he needs someone arrested when his space is compromised? I wonder is he now sees how his victims might have felt at the onset of his evil practices --- before the actual torture or murder was carried out. I cannot condone violence, and such demonstrations are perhaps psychically violent, but there is a part of me that is actually happy that these "leaders" have probably begun to feel some of the same sort of fear which they have so casually injected into the lives of so very many people in so very many places.

Anyway, here is a portion of this a.m.'s email that discussed the DAWN action.

We in the DC Anti-War Network (DAWN) Weekly Action Group returned to

Director of National Intelligence's Negroponte's 3100 Cleveland Avenue NW

home last night for a silent vigil in memorial for the dead and tortured

throughout the world (specifically, Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua,

Iraq) and instead were welcomed to the strange security world of John

Negroponte. Ten days previously, a DAWN activist had been detained for

half an hour by a CIA police officer, though was subsequently released by

the DC police without charges. The activist had been on public ground

protesting and had not committed a crime, but the CIA police officer had

explained that the Ambassador wanted someone arrested for this, a quote

that has been corroborated by audio tape. (For last time, see jsmacdonald.blogspot.com.)

This time, a security person (didn't identify himself this time except

over his phone as "John" - and we didn't ask being that it was a silent

vigil - but may have been CIA like last time) immediately came out of an

SUV to announce upon the arrival of 12 of us (ultimately 15) that he had

called the police and that they were on their way.

We set up outside of his house and were as quiet as could be, holding

signs and banners and lighting candles. Inside were John Negroponte and

what appeared to be a wife and someone else. Within a few minutes, they

looked out the window, put down their shades, and turned off the lights.

Occasionally, we could see them peaking out the window at the spectacle

below.

Several MPD (DC police) showed up, a secret service agent, another

security person related to the home. If they were CIA like last time I

can't say, but they were belligerent and as nasty as one might expect.

They went around with notepads taking notes on each participant (and later

photographs), saying out loud their description, sometimes with derogatory

things to say about people's weight or their hair color or what was on the

signs. They had to admit that we were being "very peaceful," "very quiet",

though the security man John was quick to point out, "with a lot of

attitude."

As mentioned, several DC police showed up. One higher ranking one

attempted to engage us in conversation, but we stayed silent. Another of

our group was getting concerned by police presence and was trying to

protect others in the group by keeping his bike between John and the rest

of the group, which led to a testy moment. Our friend thought it best to

get himself out of the situation, and he did by leaving the vigil.

As for the neighbors, one set of neighbors called us derogatory names, but

another set toward the end drove up and asked if we were protesters. One

of our group came up and told her that it was a silent vigil aimed at

Negroponte to which she exclained loudly, "I'm so glad! It's about time

somebody protested him!" Then, police quickly whisked her away while John

said, "That's rude."

At times, while most of us continued to aim our stares and our signs

toward Negroponte (and thankfully, the security/CIA? wrote down what every

sign said, not to mention what people's t-shirts said, what brand of bag

people were carrying on their backs, etc.), it was absolutely impossible

not to notice the darkness of 31st street glaring with several police

cars, with officers walking amongst and between us, attempting to bait

people out of silence.

The police chummed up to John and his co-worker having banter. Early on,

one police officer asked John who lived here. He quietly said something

like, "Ambassador John Negroponte." The cop quizzically said, "Who's

that?" Then, a very quiet inaudible explanation, followed by a look of,

"Oh, that's who it is" on the police officer's face.

At the end, one officer told us we needed to be off the road we'd been on

for one hour. So, we walked onto the sidewalk in front of his house, which

forced the police out of the way. A few minutes later, an hour having

passed (which was the generally pre-agreed upon target time for staying)

we left as a group or in small groups of two, as John for a short time

decided to follow us down the street. He wasn't done taking pictures and

was frustrated that some hadn't given him a clear shot. Of course, they

could see us through security cameras, so I don't know why they needed the

mug shots in addition.

We took our own pictures, audio, and video to document what was happening.

We've had very noisy protests that drew almost no police presence. This

one drew an enormous amount, probably due to last time or out of boredom -

who knows?

We were there to disrupt John Negroponte and express to him our outrage,

albeit this night silently. We were also there to remember the dead and

tortured, which despite the police, was how I spent most of my time. I

noticed a huge, beautiful tree in Negroponte's yard and wondered how he

would feel if someone had destroyed it. What a tragedy that would be, and

I became sad at the thought. And, yet that tree serves to mask the

murderer and torturer that is John Negroponte, a man who has no qualms

about spying on any one of us. I went to think of people killed by death

squads and was forced to confront a lot of intimidation tactics. Perhaps,

we were the intimidators last night. The truth hurts, and in this case, it

should.

DAWN & The Essential Nature of Activist Reporting

My recent trip to DC connected me with some signigicant sources of information. I feel these channels are essential to liberty. Jim's Eclectic Blog by a DAWN (District of Columbia Anti War Network) member illustrates the fanstastically informative nature of blogs. I need to be reading blogs from D.C. that cover, as in reporting, demonstrations, protests, and CD (that's activist lingo for civil disobedience... you know like those trouble makers Ghandi and King engaged in.)

We should not have to be the media, but we do have to be. We have to issue press releases, do our own photography, videography, and write our own articles. Where the hell is the media, the press, the fourth estate??? We should not have to do all this documentation for the public record. I try to cover aspects that are not being covered, but I'm not impartial. I really don't have time to cover all sides of issues. That is the purpose to which the press evolved. Doing all these jobs drains us energetically, but we are up to the task. We allow other aspects of our lives to slide... for me it is a biography of Gene Stratton-Porter that isn't getting written, and developing a Greening of Management Training Program for my consulting business, and cleaning my house. But I digress....

Anyway, this morning as I was reading a forwarded email about the continuing harassment of DAWN activists for legal, protected forms of demonstration, I clicked through to read Jim's blog, I realized that I had digital photos that no one else was apt to publish from the action at Rumsfeld's house on May 18th. So, for free flow of information's sake, here is a bit more info about the impromptu action at Rumsfeld's house.

DAWN first came to my attention when I marched to Rumsfeld's House with a few dozen other folks after the Network for Spiritual Progressives Prayer Action. My CODEPINK friends Katie and Toby were arrested with two guys from DAWN. Katie just wanted to deliver a note to Rumsfled and Toby was going through the hedges after Katie as she didn't want Katie to be arrested alone. I think Toby might have gotten her pink umbrella hung up in the hedge. --- Note to self: drop props before any stealth operation. --- This was a first time arrest for both women.

My goddess, I am so inspired by these women who were both at a time in their lives when they were willing to be arrested to draw attention to the war criminals who are waging for profit corporate warfare and writing off the murder of hundreds of thousands of people as a necessary expense of their ill-gotten gains. These women are peace soldiers. Katie could have been hurt or killed. DC jails are not fun places. Neither my friends nor the other women with whom they were held who had been arrested and were being held for a myriad of charges were given water or food for over 24 hours. This is apparently standard procedure. Denying fluids can kill people -- it is torture. There is a war on our own people and torture is being used on us just like it is in the bases used in extraordinary rendition, in GITMO, in Abu Ghraib... it may be a tad more sublte, varying in degree, but it is just as immoral and reprehensible and a classic example of a slippery slope. We apparently tolerate torture in our lots of our jails, such as in Chicago.

I think we need to bring back the common usage of terms such as ill-gotten gains, profiteer, carpet bagger, yellow journalism, jingoism, propaganda and sensationalism -- and thus the nuances of meaning between motive and reporting. Just a thought.


Photo credits: All photos © Julia Field, 2006 excluding the photo of the Ghandi and King section of a wall at Busboys and Poets that is mine and which you may use but which I would like an attributive link back per the creative commons license for all non-copyrighted materials on this site.

It Is About Honor, Matriotism and Truth.

As I begin writing this I am watching Bush lay the Memorial Day wreath at the tomb of the unknown soldier in Arlington. Rumsfeld is there with him. I'm incensed. I take Memorial Day very seriously.

As a child I always accompanied my mother as she went to the cemetary on this day. We would take flowers and care for the graves of all our relatives who were buried there. At each grave I would learn the story of the life of that ancestor. There is a lump in my throat as I think that no one back in that rural area I call home will move the flags stuck in the ground in a clump at the edge of the cemetery to the graves of the war dead. Today no one will pay respects at the grave of my Uncle Carl who fought in WWII, joining the Army Air Corps even though he was in his 40s when we joined the fighting of WWII. He was wounded, lost the hearing in one ear, but survived to eventually retire from NASA where he worked on optical technology that went to the moon in Apollo missions.

My brother, a Marine serving in Vietnam, caught the brunt of a morter round explosion under his flack jacket in the battle of Khe Sahn. He was bent over lifting a wounded buddy into a medevac helicopter when shrapnel sliced through him. He probably lived only because they pulled him into the chopper and could begin life-saving care immediately.

Several branches of my family came from Anabaptist, or Brethren, communities and as such were pacifist. I was not raised in this faith, but I was raised to believe in the principles that informed this faith. While I may not believe that war is ever the answer, neither do I disrespect those brave soldiers who were and are ready to give their lives for principles in which they believe. There are principles for which I would give my life. And I'm an imperfect pacifist, if my life or the life of any one I love were directly threatened I would probably fight and kill.

I am disgusted by the war criminals Bush and Rumsfeld who sully the honor and memory of women and men who were willing to fight and die for liberty. Bush went AWOL. He's never faced danger. He comes from people who fancy themselves aristocrats when they are nothing more than corporate oligarchs. Rumsfeld wanted to create a machine-driven killing corps to assure himself a place in history as the implimentor of a kind of warfare conceived by the Nazis. This melaglomania, unchecked by an administration for which war was an abstraction, created wars and killed well over 100,000 thousand people for financial gain, sent in far fewer troops than were needed to accomplish the ill-conceived and largely strategically unplanned war.

These men are not fit to tread on the hallowed ground of Arlington. I am offended, saddened, and hurt not only by the actions of this corrupt cabal, who speak of volunteer forces but enforce a stop loss program that uses up our troops humanity on mandatory third tours of duty in Iraq. I am also disappointed by the success these men have had in pulling the wool over the eyes of the American people. I sometimes feel that patriotism has been irreconcilably tainted by this administration's abuse of the term and the people who identify with the now tarnished term. I have begun calling myself a matriot -- loving of my place of origin but tempered with a mother's vision and wisdom. Men could be matriots too. It makes as much sense as women being called patriotic.

On this Memorial Day 2006 I am honoring all the dead of our nation's wars rather than barbecuing and celebrating the de facto arrival of summer. I am also honoring those women who are the core of the peace movement this time around, those women who risk imprisonment, physical harm, the loss of all private communication, firing from their jobs, separation from or loss of families and a normal life to keep the truth about this oil war and the criminals who create and fuel it in the public consciousness. So many people and the media, traditional channels of information, have fallen into a silent chasm of the oppressed. Thank you women from Gold Star Families for Peace, thank you Grannies, thank you WILPF, thank you CODEPINK, thank you Women Say NO to War, thank you Women Say Enough... thank you women who rise from that bleak fear-filled place to wage peace and speak truth.

This Memorial Day let us honor the war dead and those who work for peace so that no more war memorials need ever be made.

Coupe d'etats, euthanizing corporations and reclaiming our voting rights.

Okay, it is time to have an absolute blogging onslaught per war, peace, war criminals and how these topics along with vote count integrity roll up into a ball of decit that is the single most important issue of our lifetime. Then we must follow it up in the streets in calm peaceful but decidedly outraged action until our upper level war criminals are in prison and the rationally planned deconstruction of the framework they have built up in our society has begun. We have to reclaim the American Dream and the things that made us great once upon a time: justice, equality, peace. Corporate crime relates to all this but the conviction of Ken Lay and Jeff Skilling is just a tiny chink in the armor of a vicious transnational global oligarchy whose practices effectively make slaves of all but the miniscule few who control this system.

Here are some links to help you understand my belief that we have to address the criminal theft of our government by sick, evil men who waged a horrific, totally false war waged by our children, husbands, wives, brothers, sisters, and parents on the back of the Iraqi people. Then we need to get to work on euthanizing corporations by getting rid of the rights that corporations have foolishly been given since the noble conception of our country as a place of liberty of people.


First I recommend reading the Rolling Stone article about the criminal manipulation of our votes in order to steal the 2004 election. (Not to mention the 2000 election that was also criminally manipulated to create a Bush II administration in the first place.)

Then go see Sir No Sir if at all possible! Then figure out how to get this movie to the Guard Troops and all those soldiers conscripted via the "Stop Loss" program and the troops who are on their THIRD TOUR in Iraq. Didn't we learn anything from Vietnam? Those soldiers who signed up for a third tour of duty were commonly thought to be damaged goods, slightly crazed, and certainly best stationed in battle where their desire to kill could be channeled. This is why we are having all these attrocities in Iraq now. Men and women can only live under the constant pressure of urban warfare for a short time before the learned cultural behavior we call humanity is so eroded that we begin to operate as killer apes rather than civilized men and women.

Finally go to the Abolish Corporate Personhood section of the WILPF site and begin to teach yourself about the slow erosion of our Constitutional Rights by the creation of corporations that are have been given all the rights and none of the responsibilities of real person. Flesh and blood, mortal people cannot compete against immortal disembodied people.

Oh, one more thing. Do not fall victim to their attempts to divide us into factions. That is all the hoopla about immigration and securing our borders is about. It is an attempt to create hatred and suspicion of all brown skinned persons by one-time middle class folks who have seen their standards of living slip on an economic incline that has been greased by corporate greed. If this administration was concerned about border integrity they would not have facilitated the evacuation bin Laden's family and other Saudi citizens across our borders when all other flights were grounded on 9/11/2001.

Then you can begin to remedy the illicit takeover of our government and the criminal trail of tears that can be found behind the villainous leaders who masquerade as our governmental administration.

Frames for the Military

It is always difficult to determine patterns from within the design...but that is what I spend a good deal of my life trying to do. I am but a fiber temporarily interwoven within a living fabric. Not terribly a terribly important part, but still, over all I am a part of the design. Single actions from single folks can make for perceptible change. All of Fort McNair now knows about the documentary film , Sir No Sir, that deals with military history and Vietnam because of an attempt to suppress the dissemination of information about the film. This is such a perfect example of how feeding information or energy into a process, even by reacting against it, strengthens that original process.

That is one of the reasons I'm not big on protest or anger as those are reactions against something and as such are not particularly effective in creating change. As Gregory Bateson said, "Information is any difference that makes a difference."

The challenge before the progressive community is to make a difference without inadvertantly strengthening the corporate/government stranglehold on our U.S. democratic Republic. Things really don't change very much, very quickly, or very often. But perspectives, both individual and collective, change constantly. Perceptual change, that mental shift in perspective can be thought of as reframing. The reframing that occurred at Fort McNair was inadvertant, but conscious reframing can also effect change.

Spiritual progressives are reasserting value and morality as topics clearly within their ow appropriate domain of discourse. Peace activists are reasserting their right to document military history. Citizens are reasserting their right to have their voices heard in the House and Senate.

Now if we could only frame the highest high ups responsible for the torture at Abu Ghirab rather than the low level non-commissioned folks such as Cardona whose trial ended today (verdict has not been determined) who are taking the fall for indemic corruption at the highest levels of government in the U.S. (also non-coms, but in a very different way.)

How much does the war & nuclear weaponry cost your community?

A great data source for examining government expenditures by various geographic zones (from zip codes and school districts to states) by spending areas.

http://database.nationalpriorities.org

May 17 and May 18 Action Pics from DC

We weren't sure if this was really the trash being picked up or an NSA vehicle picking up the Pink House's trash for scrutiny.


Me (in the pink of course!) with Vietnamese dignitaries and the young American translator who made conversation possible about the similarities of Vietnam and Iraq Wars as well as the environmental and economic degredation that is only now being transcended in Vietnam. We also spoke of my daughter's trip through Vietnam last summer and how she loved the land and people.

This was after I was tossed out of the Senate. 21 minutes or so into this video.


Whole lotta folks attend the Network of Spiritual Progressives "Pray-In" or Prayer Vigil in Lafayette Square Park across from the White House.


Blurry but peaceful sea of Peace Signs at the Prayer Vigil. It was beautiful.

This was followed by the attempt to deliver the no bombing of Iran petition signatures to the white House and the march to Rummy's house. You can see a video of these actions at politicstv.org.

Spying has no impact on our trying....

My DC action updates/coverage are still being posted at pinktucson.livejournal.com with when I can... but this email that was forwarded to me from a friend seemed more appropriate for this blog. Why? Because so many of the activists I've recently spoken to have experienced the same thing of which this woman writes. And several of us who were doing the Mothers Day 24 hour vigil had our hard drives crash multiple times within a couple weeks before the event. I try not to live in a world of suspicion and paranoia.... but it makes one wonder.

Here's the email Ellouise recieved and forwarded to me.

(Prior to this email of today, she was unable to get into her yahoo account even though her children using the same computer had no trouble with theirs) Soooooo, this is a little spooky...

----

I got a new modem today. My internet connection seems faster but
loading my email is still slower than other sites. I'll bet you
thought I would never wonder about that. Well you thought wrong.

I also opened up ANOTHER new email account. Having no access to my
email for most of last week was more than a tad inconvenient. It did
put a bit of a wrinkle in organizing our Mothers Day Peace Vigil, but
I did that the old fashioned way by using the telephone. I figure it
will take you awhile to find this new email account and I will enjoy
it working as fast as it does for everyone else on that site until you
find me there.

I spent the morning emailing my political contacts, fellow peace
activists and reporters and gave them my work email to use in case of
emergency. I figure you can't shut down that email without a flurry of
court orders or some such hassle that I am really not worth.

I have turned off my home phone. An added benefit to that is the money
I am saving. Besides, every time I answered it lately it was either a
hang up or a wrong number. So no great loss or inconvenience there.

I got a new ATM card too. Funny, I had that card for years and never
had one problem with it. I also rarely used it since it is for my
savings account and I do try to be a good girl and leave that account
alone. But right before I went to Crawford for Easter, I transferred a
bunch of money into that account and used that card while I was in
Texas. Then I used it in New York two weeks later when I was there for
the UPJ rally. Imagine my surprise when all of a sudden it stopped
working right after I got back from New York two weeks ago.

I was on the radio today! Did you hear me? Oh I know, that is most
likely a dumb question. I hope you paid attention to the part where we
talked about the loss of constitutional rights. The host of the show
told me she wants me back! So free up your Saturday afternoons. I may
even say hi to you at some point.

You see, agent mike, you don't scare me. My dad was a history teacher
for 40 years and I was the only kid in my kindergarten class who not
only had memorized the preamble to the constitution but could also
explain it and the Bill of Rights (well, as well \ s a 5 year old could
explain it). Point is, I could have told you when I was 5 that spying
on American citizens who are political activists is WRONG.

I think about my dad a lot these days. He was a proud Democrat. He was
very active politically and had all of his kids knocking on doors for
JFK in 1960. But Dad was somewhat conservative. He called me his
looney leftist daughter. He never did understand the need for a
feminist movement, as he always treated women as equals. He never
agreed with me about abortion but he thought the Vietnam war was
wrong. When he realized that he was most likely on one of Nixon's
enemies lists, he was furious. He also told me in 1967 that I had
better hope the USA NEVER got involved militarily in the middle east,
that we would never be able to get out once we got in. He disagreed
with Carter getting involved even though it was to negotiate a treaty.
And he was livid when bush sr went to war with Iraq in 1991.

See, Dad was really proud of his days as a soldier in WWII. But he
hated war. He had night terrors for the rest of his life. I can
remember many times seeing my mom or my dad sleeping on the couch in
the living room when I was a kid and I thought that was normal for a
long time. When I was finally old enough to realize it wasn't, I asked
my mom and she told me my dad tried to kick her out of the foxhole in
the middle of the night at least two or three times a week. My dad
also didn't let us watch war movies. He was a huge John Wayne fan, but
we only saw his cowboy movies. Dad said he had fought in a war and he
saw nothing entertaining about it. He thought it was wrong for
Hollywood to make money from war movies. So I guess you can say he
planted that peace activist seed in me when I was very young.

My dad was the smartest man I have ever known and he didn't raise no
fool. I know he would be proud of me today. I think of him every time
I stand with my fellow peace activists, holding signs to protest this
despicable war. I know he would worry about me and I doubt I would be
able to tell him about my phone and email and bank card problems, as I
would not want to worry him. But I know for a fact that if he were
alive today, he would most likely be right there next to me,
protesting this war and demanding the impeachment of this monster of a
president.

So I am not afraid of you or of my government. Bring it on. Oh, and I
will be back at the park tomorrow at 4:00 and again on Tuesday at
5:00. (I am thinking of making a new sign that says "HI AGENT MIKE!")
I also have a meeting on Monday night with those subversive Quakers.
We are going to plan our rally for the 28th. That should be a nice day
for you, as we expect a good turnout and it will be easier for you to
blend into the crowd.

As always, PEACE!!

Pics from Pink Mother Vigil

This Weekend I'm blogging on another site!

Heyo Peoples,

I'm in D.C. for the Mothers Day Vigil at the White House. Woo ha.... and as I'm doing CODEPINK stuff, I will be posting from pinktucson.livejournal.com. Tell your friends! This is gonna be great!!!!!

See you on livejournal for a while.

Peace,

Nancy

Watch out if you are a female in army who was born in the spring or early summer.

This is a rather bleak subject but the following two articles both came to my attention today.

The Increase in Army Suicides Is Not 'Slight'

A letter to the Editor published Tuesday, May 2, 2006 in the Washington Post.

In an April 22 Washington in Brief item, an Army spokesman called the increase in soldiers' suicides from 60 in 2003 and 67 in 2004 to 83 in 2005 a "slight" increase. But in public health terms, this is an epidemic, representing a 30 percent rise.

This statistic fits with a striking increase reported last month in mental health care by U.S. veterans of the Iraq war. A third of veterans are seeking psychiatric help, but military authorities refer only 5 percent of those on active duty for such evaluation.

Our soldiers must learn to kill and destroy. They endure difficult conditions in Iraq, and they have no say in their assignments. Yet they are expected to return home to resume civilian status without incident.

The job of mental health professionals is to address such serious internal conflicts, suicide being only one result. Post-traumatic stress disorder, alcoholism, family dysfunction and antisocial behavior are others.

E. JAMES LIEBERMAN

Potomac

The writer is a clinical professor of psychiatry at George Washington University's School of Medicine .

If you are born in April May or June you may be at a far greater risk of committing suicide than if you are born during seasons other than spring/early summer according to a British study reported by BBC News. Here are some excerpts from the article.

"Scientists have established seasonal birth trends for a number of diseases including some cancers, heart disease and brain tumours.

Other research has found more patients with schizophrenia, brain degenerating disease Alzheimer's, epilepsy and sleep disorder narcolepsy are born in December than any other month.

Equally, mental illnesses like depression and mood disorders and alcohol dependence are more frequent among those born during the spring and summer.

And 10% of suicides in England and Wales occur among people with these disorders."

And risks for women are even greater.

Among women, nearly 30% more suicides were committed by people born in the spring while among men the rate was nearly 14% higher than those born in the autumn.

Overall, the risk for people born in spring to early summer was increased by 17%.

The Border is an Imaginary Construct

I haven't gotten to address some of the "big topics" of the last couple months. "The Border" and "Immigration"are probably ones that have gotten the biggest nudge from corporate media. Some say the coverage is just distraction from issues the powers that be would prefer we forgot. Hundreds of thousands of people are taking to the streets to say we are here and we have the same inalienable rights as you .

I've seen and heard all sorts of takes on this topic, but the one I haven't seen is what I'm writing about today. Borders are not real. They are imaginary constructs drawn up by high level political entities to advance some aspect of a political agenda. Rain is real. Soil is real. People are real. Borders are not. We must remember this! I live in the Sonoran Desert. It is a real place with distinct patterns and types of soil, rainfall, flora and fauna that sets it apart from other distinct ecological zones in the world. We have an invisible, negotiated construct that runs smack dab through the middle of it. I love the place. I was married on top of one of its mountain peaks and gave birth to my daughter in one of it's valleys. But I am not of this place, I am but a migrant though I call this place home. The water saturated dense earth of the lower Great Lakes Basin will always be the place by which I measure all other places--home.

Migration used to be easier here. Rivers flowed. This Old Village released the heat of the day to the night. The Marana Agave Fields grew crops irrigated with water that flowed from the North. Oodham boys ready to become men showed they knew the ways of the world by traveling from here to Mar Bermejo, better known now as the Sea of Cortez and back. But then the Sea was undoubtedly called something else as this was before Europeans migrated to, then occupied, then claimed the area as their own and imposed their own place names. I don't say "we" because my ancestors were busy pillaging the Northeastern Coastal lands of El Norte at the time. And none of my ancestors traveled much further to the west than the Great River the Mississippi.

At some point, if we humans as a species do not want to become extinct, we need to get over the testosterone driven need to claim ownership of places and peoples and intangibles. One of the main hindrances to getting over this possession driven patriarchal tendency is a real Frankenstein called the corporation. The corporation has been given the status of a person, but it is an intangible level of organization, a process, that has no ethics, emotions, sense of well being, and can never appreciate the wonder of a newborn child -- yet it is driving the policies and practices of almost all governments and determining life and death for billions of people. These corporations were constructs created by men of power, the same men that divided Mother Earth into little fiefdoms with political structures that fed on the many to the benefit of the few. Most political systems with weapons of mass destruction such as the nuclear powers on the Earth are in male dominated societies. Just because countries are big or powerful doesn't make their power plays right. Just because men are bigger and are aggressive doesn't make it right to try to bully others. But that is just what men and the countries they have created do. Corporations and borders are creations of such societies .

The really sad thing is that the most pathetic puppets of the corporations are the ones who rabidly support the constructs of the those institutions. The vigilantes, the wackos who have the signs such as "GITMO Rocks" in support of the military recruiters across from the protest that happens every week across . These are the folks who would bequite happy to shop in WalMart the rest of their lives. Sad. They really think that being patriarchal and white somehow magically gave them the potential pathway to being rulers... and now they are pissed that they are powerless and want to kick any any dog they can corner. These folks are no different than the KKK and the John Birchers. They have testosterone and no territory to defend so they mistakenly support and defend that of the political and corporate powers apparently believing that when monarchy and state religion are restored that they will somehow benefit. They will still be slathering dogs gratefully licking the hands of their masters. And when unleashed they will gladly kill. These are the sortof people who do hate crimes. The sort of people who burn the flags of neighboring countries not realizing that the powers in those countries want to combine in order to create a better system of exploitation.

The rabid regular joes shooting off their mouths are Nazis, they are just mentally ill or misguided. The ruling folks are just fascists. Most folks don't understand the difference. The Nazis and the Fascists were allied with each other during WWII but they were not coming from the same place at all. The same still holds true. Lew Rockwell a central figure in conservative, libertarian circles explains below,

But what, in Heaven's name, does any of this have to do with "right-wing" theory? By "right wing," the media can mean one of these killer Nazi thugs, or they can mean someone who believes in private property, free enterprise, and bourgeois social norms. The blurring of the difference -- they are really polar opposites -- is wildly dishonest but obviously purposeful.

I doubt things are as purposeful as he thinks. Most people simplify the world into absurd dichotomies. I was reminded of this at Earth Day. The range of folks there was amazing. Diverse. There were liberals and conservatives, vegetarians and hunters, all sides of the immigration issue. Andrew Weil talking about the need for nuclear energy. People talking about animals as though we aren't animal. Wildlife live in habitats, not countries. We cannot stop animals from moving with shifts in prey, vegetation, and water and spacing themselves in the most optimal manner they can find. We cannot stop ourselves from doing this. If we could I guess we'd all be autralopithecines before any of us did the old out of Africa thing.

Because of these borders animals and people die. Lives are drastically altered and ended. 279 people died on my doorstep between 10/1/2004 & 9/30/2005 because of these human constructed concepts. How many animals would be stopped from migrating as they have for countless millenia if a border fence was erected? These are complex issues that cannot be solved simply and perhaps not at all unless we start thinking outside the box. Maybe only people with boxes can think outside of them. Others are too preoccupied with getting in them and drawing them. Of course not all women think holistically. Many have fallen into the sexist dichotomy thing only in an inverse fashion. Women who will only vote for women. Democratic women who are more corporate than religious neocons.

Constructs, constructs, constructs. They aren't real. They aren't interconnected in a logical or ecological fashion. If we as humans are going to allow our lives to be governed by constructs shouldn't the constructs be good ones. Perhaps all should just live the way we want to and allow others to do the same. Maybe we need to build another system altogether--one that is built upon a near universal, simple and inclusive principle: The Golden Rule. The vast majority of all the worlds religions and spiritual perspectives agree.

You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one. I hope someyou will join me and the world will live as one. -- John Lennon

There are those who would have us hate, harm each other, and have us all descend into the depth of darkness they promote. We can be better than that. Calmness and love be with you.

Stop the Hostile Take-over of the Internet!

I just became aware of this attempt by telecommunication giants to take over, privatize, corporatize and basically make the internet a non-regulated utility so they can screw us like the oil industry has done. This fits in as a great follow-up to my earlier rant on the need to focus on media and taking back the Democratic party. This is a media related urgent action item that came into my awarenes via Arizona's PDA (Progressive Democrats of America).

Do it! Sign!

Congress is now pushing a law that would end the free and open Internet as we know it. Internet providers like AT&T and Verizon are lobbying Congress hard to gut Network Neutrality, the Internet's First Amendment. Net Neutrality prevents AT&T from choosing which websites open most easily for you based on which site pays AT&T more. So Amazon doesn't have to outbid Barnes & Noble for the right to work more properly on your computer.

Many members of Congress take campaign contributions from these companies, and they don't think the public are paying attention to this issue. Let's show them we care -please sign this petition today.

I'm Ba-aack...

Where oh where oh where do I start?

Over the next couple weeks I will have a fair amount of time to write so I will be blogging about lots of things that have happened in the last few weeks when I have not been able to post, but before I start playing catch up I thought I should warn regular readers about my state of mind and what has been going on with me. There are three key things I have to work toward: taking back the media, taking back the religious discourse, and taking back the Democratic Party. I'm hot under the collar about these things. These are processes which we have to regain control of or authority in before any change can really occur.

I came to a realization that my personal situation had some parallels with our political situation. I have to take care of myself and fix some major problems inside myself (such as the gall stones that have convinced me to let them cut my gall bladder out early next week) before I will be able to truly be effective in my interactions with the world. Similarly we have to remove the corrupted elements of our representative democracy before we can be an effective player on Team Gaia.

At the end of February I awakened one night with horrific pain under my ribs on my right side that shot through all the way to the back that I can only describe as on par with the severity of pain involved with labor & birth. A few days later I found out my elderly (over 90) mother fell and broke her hip. This was while I was attempting to organize an International Women's Day vigil, a progressive fast between that day and the Tucson's March 18th rally and march on the 3rd anniversary of the war in Iraq for which I was also hoping to stir up a significant pink presence. I was also planning a stop in Tucson by one of the Iraqi women who began a speaking tour of the U.S. in March and April as a part of the Women Say No To War campaign. I dropped everything and went back to the Mid-West. Women's lives (and many men's lives too) get very complicated when the squeeze of career, children, and arranging for or providing the caretaking of an elderly parent really tightens down.

At some point, as I was sitting in the wifi connected coffee shop in the rural town in which I grew up, I experienced an epiphany and realized that not only do I detest the actions of the entire Bush Oligarchy (oil-igarchy?) I am personally pissed off at Bush because he is forcing me to put so much energy into pro-peace activities to counter their evil doings that I am not able to do the things I'd really like to be doing . I would really like to be arranging my poetry into a coherent manuscript, researching and continuing work on a biography of Gene Stratton-Porter, finishing several art projects, hanging with my teenage daughter in these blink of the eye moments before she heads off to college, doing sorely needed repairs on my home, getting several of my websites either up and running or back up, and countless other really important things. Not only are the policies of these vile men and women screwing up the world I live in to levels that may well signal the end of life as we know it, but my personal life and well-being within the moment are being impinged upon.

I need to act. It is a real need that has to be fulfilled. The only way I can explain it is in the colloquial language of the place where I was raised. I heard a call. And paraphrasing my folksinger friend Carrie Newcomer says, "when you hear/feel this type of call, you have to answer." It is that simple. Who places that call and how it is placed are up for debate, but for me it is connected to those spiritual level things that are based in belief systems and not in logical & scientific systems of knowing.

I'm not hiding my religious beliefs any longer. I've always thought that my religion, how I interact with the world of spirit and flesh, was nobody's business but my own. I still think that. But my beliefs that come from that personal understanding of religion (I'm very Protestant in that sense, I guess.) That understanding translates to my morality and my concepts of worth, my values if you will. I am sick and tired of corrupt, carpet-bagging, war-mongers calling me morally bankrupt and insinuating that my values are somehow tainted. I am a good person, at peace with the deity as I understand her, and I am gonna get righteous on people's asses when they try to pull that crap on me! Conflict resolution is a good thing, but be cannot compromise on our beliefs. Negotiations necessary to the ultimate declaration of peace will require great diplomacy, but no one should have to compromise their faith and bend to the will of another person's faith in the pursuit of that peace.

I'm tired of imposition by others into my right to believe and act in virtuous ways as dictated by my religion. Bush and his cronies are not only occupying Iraq, they are attempting to possess my soul. They are demons. Am I going too far? Okay, okay, but I do like theatrics. But you get my point. Gonzales, for example, doesn't give a *bleep* about child pornography, he is orchestrating a campaign to restrict internet freedom and privacy and is using an issue with a moral hair trigger to do it. The method is the same one used by this administration time and time again. They justify an action by inciting a mob mentality and then turn around and lynch the folks who were in the mob. Family values and the "abortion issue" were mere propaganda tools to divert the populace from stolen elections, illegal consolidation of power in the presidency, steering away from combating the real terrorist threats against our country, destroying the Bill of Rights, and setting up a completely corporate ruled fascist state. This has been enabled by Democrats who don't stand for anything and journalists who value their checks cut by corporate media more than their integrity.

We've got to multitask, keep the faith, and recognize that we are working on product and process simultaneously.

I am the walrus.

Tucson's March 18th March

I am finishing up something started the day of the march -- yesterday. I am not in top form today as I'm on my third day of a fast. I'm a bit tired and a bit grumpy... but this is a juice fast so I'm not experiencing real hunger, not the kind of hunger that so many in our war torn world live with and die from every day. It was not difficult to march yesterday while fasting as, given my generous figure, I have lots of reserves upon which I can draw.

The Tucson, Arizona observance of the 3rd Anniversary of the Iraq War began 10 a.m. yesterday (Saturday, March 18th, 2006) as the crowd of approximately 200 folks
gathered for the Peace Rally at Catalina Park at which there was music by individual artists and the Raging Grannies as well as personal statements and recollections, statements from candidates for the Arizona Senate as well as contenders for Kolbe's soon to be vacated seat, as well as spokespersons for local peace and justice groups. For me the most moving portion of the rally was when Salette Latas (see pic at left), herself an Air Force veteran, described her feelings at sending her father off to Vietnam, her husband (retired from Air Force) to the first Gulf War, her son to Iraq. She also spoke about being in Walter Reed last November on Veterans Day with her son and the other wounded soldiers while Senators and Congressional Reps were no where in sight. They were all out expressing patriotic support for war, while the soldiers who were undisputedable patriots were left to themselves in Walter Reed. That was the day her husband Jeff announced his candidacy for the AZ District 8 Congressional Seat in order to continue the family tradition of serving in a way that would not support the corporations and elite few individuals in power who benefit from war without paying any of the true costs in life and limb. She encouraged everyone to keep protesting and working to build peace.

The march itself was uneventful... the usual. With an amalgamation of people who want peace. Older people who have been in the peace movement most of their adult lives. First time marchers who have reached a critical point where they can no longer keep silent about unjust war and occupation of other countries. A few students. Some of the youthful anarchists who gravitate toward wearing black and using obscenities for reasons that are not obvious. There were Army vets (and vets from other branches too.) Political sentiments were all over the chart. There were people who seemed to not be all that comfortable protesting but felt they had to do something. There were folks holding U.S. flags "upside down." This offended some people. Others understood that this is the sign used for "distress" but were concerned that others might not know this.

The route to the Recruiting Center on Speedway was flanked by motorcycle cops but as always with a non-permitted march (permits are not an option for marches in Tucson) it is not clear that all of a sudden the officers could decide the marchers are doing something wrong. But they predominantly focused on the job of keeping cars and pedestrians separated.

The "counter-protesters" had been at the recruiting center for at least an hour before the rally had even started. Marchers vastly outnumbered the pro-war group who looked to be the same pro-war folks that demonstrate across from the weekly military recruiting protest on Wednesday mornings. The balance was at least five to one in favor of the pro-peace group by the time the march arrived at its destination. Numbers built throughout the rally and march until several blocks were filled with pro-peace folks several deep in most spots. This compared to the scattering of pro-war folks with their huge flags standing two arm lengths apart apparently to try to increase the seeming number of their group that numbered somewhere around a couple dozen. The drivers passing who chose to signal pro-peace support were in the majority making up close to 90% of the passing cars who signaled an opinion.

The pro-war group seems to truly hate the expression of viewpoints different than their own. As is often the case on Wednesdays when the groups line the opposite sides of the street, after the police left, the pro-war group had several individuals cross the street and surround and threaten the last few pro-peace demonstrators on the north side of the street. Individuals who work in the businesses on the north side of Speedway report that the pro-war people routinely cross the street and harass and attempt to intimidate the peace folks. Calls placed to the police by these workers to the police report that the police do not reign in these folks who threaten other law abiding citizens and only say that the pro-war folks say the same thing. Apparently the police are quite comfortable disregarding calls reporting harassment and intimidation of lawful peace demonstrators. This was undoubtedly the most disturbing aspect of the day. TPD officers have apparently aligned themselves, taking sides with the "pro-recruiter" folks in what certainly seems to some to be a sign of the willingness of at least some local police to participate in a police state.

The Women's Web is the World's Safety Net

Maxine Frith's article in the Independent/UK is one of the most salient articles I've seen, although the title is deceptively narrow, in quite some time on the status of women and its impact on the state of the world in regard to peace and every matter.

I usually do not reprint articles in their entirity, but in this instance, this article, UN: Women Denied Representation, Making War on Poverty Hard to Win says it all, about women, peace and society.

Millions of women around the world, including those in the UK and other Western countries, are being denied effective representation because of the low numbers of female politicians, judges and employers, the United Nations has warned.

Campaigners say that unless urgent action is taken on the status of women, the Millennium Development Goals on reducing poverty, infant deaths and standards of education will not be met.

To mark International Women's Day, the UN has published a report that says rates of female participation in governments across the developed and developing world are still appallingly low. The report says that for women to be adequately represented in their country, at least 30 per cent of parliamentary seats should have a female representative.

In Britain, only 18 per cent of MPs are women, while only 8 per cent of MPs in Arab countries are female. Just 20 nations - including Rwanda, Mozambique, Guyana and Burundi - have reached or exceeded the 30 per cent mark and only three countries (Chile, Spain and Sweden) have complete gender parity in government.

Kofi Annan, the United Nations secretary general, said: "The rate of progress overall is slow. Women are every bit as affected as any man by the challenges facing humanity in the 21st century - in economic and social development, as well as in peace and security - often they are more affected."

He added: "The world is starting to grasp that there is no policy more effective in promoting development, health and education than the empowerment of women and girls, and no policy is more important in preventing conflict, or in achieving reconciliation after a conflict has ended."

United Nations figures also show that 70 per cent of the world's 1.2 billion people who are estimated to live in poverty are women and children. A woman dies every minute from complications arising from pregnancy and childbirth, and HIV rates are now rising faster among women than men. Charities say that 700 million women are living without adequate food, water, sanitation and education.

Even in the developed world, women face endemic discrimination. Full-time female workers in Japan earn just 51 per cent of the wages of their male counterparts, while only one in five managers in Italy is a woman and just 14 per cent of the seats in the US Congress are taken by women.

In a speech to mark International Women's Day in Britain, Lady Barbara Thomas Judge, who chairs the UK Atomic Energy Authority, said that girls still suffered from discrimination in schools and work. She told a conference organised by the Aurora Network for women in business that 30 years after the introduction of the Sex Discrimination Act in the United Kingdom, women account for half of the working population but for just one in four managers, 9 per cent of the judiciary and 10 per cent of senior police officers.

Lady Judge highlighted the fact that only 14.5 per cent of people employed in the fields of technology and engineering are women, despite evidence that when they do enter the professions, female engineers earn more than men. "Research indicates that those girls that are interested in maths and science are channelled into medicine, nursing and veterinary science because these are perceived as "caring" professions," she said.

"Girls have few role models that show that women can be engineers and there are few companies that provide work experience for women in engineering. If we are to survive as a leading nation in this global- ised world, we must utilise this country's intellectual capability to the fullest extent."

Julia Häusermann, the president of the human rights charity Rights and Humanity, said: "We have much to celebrate on International Women's Day.

"All over the world, women are making progress in political participation, economic empowerment and increased access to education. But wherever we turn, poverty, violence and Aids have a woman's face.

"The empowerment of women is the single most effective tool for development. There is increasing evidence that securing women's rights benefits not just women and their immediate families, but the wider society and national economies."

For several U.N. publications on this and closely related subjects, go to this U.N. web page.

Join the CODEPINK Fast For Peace!

CODEPINK Tucson is organizing a PROGRESSIVE FAST FOR PEACE that is taking place between today and the 3rd Anniversary of the U.S. War Against Iraq.

On their site, they list pinktucson (at) cox.net as the contact where you are supposed to send an email containing your

name
location
date you will be fasting
and your reason for fasting

to be included in their fast.

The first and last day fasters are already listed on the site. A progressive fast is a coordinated fast with many different people agreeing to fast on different days within the specified time period.

Women Delivering Global Peace Petition Roughed Up and Arrested.

I thought we had the right to petition organizations charged with our welfare. Once upon a time I guess.

This arrived this a.m. from a friend who is in D.C. for International Women's Day Actions:

Medea Benjamin and Cindy Sheehan, who were both arrested in New York City with two other women, Missy Beattie (Gold Star Families for Peace), and Reverend Patty Ackerman, after refusing to leave the US Mission to the UN without being allowed the simple opportunity to deliver our Global Women’s Call for Peace petition. The US mission was so intimidated by a group of women with a piece of paper, that they locked the entrances to the building and called in the cops to arrest these four courageous women. The arrest was very rough and Cindy’s arm was badly pulled. The women spent the night in jail and were booked and released on Tuesday morning. Both Cindy and Medea safely arrived in DC last night in time for a large community event during which each of the Iraqi women shared their experiences in war-torn Iraq.

She also described this mornings actions,

This morning we are converging for a short breakfast before starting our day of actions for International Women’s Day. We will be creating an altar outside the Iraqi Embassy in memoriam of the lives lost in Iraq and then marching from the Iraqi Embassy to the White House where we intend to deliver our petition with over 100,000 signatures

And announced that 100,000 signatures have been reached on the Global Call for Women to say No to War!



Here is the press release about the arrests at the U.N.:




For Immediate Release: Contact: Andrea Buffa (510) 325-3653

March 4, 2006 or Ann Wright (808) 741-1141

Cindy Sheehan and Three Others Arrested While Attempting to Deliver Petition Signed by 60,000 Demanding an End to Bloodshed in Iraq

Arrests Take Place After US Mission to the UN Refused to Meet with Delegation of Women Visiting from Iraq and Gold Star Families for Peace

Today four women, including peace activist, Cindy Sheehan, were arrested at the United Nations while trying to deliver a petition with more than 60,000 signatures urging the “withdrawal all troops and all foreign fighters from Iraq.”


Arrested were: Sheehan, Gold Star Families for Peace; Medea Benjamin, co-founder of CODEPINK: Women for Peace; Missy Beattie, Gold Star Families for Peace; and Rev. Patricia Ackerman.



A delegation of women from Iraq and Gold Star Families for Peace had just concluded a press conference in front of the UN calling for an end to the US occupation of Iraq. The group then marched to the US Mission to deliver a petition. The US Mission office refused to send a representative to meet with the delegation of women. The women refused to leave without delivering the signatures to someone in the US Mission’s office and were later arrested.



“I am outraged that the US Mission could not send someone down to meet with a delegation of women whose lives and families have been shattered by this destructive and immoral war,” said Ann Wright, former US Army Colonel and US diplomat. Wright was physically assaulted by security officers during the arrests.



To view full text of the petition, go to: http://www.womensaynotowar.org <http://www.womensaynotowar.org/> .