***Songs To While The Time By- The Roots Is The Toots

A YouTube clip to give some flavor to this subject.

Over the past several years I have been running an occasional series in this space of songs, mainly political protest songs, you know The Internationale, Union Maid, Which Side Are You On, Viva La Quince Brigada, Universal Soldier, and such entitled Songs To While The Class Struggle By. And those songs provide our movement with that combination entertainment/political message that is an art form that we use to draw the interested around us. Even though today those interested may be counted rather than countless and the class struggle to be whiled away is rather one-sidedly going against us at present. The bosses are using every means from firing to targeting union organizing to their paid propagandists complaining that the masses are not happy with having their plight groveled in their faces like they should be while the rich, well, while away in luxury and comfort.   

But not all life is political, or rather not all music lends itself to some kind of explicit political meaning yet speaks to, let’s say, the poor sharecropper at the juke joint on Saturday listening to the country blues, unplugged, kids at the jukebox listening to high be-bop swing, other kids listening, maybe at that same jukebox now worn with play and coins listening to some guys from some Memphis record company rocking and rolling, or adults spending some dough to hear the latest from Tin Pan Alley or the Broadway musical. And so they too while away to the various aspects of the American songbook and that rich tradition is which in honored here.   

This series which could include some protest songs as well is centered on roots music as it has come down the ages and formed the core of the American songbook. You will find the odd, the eccentric, the forebears of later musical trends, and the just plain amusing here. Listen up-Peter Paul Markin

NEW WARS / OLD WARS – Are You Feeling Safer Now?

A case could be made that US intervention in Iraq – at the request of its government – might be legal (if misguided), should the US Congress resolve to approve it.  However, with or without the assent of the Congress, the attacks inside Syria are violations of international law, regardless of any “coalition of the willing” outside of UN Security Council agreement. But, lawful or not, it is still very foolish. . .

 

STUPID STUFF: America's Never-Ending War in the Middle East

While President Obama continues – at least for now – to resist redeploying large numbers of U.S. soldiers to fight the Islamic State on the ground, the military components of the anti-Islamic State strategy he has laid out effectively recommit the United States to its post-9/11 template for never-ending war in the Middle East. In the end, such an approach can only compound the damage that has already been done to America’s severely weakened strategic position in the Middle East by its previous post-9/11 military misadventures…  Without doubt, there needs to be a regional strategy for dealing with the Islamic State. Obama and his senior advisors pay lip service to this idea. But their notion of a regional strategy encompasses only established and unrepresentative Sunni regimes dependent on Washington for their security – e.g., Saudi Arabia, the rest of the Gulf Cooperation Council, Egypt, and Jordan.    More   

 

Here’s Everything Wrong with the White House’s War on the Islamic State

…with scarcely a whisper of serious debate, Obama has become the fourth consecutive U.S. president to launch a war in Iraq—and in fact has outdone his predecessors by spreading the war to Syria as well…  This was no minor escalation. According to the Washington Post, the United States and its Arab allies dropped more explosives on Syria in their first engagement there than U.S. forces had dropped over all of Iraq in the preceding month. It was the largest single U.S. military operation since NATO’s intervention in Libya was launched back in 2011… It should bother you that this war is illegal and constitutional. But even if you’re fed up with the legal niceties of the UN Security Council and the U.S. Congress, there’s simply no reason to believe that might is going to make right here… Despite Congress’ approval of $500 million in new funds to train and arm other Syrian rebels, the CIA—which has been already been conducting a smaller-scale program in Jordan to do just that—is reportedly deeply skeptical about the plausibility of this plan, with one member of Congress reporting that CIA sources had described it as a “fool’s errand.”  More

 

 

Question for Obama’s Syria plan: Who are the 'moderate' rebels?

The FSA is currently the weakest force on the ground in Syria, a result not only of inadequate foreign backing compared with that of rival Islamist and extremist factions, but of its own internal divisions, byzantine leadership structure (based in Turkey) and rampant corruption… Even some of the FSA’s top commanders admit the group no longer enjoys the confidence of Syria's political opposition. In an interview with the Washington Post, one commander called U.S. efforts to patch together the FSA’s disparate brigades into a united army a "cut and paste of previous FSA failures." … Many Syrians who detest Assad are nonetheless unconvinced by any of the armed groups waging the war, which has claimed nearly 200,000 lives, a toll that is climbing. FSA brigades have been accused of human rights abuses, such as executing its prisoners and looting. And, Syrians say, the rebels’ military strategy has increasingly involved destroying the country’s infrastructure, alienating even many anti-Assad Syrians.    More

 

U.S., anti-Assad rebels in Syria remain at odds over role of al Qaida’s Nusra Front

To the United States and its allies, the Nusra Front is a fearsome al Qaida affiliate whose extremist ideology has no place in a future Syria.  To many Syrian rebels, however, Nusra fighters are vital warriors in the battle to topple President Bashar Assad, even if the moderates don’t share the group’s end goal of a religious state. This disconnect has existed since the early days of the Syrian conflict, when the Obama administration first designated Nusra a foreign terrorist organization… The moves infuriated rebels and puzzled some analysts, who questioned the wisdom of attacking groups that, however distasteful, remain the vanguard of the anti-Assad fight… The risk of empowering an al Qaida affiliate is a small price to pay for Nusra’s contributions on the battlefield, said Jeffrey White, a former senior Defense Intelligence Agency analyst who’s now with the [AIPAC-founded] Washington Institute for Near East Policy… The U.S.-backed opposition coalition’s leader called on the United States to reconsider the designation, more than two dozen rebel factions signed a petition of support for Nusra, and thousands more took to the streets in protest, some carrying signs that read, “We are all Nusra Front.”     More

 

Beheadings v. Drone Assassinations

Why do Americans hate beheadings but love drone killings? What accounts for our irrational response to these two very different forms of illegal execution, one very profitable and high-tech, usually resulting in many collateral deaths and injuries, and the other very low-tech, but provoking fear and righteous condemnation from the citizens whose country prefers the high-tech?  … there’s reason to question that being killed by drone bombs is any less horrible  then death by beheading. Some drone pilots have talked about watching those they’ve hit try crawling away with severed limbs or lie bleeding to death for hours.  More

 

The War the Pentagon Was Hoping For

As the U.S. escalates its bombing campaign against ISIS (or IS or ISIL), U.S. officials seem to have found an enemy we can all love to hate and fear.  ISIS beheads hostages, conducts brutal ethnic cleansing and has links to Al-Qaeda.  DC power players have eagerly embraced a small war made to order to restore America's wounded military pride after the first Iraq debacle.  The contrived nature of the narrative presented by U.S. officials was evident from the outset if one cared to look behind the propaganda screen…  For Americans, this campaign brings together many of the familiar themes of the history of U.S. military expansion since the end of the Cold War, and it raises many of the same questions and problems.  U.S. officials are evidently encouraged by similarities to the 1991 First Gulf War, a model they revere but have failed to replicate: an unpopular enemy; a limited objective; domestic political support; a broad international coalition to do the fighting and pay for it; and the promise of "victory" over a villainous enemy to win the acclaim of a grateful world.   More

 

Defense Contractors Are Making a Killing

Stock prices for Lockheed Martin, General Dynamics, Raytheon and Northrop Grumman set all-time record highs last week as it became increasingly clear that President Obama was committed to a massive, sustained air war in Iraq and Syria. It’s nothing short of a windfall for these and other huge defense contractors, who’ve been getting itchy about federal budget pressures that threatened to slow the rate of increase in military spending. Now, with U.S. forces literally blowing through tens of millions of dollars of munitions a day, the industry is not just counting on vast spending to replenish inventory, but hoping for a new era of reliance on supremely expensive military hardware. More

 

Dog Bites, Workplace Accidents Killed More Americans Than Terrorism Last Year

With the Middle East grabbing headlines, many Americans are concerned about terrorism. A CNN poll [3] from earlier this month found that 53% of Americans are concerned that there will be terrorist attacks, up from 39% in 2011. But while fear of terrorism has skyrocketed, the facts are that few Americans are ever injured or killed by an act of terror, and our country has blown the threat of violence from terrorists way out of proportion. In fact, dog bites actually killed more Americans last year than terrorism—with 32 fatalities from dogs [4] logged by non-profit DogBites.org and eight fatalities from domestic terror attacks [5] (according to the University of Maryland Global Terrorism Database) and 16 from attacks overseas [6] (according to the State Department).   More

 

The War Against ISIS Could Cost American Taxpayers $1.5 Billion A Month

"On an annual basis, I estimate the operations will cost somewhere between $15 and $20 billion," Gordon Adams, a professor of U.S. foreign policy at American University, told The Huffington Post… The majority of the $15 to $20 billion total comes from airstrikes, which Adams estimates will cost about $8 billion a year… On Thursday, the Pentagon estimated the cost of U.S. military operations in Iraq and Syria to be roughly $7 million to $10 million per day -- or about $210 million to $300 million per month.  More

 

We Could Have Hired 10,000 Teachers– Instead, We Got a War

Our war against ISIS has already cost between $780 and $930 million so far, according to the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments. That is enough money to hire 10,000 teachers to work for a year.  That, of course, represents only a fraction of the money we will spend on a operation President Obama warned could take years. Depending on the style of the military engagement the center estimates this latest war could cost ‘as little’ as $2.4 billion a year, if it is only low intensity air operations, or as much as $22 billion a year if it requires a large ground contingent.  More

 

Why Obama’s assurance of ‘no boots on the ground’ isn’t so reassuring

Here’s what “no boots on the ground” apparently doesn’t mean: It doesn’t mean that no U.S. troops will be sent to Iraq or Syria. Reportedly there are already 1,600 U.S. military personnel in Iraq. True, they’re present in an “advisory” role, not in a combat role — but surely one lesson of Iraq and Afghanistan is that combat has a habit of finding its way to noncombat personnel… It’s also hard to know what publicly reported troop numbers really mean. When the Pentagon issues a Boots on the Ground report (known colloquially as a “BOG report”), it often excludes military personnel on “temporary duty” in combat areas, even though temporary duty may mean an assignment spanning five or six months. Similarly, Special Operations personnel assigned to work under CIA auspices are often left out of the BOG numbers. This makes it hard to know just who’s being counted when officials say there are 1,600 military personnel in Iraq.    More

 

Poll: 70% of troops say no more boots on the ground in Iraq

As the tide of war rises again in the Middle East, the military’s rank and file are mostly opposed to expanding the new mission in Iraq and Syria to include sending a large number of U.S. ground troops into combat, according to a Military Times survey of active-duty members...  The reader survey asked more than 2,200 active-duty troops this question: “In your opinion, do you think the U.S. military should send a substantial number of combat troops to Iraq to support the Iraqi security forces?” Slightly more than 70 percent responded: “No.”  “It’s their country, it’s their business. I don’t think major ‘boots on the ground’ is the right answer,” said one Army infantry officer and prior-enlisted soldier who deployed to Iraq three times.   More

 

OPPOSING PLUTOCRACY, ENDLESS WAR and A DESTROYED PLANET

 

TODD GITLIN: As the Globe Warms, So Does the Climate Movement

Less than two weeks have passed and yet it isn’t too early to say it: the People’s Climate March changed the social map -- many maps, in fact, since hundreds of smaller marches took place in 162 countries. That march in New York City, spectacular as it may have been with its 400,000 participants, joyous as it was, moving as it was (slow-moving, actually, since it filled more than a mile’s worth of wide avenues and countless side streets), was no simple spectacle for a day. It represented the upwelling of something that matters so much more: a genuine global climate movement.  More

 

WAR AND CLIMATE CHANGE: Time to Connect the Dots 

In the decade between 2001 and 2011, global military spending increased by an estimated 92 percent, according to Stockholm International Peace Research, although it fell by 1.9 percent in real terms in 2013 to $1,747 billion. At the same time, according to the draft of a new study from the International Peace Bureau (1), almost 10 gigatons of carbon dioxide equivalent has been released into the atmosphere. According to the Global Carbon Project, 2014 emissions are set to reach a record high. Could there be some connection between rising military expenditures and rising carbon emissions? … there can be no climate change mitigation without peace and no peace without moving swiftly to provide the poorer parts of the world with the resources needed to adapt to climate change and build resilient economies. The trillions that are spent on weapons rob national treasuries of the resources needed to provide funds for climate mitigation and adaptation.  More

 

Why Have Policymakers Abandoned the Working Class?

Why do we hear so much about the need to raise interest rates now rather than later, or get the deficit under control immediately despite the risks to households who are most vulnerable to an economic downturn? Those who are most in need – those least able to withstand a spell of unemployment or other negative economic events – have the least power in our political system.  With the decline in unions and other institutions that used to give workers a voice in the political process along with rising inequality that gives even more power to those at the top, the problem is getting worse. No wonder policy has been tilted so much in favor of those at the top. Fiscal policy in particular has been far too responsive to the interests of those with political power rather than those in greatest need. If we are going to be a fair and just society, a society that protects those among us who are the most vulnerable to economic shocks, this needs to change.   More

 

The middle class is poorer today than it was in 1989

The economy has gotten bigger, but much of that growth hasn't reached the middle class. Indeed, the top 1 percent grabbed 95 percent of all the gains during the recovery's first three years. And that's not even the most depressing part. Even adjusted for household size, real median incomes haven't increased at all since 1999. That's right: the middle class hasn't gotten a raise in 15 years.  But one of the biggest, and least appreciated reasons Democrats might be struggling, is that the middle class is poorer, too. Median net worth is actually lower, adjusted for inflation, than it was in 1989. Even worse, it's kept falling during the recovery. Yes, even after the economy started to grow again, and the stock market started to boom, and housing prices began to bounce back, the median net worth of the average American household continued to decline.  More

 

CHOMSKY: Corporations and the Richest Americans Viscerally Oppose Common Good

For those whom Adam Smith called the "Masters of Mankind,” it is important that we must become the stupid nation in the interests of their short-term gain, damn the consequences. These are essential properties of contemporary market fundamentalist doctrines. ALEC and its corporate sponsors understand the importance of ensuring that public education train children to belong to the stupid nation, and not be misled by science and rationality… There are solutions, but they do not fit the needs of the Masters, for whom the crises are no problem. They are bailed out by the Nanny State. Today corporate profits are breaking new records and the financial managers who created the current crisis are enjoying huge bonuses. Meanwhile, for the large majority, wages and income have practically stagnated in the last 30-odd years. By today, it has reached the point that 400 individuals have more wealth than the bottom 180 million Americans…  One consequence is that by now, the poorest 70% have literally no influence over policy. As you move up the income/wealth ladder influence increases, and at the very top, a tiny percent, the Masters get what they want.   More

 

Americans have no idea how the government spends money

Pew asked respondents which program the government spent the most money on: Social Security, transportation, foreign aid, or interest on the national debt…  The most popular answer was foreign aid at 33 percent, followed by interest on the debt, at 26 percent. Twenty percent named Social Security, and an additional 4 percent named transportation… Responses to this question show how Americans' understanding of their world is deeply influenced by their political leanings and preconceived notions. Foreign aid is consistently rated as the least popular spending category by Americans, even though it accounts for roughly 1 percent of the federal budget. Several years of hysterics surrounding the debt and deficit have also clearly convinced people that debt spending takes up a larger share of the budget than it actually does.  More

 

NOT ENOUGH TAXATION AND TOO MUCH REPRESENTATION

Since 2013, at least 14 U.S. corporations have relocated their headquarters abroad, according to Reuters, with 10 making the move this year alone. The most recent example is Burger King, which announced in late August that it would merge with the Canadian chain Tim Hortons and move its headquarters to Canada, which has a lower corporate tax rate than the U.S. does. That month the U.S. fruit company Chiquita Banana decided to move its headquarters to Ireland. The pharmaceutical company AbbVie moved abroad in June, and Pfizer is contemplating leaving behind its U.S. status… Obama and concerned members of Congress are right to demand that corporations doing in business in the U.S. should be made to pay their fare share and abide by the responsibilities that come with that privilege. But more than that, at a time when businesses’ civic investment grows weaker and weaker, we should be examining ways to limit undue corporate influence over our democratic system.   More

 

ELECTION DAY, November 4:

One Million Massachusetts Workers Need the Right to Earned Sick Time!

 

Raise Up Massachusetts, which is leading the campaign, writes:

This weekend will mark 30 days from Election Day and we have a lot of work to do. We’re planning canvasses across the state and we need you to join us. So far, our canvasses have been great successes: volunteers have been able to talk to dozens of voters a shift and have meaningful conversations that have spread the message of our campaign.  But as we get closer to Election Day (again, we’re only 30 days out!), we need to start talking to even more voters every weekend. You can either sign up for an event near you, or if you there’s nothing close, sign up here to set up canvassing in your neighborhood.

 

Our friends at Massachusetts Peace Action are pitching in:

You can join Massachusetts Peace Action's work on this effort in several ways. 1) Volunteer for shifts at regional call centers in many towns around the state using the state of the art HubDialer system, which guarantees many contacts with voters.  2) Use your own phone and a computer at home to do a shift using HubDialer (after simple web based training in using the system).  3) Call from an old fashioned paper list. 4) Join door to door canvasses to reach likely supporters.  5) Reach out to family, friends, co-workers and in your community to those and ask them to sign a pledge a vote for Yes on 4.

Please click here to join in the Raise Up Campaign by volunteering for a shift making calls or reaching out to your friends, neighbors, and family in support of YES on 4

And DORCHESTER PEOPLE FOR PEACE is committed to turning out at the polls for Question 4 on Election Day – and also for our local ballot QUESTION 5 to say “we want to get big money out of our politics!”

 

Sharon Bilodeau (sgbilodeau@gmail.com / 617-504-1645) writes:

We need your help on Election Day, November 4. Can you cover a morning or evening shift (or both)? Can you work the same shift you worked in September? Would you like a new time and place? Were you busy on Primary Day but can work Election Day?  Please email at sgbilodeau@gmail.com or call me at 617-504-1645
Here are the ballot questions:
1. Earned Sick Time. Our ally, New England United for Justice, has been working for the right to earned sick time for all Massachusetts workers for seven years. In November it will be a binding question on the ballot. Many people haven't heard about it but will support it if we let them know.

2. Getting Big Money Out of Politics. Recent Supreme Court decisions have allowed billionaires and corporations to spend unlimited amounts in elections, treating corporations as ‘Persons’ with free speech rights. To show that our elected officials that voters do not agree, Sydney and Hayat led a drive that put a non-binding question on the ballot in Dan Cullinane’s district. The ballot question calls for an amendment to the U.S. Constitution to saying that corporations are not people and money is not a form of speech – it must be regulated in political campaigns.

The polling places are, in priority order with double precincts and heavier-voting precincts first: 
Dorchester Academy (the former Woodrow Wilson School), 18 Croftland St, Codman Hill (Ward 17, Precincts 4 and 11)
Mildred Avenue School, Mildred Ave, Mattapan (Ward 17, Precinct 10 and Ward 18, Precinct 2)
Lower Mills Library, Richmond St (Ward 17, Precincts 13 and 14)
Groveland Community Room, Franklin Field (Ward 18, Precincts 1 and 4)
Chittick School, 154 Ruskindale Road between Cummins Highway and River St (Ward 18, Precincts 6 and 21)
Adams Street Library, near Ashmont St (Ward 16, Precinct 8)
Florian Hall, 55 Hallet St (Ward 16, Precinct 11)
Charles H. Taylor School, 1060 Morton St (Ward 17, Precinct 12)
Mattahunt School, 100 Hebron St (Ward 18, Precinct 3)
Hassan Apartments, 705 River St (Ward 18, Precinct 5)

The shifts are:  7-9 am, 5-8 pm (or 5-7 if you can't stay the whole time)

Please sign up now so we can cover all these polling places. And thanks!  

Vets Win Expansion Of Freedom Of Speech and Right To Assemble

Resist! Afghanistan, Freedom of Speech and Assembly, Wars and Militarism
By Margaret Flowers and Kevin Zeese, www.PopularResistance.org
October 10th, 2014

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Above: Veterans and allies pose at the end of the 2014 antiwar memorial service at Vietnam Veterans Memorial in New York City. They are holding photos of David George whose pictures are also on the wall behind them. Photo by Ellen Davidson.

Veterans For Peace Three Year Campaign Removes Curfew as Vets and Allies Protest the Wars, Honor The Dead

Each October 7 for the last three years, the date of the US invasion of Afghanistan, members of Veterans For Peace and their allies have gathered at the Vietnam Veteran’s Memorial in Lower Manhattan for a soulful ceremony. Their purpose: to mark another year of a war in Afghanistan and call for peace, to honor all whose lives are destroyed by war and to expand the First Amendment right to peaceably assemble.
This year, they were finally able to do so without facing a small army of police threatening arrest if the ceremony went past the arbitrary 10 pm curfew placed on the memorial.

Jacob David George

And this year, veterans and allies had more reasons to gather: to protest new wars being waged by President Obama without approval of Congress or the United Nations and to remember the much-loved Jacob David George, a veteran of three tours in Afghanistan, who died of ‘moral injury’ three weeks before.
Jacob was only 19 when he went overseas to Afghanistan for his first tour. He grew up in the mountains of Arkansas and was a talented poet and musician. After his tours, he struggled to survive in the United States, surrounded by war culture. He set off to bicycle around the country to speak about the realities of war and the need for peace, a trip that he called “A Ride til the End.” He sang “Soldiers Heart”:

“I’m just a farmer from Arkansas, there’s a lot of things I don’t understand, like why we send farmers to kill farmers in Afghanistan. I did what I’s told for my love of this land. I come home a shattered man with blood on my hands.

“Now I can’t have a relationship, I can’t hold down a job. Some may say I’m broken, I call it Soldier’s Heart. Every time I go outside, I gotta look her in the eyes knowing that she broke my heart, and turned around and lied.

“Red, white and blue, I trusted you and you never even told me why.”

“Soldier’s Heart” is a Civil War phrase used to describe what we now know as Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).  Jacob wrote that Soldiers Heart “more accurately describes my wounds and what I experienced.” “Moral injury,” which Jacob wrote was a major component of PTSD, leads to 22 veteran suicides a day.
Jacob was with members of Veterans for Peace and thousands of others in Freedom Plaza in Washington, DC for the tenth anniversary of the Afghanistan War in October, 2011. He had spent part of the summer in Afghanistan with the Afghan Youth Peace Volunteers. Jacob performed that night in Freedom Plaza and the Afghan Youth joined the event from Afghanistan by Skype. After that, he continued to travel in his search for healing and to participate in the Occupy Movement. In the summer of 2012, he marched 99 miles with the Guitarmy from Philadelphia to New York City.
Ending the Nightmares of War

The Veterans Peace Team and Occupy Faith stand between police and the people. Photo by Ellen Davidson

Although most war memorials throughout the United States are open to the public 24 hours a day, seven days a week, the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in New York ‘closes’ at 10 pm, that is, if you are expressing First Amendment rights.
There is no good reason to close the memorial since is located on a plaza surrounded by office buildings.  It isn’t really possible to close this memorial anyway. It is used as a walkway for pedestrians and dog walkers at all hours of the day and night. The veterans believe there should be no curfew as the nightmares of war don’t know curfews and they often surface late at night. War memorials should be a place of peace and refuge for those who need it without threats of intimidation or arrest by police.
The curfew has only been enforced when people are exercising their right to peaceably assemble. Tarak Kauff, a board member of Veterans For Peace, first noted the curfew at a 2012 May Day assembly by Occupy Wall Street. Tarak describes the assembly as “what you would want to see in a democracy, people gathering to discuss solutions to community problems.” Troops of NY police confronted the assembly. Members of the Veterans Peace Team stood between the police and people; and were arrested. This constitutionally permitted, democratic gathering was stopped for no good reason.

Nightmares of War Do Not End at 10PM. Photo by Ellen Davidson.

Kauff brought the idea of a campaign to open the Memorial to Vets For Peace who embraced it, holding their first memorial service on October 7, 2012. Hundreds gathered at the memorial for a powerful ceremony. Father George Packard, Chris Hedges and veterans from World War II through the wars of today spoke, read poems and sang. Participants read names of New Yorkers who were killed in war and of civilians in Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan who were also killed. After every 20 names, a gong was struck and flowers were placed in 11 vases, one for every year in Afghanistan.
As the ceremony continued, the police presence began to grow. When 10 PM arrived, the reading of the names was interrupted by a police captain with a bullhorn warning that if the crowd did not disperse, arrests would be made. Undaunted, veterans and allies persisted in reading names and honoring the dead as some in the crowd moved to the margins of the park. One by one, 25 people who continued the memorial were arrested. Those arrested included a decorated World War II Veteran and a Vietnam War Medic for whom the nightmares of holding the wounded in his arms have never ceased. The police were placed in an uncomfortable position – arresting veterans reading the names of the dead to enforce a capricious curfew.
A friend of Jacob George, Brock McIntosh, also an Afghanistan veteran described the feelings of Jacob and many vets:

“Jacob did all he could as a warrior to speak and to warn about the dangers of war. Jacob spoke to me often of moral injury, and he once told me about meeting a Vietnam veteran who felt that every war was his war, who blamed himself for not stopping each war that happened, one after the next. Jacob felt that burden.”

Vets link together facing arrest at Vietnam Memorial October 2013. Photo by Ellen Davidson.

Veterans and allies returned in 2013 to protest the deep war culture embraced by the United States. To make that point, among the war dead remembered were Indigenous peoples slaughtered in the “Indian Wars.”  That year several of the veterans refused to be removed easily. Firm in their belief that they had a right to be there, that the memorial was created to honor the dead and that nothing should interfere with that, five veterans linked themselves together with thick plastic handcuffs and lay down in front of the memorial when the police arrived to arrest them. Altogether, nineteen were arrested.
Jacob was there that year. One vet who stood with him recounted that Jacob was very distressed to see his comrades being arrested for protesting the wars and honoring the dead.
The veterans and allies who were arrested had two goals. They wanted to use the judicial process to end the curfew at the Memorial and to introduce the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights to expand the definition of Freedom of Speech to meet the international standard rather than the narrow and shrinking US standard.
Instead, charges were dropped for many of the arrestees and 14 who spent a week in trial were denied justice. The judge refused to entertain the expanded definition of free speech and found them guilty but then dismissed the charges “in the interest of justice,” undermining their ability to appeal.
Fourteen of the second year arrestees had their charges dismissed and the five who linked themselves together had their charges downgraded against their will to avoid a jury trial. The judge also found them guilty but gave them conditional release.
Each time the vets appeared in court, police offers shook their hands, thanked them and told them they supported what they were doing. The memorial services were having an added effect of dividing the police.
Victory is bittersweet
This year, the veterans won the right to stay at the memorial without interference from the police. In a letter to the mayor, the veterans outlined their intent to hold the vigil again and their desire that the memorial remain open at all hours. They thanked the mayor for his statement, after the Flood Wall Street protest two weeks before, that First Amendment Rights were more important than traffic and invited him to join them on October 7. The mayor’s office responded by saying that the curfew would be lifted for the night.

Singing songs of Jacob George and antiwar ballads at the Vietnam Veterans War Memorial, October 7, 2014. Photo by Ellen Davidson.

The mood at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial this year was bittersweet. There was palpable relief that we were free to express ourselves without police intimidation and that we could choose when to leave under our own terms. But there was also greater sadness than years before because a week after the President began bombing Iraq again and then Syria, Jacob George took his life. Some suspect the trauma of watching another US war begin, knowing that more soldiers and innocent civilians would die or be forever traumatized and seeing the Masters of War succeed in manipulating the public to support war was too much to bear.
Jacob wrote:

“With our choice to join the US military, we soldiers gained great insights into the effects of war. During basic training, we are weaponized: our souls are turned into weapons. This intentional adjustment of the moral compass seems to be the onset of Moral Injury. Basic training demands the dehumanization of the enemy.

“Through my personal healing from PTSD, I’ve discovered it’s not possible to dehumanize others without dehumanizing the self.”

We gathered that night to speak, read poems and sing together once again. We remembered Jacob and all who are devastated by war.  Large photos of Jacob were placed on the memorial wall.  ‘Taps’ was played.
One vet read a statement about the damage war does and the toll it takes on families, remembering his nephew, a vet who also committed suicide:

“Not only was he profoundly affected by war, but so was his entire family. The pain will be felt by those who loved him for generations. That is what war does. It causes deep wounds that cut across generations. His father, a Vietnam Veteran, is having a very difficult time and has withdrawn, buried in grief. He already suffered from PTSD, and this has made things much worse. His mother, my sister, is racked with guilt and blames herself for not being able to help [her son].”

A poem by Vets For Peace poet laureate, Doug Rawlings, called “We Need Not Go There Again: A tribute to Jacob George, was read:

Over 100 years of
shooting into a mirror
thinking they were
squashing the other –
first the Hun, then the Nip, then the gook,
and now the sand niggers —
the old war mongers remain insatiable
in their self-delusion
Freudian analysts can’t get them off
their couches:
moral cripples
they never sense
that something is awry
How could they?
It is not the blood
of their daughters and sons
pours back into their hands
slippery with the stench
of their calculated ignorance
They will continue to
worship at the alter
of Pontius Pilate
to wash their hands
in the trough
of our passivity
until we gather in the streets
until we bring down
the walls of the Pentagon
singing the choruses
of Jacob George

Participants in antiwar memorial circle of hugs. Photo by Ellen Davidson.

We formed a circle and one by one, we walked the circle and hugged each other. Members of the Guitarmy led us through songs written by Jacob. We also sang Down By the Riverside and Lean On Me. We read names of the dead, raised our fists and shouted “Presente” in unison after each name. Afterwards, we talked quietly in small groups. And when we were ready, we left the memorial.
It took three years to win the right to vigil at the war memorial. The next task is to change the policy so that it remains open at all times and is there for those who need it. Members of Veterans for Peace are committed to seeing that task through. We hope this campaign encourages others to find ways to expand our rights.
Though it is important to choose particular days to gather for remembrance and protesting these illegal and unjust wars, the work for peace is a daily task. Those who are not fooled by the propaganda or by persuaded by partisanship can best honor those who have died and those still living who have served by speaking out regularly for an end to war.
In his song called Support the Troops, Jacob wrote:

“I’m tellin’ you, don’t thank me for what I’ve done. Give me a hug and let me know we ain’t gonna let this happen again because we support the troops and we’re gonna bring war to an end.”

Margaret Flowers and Kevin Zeese are organizers of Popular Resistance. They participated in the campaign to end the curfew at the NYC Vietnam Veterans Memorial. They can be followed @KBZeese and @MFlowers8.
This article was originally published on MintPress News.

Guitarmy Travels Staten Island to ZuccottiJacob George singing with the Guitarmy on July 12, 2012, Jacob is in the front playing Banjo

Vets Win Free Speech Victory
Tarak Kauff interviewed by Luke Rudkowski of We Are Change

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SYRIA-IRAQ WAR: Where is the antiwar movement?

But even though organizers acknowledge the uphill battle, some say there’s cause for optimism. There was some Congressional opposition to arming Syrian rebels to fight the Islamic State. The authorization to help rebels passed the House by a 273-156 vote; the Senate opposition amounted to only 22 votes.  “This war is far less popular than either the Afghanistan or Iraq War at their outset at this time period. And it’s worth remembering that inevitably what happens, no matter where these wars start, they always end at the same place, which is incredibly unpopular,” Win Without War’s Miles told me. So where does the anti-war movement go from here? Ali Issa, the national field organizer with War Resisters League, says the key is connecting struggles against militarism to other movements.  More

 

ISIS in WASHINGTON: Inside the American Terrordome

… the chorus of hysteria-purveyors, Republican and Democrat alike, nattered on, as had been true for weeks, about the "direct," not to say apocalyptic, threat the Islamic State and its caliph posed to the American way of life… Terror as the preeminent danger to our American world now courses through the societal bloodstream, helped along by regular infusions of fear from the usual panic-meisters. On that set of emotions, an unparalleled global security state has been built (and funded), as well as a military that, in terms of its destructive power, leaves the rest of the world in the dust… In this context, perhaps we should think of the puffing up of an ugly but limited reality into an all-encompassing, eternally “imminent” threat to our way of life as the final chapter in the demobilization of the American people.  Terror-phobia, after all, leaves you feeling helpless and in need of protection.  The only reasonable response to it is support for whatever actions your government takes to keep you "safe."   More

 

FIGHTING THE ISLAMIC STATE - HOW MUCH WILL IT COST?

Even bigger than the direct costs of the new campaign against the Islamic State is the dramatic U-turn in the political mood toward military spending. Twelve months ago, the wartime culture of "endless money," as former Defense Secretary Robert Gates dubbed it, with its endless "emergency" funding from Congress (nearly $2 trillion in more than 30 special funding bills) - was finally coming to an end… But now that's all so-last-fiscal-year. The new trend is ramping up Pentagon spending.   More

 

BOMBING AND BIGOTRY:

The Wars Abroad, the Wars at Home

 

Martin Luther King: “The bombs that are falling [overseas] are exploding in our cities”

 

Saturday, October 18

NU4J COMMUNITY CONNECTIONS STREET FAIR

12-4pm - Our friends at New England United for Justice have invited DPP to participate in their event on Tilman St. in Dorchester and DPPers will have a table and a version of the leaflet at the right.  Please come!

 

Tuesday, October 21

DPP Standout at  Ashmont T Station

4-6pm – Please join us! We’ll have the same flyer, making the connection between the new US war in Syria/Iraq and the violence and repression in our own neighborhoods.

 

UJP to march in HONK! Parade with Drone replica.

When: Sunday, October 12, 2014, 12:00 pm to 6:30 pm

Where: Davis Square • Elm Street • Somerville

The Somerville-based HONK! Parade of Activist Street Bands will take place on Sunday, October 12 at noon, and once again UJP's Eastern Massachusetts Anti-Drones Network (EMAD) will march carrying signs and its eye-catching Drone replica. The group's message is encapsulated in the banner it will carry: "No Killer Drones! No Spy Drones!" The U.S. Government must stop surveilling its citizens and killing people from other countries with drones.

 

The HONK! Parade is the culmination of the annual weekend-long HONK! Festival. Dozens of bands, community, artist and activist groups, including Veterans For Peace, will march from Davis Square down Elm Street, Beech Street and Massachusetts Avenue to Harvard Square, where they'll join forces with the Octoberfest celebration. Thousands of people view the parade, and last year, EMAD's Drone replica and anti-drones message were well-received. This year, EMAD's participation coincides with the first Global Action Day Against the Use of Drones for Surveillance & Killing, called by the KnowDrones.com network.

 

We welcome marchers to join our contingent.  Join us at the Parade gathering place in Davis Square at 11:30 am.

 

To join or support the Eastern Massachusetts Anti-Drones Network, email info@justicewithpeace.org or call 617-383-4857

 

As The 100th Anniversary Of The First Year Of World War I (Remember The War To End All Wars) Continues ... Some Remembrances-Poet’s Corner  

A CHANT OF LOVE FOR ENGLAND


A song of hate is a song of Hell;
Some there be that sing it well.
Let them sing it loud and long,
We lift our hearts in a loftier song:
We lift our hearts to Heaven above,
Singing the glory of her we love,--
          _England!_

Glory of thought and glory of deed,
Glory of Hampden and Runnymede;
Glory of ships that sought far goals,
Glory of swords and glory of souls!
Glory of songs mounting as birds,
Glory immortal of magical words;
Glory of Milton, glory of Nelson,
Tragical glory of Gordon and Scott;
Glory of Shelley, glory of Sidney,
Glory transcendent that perishes not,--
Hers is the story, hers be the glory,
            _England!_

Shatter her beauteous breast ye may;
The spirit of England none can slay!
Dash the bomb on the dome of Paul's--
Deem ye the fame of the Admiral falls?
Pry the stone from the chancel floor,--
Dream ye that Shakespeare shall live no more?
Where is the giant shot that kills
Wordsworth walking the old green hills?
Trample the red rose on the ground,--
Keats is Beauty while earth spins round!
Bind her, grind her, burn her with fire,
Cast her ashes into the sea,--
She shall escape, she shall aspire,
She shall arise to make men free:
She shall arise in a sacred scorn,
Lighting the lives that are yet unborn;
Spirit supernal, Splendour eternal,
              ENGLAND!

_Helen Gray Cone_




AT ST. PAUL'S

APRIL 20, 1917


Not since Wren's Dome has whispered with man's prayer
  Have angels leaned to wonder out of Heaven
  At such uprush of intercession given,
Here where to-day one soul two nations share,
And with accord send up thro' trembling air
  Their vows to strive as Honour ne'er has striven
  Till back to hell the Lords of hell are driven,
And Life and Peace again shall flourish fair.

This is the day of conscience high-enthroned,
  The day when East is West and West is East
    To strike for human Love and Freedom's word
Against foul wrong that cannot be atoned;
  To-day is hope of brotherhood's bond increased,
    And Christ, not Odin, is acclaimed the Lord.

_Hardwicke Drummond Rawnsley_