| ||||||||
| ||||||||
| ||||||||
|
Friday, May 08, 2015
George Galloway Defeated in UK General Election
by Stephen Lendman
Parliamentarian, writer, broadcaster, anti-war activist, human rights supporter, Israeli critic, and champion of Palestinian rights among other credentials Respect Party member Galloway was defeated in Thursday's general election.
He lost his Bradford West constituency decisively to New Labour's Naz Shah - 19,977 to 8,557. Down but not out, he commented, saying:
I don't begrudge the Labour members here their moment of celebration, of course."
"But there will be others who are already celebrating: the venal, the vile, the racists and the Zionists will all be celebrating."
"The hyena can bounce on the lion’s grave but it can never be a lion and in any case, I’m not in my grave. As a matter of fact I’m going off now to plan the next campaign."
"Bradford West will always have a central place in my heart," he explained.
Shah thanked all her opponents in her victory speech "with the exception of one," she said - leaving no doubt who she meant.
She outrageously claimed Galloway "demean(ed) our democracy" while campaigning. He blasted Torries and New Labour for continuing business as usual.
Millions of Brits are suffering. Corrupt politicians don't care. Food banks are proliferating, Galloway explained. "Can you imagine what the country will look like by 2020 if these barbarians are returned" to power, he stressed.
Social justice is fast disappearing. Neoliberal harshness is official UK policy. So is partnering with Washington's endless wars.
Galloway demands better. He was a marked man for championing what power brokers oppose.
Campaigning was rough and tumble. A Galloway spokesman denied his tactics were out of line.
"Shah has made it personal from the beginning," he said. "She hasn't told the truth, and she's told untruths about George."
It didn't affect his core supporters, reports indicated. They were out in force. It wasn't enough.
In 2012, Galloway defeated New Labour's Imran Hussein overwhelmingly. This time was different.
In late April, Galloway said he'll run for mayor of London if his reelection campaign fails. He told Sky News:
"I won't run for London mayor if I am reelected on 7 May. If I am not reelected, I will run" in May 2016.
He ruled out running as a sitting MP - suggesting it would be impossible to represent his constituents properly. A spokesman had no further comment.
Galloway remains one of politics most charismatic figures. Supporters and critics alike agree few can arouse a crowd the way he does.
It was an honor for this writer to be on air once with him as a guest. We had a rousing discussion not heard on major Western media outlets.
Hard truths on issues mattering most are strictly verboten. Galloway features them on air and in parliament. Maybe as mayor of London next year.
Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago. He can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.
His new book as editor and contributor is titled "Flashpoint in Ukraine: US Drive for Hegemony Risks WW III."
http://www.claritypress.com/LendmanIII.html
Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com.
Listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network.
It airs three times weekly: live on Sundays at 1PM Central time plus two prerecorded archived programs.
Family Secrets-Robert Downey, Jr.’s The Judge
DVD Review
From The Pen Of Frank Jackman
The Judge, starring Robert Downey,Jr., Robert Duvall, 2014
A couple of things that I learned from my cranky old Irish Catholic grandfather, cranky once he had a stroke and had to be invalided out of Carver Fire Department that he dearly loved, that came to my mind when watching the film under review, Robert Downey, Jr.’s The Judge. First, my grandfather, or rather my grandfather and his people had been kicked out of Irish from nothing more than they had run out of luck. Run out of luck in that case being when the absentee Anglo-Irish landlord owner of the midget farm they were trying to survive on decided to call in their debts and not having any money when they resisted foreclosure the landlord went to Her Majesty’s court (this was back in the 19th century during benighted Queen Victoria’s time) about it the judge dismissed their concerns out of hand. Adding insult to injury that same judge when my grandfather and his kindred physically resisted eviction and wound up in gaol (jail) for some serious assault and battery charges the judge ordered them out of the country on penalty of a severe sentence. So the first lesson in life he told me was that while justice was blind, she was blind to injustice more often than not. I would translate that wisdom later to something the sardonic comedy Lenny Bruce, who had had a fistful of run-ins with Lady Justice, said after on such run-in-“in the halls of justice, the only justice is in the halls.” After a lifetime of observations and my own run-ins that still seems about right. The second thing the old man told me, and that may be reflected from the first idea, was an ageless adage which seemed entirely right in our claustrophobic old heavily Irish working class neighborhood, especially when the “shawlie social network” was on the prowl –“don’t air the family’s dirty linen in public.” Sound familiar in your family history?
Those two ideas come together in this film where a kid who made good as a big time, big city lawyer Hank (played by Robert Downey, Jr. of Ironman one million or whatever number have been produced and late of the now old time “brat pack”) is called back home to his estranged family after his mother died. While there his father, Judge Palmer, the longtime local district judge (played by seemingly ancient Robert Duvall which reminded me that to has been many moons since he first “loved the smell of napalm” in Apocalypse Now early in his career) who had meted out justice good and bad got into trouble, legal trouble, criminal trouble. The trouble was that a man whom the judge had originally lightly sentenced on an assault case against his girlfriend when released from that sentence went back and killed her and on the second trial the judge had thrown the book at him. That case had weighed heavily on his mind and so one night after the judge had buried his own wife he ran into that killer in a convenience store, followed him out and then ran over him. Simply justice.
Well not so simple since the judge believed that he had committed no crime, did not remember the event pleading duress, approaching senility, and a losing bout with cancer. And that is where long estranged Hank, the big time, big city hardball lawyer had to come in and save the day by defending his dad in court. Naturally there is much friction before the trial, generational friction, estrangement friction, that above-mentioned not airing dirty linen in public, and the hard fact that only grudgingly did the judge offer information to help defend himself. Well, the long and short of it was that the judge was found not guilty on the murder charge but got a four year sentence on manslaughter charges. That sentence was later commuted as his health worsened and he died with Hank at his side at the end of the film. That whole episode got Hank thinking though about how much he was still a small town boy. And got me thinking about those two things my grandfather told me.
DVD Review
From The Pen Of Frank Jackman
The Judge, starring Robert Downey,Jr., Robert Duvall, 2014
A couple of things that I learned from my cranky old Irish Catholic grandfather, cranky once he had a stroke and had to be invalided out of Carver Fire Department that he dearly loved, that came to my mind when watching the film under review, Robert Downey, Jr.’s The Judge. First, my grandfather, or rather my grandfather and his people had been kicked out of Irish from nothing more than they had run out of luck. Run out of luck in that case being when the absentee Anglo-Irish landlord owner of the midget farm they were trying to survive on decided to call in their debts and not having any money when they resisted foreclosure the landlord went to Her Majesty’s court (this was back in the 19th century during benighted Queen Victoria’s time) about it the judge dismissed their concerns out of hand. Adding insult to injury that same judge when my grandfather and his kindred physically resisted eviction and wound up in gaol (jail) for some serious assault and battery charges the judge ordered them out of the country on penalty of a severe sentence. So the first lesson in life he told me was that while justice was blind, she was blind to injustice more often than not. I would translate that wisdom later to something the sardonic comedy Lenny Bruce, who had had a fistful of run-ins with Lady Justice, said after on such run-in-“in the halls of justice, the only justice is in the halls.” After a lifetime of observations and my own run-ins that still seems about right. The second thing the old man told me, and that may be reflected from the first idea, was an ageless adage which seemed entirely right in our claustrophobic old heavily Irish working class neighborhood, especially when the “shawlie social network” was on the prowl –“don’t air the family’s dirty linen in public.” Sound familiar in your family history?
Those two ideas come together in this film where a kid who made good as a big time, big city lawyer Hank (played by Robert Downey, Jr. of Ironman one million or whatever number have been produced and late of the now old time “brat pack”) is called back home to his estranged family after his mother died. While there his father, Judge Palmer, the longtime local district judge (played by seemingly ancient Robert Duvall which reminded me that to has been many moons since he first “loved the smell of napalm” in Apocalypse Now early in his career) who had meted out justice good and bad got into trouble, legal trouble, criminal trouble. The trouble was that a man whom the judge had originally lightly sentenced on an assault case against his girlfriend when released from that sentence went back and killed her and on the second trial the judge had thrown the book at him. That case had weighed heavily on his mind and so one night after the judge had buried his own wife he ran into that killer in a convenience store, followed him out and then ran over him. Simply justice.
Well not so simple since the judge believed that he had committed no crime, did not remember the event pleading duress, approaching senility, and a losing bout with cancer. And that is where long estranged Hank, the big time, big city hardball lawyer had to come in and save the day by defending his dad in court. Naturally there is much friction before the trial, generational friction, estrangement friction, that above-mentioned not airing dirty linen in public, and the hard fact that only grudgingly did the judge offer information to help defend himself. Well, the long and short of it was that the judge was found not guilty on the murder charge but got a four year sentence on manslaughter charges. That sentence was later commuted as his health worsened and he died with Hank at his side at the end of the film. That whole episode got Hank thinking though about how much he was still a small town boy. And got me thinking about those two things my grandfather told me.
Thursday, May 07, 2015
In Honor Of International Workers’ Day- May Day 2015
-Ancient dreams, dreamed-The Risen People?-Frank Jackman’s War-Take Six
From The American Left History Blog Archives –May Day 1971
Endless, dusty, truck heavy, asphalt steaming
hitchhike roads travelled, Route 6, 66, maybe 666 and perdition for all I know,
every back road, every Connecticut highway avoiding back road from
Massachusetts south to the capital for one last winner-take-all, no prisoners
taken show-down to end all show-downs. And maybe, just maybe, finally some
peace and a new world a-borning, a world we had been talking about for at least
a decade (clueless, as all youth nations are clueless, that that road was
well-travelled, very well- travelled, before us). No Jack Kerouac dharma bum
easy road (although there were dharma bums, or at least faux dharma bums,
aplenty on those 1971 roads south, and west too) let- her-rip cosmic brakeman
Neal Cassady at the wheel flying through some Iowa/Kansas wheat field night
fantasy this trip.
No this trip was not about securing some cultural
enclave in post-war America (post-World War II so as not to confuse the reader)
in break-out factory town Lowell or cold water tenement Greenwich Village/Soho
New Jack City or Shangri-La West out in the Bay area, east or west, but about
mucking up the works, the whole freaking
governmental/societal/economic/cultural/personal/godhead world (that last one,
the godhead one, not thrown in just for show, no way) and maybe, just maybe
sneaking away with the prize. But a total absolute, absolutist, big karma sky
fight out, no question. And we, I, am ready. On that dusty road ready.
More. See all roads head south as we, my girlfriend of
the day, maybe more, maybe more than a day, Joyell, but along this time more
for ease of travelling for those blessed truck driver eye rides, than lust or
dream wish and my sainted wise-guy amigo (and shades of Gregory Corso, sainted,
okay), Matty, who had more than a passing love or dream wish in her and if you
had seen her you would not have wondered why. Not have wondered why if your “type”
was Botticelli painted and thoughts of butterfly swirls just then or were
all-type sleepy-eyed benny-addled teamster half-visioned out of some forlorn
rear view mirror.
Yah, head south, in ones, twos, and threes (no more,
too menacing even for hefty ex-crack back truckers to stop for) travelling down
to D.C. for what many of us figure will be the last, finally, push back against
the war, the Vietnam War, for those who have forgotten, or stopped watching
television and the news, but THEY, and you knew (know) who they were (are), had
their antennae out too, they KNEW we were coming, even high-ball fixed (or
whiskey neat she had the face for them) looking out from lonely balconies
Martha Mitchell knew that much. They were, especially in mad max robot-cop Connecticut,
out to pick off the stray or seven who got into their mitts as a contribution
to law and order, law and order one Richard Milhous Nixon-style (and in front
of him, leading some off-key, off-human key chorus some banshee guy from
Maryland, another watch out hitchhike trail spot, although not as bad as Ct,
nothing except Arizona is). And thus those dusty, steamy, truck heavy (remind
me to tell you about hitchhiking stuff, and the good guy truckers you wanted,
desperately wanted, to ride with in those days, if I ever get a chance
sometime).
The idea behind this hitchhiked road, or maybe,
better, the why. Simple, too simple when you, I, thought about it later in
lonely celled night but those were hard trying times, desperate times really,
and just free, free from another set of steel-barred rooms this jailbird was
ready to bring down heaven, hell, hell if it came down to it to stop that
furious war (Vietnam, for the later reader) and start creating something
recognizable for humans to live in. So youth nation, then somewhat long in the
tooth, and long on bad karma-driven bloody defeats too, decided to risk all
with the throw of the dice and bring a massive presence to D.C. on May Day
1971.
And not just any massed presence like the then
familiar seasonal peace crawl that nobody paid attention too anymore except the
organizers, although the May Day action was wrapped around that year’s spring
peace crawl, (wrapped up, cozily wrapped up, in their utopian reformist dream
that more and more passive masses, more and more suburban housewives from New
Jersey, okay, okay not just Jersey, more and more high school freshman, more
and more barbers, more and more truck driver stop waitresses, for that matter,
would bring the b-o-u-r-g-e-o-i-s-i-e (just in case there are sensitive souls
in the room) to their knees. No, we were going to stop the government, flat.
Big scheme, big scheme no question and if anybody, any “real” youth nation
refugee, excepting, of course, always infernal always, those cozy peace crawl
organizers, tried to interject that perhaps there were wiser courses nobody
mentioned them out loud in my presence and I was at every meeting, high or low.
Moreover I had my ears closed, flapped shut closed, to any lesser argument. I,
rightly or wrongly, silly me thought “cop.”
So onward anti-war soldiers from late night too little
sleep Sunday night before Monday May Day dawn in some vagrant student apartment
around DuPont Circle (I think) but it may have been further up off 14th Street,
Christ after eight million marches for seven million causes who can remember
that much. No question though on the student ghetto apartment locale; bed
helter-skelter on the floor, telephone wire spool for a table, orange crates
for book shelves, unmistakably, and the clincher, seventeen posters, mainly
Che, Mao, Ho, Malcolm etc., the first name only necessary for identification
pantheon just then, a smattering of Lenin and Trotsky but they were old guys
from old revolutions and so, well, discounted to early rise (or early stay up
cigarette chain-smoking and coffee slurping to keep the juices flowing). Out
into the streets, out into the small collectives coming out of other vagrant
apartments streets (filled with other posters of Huey Newton , George Jackson,
Frantz Fanon, etc. from the two names needed pantheon) joining up to make a
cohorted mass (nice way to put it, right?). And then dawn darkness surrounded,
coffee spilled out, cigarette bogarted, AND out of nowhere, or everywhere,
bang, bang, bang of governmental steel, of baton, of chemical dust, of whatever
latest technology they had come up with they came at us (pre-tested in Vietnam,
naturally, as I found out later). Jesus, bedlam, mad house, insane asylum,
beat, beat like gongs, defeated.
Through bloodless bloodied streets (this, after all,
was not Chicago, hog butcher to the world), may day tear down the government
days, tears, tear-gas exploding, people running this way and that coming out of
a half-induced daze, a crazed half-induced daze that mere good- will, mere righteousness
would right the wrongs of this wicked old world. One arrested, two, three,
many, endless thousands as if there was an endless capacity to arrest, and be
arrested, arrest the world, and put it all in one great big Robert F. Kennedy
stadium home to autumn gladiators on Sunday and sacrificial lambs this spring
maypole may day basket druid day.
And, as I was being led away by one of D.C.’s finest,
I turned around and saw that some early Sunday morning voice, some “cop” voice
who advised caution and went on and on about getting some workers out to join
us before we perished in an isolated blast of arrests and bad hubris also being
led away all trussed up, metal hand-cuffs seemingly entwined around her whole
slight body. She said she would stick with us even though she disagreed with
the strategy that day and I had scoffed, less than twenty-four hours before,
that she made it sound like she had to protect her erring children from
themselves. And she, maybe, the only hero of the day. Righteous anonymous sister,
forgive me. (Not so anonymous actually since I saw her many times later in
Boston, almost would have traded in lust for her but I was still painted
Botticelli-bewitched and so I, we, let the moment passed, and worked on about
six million marches for about five millions causes with her but that was later.
I saw no more of her in D.C. that week.)
Stop. Brain start. Out of the bloodless fury, out of
the miscalculated night a strange bird, no peace dove, these were not such
times even with all our unforced errors, and no flame-flecked phoenix raising
but a bird, maybe the owl of Minerva came a better sense that this new world
a-bornin’ would take some doing, some serious doing. More serious that some
wispy-bearded, pony-tailed beat, beat down, beat around, beat up young stalwart
road tramp acting in god’s place could even dream of. But that was later. Just
then, just that screwed-up martyr moment, I was longing for the hot, dusty,
truck driver stop meat loaf special, dishwater coffee on the side, road back
home even ready to chance Connecticut highway dragnets to get there.
*********
“Everybody in the Che May Day collective head to the
house on 14th Street near Dupont Circle for last minute
instructions, some food, some sleep and some solidarity,” came a voice ringing
through the air near the campfire on the National Mall around midnight where
Frank Jackman, a spare blanket over his shoulders, was huddled to keep warm and
awake. The guy who yelled in the direction of the campfire, a guy in long hair
and beard looked like any of about five thousand other guys, except Frank
Jackman knew the guy was Benjy Warren, the well-known organizer of the Harvard
take-over a couple of years before. Frank, after some agonizing (he had just
gotten out of an Army stockade after a year’s time) had decided to take part in
the May Day 1971 actions. Yes, he wanted to participant in this action-as
advertised-“if the government does not shut down the war, we will shut down the
government” after seeing the too festive atmosphere of the Saturday mass rally.
In his mind the ante had been upped.
The only question left was which contingent, what
collective, he would adhere to and when he saw and heard Benjy he decided to
drift over to Dupont Circle and join the Che contingent. Moreover he decided he
could use some indoor sleep, a little food and maybe cadge a few butts since his
stash had run out. Once he got to the location, a college apartment if he ever
saw one, filled radical books and posters and not much in the way of furniture,
he stood with about thirty others listening to Sherry Shaw from SDS fame call
on the women to be particularly out front in the morning. The task of this
collective, vaguely stated to throw off any cops or snitches, was to head down
14th Street toward the White House and begin blocking intersections
as soon as possible. Somebody naively asked if the police would be out in force
and a few snickers ensued (in the event the police/military force was massive)
from those who had been in direct actions before. After the obligatory pep talk
everybody was encouraged to get a few hours’ sleep since they would be up at
five to move out.
The next morning (really later that morning by the
time Frank dozed off) the collective was up and out by about five-fifteen. They
began to march down 14th Street, some in the streets some on the
sidewalks, guerilla-style as was the fashion for street actions then. Before
they hit M Street thought they were waylaid by a phalanx of cops who began
busting heads, and making arrests immediately. Frank, in a rather rookie move,
tried to cut through a back alley but Washington, D.C. that day was short on
back alleys. He was arrested by a D.C. cop, placed in a paddy wagon, and
transported to RFK stadium (the town’s professional football team’s field). And
so ended Frank Jackman’s small effort to “shut down the government” with a
bunch of students, radicals and other marginal people. He would spent a few
days in that stadium before being released.
But see Frank did learn something that day, something
that he would remember later. If you really want to shut down the government
you better have some people who have the power and the skill to do so and not
just the likes of some scraggily ex-soldier...
The Latest From The “Veterans For Peace” Facebook Page-Gear Up For The Winter 2015 Anti-War Season-Troops Out Of Afghanistan Now!-Not Another War In Iraq! -No Intervention In Syria!-Hands Off Ukraine! Hands Off The World!
Click below to link to the Veterans For Peace Facebook page for the latest news on what anti-war front the organization is working on.
http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/Veterans-For-Peace/49422026153
A Stroll In The Park On Veterans Day-Tuesday November 11, 2014 - Immediate, Unconditional Withdrawal Of All U.S. Troops From Afghanistan! Hands Off Syria! Hands Off Iran! Hands Off The World!
Peter Paul Markin comment:
Back on Veterans Day 2010 I happened to be at the Boston Common located just off the downtown section when I came across some white flags, maybe twenty, waving in the distance over near when Charles Street intersects Beacon Street (the main street of the famous Beacon Hill section of Boston). Since I was heading that way I decided to check out what those flags were all about. Upon investigation I found that the white flags also contained in black outline a peace dove symbol and the words Veterans for Peace. Yah, sign me up, my kind of guys and gals. So, to make a long story short, I marched with the contingent that year in their spot behind, and not part of, the official parade sponsored by the city (the reason for that separation will be described in more detail below) and have marched each year since, including this year. Previously in promoting and commemorating this peace event I have recycled my sketch from 2010 out of laziness, hubris, or the basic sameness of the yearly event. I have updated that sketch a bit here to reflect on this year’s event.
**********
Listen, I have been to many marches and demonstrations for democratic, progressive, and socialist causes in my long political life. Some large, many small but both necessary. However, of all those events none, by far, has been more satisfying that to march alongside my fellow ex-soldiers who have, like I have, “switched” over to the other side, have gotten “religion” on the questions of war and peace and what to do about it, have exposed the better angels of their nature after the long hard thrust of war and preparations for war have lost their allure, and are now part of the struggle against war, the hard, hard struggle against the permanent war machine that this imperial system in America has embarked upon.
From as far back as in the Vietnam Veterans Against the War (VVAW) days (the days when even guys like the present Secretary of State John Forbes Kerry had to march in the streets to allay their angers and hurts) I have always felt that ex-soldiers (hell, active soldiers too, if you can get them out of the barracks, off the bases, and into the streets as happened a little as the Vietnam War moved relentlessly onward ) have had just a little bit more “street cred” on the war issue than the professors, pacifists and little old ladies in tennis sneakers who have traditionally led the anti-war movements. Maybe those brothers (and in my generation it was mainly only brothers) and now sisters may not quite pose the questions of war and peace the way I do, or the way that I would like them to do, don’t do a bookish analysis, complete with footnotes, of the imperial system and their cog part in it, but they are kindred spirits.
Now normally in Boston, and in most places, a Veterans Day parade means a bunch of Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW) or American Legion-types taking time off from drinking at their post bars (the infamous “battle of the barstool,” no, battles) and donning the old overstuffed moth-eaten uniform and heading out on to Main Street to be waved at, and cheered on, by like-minded, thankful citizens. And of course that happened in 2010 (and this year) as well. What also happened in Boston this year as in 2010 (and other years but I had not been involved in prior marches) was that the Smedley Butler Brigade of Veterans for Peace (VFP) organized an anti-war march as part of their Armistice Day (“Veterans Day”) program. Said march to be held at the same place and time as the official one, one o’clock in the afternoon in downtown Boston near the Common.
Prior to 2010 there had been a certain amount of trouble, although I am not sure that it came to blows, between the two groups. (I have only heard third-hand reports on previous events so all I know is that there were some heated disputes) You know the "super-patriots" vs. “commie symps” thing that has been going on as long as there have been ex-soldiers (and others), maybe before, who have differed from the bourgeois parties’ pro-war line. In any case the way this impasse had been resolved previously, and the way the parameters were set in 2010 and this year as well, was that the VFP took up the rear of the official parade, and took up the rear in an obvious way. Separated that year, if you can believe this, from the main body of the official parade by a medical emergency truck. This year by a phalanx of Boston Police motorcycle cops. Nice, right? Something of the old "I’ll take my ball and bat and go home" by the "officials" was in the air on that one on every occasion.
In the event this year’s march went off as usual for both parties, as we waited behind the motorcycle cordon for the “officials” to pass by. While waiting I noticed that while the anti-war contingent was about the same size as it has been for the past few years that I have participated, filled out with other peace activists from Quakers and shakers to ranters and chanters and ant-drone folk (strolling along with a mobile replica of a drone to make their point nicely), all angelic, or at least all also on the right side of the angels, the VFP component looked a little smaller. This reflecting the inevitable aging, can’t make the walk, reality that VFP like myriad peace and social justice-oriented organizations are now peopled, alarmingly so, mainly by older activists who cut their teeth in the struggles of the 1960s (or earlier).
Equally as alarming was the sight of more of my Vietnam era veterans using canes, walkers and other aids to either walk the parade or to get around and listen to the program at the end of the march at the Samuel Adams Park at Fanuiel Hall. The hopeful sign though was an increased number of Iraq (Iraq II, 2003) and Afghanistan veterans who have had enough time to reflect on their war experiences and made a decision to come over to the side of the angels. One such veteran spoke from platform, as did veterans from World War II, the Korean and Vietnam War eras, as well as a speakers, young speakers and proud from the Iraq and Afghan war zones, who sang, read their poets, or read their prose pieces to flush out the event. And to say that a new generation of anti-war soldiers will take the torch, take it and go forward as the older generations fades away.
But here is where there is a certain amount of rough plebeian justice, a small dose for those on the side of the angels, in this wicked old world. In order to form up, and this was done knowingly by VFP organizers in 2010 and this year well, the official marchers, the bands and battalions that make up such a march, had to “run the gauntlet” of dove emblem-emblazoned VFP banners waving frantically directly in front of their faces as they passed by. Moreover, although we again this year formed the caboose of this thing the crowds along the parade route actually waited for us after the official paraders had marched by and waved, clapped, and flashed the ubiquitous peace sign at our procession from the sidelines. Be still my heart.
That response just provides another example of the "street cred” that ex-soldiers have on the anti-war question. Now, if there is to be any really serious justice in the world, if only these fellow vets would go beyond then “bring the troops home” and pacific vigil tactics and embrace- immediate, unconditional withdrawal of all U.S./Allied Troops from everywhere, embrace a more studied response to the nature of war policy “in the belly of the beast” then we could maybe start to get somewhere out on those streets. But today, like at that first white flag sighting in 2010 I was very glad to be fighting for our peaceful more social future among those who know first-hand about the dark side of the American experience. No question.
*******
In The Desperate Search For Peace- The Maine March For Peace and Protection Of The Planet From Rangeley To North Berwick -October 2014
From The Pen Of Frank Jackman
“You know I never stepped up and opposed that damn war in Vietnam that I was part of, a big part of gathering intelligence to direct those monster B-52s to their targets. Never thought about much except to try and get my ass out of there alive. Didn’t get “religion” on the issues of war and peace until sometime after I got out when I ran into a few Vietnam veterans who were organizing a demonstration with the famous Vietnam Veterans Against The War (VVAW) down in Washington and they told me what was what. So since then, you know, even if we never get peace, and at times that seems like some kind of naïve fantasy I have to be part of actions like today to let people know, to let myself know, that when the deal went down I was where the action was, ’’ said Jack Scully to his fellow Vietnam veteran Pete Markin.
It had been a long day starting early for Peter since, due to other commitments, he had had to drive up to York before dawn that morning. Jack and Mike already in York too had gotten up early to make sure all the Veterans for Peace and personal gear for the march was in order. They were expected in Saco (you know how to say it now even if you are not from Maine, or even been there) for an 8:30 start to the walk and so left York for the twenty-five mile trip up to that town about 7:30. They arrived at the inevitable Universalist-Unitarian Church (U-U) about 8:15 and prepared the Veterans for Peace flags that the twelve VFPers from the Smedley Butler Brigade who came up from Boston for the last leg would carry.
Click below to link to the Veterans For Peace Facebook page for the latest news on what anti-war front the organization is working on.
http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/Veterans-For-Peace/49422026153
A Stroll In The Park On Veterans Day-Tuesday November 11, 2014 - Immediate, Unconditional Withdrawal Of All U.S. Troops From Afghanistan! Hands Off Syria! Hands Off Iran! Hands Off The World!
Peter Paul Markin comment:
Back on Veterans Day 2010 I happened to be at the Boston Common located just off the downtown section when I came across some white flags, maybe twenty, waving in the distance over near when Charles Street intersects Beacon Street (the main street of the famous Beacon Hill section of Boston). Since I was heading that way I decided to check out what those flags were all about. Upon investigation I found that the white flags also contained in black outline a peace dove symbol and the words Veterans for Peace. Yah, sign me up, my kind of guys and gals. So, to make a long story short, I marched with the contingent that year in their spot behind, and not part of, the official parade sponsored by the city (the reason for that separation will be described in more detail below) and have marched each year since, including this year. Previously in promoting and commemorating this peace event I have recycled my sketch from 2010 out of laziness, hubris, or the basic sameness of the yearly event. I have updated that sketch a bit here to reflect on this year’s event.
**********
Listen, I have been to many marches and demonstrations for democratic, progressive, and socialist causes in my long political life. Some large, many small but both necessary. However, of all those events none, by far, has been more satisfying that to march alongside my fellow ex-soldiers who have, like I have, “switched” over to the other side, have gotten “religion” on the questions of war and peace and what to do about it, have exposed the better angels of their nature after the long hard thrust of war and preparations for war have lost their allure, and are now part of the struggle against war, the hard, hard struggle against the permanent war machine that this imperial system in America has embarked upon.
From as far back as in the Vietnam Veterans Against the War (VVAW) days (the days when even guys like the present Secretary of State John Forbes Kerry had to march in the streets to allay their angers and hurts) I have always felt that ex-soldiers (hell, active soldiers too, if you can get them out of the barracks, off the bases, and into the streets as happened a little as the Vietnam War moved relentlessly onward ) have had just a little bit more “street cred” on the war issue than the professors, pacifists and little old ladies in tennis sneakers who have traditionally led the anti-war movements. Maybe those brothers (and in my generation it was mainly only brothers) and now sisters may not quite pose the questions of war and peace the way I do, or the way that I would like them to do, don’t do a bookish analysis, complete with footnotes, of the imperial system and their cog part in it, but they are kindred spirits.
Now normally in Boston, and in most places, a Veterans Day parade means a bunch of Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW) or American Legion-types taking time off from drinking at their post bars (the infamous “battle of the barstool,” no, battles) and donning the old overstuffed moth-eaten uniform and heading out on to Main Street to be waved at, and cheered on, by like-minded, thankful citizens. And of course that happened in 2010 (and this year) as well. What also happened in Boston this year as in 2010 (and other years but I had not been involved in prior marches) was that the Smedley Butler Brigade of Veterans for Peace (VFP) organized an anti-war march as part of their Armistice Day (“Veterans Day”) program. Said march to be held at the same place and time as the official one, one o’clock in the afternoon in downtown Boston near the Common.
Prior to 2010 there had been a certain amount of trouble, although I am not sure that it came to blows, between the two groups. (I have only heard third-hand reports on previous events so all I know is that there were some heated disputes) You know the "super-patriots" vs. “commie symps” thing that has been going on as long as there have been ex-soldiers (and others), maybe before, who have differed from the bourgeois parties’ pro-war line. In any case the way this impasse had been resolved previously, and the way the parameters were set in 2010 and this year as well, was that the VFP took up the rear of the official parade, and took up the rear in an obvious way. Separated that year, if you can believe this, from the main body of the official parade by a medical emergency truck. This year by a phalanx of Boston Police motorcycle cops. Nice, right? Something of the old "I’ll take my ball and bat and go home" by the "officials" was in the air on that one on every occasion.
In the event this year’s march went off as usual for both parties, as we waited behind the motorcycle cordon for the “officials” to pass by. While waiting I noticed that while the anti-war contingent was about the same size as it has been for the past few years that I have participated, filled out with other peace activists from Quakers and shakers to ranters and chanters and ant-drone folk (strolling along with a mobile replica of a drone to make their point nicely), all angelic, or at least all also on the right side of the angels, the VFP component looked a little smaller. This reflecting the inevitable aging, can’t make the walk, reality that VFP like myriad peace and social justice-oriented organizations are now peopled, alarmingly so, mainly by older activists who cut their teeth in the struggles of the 1960s (or earlier).
Equally as alarming was the sight of more of my Vietnam era veterans using canes, walkers and other aids to either walk the parade or to get around and listen to the program at the end of the march at the Samuel Adams Park at Fanuiel Hall. The hopeful sign though was an increased number of Iraq (Iraq II, 2003) and Afghanistan veterans who have had enough time to reflect on their war experiences and made a decision to come over to the side of the angels. One such veteran spoke from platform, as did veterans from World War II, the Korean and Vietnam War eras, as well as a speakers, young speakers and proud from the Iraq and Afghan war zones, who sang, read their poets, or read their prose pieces to flush out the event. And to say that a new generation of anti-war soldiers will take the torch, take it and go forward as the older generations fades away.
But here is where there is a certain amount of rough plebeian justice, a small dose for those on the side of the angels, in this wicked old world. In order to form up, and this was done knowingly by VFP organizers in 2010 and this year well, the official marchers, the bands and battalions that make up such a march, had to “run the gauntlet” of dove emblem-emblazoned VFP banners waving frantically directly in front of their faces as they passed by. Moreover, although we again this year formed the caboose of this thing the crowds along the parade route actually waited for us after the official paraders had marched by and waved, clapped, and flashed the ubiquitous peace sign at our procession from the sidelines. Be still my heart.
That response just provides another example of the "street cred” that ex-soldiers have on the anti-war question. Now, if there is to be any really serious justice in the world, if only these fellow vets would go beyond then “bring the troops home” and pacific vigil tactics and embrace- immediate, unconditional withdrawal of all U.S./Allied Troops from everywhere, embrace a more studied response to the nature of war policy “in the belly of the beast” then we could maybe start to get somewhere out on those streets. But today, like at that first white flag sighting in 2010 I was very glad to be fighting for our peaceful more social future among those who know first-hand about the dark side of the American experience. No question.
*******
In The Desperate Search For Peace- The Maine March For Peace and Protection Of The Planet From Rangeley To North Berwick -October 2014
From The Pen Of Frank Jackman
“You know I never stepped up and opposed that damn war in Vietnam that I was part of, a big part of gathering intelligence to direct those monster B-52s to their targets. Never thought about much except to try and get my ass out of there alive. Didn’t get “religion” on the issues of war and peace until sometime after I got out when I ran into a few Vietnam veterans who were organizing a demonstration with the famous Vietnam Veterans Against The War (VVAW) down in Washington and they told me what was what. So since then, you know, even if we never get peace, and at times that seems like some kind of naïve fantasy I have to be part of actions like today to let people know, to let myself know, that when the deal went down I was where the action was, ’’ said Jack Scully to his fellow Vietnam veteran Pete Markin.
Peter was sitting in the passenger seat of the car Jack was driving (Mike Kelly, a younger veterans from the Iraq wars sat in back silently drinking in what these grizzled old activists were discussing) as they were travelling back to Jack’s place in York after they had just finished participating in the last leg of the Maine Veterans for Peace-sponsored walk for peace and preservation of the planet from Rangeley to North Berwick, a distance of about one hundred and twenty miles over a ten day period in the October breezes. The organizers of the march had a method to their madness since Rangeley was projected to be a missile site, and the stopping points in between were related to the war industries or to some environmental protection issue ending in North Berwick where the giant defense contractor Pratt-Whitney has three shifts running building F-35 missiles and parts for fighter jets. The three veterans who had come up from Boston to participate in the action had walked the last leg from Saco (pronounced “socko” as a Mainiac pointed out to Peter when he said “sacko”) to the Pratt-Whitney plant in North Berwick, some fifteen miles or so along U.S. Route One and Maine Route Nine.
After Peter thought about what Jack had said about his commitment to such actions he made this reply, “You know I didn’t step up and oppose the Vietnam War very seriously until pretty late, after I got out of the Army and was working with some Quaker-types in a GI bookstore near Fort Dix down in New Jersey (both of the other men gave signs of recognition of that place, a place where they had taken their respective basis trainings) and that is where I got, what did you call it Jack, “religion” on the war issue. You know I have done quite a few things in my life, some good, some bad but of the good that people have always praised me for that social work I did, and later teaching I always tell them this- there are a million social workers, there are a million teachers, but these days, and for long time now, there have been very few peace activists on the ground so if you want to praise me, want to remember me for anything then let it be for this kind of work, things like this march today when our forces were few and the tasks enormous.”
With that the three men, as the sun started setting, headed back to the last stretch to York in silence all thinking about what they had accomplished that day.
******After Peter thought about what Jack had said about his commitment to such actions he made this reply, “You know I didn’t step up and oppose the Vietnam War very seriously until pretty late, after I got out of the Army and was working with some Quaker-types in a GI bookstore near Fort Dix down in New Jersey (both of the other men gave signs of recognition of that place, a place where they had taken their respective basis trainings) and that is where I got, what did you call it Jack, “religion” on the war issue. You know I have done quite a few things in my life, some good, some bad but of the good that people have always praised me for that social work I did, and later teaching I always tell them this- there are a million social workers, there are a million teachers, but these days, and for long time now, there have been very few peace activists on the ground so if you want to praise me, want to remember me for anything then let it be for this kind of work, things like this march today when our forces were few and the tasks enormous.”
With that the three men, as the sun started setting, headed back to the last stretch to York in silence all thinking about what they had accomplished that day.
It had been a long day starting early for Peter since, due to other commitments, he had had to drive up to York before dawn that morning. Jack and Mike already in York too had gotten up early to make sure all the Veterans for Peace and personal gear for the march was in order. They were expected in Saco (you know how to say it now even if you are not from Maine, or even been there) for an 8:30 start to the walk and so left York for the twenty-five mile trip up to that town about 7:30. They arrived at the inevitable Universalist-Unitarian Church (U-U) about 8:15 and prepared the Veterans for Peace flags that the twelve VFPers from the Smedley Butler Brigade who came up from Boston for the last leg would carry.
That inevitable U-U remark by the way needs some explanation, or rather a kudo. Of all the churches with the honorable exception of the Quakers the U-Us have been the one consistent church which has provided a haven for peace activists and their projects, various social support groups and 12- step programs and, of course, the thing that Peter knew them for was as the last gasp effort to preserve the folk minute of the early 1960s by opening their doors on a monthly basis and turn their basements or auditoria into throw-back coffeehouses with the remnant folk performers from that milieu playing, young and old.
And so a little after 8:30 they were off, a motley collection of about forty to fifty people, some VFPers from the sponsoring Maine chapter, the Smedleys, some church peace activist types, a few young environmental activists, and a cohort of Buddhists in full yellow robe regalia leading the procession with their chanting and pacing drum beating. Those Buddhists, or some of them, had been on the whole journey from Rangeley unlike most participants who came on one or a few legs and then left. The group started appropriately up Main Street although if you know about coastal Maine that is really U.S. Route One which would be the main road of the march until Wells where they would pick up Maine Route Nine into North Berwick and the Pratt-Whitney plant.
Peter had a flash-back thought early on the walk through downtown Saco as he noticed that the area was filled with old red brick buildings that had once been part of the thriving textile industry which ignited the Industrial Revolution here in America. Yes, Peter “knew” this town much like his own North Adamsville, another red brick building town, and like old Jack Kerouac’s Lowell which he had been in the previous week to help celebrate the annual Kerouac festival. All those towns had seen better days, had also made certain come-backs of late, but walking pass the small store blocks in Saco there were plenty of empty spaces and a look of quiet desperation on those that were still operating just like he had recently observed in those other towns.
That sociological observation was about the only one that Peter (or anybody) on the march could make since once outside the downtown area heading to Biddeford and Kennebunk the views in passing were mainly houses, small strip malls, an occasional gas station and many trees. As the Buddhists warmed up to their task the first leg was uneventful except for the odd car or truck honking support from the roadway. (Peter and every other peace activist always counted honks as support whether they were or not, whether it was more a matter of road rage or not in the area of an action, stand-out or march). And so the three legs of the morning went. A longer stop for lunch followed and then back on the road for the final stages trying to reach the Pratt-Whitney plant for a planned vigil as the shifts were changing about three o’clock.
[A word on logistics since this was a straight line march with no circling back. The organizers had been given an old small green bus for their transportation needs. That green bus was festooned with painted graffiti drawings which reminded Peter of the old time 1960s Ken Kesey Merry Prankster bus and a million replicas that one could see coming about every other minute out of the Pacific Coast Highway hitchhike minute back then. The green bus served as the storage area for personal belongings and snack and, importantly, as the vehicle which would periodically pick up the drivers in the group and leaf-frog their cars toward North Berwick. Also provided rest for those too tired or injured to walk any farther. And was the lead vehicle for the short portion of the walk where everybody rode during one leg before the final walk to the plant gate.]
So just before three o’clock they arrived at the plant and spread out to the areas in front of the three parking lots holding signs and waving to on-coming traffic. That was done for about an hour and then they formed a circle, sang a couple of songs, took some group photographs before the Pratt-Whitney sign and then headed for the cars to be carried a few miles up the road to friendly farmhouse for a simple meal before dispersing to their various homes. In all an uneventful day as far as logistics went. Of course no vigil, no march, no rally or anything else in the front of some huge corporate enterprise, some war industries target, or some high finance or technological site would be complete without the cops, public or private, thinking they were confronting the Russian Revolution of 1917 on their property and that was the case this day as well.
And so a little after 8:30 they were off, a motley collection of about forty to fifty people, some VFPers from the sponsoring Maine chapter, the Smedleys, some church peace activist types, a few young environmental activists, and a cohort of Buddhists in full yellow robe regalia leading the procession with their chanting and pacing drum beating. Those Buddhists, or some of them, had been on the whole journey from Rangeley unlike most participants who came on one or a few legs and then left. The group started appropriately up Main Street although if you know about coastal Maine that is really U.S. Route One which would be the main road of the march until Wells where they would pick up Maine Route Nine into North Berwick and the Pratt-Whitney plant.
Peter had a flash-back thought early on the walk through downtown Saco as he noticed that the area was filled with old red brick buildings that had once been part of the thriving textile industry which ignited the Industrial Revolution here in America. Yes, Peter “knew” this town much like his own North Adamsville, another red brick building town, and like old Jack Kerouac’s Lowell which he had been in the previous week to help celebrate the annual Kerouac festival. All those towns had seen better days, had also made certain come-backs of late, but walking pass the small store blocks in Saco there were plenty of empty spaces and a look of quiet desperation on those that were still operating just like he had recently observed in those other towns.
That sociological observation was about the only one that Peter (or anybody) on the march could make since once outside the downtown area heading to Biddeford and Kennebunk the views in passing were mainly houses, small strip malls, an occasional gas station and many trees. As the Buddhists warmed up to their task the first leg was uneventful except for the odd car or truck honking support from the roadway. (Peter and every other peace activist always counted honks as support whether they were or not, whether it was more a matter of road rage or not in the area of an action, stand-out or march). And so the three legs of the morning went. A longer stop for lunch followed and then back on the road for the final stages trying to reach the Pratt-Whitney plant for a planned vigil as the shifts were changing about three o’clock.
[A word on logistics since this was a straight line march with no circling back. The organizers had been given an old small green bus for their transportation needs. That green bus was festooned with painted graffiti drawings which reminded Peter of the old time 1960s Ken Kesey Merry Prankster bus and a million replicas that one could see coming about every other minute out of the Pacific Coast Highway hitchhike minute back then. The green bus served as the storage area for personal belongings and snack and, importantly, as the vehicle which would periodically pick up the drivers in the group and leaf-frog their cars toward North Berwick. Also provided rest for those too tired or injured to walk any farther. And was the lead vehicle for the short portion of the walk where everybody rode during one leg before the final walk to the plant gate.]
So just before three o’clock they arrived at the plant and spread out to the areas in front of the three parking lots holding signs and waving to on-coming traffic. That was done for about an hour and then they formed a circle, sang a couple of songs, took some group photographs before the Pratt-Whitney sign and then headed for the cars to be carried a few miles up the road to friendly farmhouse for a simple meal before dispersing to their various homes. In all an uneventful day as far as logistics went. Of course no vigil, no march, no rally or anything else in the front of some huge corporate enterprise, some war industries target, or some high finance or technological site would be complete without the cops, public or private, thinking they were confronting the Russian Revolution of 1917 on their property and that was the case this day as well.
Peter did not know whether the organizers had contacted Pratt-Whitney, probably not nor he thought should they have, or security had intelligence that the march was heading their way but a surly security type made it plain that the marchers were not to go on that P-W property, or else. As if a rag-tag group of fifty mostly older pacifists, lukewarm socialists, non-violent veterans and assorted church people were going to shut the damn place done, or try to, that day.
Nothing came of the security agent’s threats as there was no need for that but as Peter got out of Jack’s car he expressed the hope that someday they would be leading a big crowd to shut that plant down. No questions asked. In the meantime they had set the fragile groundwork. Yes, it had been a good day and they had all been at the right place.
Nothing came of the security agent’s threats as there was no need for that but as Peter got out of Jack’s car he expressed the hope that someday they would be leading a big crowd to shut that plant down. No questions asked. In the meantime they had set the fragile groundwork. Yes, it had been a good day and they had all been at the right place.
URGENT: Calls Again Needed to Save Mumia's Life!Stop the attempted murder of Mumia through medical neglect!Keep the pressure on! | ||
|
Please call these
numbers and any other
numbers you have for the Prison and the Governor.
(Dialling
code from UK for the USA is 001. Pennsylvania is five hours behind
London.)
John
Wetzel
Secretary, Department of Corrections ra-crpadocsecretary@pa.gov 717-728-4109 717-728-4178 Fax 1920 Technology Pkwy, Mechanicsburg PA 17050
John Kerestes
Superintendent SCI Mahanoy 570-773-2158 x8102 570-783-2008 Fax 301 Morea Road, Frackville PA 17932
Susan
McNaughton
Public Information Office PA DOC Press secretary: 717-728-4025 smcnaughton@pa.gov | ||
|
Mumia's
Condition Grave
Take Action NOW! |
 | |
|
On
Friday, April 24, Mumia Abu-Jamal was visited by his
wife, Wadiya Jamal, who reported that his condition
has worsened.
She
saw him again on April 25 and he appeared even more gravely ill. Everyone is asked to call the prison
and the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections
immediately.
Please
continue to call on
throughout this week.
Mumia was
released from the prison infirmary three days ago even though he was in no
condition to be in general population. His request to be seen by independent
medical specialists was denied by the PA Department of Corrections. Yet he is in
need of 24-hour care and supervision. He is too weak and in this state he may
not be able ask for help.
| ||
|
Please
call the numbers listed. Along with Mumia's
name his prison number is AM 8335. Call
local news sources
in your area that would report on this crisis. Share this email with your contact
lists. Get out the information via any
social media you use especially Facebook and
Twitter using the hashtag #MumiaMustLive.
Demand
that prison officials call Mumia’s wife and his lawyer
Bret Grote to discuss his condition. Demand
that Mumia Abu-Jamal see a competent doctor of his
choice immediately, that he be taken to the hospital for emergency care and not
be left to go into a diabetic coma.
| ||
|
It
is clear that Pennsylvania prison officials are intent on carrying out their
plans to murder Mumia through medical neglect.
This
situation is urgent.
Every call matters. Every action matters. Call your friends, your neighbours. We must
speak out now before it’s too late.
For
more information:
Free
Mumia,
Move organization, Campaign
to Bring Mumia Home, International Action Center and Mumia’s Facebook.
| ||
|
| ||
Will The Circle Be Unbroken-The Music Of The Carter Family (First Generation)
You know it took a long time for me to figure out why I was drawn, seemingly out of nowhere, to the mountain music most famously brought to public, Northern public, attention by the likes of the Carter Family, Jimmy Rodgers, The Seegers and the Lomaxes back a couple of generations ago. The Carter Family famously arrived via a record contract in Bristol, Tennessee in the days when radio and record companies were looking for music, authentic American music to fill the air and their catalogs. The Seegers and Lomaxes went out into the sweated dusty fields, out to the Saturday night red barn dance, out to the Sunday morning praise Jehovah gathered church brethren, out to the juke joint, down to the mountain general store to grab whatever was available some of it pretty remarkable filled with fiddles, banjos and mandolins.
As a kid, as a very conscious Northern city boy, I could not abide that kind of music but later on I figured that was because I was so embroiled in the uprising jail-break music of my generation, rock and roll, that anything else faded, faded badly by comparison. Later in high school when Brian Pirot would drive us down to Cambridge and after in college when I used to hang around Harvard Square to be around the burgeoning folk scene that was emerging for what I later would call the folk minute of the early 1960s I would let something like Gold Watch And Chain register a bit, registering a bit then meaning that I would find myself occasionally idly humming such a tune. (The version done by Alice Stuart at the time gleaned when I hear her perform at the Club Nana in the Square one time when I had enough dough for two coffees, a shared pastry and money for the “basket” for a date, a cheap date. The only Carter Family song that I consciously could claim I knew was theirs was Under the Weeping Willow although I may have unconsciously known others from seventh grade music class when Mr. Dasher would bury us with all kind of songs and genre from the American songbook so we would not get tied down to that heathen “rock and roll” that drove him crazy when we asked him to play some for us.) But again more urban, more protest-oriented folk music was what caught my attention more when the folk minute was at high tide in the early 1960s.
Then one day not all that many years ago as part of a final reconciliation with my family which I had been estranged from periodically since teenage-hood, going back to my own roots, making peace with my old growing up neighborhood, I started asking many questions about how things turned so sour back when I was young. More importantly asking questions that had stirred in my mind for a long time and formed part of the reason that I went for reconciliation. To find out what my roots were while somebody was around to explain the days before I could rightly remember the early day. And in that process I finally, finally figured out why the Carter Family and others began to “speak” to me.
The thing was simplicity itself. See my father hailed from Kentucky, Hazard, Kentucky long noted in song and legend as hard coal country. When World War II came along he left to join the Marines to get the hell out of there. During his tour of duty he was stationed for a short while at the Portsmouth Naval Base and during that stay attended a USO dance held in Portland where he met my mother who had grown up in deep French-Canadian Olde Saco. Needless to say he stayed in the North, for better or worse, working the mills in Olde Saco until they closed or headed south for cheaper labor and then worked at whatever jobs he could find. All during my childhood though along with that popular music that got many mothers and fathers through the war mountain music, although I would not have called it that then filtered in the background on the family living room record player.
But here is the real “discovery,” a discovery that could only be disclosed by my parents. Early on in their marriage they had tried to go back to Hazard to see if they could make a go of it there. This was after my older brother Prescott was born and while my mother was carrying me. Apparently they stayed for several months before they left to go back to Olde Saco before I was born since I was born in Portland General Hospital. So see that damn mountain was in my DNA, was just harking to me when I got the bug. Funny, isn’t it.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)