Town Hall Meeting

‘Nuff said. Thanks Topy for the picture!

Yet people still say things like “Oh everybody thought there were WMD and that we had to invade. We were all duped.” That is flat out not true. Here is my research into how many and who voted against the war at the time.

“Although given little public credit at the time, or since, many of the 126 House Democrats who spoke out and voted against the October 2002 resolution that gave President Bush authority to wage war against Iraq have turned out to be correct in their warnings about the
problems a war would create.”

source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/12/03/AR
2006120301108_pf.html

“In the early morning hours of Oct. 11, 2002, the Democratic-controlled Senate voted 77-23 giving President Bush the authority to use military force in Iraq. Forty-eight of the Senate’s 49 Republicans voted yes; only Rhode Island’s Lincoln Chafee dissented. Of the 51 Democrats including the independent from Vermont), 29 voted yes and 22 voted no.”

source: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=7275360

So in total, 148 out of a possible 257 Democrat congress members voted against the war. That comes out to 58% of all Democrats voted against it!

Actual Senate and House Iraq Vote Breakdowns:
http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/
roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=107&session=2&vote=00237
http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2002/roll455.xml

Barbara Lee story that is sometimes confused with the Iraq War vote:

“On September 15 (2001), the US Congress approved a resolution authorizing President Bush to use “all necessary and appropriate force” against anyone associated with the terrorist attacks of September 11. The measure passed 98-0 in the Senate and 420-1 in the House. The lone dissenting vote was a colonel’s daughter and longtime maverick from California — Democrat Barbara Lee.

“I am convinced that military action will not prevent further acts of international terrorism against the United States,” Lee said on the House floor on Sept. 15. “There must be some of us who say, ‘Let’s step back for a moment and think through the implications of our actions today — let us more fully understand the consequences.'” ”

Source: http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/2001/09/lee.html

I estimate about 20,000 showed up yesterday in Los Angeles to speak up for an end to the Iraq war and occupation. Check out the pictures here. Unfortunately, the local government no longer makes estimates, so we don’t really know, and the news media won’t pick up the duty. I made sure to get a sampling of the media coverage, so I watched the national NBC news and the local CBS news. Neither one covered the voices of the protesters for more than 10 seconds, and BOTH made sure to mention counter protesters. I was at the LA protest, and we outnumbered the counter protesters approx. 20,000 to 4. It is so sad that we can participate in such a huge showing of solidarity, but our voices are suppressed. When we behave peacefully, they don’t air our voices and they give us a few seconds of coverage. What do we have to do to be heard?!? This reminds me of the quote from John F. Kennedy, “Those who make peaceful revolution impossible make violent revolution inevitable.”

It is very inspiring to see so many turnout here, and this wasn’t even the main protest, that was at the Pentagon.

Surge the twins, George W. Bush! When will you listen: we reject your manifest destiny for capitalism. Click on the picture below for some images of the protest.

This picture is of a sign on the corner across from the protest. I am amazed at just how much Americans yearn for and idolize power and wealth. I don’t claim to be immune myself, but while protesting war and staring at this sign I have to ask, is there any virtue in wealth and power?

Wow, watch this film if you can. It documents in great detail the 2002 coup of Hugo Chavez, the President of Venezuela. This coup was perpetrated by the elite of Venezuela, with the alleged backing of the CIA. Two Irish filmakers happened to be making a documentary when the coup took place, and this film is the result. One side note that I think is very interesting is when you see the interviews of people united against Chavez, they are wealthy of course, but they are also much more light skinned than the average Venezuelan. I have noticed that in many countries the affluent tend to be more light skinned, just like in the US. This is a side note when it comes to the film, but it was something that kinda got to me while I was watching. Can racism be more blatant? Look around you the next time you are with mostly rich or mostly poor. The film is about 75 minutes.

Answer by George Carlin.

Some names that give me concern because they are powerful and they are Democratic presidential hopefuls and they are sometimes considered liberal or centrist: Biden, Clinton, McCain, and Schumer.

Some names that give me relief are all 30 (not one Republican) who voted for it. You can see how everyone voted at the senate website: Cluster Bomb Vote Breakdown.

Who would vote against such a thing, it is beyond comprehension. This issue has been around for a while but was reignited when Israel dropped cluster bombs on Lebanon in the last days before the recent cease fire. Many of the bomblets go undetonated, and then days or weeks later innocent people might walk by and trigger them, killing or maiming all near it. This is the exact same problem with land mines and the reaosn why land mines have been made illegal all over the world. But here we have the US Senate voting 70-30 against stopping the use of cluster bombs! In case you are wondering, the US uses cluster bombs in Iraq and Afghanistan and NATO used them in Yugoslavia in 1999.

1. Torture
2. Held prisoner without a trial
3. No access to lawyers
4. No right to hear the charges (if any) against them
5. Taken prisoner without charges

Go to shutitdown.org to show your leaders you want the Guantanamo Bay prison center shut down immediately.

Working For Change has sent out an email asking people to email their phone company if you disagree with the NSA spying program and are not happy with paying a company for this kind of phone service. Here are the links:

* Contact AT&T: www.consumer.att.com/contact?source=body
* Contact Verizon: www22.verizon.com/CustomerSupport/ContactUs/
* Contact BellSouth: www.bellsouth.com/contactus/index.html

If you need any more motivation other than just being angry, I truly believe that direct action against a corporation is more effective than asking a politician to do it for you!

I would like to summarize a thought put forward by Noam Chomsky recently that I think is highly relevant today. When watching or reading non-Iraqi people debate whether or not America should withdraw, consider his words.

When asked whether or not the U.S. should withdraw from Iraq immediately, Chomsky said that invading armies have no rights whatsoever. In fact, they have two responsibilities: (1) heed the will of the victims of the war (2) pay war reparations. And so in terms of withdrawal, his answer is that his opinion does not matter, so long as the Iraqi people want America out, as they overwhelmingly do. The reporter then asked him what about the concern that Iraq will turn into chaos and civil war. Chomsky replied that Germany could have said the same about France during WWII (and that in fact when the Germans pulled out of France, perhaps 10,000 people were killed as collaborators), and Japan could have said the same about the Asian countries it occupied, and the Soviet Union about the Russian satellite countries it occupied.

I just wanted to put this point on the blog for the record because daily I hear these debates between presumably well-meaning people, about how the U.S. has a responsibility to stay in Iraq. I strongly agree with Chomsky’s assertion that the U.S. has a responsibility to adhere to what the victims want from us. Coincidentally, isn’t that how democracy works anyway?

I marched in the Los Angeles protest on Saturday to mark the 3rd anniversary of the Iraq invasion by U.S. led troops. The turnout was once again great, I would say around 5,000-7,000 people came to represent. You can see my pictures here. This march was another sign of hope that we are not alone and in fact huge numbers of us want peace and justice. Los Angeles is such a huge, disconnected place with no open spaces and to see such a huge group gather like this for the 3rd time in a year is very promising.

I just added this song called “Message For Freedom” by Sarah Thompson to our protest songs page. You can listen to it from a segment on DemocracyNow! Watch it here or you can download it here. This is licensed under Creative Commons, so don’t worry, it is legal to download! This song is very moving.

MoveOn has started a petition to be sent to your local Senator to stand up with Senator Feingold to censure Bush. The Bush administration is using fear to get Americans to allow themselves to be illegally monitored. Information came out this morning, as reported here on Democracy Now!, that at least one pacifist group has been monitored. I believe the Bush administration is using this power to eliminate dissent, and so I signed the petition. Go to this site to sign up: political.moveon.org/censure/.

The anniversary of the invasion of Iraq is coming up again. There will be mass protests all around. Demonstrate your disgust for militarism, greed, nepotism, cronyism, or just go out and meet a bunch of fellow peaceful citizens. Try a google search to find a protest near you, or any of the following links:

www.internationalanswer.org
www.unitedforpeace.org
www.campusantiwar.net
www.warresisters.org

Bernie Sanders is an independent running in Vermont. He is honest and fights for very important issues, such as corporate domination of media, workers rights, and protecting the environment. I donated some money to his campaign, which you can do too by going to his website: www.bernie.org.

You can also learn more about what he is doing now in the House of Representatives at: www.bernie.house.gov

What an outstanding turnout today in Los Angeles. The turnout was announced at 50,000 people. That same number was announced in San Francisco, and an amazing 300,000 announced at the main event in Washington, DC! It was invigorating to see such non-violent support for peace and justice. All of my pictures have been posted here. I’ve already seen the national press say things like “thousands of protestors showed up across the country” and “pro-Bush protestors were there as well.” I have given up on the mainstream media long ago: CBS, ABC, NBC, CNN (I don’t even count Fox since they are in a whole other league). I was there, you can see my pictures. Real reporting would include things like “hundreds of thousands protested across America today” and “people are fed up with militarism and occupations.” Thankfully we still have news programs like Democracy Now!.

September 24, 2005 – mark your calendars! It’s a great opportunity to protest the illegal war on Iraq, the illegal occupation of Haiti, the attempted and failed coup on Venezuela’s president, and any of the other U.S. foreign or domestic policy horrors you can think of. The main protest will be in Washington, D.C. There will also be major ones in at least Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Seattle. Go to our demonstrations page for links to more information.

and D students:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4074922.stm

-Thanks G for the post

If you haven’t heard about this model before, read about it here. It is so important to understand that the people who wrote this plan are in charge of the American government right now. After reading that, go to their website www.newamericancentury.org to see the sunshine version. Check out their statement of principles and who signed it at the bottom, such as Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Jeb Bush.

Whether you read it straight from their website, or anywhere else, PNAC is about global dominance by America through military means. September 11 was an opportunity for the military part of PNAC’s strategy to really be fulfilled. In their definitive 2000 white paper “Rebuilding America’s Defenses: Strategy, Forces and Resources for a New Century,” they explain that America’s military spending should be, at a minimum, 3.8% of GDP. By 2004, it was 3.9%, up from 3.0% in 2001 (check my references here and here).

Isn’t he? In Iraq, he took a desperate war torn country and took all the state owned industries and privatized them. Now they are controlled by foreign companies (Halliburton, Bechtel, et al). Just what the World Bank is good at: taking resources from a nation’s citizens and giving them to corporations on a silver platter. This cover story from The Nation is titled “The Rise of Disaster Capitalism.” The idea is to take a country that is desperate, by a natural disaster such as Aceh after the Tsunami or by imperial means such as Iraq or Yugoslavia, and open the nation 100% to foreign business-a clean slate. Maybe the title of the article should be “Unrestrained Capitalism is the Disaster.”