Mike Ferner - Articles

Veterans Group Delivers 23,000 Impeachment Signatures to House Judiciary Committee Chair Conyers

Mike Ferner — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 19:46:19 +0000

Subtitle

Impeachment then Imprisonment!

Home Page Excerpt

June 12, 2008

Adams reminded the 21-term Detroit Democrat that, “You have taken the same oath, Congressman Conyers, and we expect you will hold it just as sacred as we do and begin impeachment hearings at the soonest possible moment.”

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June 12, 2008

Washington - Yesterday, members of Veterans For Peace delivered some 23,000 signatures on petitions to impeach President Bush to Congressman John Conyers (D-MI), urging him to call impeachment hearings.

Conyers met with Veterans For Peace (VFP) members from New York, North Carolina, New Jersey, Ohio and the District of Columbia involved in the organization’s petition drive.

VFP Executive Director, Michael McPhearson, said, “By invading and occupying Iraq, the Bush administration every day violates legally binding international treaties and domestic laws. Congressman Conyers and his colleagues must hold them accountable and our Constitution prescribes how: impeachment. It’s not enough to simply watch the Bush administration retire.”

In letters requesting the meeting and transmitting the signatures, VFP president, Elliott Adams, emphasized that the Bush administration has committed numerous impeachable offenses by violating domestic laws, binding international treaties and the U.S. Constitution, by condoning torture in Iraq, violating the Geneva Conventions, U.N. Charter and resolutions, the Nuremberg Principles and the Laws and Customs of War on Land.

Attached to his transmittal letter, the former Army paratrooper and Viet Nam combat vet included the VFP “Case for Impeachment” consisting of “six single-spaced pages documenting claims of war crimes, crimes against humanity and crimes against peace committed or encouraged by the Bush administration.” He also included a video CD of testimonies selected from the Iraq Veterans Against the War’s “Winter Soldier” hearings held in March of this year, documenting many additional violations.

Adams wrote, “Having taken an oath to defend the Constitution ‘from all enemies foreign and domestic,’ our members take the obligation to impeach George W. Bush most seriously. We must hold this administration accountable for waging a war of aggression against Iraq.”

He reminded the 21-term Detroit Democrat that “You have taken the same oath, Congressman Conyers, and we expect you will hold it just as sacred as we do and begin impeachment hearings at the soonest possible moment. To do any less is to disgrace the memory of the thousands of U.S. troops killed and wounded in this illegal war, and mocks the millions of Iraqis who have died and suffered in George Bush’s war of aggression.”

The VFP president concluded, “Congressman Conyers, you have stood on the side of justice in battles too numerous to mention during your long career in the House. At this point in history, when the Executive Branch is usurping powers it may never relinquish, we ask you to not sit on the sidelines or be a keeper of the status quo like those who stood in your way when you demanded action for what is right. The time for justice is always now.”

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(Almost) Inside American Royalty's Security Bubble

Mike Ferner — Sat, 03 May 2008 01:23:39 +0000

Subtitle

Bush family momentarily bumps into reality

Home Page Excerpt

April 28, 2008

The First Family Security Bubble was nearly pried open for a moment last Friday; but in the end Disneyland remained blessedly undisturbed.

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April 28, 2008

by Mike Ferner

Washington, D.C. – The First Family Security Bubble was nearly pried open for a moment last Friday; but in the end Disneyland remained blessedly undisturbed.

On a particularly warm spring evening, Laura and Jenna Bush alighted from a squadron of black SUVs at the Borders book store in downtown Washington, D.C., right on schedule at 7:00 pm. Flanked by Secret Service agents, they went inside to an area set up for authors to sign books – yes, sign books. The two Bush women have co-authored a 32-page children’s book, “Read All About It,” the story of Tyrone, a youngster who is good at everything in school but reading.

In line to have her copy signed, and more importantly, to get a moment to deliver a letter to the authors, waited Gilda Carbonaro, the mother of a U.S. Marine Sergeant who died a quite terrible death in Iraq.

After nearly an hour wait, Gilda approached the table to proffer her book for a signature.

“So that they wouldn’t see me as threatening, I made sure to introduce myself as a grade school teacher, like Jenna,” she said.

The moment she got her signed book back, she took her letter out from within its pages and extended it to Laura and Jenna. Not 500 words long, it was laminated so it would clearly not be in something as suspicious-looking as an envelope.

“At that moment, swooping down out of absolutely nowhere, a Secret Service agent grabbed it out of my hand,” Gilda explained. But before she was hustled away, she extracted a promise from the younger Bush to read it.

After her brief encounter with American royalty, the member of Gold Star Families Speak Out said, “If I had the chance, I would’ve liked to ask Laura Bush, ‘What would you consider enough of a real emergency to urge your kids to enlist? If New Jersey was invaded? Your husband constantly tells us that all hangs in the balance in this war. Just what would it take for your family to really risk something?”

You may be interested to read what Gilda Carbonaro wrote to Laura and Jenna Bush. Heaven knows they’re not likely to, inside the bubble.

Laura and Jenna Bush
c/o Borders Books
14th and F Streets NW
Washington, D.C.

April 25, 2008

Dear Laura and Jenna Bush,

As you promote your new children’s book, “Read All About It,” and advocate for literacy tonight I hope you will take but a few moments to read these heartfelt lines.

I write to you as one of thousands of parents and family members whose loved ones have been killed in Iraq or Afghanistan; whose child, parent or spouse has returned blinded or deaf, armless or legless, or unable to ever move their limbs again; or perhaps have returned apparently unharmed, but with nightmares and a ticking timebomb in their minds.

You may think this a grim postscript to an evening’s chat about a book for children, but when someone you love has been taken from you forever, or returned so terribly damaged you barely know them, it becomes foremost in your thoughts every waking moment. You then begin to understand what is truly grim. And, I must add, there are those among us who still carry such unspeakable pain and anger they’ve become all but exhausted.

But many of us have felt exhaustion be replaced by an energy and a clarity of purpose we have never experienced before. One thing that has become clear to us is an answer to the question, “How could anyone send the youth of its nation to invade Iraq?” We see now how differently someone would answer that question if they suffered the anguish of a family member being killed as the result.

Your children, Mrs. Bush, are safe and I am glad for you. But I wonder, have you ever urged them to enlist in this heroic adventure? Your husband has told us many times how important this cause is. Your children appear well qualified, and as part of the First Family you’ve no doubt taught them the value of demonstrating leadership for the nation.

Why, then, has the price for this war been paid only by people like my son, Marine Corps Sgt. Alessandro Carbonaro, who died May 10, 2006, eight days after being horrifically burned in an IED blast in Al Anbar Province, Iraq?

Can you not see the simple, basic unfairness of asking others to do what you yourself are unwilling to do? Have you drifted so far from an understanding of fundamental justice that you cannot see the contradictions apparent to so many of us?

These are not rhetorical questions. They are as real as the knot in our stomachs and the ache in our hearts. It is time – and past time – that you face these questions without blinking or dodging and give us a satisfactory answer.

Most Sincerely,

Gilda Carbonaro Bethesda, Maryland

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Counterpunch

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http://www.counterpunch.org/ferner04292008.html

Anniversary of Another Infamous Date

Mike Ferner — Tue, 25 Mar 2008 18:54:43 +0000

Subtitle

The U.S. never remembers and our victims can never forget

Home Page Excerpt

March 19, 2003

“But you say you live in a democracy. How can this be happening to us?” - Village sheik, Abu Hishma, Iraq

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March 19, 2008

by Mike Ferner

March 19, 2003: a date that will live in infamy. Perhaps not in the minds of many of our fellow citizens, but surely to most people around the world. On that date, U.S. military forces invaded Iraq.

Almost a year later I was in a small farming village some miles north of Baghdad, accompanying members of the Christian Peacemaker Teams. They were recording the stories of the common people of Iraq who had no access to news media or decision-makers in the Green Zone. One of those stories was from a village sheikh who recounted his weeks of horror as a detainee under the control of the U.S. Army.

He and a dozen others were held in, or rather on, a patch of open ground, surrounded by concertina wire, exposed to the sun, huddled against a two-day rain, and only a hole, dug with their hands, for a toilet. After several days he finally was given at least a blanket.

With his humanity and graciousness somehow still intact, he quickly added that he understood the difference between the American people and their government. But then he uttered the words that haunt me to this day: “But you say you live in a democracy. How can this be happening to us?”

As we arrive at the heartbreaking fifth anniversary of the invasion of Iraq and begin Year Six as that nation’s occupier, it is a good time to reflect on the words of that sheikh.

We might, for example, reflect on this democracy business and whether we have it in such surplus that we can drop quantities of it from F-16s on those we deem need it most; or whether shoveling additional billions into the treasuries of Exxon, Texaco, Shell, Halliburton, and Blackwater ultimately will make our society more or less democratic.

We might reflect on the 1 million-plus Iraqis we have killed, the likely 5 million wounded, the more than 4 million displaced from their homes, the untold millions desperate for clean water, electricity, food, work, security, and sanity in an unending madness. We might reflect on whether we are more or less safe following such a holocaust against our fellow human beings.

We also could reflect on some numbers painfully close to home — at least 3,984 U.S. troops killed and 29,320 wounded, according to President Bush. His definition of “casualties” conveniently does not include more than 100 suicides and 31,325 “nonhostile” injuries — such as getting hurt in a traffic accident racing down the road to a firefight. That is somehow not considered “wounded in action.”

We could reflect on all the doctors, teachers, scientists, and loving parents whose communities will never benefit from their skills and compassion because their blood drained into the sands of Iraq.

We could reflect on how much health care or schooling or public transit we might have bought with the $3 trillion plus this war is likely to cost, or the $390 million it has already taken from taxpayers in the city of Toledo, or the $18 billion vacuumed out of Ohio.

For generations, graveyards have been traditional places to pause and reflect. One particularly stirring and poignant portrayal of a graveyard, called Arlington Midwest, will be erected on the lawn of the Lucas County Courthouse today through Saturday. It consists of some 5,000 small, wooden tombstones, painted white and arranged in precise rows like its namesake in Virginia. Each marker bears the name, rank, branch of service, hometown, and place and date of death for every U.S. soldier killed in Iraq and Afghanistan. Unique to the dozen or so “Arlingtons” that Veterans For Peace has inspired around the country, Arlington Midwest also has a section memorializing the Iraq and Afghanistan veterans who have taken their own lives, and a moving tribute to the Iraqi dead.

Just as that mystified village sheikh wondered — “But you say you live in a democracy. How can this be happening to us?” — so might we stand silently for a moment in Arlington Midwest and ask ourselves, “How can this be happening to us?”

How indeed?

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http://www.monthlyreview.org/mrzine/ferner180308.html

Clinton Campaign Office Re-occupied by Peace Activists on Day of Iowa Voting

Mike Ferner — Sat, 05 Jan 2008 17:42:13 +0000

Subtitle

Action caps four days of Iowa primary protests against war in Iraq

Home Page Excerpt

January 3, 2008

“While the people of Iowa are exercising their legal right…to choose their presidential nominees, it is appropriate that we exercise our extra-legal rights of nonviolent protest to bring this war to an end.”

Full Article

January 3, 2008

by Mike Ferner

Des Moines – Hours before voting begins in the nation’s first presidential poll, peace activists placed the Iraq war front and center again this afternoon as they occupied the Iowa headquarters of Senator Hillary Clinton for the second time since campaigning began last fall.

Over a dozen members of a campaign called “Seasons Of Discontent: A Presidential Occupation Project” (SODaPOP) went to Clinton’s office, saying they still had not gotten a response to a letter delivered in October demanding she publicly oppose any more spending for the war or occupation, and foreswear an attack on Iran.

But as the peace activists approached Clinton’s East Second Street office, staff members locked the main door and refused admittance. At a locked side door, a Clinton staff person was admitted but could not close the door before Jeff Leys, co-director of Voices for Creative Nonviolence, sat down in the doorway.

Leys, speaking on the phone as he remained in the doorway, said about another 15 peace activists were standing outside the entrance helping block it, several Clinton staffers were blocking the doorway into the office, and that no one was going in or out.

Asked why the campaign targeted Senator Clinton’s Iowa headquarters again, Leys said “because she is the most hawkish of any of the leading candidates on foreign policy and she refuses to commit to ending the war in Iraq.”

He said that they are also concerned with Senator Clinton’s connection to the Center for a New American Security (CNAS), at which she gave a keynote address for the center’s launch in June 2007. One of its initial reports released that day, “Phased Transition,” concluded that “…as a rough estimate 25,000 to 40,000 American troops might remain in Iraq” until as late as 2012.

“While the people of Iowa are exercising their legal right to go to the caucuses to choose their presidential nominees, it is appropriate that we exercise our extra-legal rights of nonviolent protest to bring this war to an end,” Leys concluded.

Extra-legal or not, Clinton’s office was reluctant to file a complaint that would trigger arrests, so police withdrew after being on the scene about an hour. Protesters continued their vigil until about 5 pm, by which time nearly all the Clinton staff had left.

Caucus voting was scheduled to begin at 7pm Iowa time and a “Caucus Night Celebration with Hillary” was scheduled at a downtown Des Moines hotel later in the evening.

Clinton’s Des Moines press office was contacted for a statement but had no comment.

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http://www.michaelmoore.com/mustread/index.php?id=952

"I Will Salute No More Forever"

Mike Ferner — Wed, 05 Sep 2007 19:47:51 +0000

Subtitle

Home Page Excerpt

September 5, 2007

St. Louis – His government broke his heart but it could not break Air Force veteran Charles Powell’s spirit. Fighting back tears, the 64 year-old vet stood tall and resolute in front of 400 of his comrades, describing in verse the final steps of a painful disillusionment.

Full Article

September 5, 2007

by Mike Ferner

Each summer during the national convention of Veterans For Peace, time is reserved for a Veterans’ Speakout, where any member can rise to say whatever is on their mind.

When the veterans gathered in 2002, prior to the invasion of Iraq, George Bush and the hawks of Washington were pounding away on the war drums. That year, Powell, who had served on a Titan ICBM launch crew during the Cuban missile crisis, read his poem titled, “I Won’t Let Them Take My Flag.” He noted the warmongers were “again waving my flag” as a buildup to invasion, and he countered what he felt was a manipulation of the national symbol with the following lines reminiscent of the great Langston Hughes.

“But to me ‘Old Glory’ still stands for the liberty, justice and solidarity yet to come. So I still wave it too. I wave it for health care, education, housing and food for all. I wave it for peace and love and I wave it for hope. Most of all, I wave it for the America yet to be.”

After four and a half years of war in Iraq, Veterans For Peace convened again this summer and Charles Powell was there as always. As his turn came at the Speakout microphone he struggled a few seconds to compose himself. Then, in a clear voice growing more determined as he spoke, Powell mirrored the pain, regret and anger in the hearts of so many who listened.

I WILL SALUTE NO MORE FOREVER

As a child I learned to Worship that piece of colored cloth.

My family, my school, the movies, TV taught me to believe that fragment of fabric stood for good things.

I watched my father, a World War II Army veteran, give homage to that wad of material.

As an airman I saluted that banner for the four years I served in the Air Force where I stood ready to help launch Titan Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles on command.

Then I became aware that the wonderful things for which that clump of colors is suppose to represent, have not been achieved.

I came to know that awful, unlawful, unwise and immoral acts have occurred under the stars and stripes.

But I still clung onto the belief and hope that someday, somehow conditions would change and the good things for which that rag is still supposed to stand would yet be realized.

However, I’ve been forced to come to my senses.

Now we have: preemptive war, the Patriot Act, the Military Commissions Act, stop loss, neglect of returning veterans, ignored infrastructure, billions of dollars squandered on war and occupation, extraordinary rendition, secret imprisonment, warrantless domestic spying, disenfranchisement of voters, stolen elections, torture, suspension of habeas corpus and denial of due process.

So, even though hearing “America The Beautiful” still increases my heartbeat.

Although seeing those stripes still brings a lump to my throat.

Even though the sight of those stars continues to bring tears to my eyes.

I won’t pledge to it anymore.

I won’t remove my cap.

I won’t stand in respect.

I won’t wave it.

I will salute no more forever.

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http://www.buzzflash.com/articles/contributors/1286

Former Enemies Find Way Forward

Mike Ferner — Tue, 28 Aug 2007 18:41:08 +0000

Subtitle

Home Page Excerpt

August 22, 2007

St. Louis - A young man from Palestine and another from Israel riveted 400 U.S. military veterans to their seats last week in this city on the Mississippi River. What captivated the audience was the fighters’ recent decision to put down the guns they’d pointed at each other for years.

Full Article

August 22, 2007

by Mike Ferner

The two members of Combatants For Peace addressed the mid-August national convention of Veterans For Peace, a 7,000 member organization dedicated to abolishing war. Yonaton Gur, a 28 year-old Israeli journalist and Tel Aviv University student spoke first.

“My grandfather commanded the Israeli Navy during the 1967 war, my father was an officer in Israeli Army Intelligence, and I grew up on a kibbutz.” But, he explained, “I also grew up in the ’90s, with a more peaceful perspective following the (1993) Oslo Accords.”

Gur served as a Lieutenant in the Israeli Army’s armored corps and as a reservist in the occupied territories. “Many small stories make up the everyday life of an occupation,” he said, and something as mundane as a shirt pocket first caught his attention. “I never realized how important shirt pockets were, but when you’re an Arab in the occupied territories, you have to reach into that pocket many times a day, at any moment, to produce your ID for Israeli authorities at checkpoints.”

His duty in the occupied territories eventually convinced the former reservist that the occupation was wrong. “We would be on patrol and stop simple farmers, making them wait a half hour or more while we called back to the base to check on them. I tried to be as human as possible, with my best attitude. That felt good at first but the fact that I was doing it at all was the main issue. It didn’t matter if I was being nice about it.”

The moral dilemma he found himself in eventually forced him to quit the reserves. “You can’t on the one hand be against the occupation and yet still be part of the military.” Gur’s decision placed him “against most of my people and my family tradition. But once I resigned, I knew I had to do more, so I joined Combatants for Peace.”

That group was formed in early 2005 by Palestinian and Israeli fighters tired of violence, who decided to try a different way. Their Web site succinctly states this revolutionary idea: “After brandishing weapons for so many years, and having seen one another only through weapon sights, we have decided to put down our guns, and to fight for peace.”

Raed Al-Haddar, who holds a Bachelor’s in Sociology from Bir Zeit University in Ramalla, is Gur’s Palestinian partner in CFP. Today he shares a stage instead of the killing grounds with his former enemy. Married, with two daughters, the 28 year-old calls his own story “part of the whole Palestinian story.”

Not even 10 years old at the start of the first intifada in 1987, he “faced the occupier on the way to school every day” and saw people gunned down by Israeli forces. It became the norm for boys to try and provoke an incident with troops “sometimes to prove our manhood, and sometimes just for shits and giggles,” Al-Haddar said through a bemused interpreter.

On one occasion, he and a young friend were throwing rocks at an Israeli Army jeep. “The soldiers fired at us and my friend was killed on the spot. I couldn’t believe it. I was in shock. It made me angry so that only black revenge stayed in my mind. I revolted any way I could. I even joined the radical group, Fatah. I used guns and threw Molotov cocktails. I was arrested before finishing high school.”

Israeli security forces put Al-Haddar in a small, dark cell under solitary confinement for 45 days of interrogation. “I was petrified of death. During that time I learned about other revolutions, like the ones in Algeria, Cuba and Vietnam. That knowledge gave me the push to continue.”

Released at the age of 17, he “kept the same attitude — to fight and use violence.” When the second intifada began in 2000, Israelis placed a curfew on his village as the killings and bloodshed resumed. When his cousin was killed, it changed his life, Al-Haddar recalled.

“A sniper killed him with one head shot. The killing of my friend during the first intifada made me violent, but for some reason the killing of my cousin made me think. I retraced my thoughts about the struggles between Palestinians and Israelis and thought of how to end it.”

He met an Israeli family and learned to his surprise that “they supported the existence of Palestine, even though I thought no one in Israel supported having two states.”

His thinking continued to change until eventually he was ready to attend a meeting of Combatants For Peace. “I was hesitant. Psychologically I wasn’t ready to accept that I would actually meet one of the Israeli soldiers who had caused the struggle of the Palestinian people. Our first meeting was in secret with lookouts posted. I was so afraid. I asked myself ‘what the hell am I doing meeting with an Israeli soldier? Just yesterday we were fighting!’”

Both parties to the meeting suspected an ambush and, only after a while, did the suspicion between Al-Haddar and his Israeli brothers-in-arms begin to lift. “Eventually I realized the Israeli was intelligent. We began by taking it a step at a time. Trust started. Now we have a very strong relationship.”

“I know many people have lost hope in this life,” the former fighter said, citing Palestinian unemployment of 70 percent and 12,000 Palestinians imprisoned. “But me and Combatants For Peace have not lost hope. I will never lose hope.”

To a prolonged standing ovation, the former fighter pleaded, “Do not leave me alone. We need your help. Stand by our side so the struggle will be against war and we will have security, peace and justice.”

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http://www.opednews.com/maxwrite/link.php?id=40845

Collateral Genocide

Mike Ferner — Fri, 11 May 2007 13:28:48 +0000

Subtitle

Home Page Excerpt

May 10, 2007

Things could start getting a little worrisome for Uncle Sam – especially when you realize that since our government began waging economic and military warfare on Iraq we’ve killed well over one million people, fast approaching two.

Full Article

May 10,2007

by Mike Ferner

Two elements are necessary to commit the crime of genocide: 1) the mental element, meaning intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, and 2) the physical element, which includes any of the following: killing or causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; deliberately inflicting conditions of life calculated to bring about the group’s physical destruction in whole or in part; imposing measures intended to prevent births; or forcibly transferring children to another group.

Considering that such clear language comes from a UN treaty which is legally binding on our country, things could start getting a little worrisome for Uncle Sam – especially when you realize that since our government began waging economic and military warfare on Iraq we’ve killed well over one million people, fast approaching two.

This summer will be one year since researchers from Johns Hopkins University collected data for a study which concluded 655,000 additional deaths were caused by the military war, and things have only gotten worse. Then consider that the economic war killed an additional 500,000 Iraqi kids under the age of five during only the first seven years of sanctions which were in force for a dozen years, according to just one 1999 U.N. report.

Based on the Johns Hopkins estimate of Iraqis killed in the war, one could conservatively estimate that another 2.6 million people have been wounded. The U.N. estimates that between 1.5 million and 2 million Iraqis are now “internally displaced” by the fighting and roughly the same number have fled their country, including disproportionate numbers of doctors and other professionals.

If you are sitting down and possess a healthy imagination, try conjuring up similar conditions here in our land.

• Start with the fact that few people buy bottled water and what comes out of the tap is guaranteed to at least make you sick if not kill you
• Three times as many of our fellow citizens are out of work as during the Great Depression
• On a good day we have three or four hours of electricity to preserve food or cool the 110-degree heat
• No proper hospitals or rehab clinics exist to help the wounded become productive members of society
• Roads are a mess
• Reports of birth defects from exposure to depleted uranium have begun surfacing around the country.

Reflect for a minute on the grief you’ve felt from a single loved one’s death. Then open your heart to the reality of life if we suffered casualties comparable to those endured by the people of Iraq.

• In the former cities of Atlanta, Denver, Boston, Seattle, Milwaukee, Fort Worth, Baltimore, San Francisco, Dallas and Philadelphia every single person is dead.
• In Vermont, Delaware, Hawaii, Idaho, Nebraska, Nevada, Kansas, Mississippi, Iowa, Oregon, South Carolina and Colorado every single person is wounded.
• The entire populations of Ohio and New Jersey are homeless, surviving with friends, relatives or under bridges as they can.
• The entire populations of Michigan, Indiana and Kentucky have fled to Canada or Mexico.
• Over the past three years, one in four U.S. doctors has left the country.
• Last year alone 3,000 doctors were kidnapped and 800 killed.

In short, nobody “out there” is coming to save us. We are in hell.

Of course our government didn’t intend to commit genocide in Iraq, it just sort of happened. The Iraqis kept getting in the way while we were trying to complete the mission. Mistakes were made as we were building democracy, but surely no genocide was intended. Indeed, we are the international deciders of what is and what isn’t genocide, and we know full well that intent is a requirement.

It was only “collateral genocide” and lord knows we did our very best to avoid it. We are, after all, Good Americans.

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http://www.freerangethought.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=195&Itemid=41

Dems' Fake "Withdrawal" Bill DEMANDED a Veto!

Mike Ferner — Wed, 09 May 2007 17:46:07 +0000

Subtitle

Now it's up to us to sit on Congress to end the war funding.

Home Page Excerpt

May 3, 2007

Let’s use this brief delay in war funding to get serious about occupying Congressional offices, shutting down universities, tying up traffic — resisting as if, well, as if lives depended on it!

Full Article

May 3, 2007

by Mike Ferner

As expected, Resident Bush immediately vetoed the Democrats “$100 Billion for the War and An Illusion of Withdrawal Bill” otherwise known as HR1591, but now this? MoveOn and the DemBoosters are ringing some kind of dizzy alarm: “Emergency Iraq Rally…show our leaders we mean business…tell Congress this is the key moment to stand strong against the President’s veto.”

Come again?!

For all the wrong reasons The Pretender has briefly delayed the next payment of war money and created a momentary crisis among the Empire’s leadership. OK, so don’t pin a medal on the guy, but at least define the current state of affairs as an opportunity: get serious about occupying local Congressional offices, tying up traffic, shutting down universities – resisting as if, well, as if lives depended on it.

Let’s examine what the Terrorist-in-Chief vetoed.

To demonstrate his iron will he rejected a pathetic bill designed to a) keep the money and the blood flowing in Iraq, and b) hoodwink war opponents into thinking it will end the war. For that we’re supposed to urge the peoples’ champions, that pusillanimous pack of Congressional invertebrates to “stand strong?” (Insert expletive here)

Last November, a wave of popular outrage against the war swept the Democratic Party into control of the House and the Senate. This should have been all the backbone they needed to stand strong. But instead of using their powerful mandate to end the war, the Democratic leadership gave us HR 1591, the very embodiment of arrogance towards voters and submission to Empire. To wit:

• Before troops can be deployed to Iraq, Army and Marine commanders must certify in writing that they are “fully mission capable” unless Shrub says “for reasons of national security” they’re good to go.

• Deployments to Iraq will be limited to no more than one year for the Army and 210 days for the Marines unless Shrub says “for reasons of national security,” they’re needed longer.

• After each tour of duty in Iraq, Army units will get a minimum of 365 days back home, Marines 210 days unless Shrub says “for reasons of national security” they’re needed sooner.

HR 1591 would also have made this the first thoroughly “benchmarked” war in the nation’s history, requiring the Mad Bomber to determine on or before July 1, 2007:

“(1) whether the Government of Iraq has given United States Armed Forces and Iraqi Security Forces the authority to pursue all extremists, including Sunni insurgents and Shiite militias, and is making substantial progress in delivering necessary Iraqi Security Forces for Baghdad and protecting such Forces from political interference; intensifying efforts to build balanced security forces throughout Iraq that provide even-handed security for all Iraqis; ensuring that Iraq’s political authorities are not undermining or making false accusations against members of the Iraqi Security Forces; eliminating militia control of local security; establishing a strong militia disarmament program; ensuring fair and just enforcement of laws; establishing political, media, economic, and service committees in support of the Baghdad Security Plan; and eradicating safe havens;
(2) whether the Government of Iraq is making substantial progress in meeting its commitment to pursue reconciliation initiatives, including enactment of a hydro-carbon law; adoption of legislation necessary for the conduct of provincial and local elections; reform of current laws governing the de-Baathification process; amendment of the Constitution of Iraq; and allocation of Iraqi revenues for reconstruction projects;
(3) whether the Government of Iraq and United States Armed Forces are making substantial progress in reducing the level of sectarian violence in Iraq; and
(4) whether the Government of Iraq is ensuring the rights of minority political parties in the Iraqi Parliament are protected.”

After this list of, to be charitable, somewhat slippery requirements, Congressional Democrats then laid a clever trap they claim will bring the troops home:

“If the President fails to make any of the (above) determinations the Secretary of Defense shall commence the redeployment of the Armed Forces from Iraq no later than July 1, 2007, with a goal of completing such redeployment within 180 days.

If the President makes the determinations specified (above) the Secretary of Defense shall commence the redeployment of the Armed Forces from Iraq not later than October 1, 2007, with a goal of completing such redeployment within 180 days.”

Except that what’s even more clever is how they define a withdrawal from Iraq: “After the conclusion of the redeployment the Secretary of Defense may not deploy or maintain members of the Armed Forces in Iraq for any purpose other than the following:

• Protecting American diplomatic facilities and American citizens, including members of the U.S. armed forces

• Serving in roles consistent with customary diplomatic positions

• Engaging in targeted special actions limited in duration and scope to killing or capturing members of al-Qaeda and other terrorist organizations with global reach

• Training and equipping members of the Iraqi Security Forces.”

In case you’re still waiting for the punch line to a sick joke, you can read it for yourself here.

Maybe Congressional Democrats are playing their version of “Gotcha” while they set up what they hope will be a Democratic White House in ‘08. Maybe, giving them every benefit of the doubt, they figured this was the best they could get majority support for. In the final analysis it doesn’t matter. What matters is that we’ve not yet thrown a big enough wrench into business as usual nor made the nation ungovernable until the war is ended. What matters is that many more people will be killed and maimed until we do.

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Counterpunch

Published Address

http://www.counterpunch.org/ferner05032007.html

Keep Them Out of Ohio!

Mike Ferner — Fri, 16 Feb 2007 23:29:48 +0000

Subtitle

Lord knows we've suffered enough already

Home Page Excerpt

February 16, 2007

Refugees from Iraq ready to swamp Ohio? Our new governor is ready!!

Full Article

February 16, 2007

by Mike Ferner

The following news brief ran on the Associated Press yesterday:

“Ohio Governor Ted Strickland has a message for President Bush: any plan to relocate to the US thousands of refugees uprooted by the Iraq war shouldn’t include Ohio.

The administration plans to allow about 7,000 Iraqi refugees to settle in the United States over the next year, a huge expansion at a time of mounting international pressure to help millions who have fled their homes in the nearly four-year-old war.

Strickland — a Democrat who opposed the war as a US House member — says Ohioans can’t be expected to have open arms for Iraqis displaced by the war. More than 100 Ohioans have been killed since the war began. The governor says he has sympathy for the refugees’ plight, but he won’t ask Ohioans to accept a greater burden.”

It is really all quite mad, isn’t it?

That on top of the million or so Iraqis we’ve killed, and the four million we’ve maimed, we’ve also created millions of refugees; that our Maniac-in-Chief now decrees 7,000 refugees is a politically acceptable number we should allow into the U.S. even as he continues the slaughter around the clock; that the governor of a state, having absolutely nothing to do with immigration policy anyway, feels compelled to protect the homeland (or would that be “homestate?”) by warning a morbidly unpopular president, “Not in our backyard, pallie!”

Something for people of good conscience to keep in mind: When we finally get our troops out of Iraq, and our bases out of Iraq, and our mercenaries out of Iraq, and our spooks out of Iraq, and Halliburton Corp., and Burger King Corp., and all the rest - when the last U.S. helicopter flies off the roof of the world’s largest embassy and the American Empire’s sorry, bloody, murderous adventure draws to a close - we owe these people. Big time.

I don’t know how many, or more to the point why, any of them would want to come live in Disneyland. But if some do, we should welcome them and the many lessons they could teach us about maintaining humanity in conditions of pure hell.

For the 99.9% of Iraqis who would rather stay home and rebuild their shattered lives, at the very least we owe them money. Lots of money. Multiple billions of dollars. And not to be administered by our military or our corporations or our mercenaries or our spooks. No, we should have nothing to do with that money except deliver it to Iraq and let them decide what to do with it. I hope they can rebuild the hospitals and the electric and phone systems we bombed, and the water treatment plants we’ve destroyed, and the economy we’ve wrecked. But frankly it doesn’t matter if they want to insulate their attics with it, or mix it with mud and turn it into building material, or pile it up in the middle of the desert and fucking burn it all. They can’t possibly do any worse with it than we have.

And THAT is just the beginning of the magnitude of the dollar amount we owe Iraq.

What we do for all the pain and suffering and heartache and terror we’ve created, only God knows. Those things we carry on our conscience to our graves.

And the governor of Ohio wants to be first in line to say, “Keep your tired and maimed. Don’t burden us.”

What world is this?

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Published On

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War Opponents Occupy Congressional Offices

Mike Ferner — Tue, 06 Feb 2007 20:45:54 +0000

Subtitle

"Occupation Project" Begins

Home Page Excerpt

February 6, 2007

“We didn’t come here to sit down and be quiet. We are responding to an emergency. If an apartment were on fire across the street I would bang on every door and interrupt whatever the neighbors were doing and I wouldn’t feel bad about it.”

Full Article

WAR OPPONENTS OCCUPY CONGRESSIONAL OFFICES

February 6, 2007

From Alaska to Washington, D.C. yesterday, peace activists escalated their tactics and occupied Congressional offices, demanding elected officials vote against George Bush’s request of $93,000,000,000 to extend the war.

The Occupation Project, organized by Voices for Creative Nonviolence (VCNV), kicked off at noon, Eastern Time when four people were arrested holding a funeral service in the Chicago office of Democratic U.S. Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL) and four more people were arrested in the Chicago office of U.S. Senator Barack Obama (D-IL), reading names of Iraqis and U.S. soldiers.

Also yesterday, 10 people sat down and were arrested in the Washington, D.C. office of Senator John McCain (R-AZ), including Garett Reppenhagen, a director of Iraq Veterans Against the War, Franciscan priest Jerry Zawada, and Kathy Kelly, Nobel Peace Prize nominee and co-director of VCNV. McCain’s offices in Phoenix and Tucson were also occupied but no arrests were made.

On the opening day of the six-week project, a total of eight congressional offices were occupied across the country, including the San Francisco offices of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and U.S. Senator Diane Feinstein (D-CA), and the Portland office of Senator Gordon Smith (R-OR). In the Fairbanks office of Senator Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), Veterans For Peace member Rob Mulford was arrested reading Wilfred Owen’s WWI poem, “Dulce et Decorum Est.”

Dan Pearson, a spokesperson for the Occupation Project, explained the campaign’s goal is to defeat the $93 billion “emergency supplemental” war funding bill that the Bush administration forwarded to Congress yesterday.

Pearson and three others were removed from Obama’s Chicago office yesterday after the office manager told them they could stay until closing time if they stopped reading names of U.S. soldiers and Iraqis. Pearson said, “We didn’t come here to sit down and be quiet. We are responding to an emergency. If an apartment were on fire across the street I would bang on every door and interrupt whatever the neighbors were doing and I wouldn’t feel bad about it.”

Today, organizers are targeting congressional offices in Minneapolis-St. Paul, St. Louis, and Seattle. Plans for other occupations are underway in over 20 states as a way to pressure elected officials to “defund” the Iraq war.

The Occupation Project got a boost yesterday when United for Peace and Justice (UFPJ), the coalition that brought some 300,000 protesters to Washington on January 27, endorsed it and sent an email letter to its 1400 member organizations around the nation, urging their participation.

-end-