Stop Bolton!

Please please please for the sake of this world call Senator Chafee (202) 224-2921 and tell him to vote AGAINST Bolton. Here is our chance! There is hope.

Keep this in mind as you consider this option:

Bolton has come out opposing the ICC and the UN, yet we are appointing him as our representative.

When Clinton was president and there was a representative more willing to negotiate with other nations we still used our veto to oppose action in Rwanda. 800,000+ people died.

Bolton will use his veto power more expansively.

As globalization increases we need to have working relationships with other nations. Do something to sustain this! Please, for the sake of the future.

Peace, krissy

Senate Committee Delays Vote on Bolton
By Barry Schweid
The Associated Press

Wednesday 13 April 2005

Washington - President Bush's drive to make John R. Bolton the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations got sidetracked Wednesday as Senate Democrats forced a delay until next week of an important confirmation vote.

In buying time, they hoped to win over a pivotal Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Sen. Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island, by amassing evidence that Bolton harassed U.S. officials who challenged his judgment on weapons issues.

Chafee said Wednesday he is leaning toward supporting Bolton, which would all but assure Bolton's confirmation.

Bolton, currently the undersecretary of state, has rejected the accusations.

A committee vote, tentatively planned for Thursday, was scrubbed after Democrats objected, said Andy Fisher, spokesman for the chairman, Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind.

Under Senate rules, at least one Democratic senator has to attend a meeting for a vote to occur.

Democrats want further questioning of Bolton in writing and they are seeking testimony by three U.S. officials on what lawmakers said were Bolton's efforts to remove the dissenting analysts.

Fisher said the three officials already had been interviewed by committee aides and their statements were made public.

"There is no need for an additional hearing," he said.

The postponement was agreed to by Lugar and the committee's senior Democrat, Sen. Joe Biden of Delaware, said Norm Kurz, an aide to Biden.

"A nomination of this importance deserves providing each and every senator with ample time," Kurz said.

Republicans hold a 10-8 committee majority. Unanimous GOP support would send Bolton's nomination to the GOP-controlled Senate, where approval is considered likely.

The committee, in two days of hearings this week, heard from two witnesses, Bolton and Carl Ford Jr., a former chief at the State Department's bureau of intelligence and research.

Ford denounced Bolton as a bully and a "serial abuser" of lower-level officials who challenged his assessments of the weapons potential of Cuba and other nations.

In a letter to Lugar, Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., requested an additional hearing in which three officials would testify on Bolton's dealings with intelligence analysts. Dodd described Bolton as "evasive."

The three officials Dodd wants questioned are Thomas Fingar, assistant secretary of state for intelligence; Neil Silver, director of the strategic proliferation office; and Stuart Cohen, a former acting chief of the National Intelligence Council.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice took issue with Ford's characterization of Bolton as a bully.

"John Bolton has been a very effective manager and diplomat," she said. She added, "It would be very useful if we could get this nomination done."

Rice said she believed strongly in the "role of debate, the role of the open and free exchange of ideas."

But, she said, when decisions are taken, "I fully expect that people will support those decisions because there is only one president of the United States and that's President Bush."

If you aren't outraged...

…you must not be paying attention.

What are people’s thoughts on the ‘nomination’ of Paul Wolfowitz (who, I’m sorry to tell you Pat and Jill, was raised in Ithica N.Y.) as president of the World Bank right after the appointment of John Bolton as the US ambassador to the UN. (He has spent the last several years talking about how much he hated the UN (not to mention the fact that he looks like he walked out of a text book on white colonialism in Africa)). I’m not putting links in here because every paper and news source is covering this in many ways.

And this is happening at the same time that we have decided to drill in Alaska: http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/17/politics/17arctic.html?th or http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A40670-2005Mar16.html and yes, if you are wondering, this is the same president who said a few weeks ago he was going to work on using alternative fuels and preserving the environment. Perhaps he forgot.

Also the republican party is attempting to make it so that they can unilaterally appoint judges. What a great, truly democratic idea, eh? What, again, is the point of having more than one party? What again is the reason we even have elections? Seriously… my heart hurts. I can’t find the article I read it in right now, but this one is related… interesting that only 10 of the 214 judges nominated have had problems getting through the Senate yet the Democrats are being blamed for the delay – perhaps these few judges just shouldn’t be nominated! http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/16/politics/16filibuster.html

But, it gets better, because it is also ok for the government to broadcast fake news. I’m sure you have heard about this, but here is the most recent article. http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/17/politics/17video.html?th To me this sounds like Nazi propaganda and fascism… but, you can make your own call. Seriously, if you aren’t pissed off by now – you must not be paying attention.

So, what do we do? How can we fix it?

People are still dying in Sudan by the way, in fact the UN left many parts of Darfur last week. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/4357021.stm Reminds you a bit about Rwanda. However, there is a bill to do something about this, so call your senator. Here is info on the bill (The Darfur Accountability Act). http://www.theorator.com/bills109/s495.html Call your senators and get them to sign on. There is also a hunger strike (one day between the 16th and 20th) here is info about that: http://talacon.com/rp/PointMapper/USA/MarchStrike/display.cfm (may not change policy, but may help you think about things). I urge everyone in the DC metro area to visit the Holocaust museum. There is an exhibit on Darfur, and an important exhibit on Eugenics and ‘Deadly Medicine’.

Good thing Bono just came out with a new sweatshop free clothing line, or I would think that everyone in this country was nuts. Who knew the ‘rock stars’ would be the one with souls?

Do something.

News and Comments, 17 Feb 05

This isn’t nearly enough, but perhaps a start on corporate responsibility? “Conn. to Probe Wal-Mart on Child Labor” http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A31047-2005Feb16.html

“D.C. Has A 'Deal' To Build Hospital Howard U. to Run SE Medical Center” http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A30281-2005Feb16.html – In regards to this. I heard that the closing of DC General was bogus. There was an article last week talking about how it wasn’t really “taking money from the city” but instead was doing fine. The article alleged that 500,000 had been essentially stolen from the hospital by the city leading to its closing. It was in that new free DC paper, the Examiner. All I know is, it wouldn’t have happened had this hospital been in Northwest.

Borrow Cautiously, Greenspan Advises Bush May Agree to Raise Social Security Tax Ceiling http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A27890-2005Feb16.html?referrer=email – so, if they are agreeing to raise the tax ceiling, why couldn’t that extra money be used to maintain the system as it is? Especially if it is the most effective anti-poverty program we have? Why ruin a (mostly) good thing? Are we that masochistic? (also found here: http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/17/business/17fed.html?th and here: http://money.cnn.com/2005/02/16/news/economy/fed_greenspan_testimony/index.htm)

I’ve been waiting for this. I don’t know about all of the folks who said that Bush was a “fiscal conservative”. That wasn’t the president I saw. Critical Republicans Look to Cut Bush's $82 Billion War Request http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A30679-2005Feb16.html

Now, related to that… Secretary On the Offensive “Two dozen members of the House Armed Services Committee had not yet had their turn to question Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld at yesterday's hearings when he decided he had had enough.” http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A30800-2005Feb16.html You would think that someone who’s decisions affect not only the lives of thousands of US soldiers, millions of Iraqi citizens, but also all of the rest of the US and really the world wouldn’t be allowed to act like this. Our ‘decision makers’ have no information on which to base their ‘decisions’. (Maybe that’s why corporate lobbying is so successful, does money speak louder than words?)

War Helps Recruit Terrorists, Hill Told Intelligence Officials Talk Of Growing Insurgency. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A28876-2005Feb16.html?referrer=email Who wants to be the first to say ‘duh’?! Throughout history oppressed peoples have reacted to massive brutality in the way that appears most effective. The greater the brutality the greater the resistance. I took a class on terrorism and democracy – the books had interesting insight on this (I can’t say I always agreed). I wrote a paper for it about non-violent ways to resist terrorism… maybe I’ll send it to Rummy.

Sure, act “quickly” two years after this all started (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/4268733.stm)… Maybe they went to see Hotel Rwanda. Human Rights Chief Urges U.N. to Act Quickly on Sudan http://query.nytimes.com/mem/tnt.html?tntget=2005/02/17/international/africa/17nations.html&tntemail0 Speaking of Rwanda, the French are in trouble: Rwanda lawsuit for French troops Six Rwandan citizens have filed a lawsuit in France accusing French soldiers of complicity in genocide. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/4272437.stm

And, we’ll end with an op-ed piece. The Gay Child Left Behind http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/17/opinion/17savage.html?th

Real Events on Inauguration Day

I got this from my theory professors; I urge you to read it. I know I send a lot of things, but you’ve had a long break (and I always say I’m willing to stop sending this stuff to you).

Peace, krissy

Published on Friday, January 28, 2005 by the National Catholic Reporter
What the Rest of the World Watched on Inauguration Day
by Joan Chittister

Dublin, on U.S. Inauguration Day, didn't seem to notice. Oh, they played a few clips that night of the American president saying, "The survival of liberty in our land increasingly depends on the success of liberty in other lands."

But that was not their lead story.

The picture on the front page of The Irish Times was a large four-color picture of a small Iraqi girl. Her little body was a coil of steel. She sat knees up, cowering, screaming madly into the dark night. Her white clothes and spread hands and small tight face were blood-spattered. The blood was the blood of her father and mother, shot through the car window in Tal Afar by American soldiers while she sat beside her parents in the car, her four brothers and sisters in the back seat.

A series of pictures of the incident played on the inside page, as well. A 12-year-old brother, wounded in the fray, falls face down out of the car when the car door opens, the pictures show. In another, a soldier decked out in battle gear, holds a large automatic weapon on the four children, all potential enemies, all possible suicide bombers, apparently, as they cling traumatized to one another in the back seat and the child on the ground goes on screaming in her parent's blood.

No promise of "freedom" rings in the cutline on this picture. No joy of liberty underlies the terror on these faces here.

I found myself closing my eyes over and over again as I stared at the story, maybe to crush the tears forming there, maybe in the hope that the whole scene would simply disappear.

But no, like the photo of a naked little girl bathed in napalm and running down a road in Vietnam served to crystallize the situation there for the rest of the world, I knew that this picture of a screaming, angry, helpless, orphaned child could do the same.

The soldiers standing in the dusk had called "halt," the story said, but no one did. Maybe the soldiers' accents were bad. Maybe the car motor was unduly noisy. Maybe the children were laughing loudly -- the way children do on family trips. Whatever the case, the car did not stop, the soldiers shot with deadly accuracy, seven lives changed in an instant: two died in body, five died in soul.

BBC news announced that the picture was spreading across Europe like a brushfire that morning, featured from one major newspaper to another, served with coffee and Danish from kitchen table to kitchen table in one country after another. I watched, while Inauguration Day dawned across the Atlantic, as the Irish up and down the aisle on the train from Killarney to Dublin, narrowed their eyes at the picture, shook their heads silently and slowly over it, and then sat back heavily in their seats, too stunned into reality to go back to business as usual -- the real estate section, the sports section, the life-style section of the paper.

Here was the other side of the inauguration story. No military bands played for this one. No bulletproof viewing stands could stop the impact of this insight into the glory of force. Here was an America they could no longer understand. The contrast rang cruelly everywhere.

I sat back and looked out the train window myself. Would anybody in the United States be seeing this picture today? Would the United States ever see it, in fact? And if it is printed in the United States, will it also cross the country like wildfire and would people hear the unwritten story under it?

There are 54 million people in Iraq. Over half of them are under the age of 15. Of the over 100,000 civilians dead in this war, then, over half of them are children. We are killing children. The children are our enemy. And we are defeating them.

"I'll tell you why I voted for George Bush," a friend of mine said. "I voted for George Bush because he had the courage to do what Al Gore and John Kerry would never have done."

I've been thinking about that one.

Osama Bin Laden is still alive. Sadam Hussein is still alive. Abu Musab al-Zarqawi is still alive. Baghdad, Mosul and Fallujah are burning. But my government has the courage to kill children or their parents. And I'm supposed to be impressed.

That's an unfair assessment, of course. A lot of young soldiers have died, too. A lot of weekend soldiers are maimed for life. A lot of our kids went into the military only to get a college education and are now shattered in soul by what they had to do to other bodies.

A lot of adult civilians have been blasted out of their homes and their neighborhoods and their cars. More and more every day. According to U.N. Development Fund for Women, 15 percent of wartime casualties in World War I were civilians. In World War II, 65 percent were civilians. By the mid '90s, over 75 percent of wartime casualties were civilians.

In Iraq, for every dead U.S. soldier, there are 14 other deaths, 93 percent of them are civilian. But those things happen in war, the story says. It's all for a greater good, we have to remember. It's all to free them. It's all being done to spread "liberty."

From where I stand, the only question now is who or what will free us from the 21st century's new definition of bravery. Who will free us from the notion that killing children or their civilian parents takes courage?

A Benedictine Sister of Erie, Sister Joan is a best-selling author and well-known international lecturer. She is founder and executive director of Benetvision: A Resource and Research Center for Contemporary Spirituality, and past president of the Conference of American Benedictine Prioresses and the Leadership Conference of Women Religious. Sister Joan has been recognized by universities and national organizations for her work for justice, peace and equality for women in the Church and society. She is an active member of the International Peace Council.

© 2005 The National Catholic Reporter

Robo-Soldiers

The following is a rather fragmented reflection on recent events, but I am not sure how to collect all of my thoughts on this.

Today the Washington Post published an article entitled “Army Prepares 'Robo-Soldier' for Iraq” (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A31968-2005Jan24.html) (the BBC did a similar article: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4199935.stm) discussing the deployment of machine-gun laden remote control robots to Iraq this spring. This development brings the inhumanity of war to a new level.

By developing these remote control killing machines, the act of taking one’s life becomes a more distant and less meaningful act. War becomes a virtual-reality video game in which the value of human life is disregarded; soldiers are able to operate deadly machinery as they would a remote control car.

The discussion of the autonomy of these ‘soldiers’ is even more frightening. The Pentagon’s goal of creating robots that are able to “navigate rough terrain, avoid obstacles and make decisions about certain tasks on their own” is devastatingly frightening. For now Perceptek Inc, the developers of robotic systems for military use, claim that “there always will be a person in the loop” but this “problem” of autonomy discussed in yesterday’s article brings up questions as to the possibility of mistaking allies for enemies, and, equally important, demonstrates the disregard this war has for human life. By allowing machines to cause mass destruction and death we wipe the guilt from our hands, and become absent destroyers.

War is supposed to be hard: a last resort following extensive diplomacy and negotiation. Weapons that allow war to be performed through the actions of adolescent video games will allow decisions to enter war more likely and easy. The death of Iraqi citizens has already been unreported; their lives ignored. The enactment of video-game warfare further disregards the humanity of those we kill. I want my friends to be safe and to come home, but this is not the way to expedite the war.

The argument behind the development of SWORDS is that they will save both money and time: “They don’t need to be trained, fed or clothed. They can be boxed up and warehoused between wars. They never complain. And there are no letters to write home if they meet their demise in battle”. These comments completely disrespect the work of soldiers currently serving in the armed forces.

I know that these robots could save US lives, and perhaps I'm being horribly insensitive. It just seems to be that 1) avoiding war, 2) funding domestic social service programs (preventing people from having to enlist to pay for school, etc), and 3) taking care of veterans is a better way to do this. Why can't the killing just stop?

Request from Iraq

This is part of an email from my dear friend Nick who is currently in Iraq. I thought that you may be interested in helping him out... I'm going to be sending him some items and doing a minidrive, so, if you want to help out I'd be happy to add anythings you can donate to my load. (I may do a drive at AU after the tsunami relief work is winding down).

Sounds like it could be a project for SDAC or some of your churches???

I'd be happy to help if you are feeling inspired to do something. Contact me: I will either send your items to Nick, or give you his contact info.

peace, krissy
__________________________________________________________
Merry Christmas! I guess it's Christmas. It doesn't really seem like it.


I am in Iraq. That's about it.

The people here are friendly and people just like everyone else across the world. Sorry to be generalizing. They live the lives they have and are content with it. Many here want better lives for their children.

This is actually a more serious note. There is great need here, but more importantly, there are a lot of kids. The only way to keep our kids from fighting their kids is to reach out to the children. It'll take a generation here and this is my goal. I'd like you to attempt to gain the support of local community organizations and churches if you can. Send everything to me and I will personally ensure it is put into the hands of someone who needs it. I will take pictures and give feed back to any organizations/chruches that are involved. I have a list of things that would be preferred.

1) Tons of cheap candy. Don't get the good stuff. They don't care.
2) School supplies, especially pens and notepads.
That's a big one. The kids like to learn and write english.
3) Shoes for kids are another big item here.
4) Soccer balls and other general round balls are great. They want those everytime we go into town. Don't send basketballs or normal footballs, but smaller footballs work.

I am going to focus this stuff on the farm community because the city kids are supplied pretty regularly by our Civil affairs representative. You do not have to do this, but I think it's a good idea. DO NOT SEND MONEY.

Thank you for your support if you give it this way, but otherwise thanks for it in thought. Please go through organizations. Don't spend a lot of money buying stuff or anything like that. Use other resources. It might take up your time. I thank you for that! Take care again and enjoy your vacations if you have them!

Nick

Grave Disservice

Well, our nation has committed a great disservice to the world. Once again we have been blinded by privilege, power, and money. I for one am angry, shocked, and disappointed. Not only have we re-elected someone with a history of harming the world, but in many places we have made it unconstitutional to marry the person you love.

As much as this hurts, we can’t wallow in these feelings. Remember that change is not made by people who sleep. As the amazing group Sweet Honey in the Rock sings, "We who believe in freedom cannot rest". We have a lot of work to do.

As your heart is angry today remember that "the only thing necessary for the perpetuation of evil is for good people to do nothing" (Jane Elliot). We cannot "sell-out" and relax in complacency. Yes, the easy thing is to relax and ignore the evils and harsh realities of life on this planet. The easy thing is to go to work, come home, watch TV, and not challenge ourselves. I for one pledge never to resign myself to accepting the system, and I ask you to join me.

We can use our voices.
We can use our actions.
We can use our pens.
We can use our purchasing power.
We have so many skills, we need to put them to use.

We need to work in communications and end this media domination by the right. We need to work in education and teach our children to think critically. We need to work in law and public policy. We need to work in marketing and sell social justice. Two weeks ago I was at a Baltimore Ravens football game. Over 60,000 people were willing to fight for a group of people to get a ball across a line. We need to tap into this energy. We need to use our talents, whatever they are, to fix this system.

It is time to reorganize and remobilize ourselves. Progressive peoples are lacking in real leadership these days. We cannot let this fact prevent us from tackling injustice and ignorance wherever we face it.

Let this election be a reminder to you of the importance of your role in the world. Together we can change so much.

"It is not enough to be compassionate. You must act." Tenzin Gyatso (14th Dalai Lama), 1999