April 19, 2005, Congressional Office Visit
Thanks for being here today. The good news is that Mike Michaud has signed on to the Woolsey Amendment regarding leaving Iraq.
We should remember that our congresspeople need us. Years ago a delegation visited President Roosevelt on some issue. As they left he said,” I agree with everything that you said...now it is your job to go out and put pressure on me so that I can do the right thing.”
Mark Twain said,”It is curious that physical courage should be so common in the world and moral courage so rare.” So these folks need us to get them to do the right thing.
Greetings from the Bangor Area Chapter of Veterans for Peace. We are Chapter 003. 003....License to Make Peace. 20 years ago veterans Jerry Genesio, Judy Genesio, Rev. Willard Bicket, Ken Perkins and Doug Rawlings who were disturbed by the militancy of the United States and its violent intervention into the affairs of other nations....sat down and talked about how they could abolish war. Now Veterans for Peace has 120 chapters and missions all around the world.
Some people may think that Veterans for Peace is a bunch of overweight veterans who get together and tell war stories or show up at these events just to bang our gums. That is not so...First of all, you don’t have to be a veteran to join Veterans for Peace. You just have to agree with our goal of working to abolish war. You are all invited to join.
Secondly, Veterans for Peace are working all over the world as I speak on numerous projects...buying and shipping ambulances to Palestine, working with coffee growers in Laos, building prosthetics for the citizens of Vietnam...For many Vietnamese the war never ended. One of our members Roger Marshall is on his way to Vietnam again to refit prosthetics. Veterans for Peace also has a seat as an NGO member of the United Nations.
Now we are hearing reports of the use of napalm, white phosporus, nerve gas, mustard gas and other burning chemicals on the citizens of Fallujah...an ex-city of 350,000 people. Half of whom are children under the age of 15. And American officials have admitted raining more than 250,000 pounds of toxin-tipped DU ammunition on Iraqis since the war began.
For those of you who might not know....napalm is jellied gasoline...once on you...it melts your flesh. White phosphorous is used to illuminate and as an anti personnel weapon. White phosporous burns right through your body. If you got some on your hand don’t bother pouring water it or putting you hand in a bucket of water. To get it out of you you would have to take a sharp knife and dig it out...(I demonstrate using a bayonet.)
Your tax dollars at work. More maiming through chemistry.
The resistance to this war is growing daily. As soldiers return from the field.....and as wounded veterans return...their stories are being told all across this country. And their stories give the rest of us the hope to keep on keeping on. And Veterans for Peace welcome them into our ranks.
Veterans for Peace are also helping soldiers with their conscientious objector claims. Currently we are helping five soldiers with their CO applications.
Last week we got an email from Clifton, a PFC in Iraq. ““I just notified my command today that I am a conscientious objector. My platoon sergeant screamed at me for a half hour straight calling me a coward and an idiot. The two E5's in the orderly room refused to type up the 4187 personal action form until I explained that they had to since it had already been cleared by the chaplain. Then they spent all day going all over the squadron trying to find out HOW to do it, and it never got done. I'm in one of those moron infested Cav units too, so I'm in for the long haul............I don't know how you can help me but I assure I need it."
Just yesterday we got an email from Clifton that the corporals in the orderly room couldn’t find a form 4187...and that if they could find it they didn’t know how to fill it out...So we emailed him a 4187 with sample information.
We also got an email from a young woman named Shannon who had joined the national guard shortly before 911. Shannon wants to be a school teacher. Now she is in Afghanistan. She writes,””I learned so much I had never known about. I realized I had a right to certain things. Now that I know what I know, I want to claim CO status. A lot of people tell me I don't have a chance, because I've already qualified with the M-16 during training at Ft. Hood . I don't believe in war and I don't want to use force. Everyone make's me feel like it's too late, because I am already here in Kabul, Afghanistan. I will not use my weapon! Do you think it's too late? PLEASE let me know what you think!" We are helping these young people with information and and moral support and legal help.
Brave young people are seeing war for what it is. There are no winners. There is only death and destruction and illness and broken families and broken hopes.
Recently Representatives Tom Allen and Mike Michaud joined 160 other Democrats and all but 3 Republicans in voting for another 82 billion dollars to fund the war in Iraq.
What is it that Clifton and Shannon understand that Tom and Mike don’t seem to understand? Maybe Tom and Mike need to be sent over there so they can understand.
It is time to let the Iraqis control their own country come what may. It is time for American soldiers to come home. We support our troops best by bringing them home.
In 1941 Winston Churchill visited Harrow School, and he said to the students there....”Never give in. Never give in. Never, never, never, never--in nothing, great or small, large or petty--never give in, except to convictions of honour and good sense. Never give in."
And so the struggle goes on. The struggle for peace, and justice, and freedom in Iraq and Afghanistan and Palestine.
The struggles of the working people in Colombia and El Salvador. The struggle of the Cuban Five who were imprisoned for infiltrating a terrorist group that were planning to kill their brothers and sisters in Cuba. The struggle for the freedom of Jose Padilla who has spent almost three years in jail without any charges being brought against him. The struggle continues for the Passamaquody Indians in Maine. 2012 prisoners are currently in Maine jails. That is less that one half of one percent. 6% of Passamaquodies have served a year or more in jail and 10% of the Passamaquodies in Washington County have spent more that 30 days in jail where racism and sexual harrassment is prevalent.
Dennis Dechaine has spent more that 16 years in the Maine state prison for the crime of murder...A crime that he did not commit.
This is April 19. In 1775 on this day there was the shot heard around the world. I had an ancestor who fought in the Revolution. In those days a man who might have called himself Sir John the Duke of Ashcroft would have accused my ancestor of being a “domestic terrorist.” I think he was a patriot. Sir John would called him an “insurgent”; I think he was a patriot.
So instead of a shot heard around the world. Let us give a shout to be heard around the world. “Peace and Justice Everywhere. No more war..No more war.”
We should remember that our congresspeople need us. Years ago a delegation visited President Roosevelt on some issue. As they left he said,” I agree with everything that you said...now it is your job to go out and put pressure on me so that I can do the right thing.”
Mark Twain said,”It is curious that physical courage should be so common in the world and moral courage so rare.” So these folks need us to get them to do the right thing.
Greetings from the Bangor Area Chapter of Veterans for Peace. We are Chapter 003. 003....License to Make Peace. 20 years ago veterans Jerry Genesio, Judy Genesio, Rev. Willard Bicket, Ken Perkins and Doug Rawlings who were disturbed by the militancy of the United States and its violent intervention into the affairs of other nations....sat down and talked about how they could abolish war. Now Veterans for Peace has 120 chapters and missions all around the world.
Some people may think that Veterans for Peace is a bunch of overweight veterans who get together and tell war stories or show up at these events just to bang our gums. That is not so...First of all, you don’t have to be a veteran to join Veterans for Peace. You just have to agree with our goal of working to abolish war. You are all invited to join.
Secondly, Veterans for Peace are working all over the world as I speak on numerous projects...buying and shipping ambulances to Palestine, working with coffee growers in Laos, building prosthetics for the citizens of Vietnam...For many Vietnamese the war never ended. One of our members Roger Marshall is on his way to Vietnam again to refit prosthetics. Veterans for Peace also has a seat as an NGO member of the United Nations.
Now we are hearing reports of the use of napalm, white phosporus, nerve gas, mustard gas and other burning chemicals on the citizens of Fallujah...an ex-city of 350,000 people. Half of whom are children under the age of 15. And American officials have admitted raining more than 250,000 pounds of toxin-tipped DU ammunition on Iraqis since the war began.
For those of you who might not know....napalm is jellied gasoline...once on you...it melts your flesh. White phosphorous is used to illuminate and as an anti personnel weapon. White phosporous burns right through your body. If you got some on your hand don’t bother pouring water it or putting you hand in a bucket of water. To get it out of you you would have to take a sharp knife and dig it out...(I demonstrate using a bayonet.)
Your tax dollars at work. More maiming through chemistry.
The resistance to this war is growing daily. As soldiers return from the field.....and as wounded veterans return...their stories are being told all across this country. And their stories give the rest of us the hope to keep on keeping on. And Veterans for Peace welcome them into our ranks.
Veterans for Peace are also helping soldiers with their conscientious objector claims. Currently we are helping five soldiers with their CO applications.
Last week we got an email from Clifton, a PFC in Iraq. ““I just notified my command today that I am a conscientious objector. My platoon sergeant screamed at me for a half hour straight calling me a coward and an idiot. The two E5's in the orderly room refused to type up the 4187 personal action form until I explained that they had to since it had already been cleared by the chaplain. Then they spent all day going all over the squadron trying to find out HOW to do it, and it never got done. I'm in one of those moron infested Cav units too, so I'm in for the long haul............I don't know how you can help me but I assure I need it."
Just yesterday we got an email from Clifton that the corporals in the orderly room couldn’t find a form 4187...and that if they could find it they didn’t know how to fill it out...So we emailed him a 4187 with sample information.
We also got an email from a young woman named Shannon who had joined the national guard shortly before 911. Shannon wants to be a school teacher. Now she is in Afghanistan. She writes,””I learned so much I had never known about. I realized I had a right to certain things. Now that I know what I know, I want to claim CO status. A lot of people tell me I don't have a chance, because I've already qualified with the M-16 during training at Ft. Hood . I don't believe in war and I don't want to use force. Everyone make's me feel like it's too late, because I am already here in Kabul, Afghanistan. I will not use my weapon! Do you think it's too late? PLEASE let me know what you think!" We are helping these young people with information and and moral support and legal help.
Brave young people are seeing war for what it is. There are no winners. There is only death and destruction and illness and broken families and broken hopes.
Recently Representatives Tom Allen and Mike Michaud joined 160 other Democrats and all but 3 Republicans in voting for another 82 billion dollars to fund the war in Iraq.
What is it that Clifton and Shannon understand that Tom and Mike don’t seem to understand? Maybe Tom and Mike need to be sent over there so they can understand.
It is time to let the Iraqis control their own country come what may. It is time for American soldiers to come home. We support our troops best by bringing them home.
In 1941 Winston Churchill visited Harrow School, and he said to the students there....”Never give in. Never give in. Never, never, never, never--in nothing, great or small, large or petty--never give in, except to convictions of honour and good sense. Never give in."
And so the struggle goes on. The struggle for peace, and justice, and freedom in Iraq and Afghanistan and Palestine.
The struggles of the working people in Colombia and El Salvador. The struggle of the Cuban Five who were imprisoned for infiltrating a terrorist group that were planning to kill their brothers and sisters in Cuba. The struggle for the freedom of Jose Padilla who has spent almost three years in jail without any charges being brought against him. The struggle continues for the Passamaquody Indians in Maine. 2012 prisoners are currently in Maine jails. That is less that one half of one percent. 6% of Passamaquodies have served a year or more in jail and 10% of the Passamaquodies in Washington County have spent more that 30 days in jail where racism and sexual harrassment is prevalent.
Dennis Dechaine has spent more that 16 years in the Maine state prison for the crime of murder...A crime that he did not commit.
This is April 19. In 1775 on this day there was the shot heard around the world. I had an ancestor who fought in the Revolution. In those days a man who might have called himself Sir John the Duke of Ashcroft would have accused my ancestor of being a “domestic terrorist.” I think he was a patriot. Sir John would called him an “insurgent”; I think he was a patriot.
So instead of a shot heard around the world. Let us give a shout to be heard around the world. “Peace and Justice Everywhere. No more war..No more war.”
posted by Rev. G. | 7:54 PM
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