30
May
Cindy Sheehan’s Message to Congress and the Movement
CINDY SHEEHAN RESIGNS FROM PROTEST
MEDIA BATTLE ESCALATES IN CARACUS
GREG PALAST ON THOM HARTMANN
There were scores of Iraqi civilians and 8 more US soldiers killed and a helicopter shot down as the war went from bad to worse on the day that America’s best known anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan bitterly announced her resignation from the anti-war movmenet with a blast at Congresss and the anti-war movement. She wrote in part:
“This is my resignation letter as the “face” of the American anti-war movement. This is not my “Checkers” moment, because I will never give up trying to help people in the world who are harmed by the empire of the good old US of A, but I am finished working in, or outside of this system.”
The first conclusion is that I was the darling of the so-called left as long as I limited my protests to George Bush and the Republican Party. Of course, I was slandered and libeled by the right as a “tool” of the Democratic Party. This label was to marginalize me and my message. How could a woman have an original thought, or be working outside of our “two-party” system?
However, when I started to hold the Democratic Party to the same standards that I held the Republican Party, support for my cause started to erode and the “left” started labeling me with the same slurs that the right used. I guess no one paid attention to me when I said that the issue of peace and people dying for no reason is not a matter of “right or left”, but “right and wrong.”
I am deemed a radical because I believe that partisan politics should be left to the wayside when hundreds of thousands of people are dying for a war based on lies that is supported by Democrats and Republican alike.
MY VIEW
I have written a commentary on Cindy’s action which should be up on Medichannel and other sites today. In it. I say in part:
Personally, I know how she feels. When I made the film, WMD (Weapons of Mass Deception) challenging the media role in the war, many anti-war groups paid lip service to its message and then did little or nothing to promote it. Perhaps that’s why some activists call MoveOn.org “Walkon.org” when it comes to the issues of media deception or for that matter any issues that also holds Democrats and corporate media institutions accountable.
It is so much easier and emotionally self-righteous to attack easier targets like the Republicans and Bush White House.
Lets face it, the media has not really changed and nor have many Democrats. They believe in convenient truths and don’t recognize the importance of demanding media integrity. Don’t forget that most of the media coverage was hostile to Democrats setting a timeline and many pundits pressured them to relent in the name of “pragmatism,” patriotism, or getting the pork they wanted for their own districts.
I don’t think Cindy has really resigned from politics. But she is upset and has a right to be. She has lost so much and is also apparently in debt—something this director of the film In Debt We Trust can relate to….
Tina Richards, another mother of a soldier in Iraq
“I think I understand much of what Cindy is going through. When I would challenge members of the Democratic Party leadership about their continued funding of this illegal and immoral war, people who cheered me on when I challenged Bush would suddenly be attacking me — even though I was calling for an end to war in both cases.” Richards gained notice when she challenged David Obey, the Democratic chair of the House appropriations committee, about the stance that Democrats were taking on funding the Iraq war.
She said today: “The leaderships of both parties are, in different ways, committed to continuing this war.” Some of the same assessments in Sheehan’s piece are evident in Richards’ recent piece.”
BBC: BUSH’S NEW WORLD BANK PICK TO “HEAL THE RIFTS”
President Bush chooses former top diplomat Robert Zoellick to replace Paul Wolfowitz at the World Bank, officials say.
BBC ON ZOELLICK: “CHARMLESS, PRONE TO TIRADES”
No stranger to high-profile positions, the 53-year-old spent nearly 18 months as deputy secretary of state, where he was number two to Condoleezza Rice.
When he left the job in June last year, to take an executive role at the investment bank Goldman Sachs, Ms Rice described him as her “alter ego”, praising his “tireless work ethic” and saying his efforts had made the US “stronger and safer”.
A Washington insider told the BBC that Mr Zoellick was “charmless and prone to tirades” but that he “had mellowed as he had risen in political life”.
A PROPONENT OF LAW CHALLENGES IRAN
Rice says Iran spying charges pervert rule of law - Yahoo! News
Cindy is suffering what one observer termed ‘burnout’. No surprise. She has succumbed to the pressures associated with trying to compensate for the loss of a child she can never bring back. She has tilted the windmill, fought the good fight and in the end realized that there is no salvation, no change, no reawakening, only more of the same. The Democrats have shown themselves to be no better than those they should castigate. Big business still rules and no Democrat has put their career on the line to express what apparently two thirds of the country wants to hear. A two party system will never give voice to those who would otherwise speak if they had the price of admission. We are condemned to embrace some variation of what two compromised groups, beholden to the same interests, choose to put before us. We have moved from the populist traditions that were once the bulwark of the Democratic Party. RFK Jr. was the last candidate from that party to expouse the principles of equality, dignity and justice for the common man. The middle class is now faced with a fight for its survival at the expense of the working poor, as choreographed by the corporate elite. Maybe John Edwards’ strategy will somehow strike a chord with those who are otherwise preoccupied with the ‘relevant’ topics fed them by the mainstream press. He seems to be the only candidate who has taken a road that, while less travelled, has everything to do with our survival as a society.
May 30th, 2007 at 1:51 amWhen in God’s name, is someone in authority going to take the imitative and tell the truth for exactly what it is, the “TRUTH.”
There is no difference between either republican’s or democrat’s, both work for their masters, the CFR (Council on Foreign Relation’s) and the Federal Reserve System.
The United States of America most Americans were born and raised in no longer exist, and hasn‘t for decades. The Constitution and America’s most precious Bill of Rights, went down the drain with the passing of the Patriot Act. Habeus Corpus, the very foundation of juris prudence, was destroyed with the Military Act of 2006. Constitutional law was suborned with NAFTA and CAFTA, subjecting America to Communitarian law, a legal system that most American attorneys have never even heard of, much less practice.
Are we all really that stupid? We stand by while the Congress goes through the motions of debating an amnesty for illegal immigrants when in fact, the borders were removed when this treasonous President signed the North American Common Agreement. We are now part of the One-World-Order people, we are no longer “American’s and we no longer have rights. What was once the United States of America no longer exist, except perhaps in our minds. Even the U.S. military fights under international banners and wear an international patch.
In 1963 John F. Kennedy, the 35th President of the United States, speaking before the graduating class at Columbia University stated; “The high office of President in being used to foment a plan to destroy Americans freedom and before I leave office I must make citizens aware of their plight.” Unfortunately he was never given that opportunity as he was assassinated just 10 days later.
Now if you find all of this to unbelievable or upsetting to pay attention, well go to the frig, get yourself another beer and sit your ass back down in front of the idiot box, I am sure when this administration needs more of your kids to be used as war fodder, they will know where to find you.
May 30th, 2007 at 1:57 amSadness and disappointment became outrage and disgust in a system that is so stuck in it’s dysfunction that a courageous woman wiling to stand up and speak the truth is forced to quit. I have nothing but admiration for Cindy Sheehan and what she accomplished. Change can’t happen when there is complacency. Cindy challenged our laziness and acceptance that we have no power. I would encourage her not to quit but that’s easy for me to do from the comfort of my living room and causes me to wonder where my power and conviction are. My heart breaks with every soldier’s death. Having lost a son I know the pain; having sent a son to Iraq twice, I’ve lived with the fear and life is never as secure again. Somehow we have to find the way to take back our country and make it a place we’re proud to call America.
May 30th, 2007 at 12:50 pmCindy Sheehan is nothing but a stupid pawn for the likes of Move on .org and all the other assinine Liberals she is so ignorant she has allowed her self to desicrate he son’s memory and the reason that he enlisted in the military. People like her and the liberal asswipes don’t or can’t grasp what the reason for fighting these people ,the Alquida and Muslams in general have no qualms about killing them or their children for their cause.I personally have no use or pitty for these people. I have had occasion to be confonted by these lowlives when I came home from Vietnam,and had I had a weapon I would have given them the same treatment that I gave the gooks that shot the hell out of me. I hope that Sheehan is one of the first to run into a suicide bomber in a mall some where, along with the likes of Murtha,Pelsi,Kennedy and all of the liberal jokes that serve in the congress and senate.
May 30th, 2007 at 1:06 pmIt’s interesting that there’s so much focus on the “resignation” portion of Cindy’s statement as opposed to statement about the futility of relying on figureheads and individuals (even as courageous and impassioned as she)to lead us in a new direction. In some ways, I take her comment that “It’s up to you America,” seriously. As an independent (1 of 42% of the electorate, never mind those who have become disgusted and don’t vote), we need to take serious the kind of grassroots building of a movement that it will take for us to be able to have any kind of impact on the American corruption that she describes.
I also thought that what she had to say about the failure of the Democratic Party to be a real opposition party, including the hypocrisy of the “peace” movement needs to be looked at.
Gwen
May 30th, 2007 at 1:46 pmwww.independentvoting.org
in the name of allah-the beneficent-the merciful:say:he,allah is one.allah is he on whom all depend.he begets not,nor is he begotten.and none is like him.[qur’an:112]” the white man can never win another war on the ground.can i prove it ?yes!tell me where he is winning?no where!” [malcolm x]may allah the god of abraham [pbuh]bless and guard and guide cindy sheehan for having the courage to stand up to the military industrial complex that president and five star general dwight d.eisehower warned the american people about as he made his exit after being elected for two terms.what court of law has seen clear evidence of iraq and afghanistan having anything to do with the atrocities that happened 9-11-2001 in amerika? who controls the security council of the united nations to go to war besides amerika? where was the national security agency and the united states military 9-11-2001? what was the command that day?” stand down!!!” taif’tul’islam-p.o.box 338-compton,ca.90223
May 30th, 2007 at 10:58 pm