Take This 40-Question Quiz: “Hillary or Barack???” (My Score Was Barack 40, Hillary 0)

Hillary and Barack both have wonderful abilities and qualities.

However, pick only the one candidate whom you feel is the BEST qualified:

 

 

Whose campaign runs like the country should run?

 

Who believes in a transparent government?

 

Who will tell the truth if they do something wrong?

 

Who trusts the public to be able to handle the truth?

 

Who values advisors who disagree?

 

Who respects and welcomes opposing points of view?

 

Who won’t hurry into war?

 

Who will resist the pressures of special interests and big money?

 

Whose family will be a credit to (and a delight in) the White House?

 

Whose tenure will reflect most positively upon America?

 

Who is liked and respected by all members of Congress and the Supreme Court?

 

Who can explain confusing issues to the American public?

 

Who can we believe when we hear conflicting stories?

 

Who is the least partisan candidate?

 

Who has the most global perspectives?

 

Who has an audacious vision of where to go, and a detailed plan for how to get there?

 

Who has the leadership and executive skills to solve even our biggest problems?

 

Whose example inspires us all to make personal sacrifices for the common good?

 

Who will guide us thoughtfully through national emergencies, tragedies, and catastrophes?

 

Who inspires our youth to greater effort, contribution, and productivity?

 

Who are national and world leaders eager to work with?

 

Who is it impossible not to like and admire?

 

Who do we most want to see succeed?

 

Who can heal our many divisions?

 

Who holds to moral principles under pressure?

 

Who has sound judgment under pressure?

 

Who reaches out in friendship to all foreign leaders and ordinary citizens?

 

Who will bind up the nation’s wounds?

 

Who can be counted on to defend us wisely from those who would do us harm?

 

Whose leadership inspires all the world’s peoples?

 

Who will move citizens of all ages and backgrounds toward greater civic involvement?

 

Who is the most intellectually broad-banded?

 

Who has the best “people skills”?

 

Who understands minority perspectives?

 

Who can offer global leadership toward solutions to common problems?

 

Who can sell tough solutions to the American public?

 

Who do Republicans not mind losing to?

 

Who inspires the confidence of Democrats, Republicans, and Independents alike?

 

Who do I look forward to listening to, weekly or more often, for the next eight years?

 

Who has the potential to become America’s greatest President, in her time of greatest need?

 

 

Please send comments to njcpace@gmail.com

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Winning Factors that Obama and Huckabee Share

Barack Obama and Mike Huckabee are unique among the Presidential candidates in relishing honest opportunities to think on their feet. They are visibly energized by being publicly asked to consider hard, original questions on-the-spot, answering them directly and freshly.

From the other candidates, we mostly get their rehashed and rehearsed campaign rhetoric, no matter the questions. Despite their varying perspectives and strengths, no other candidates have that star-quality ability to rise to the challenge of thinking and speaking and leading under pressure, on-the-fly, extemporaneously, critically, creatively, and even charmingly, which Huckabee and Obama share.

I'm unnerved at the prospect of listening for another four years to more canned nonsense, pre-masticated gobbledygook, and predictable ideology from some partisan political hack speaking on behalf of the corporate and political power elites.

Obama and Huckabee could not possibly be more different in their thinking and perspectives, and, to be honest, I have little confidence in the breadth and robustness of Huckabee's world view, while I have great confidence in Obama's inclusive, visionary one. But at least both are honest and self-consistent. A few of the other candidates are also trustworthy, but either they are unelectable, or they're too polarizing, too contentious, too partisan, too 20th-century / old-world, too boring, too opportunistic, too old, too out-of-touch, too fringey, too militaristic, or too unprincipled to earn the necessary universal respect and trust required by the mass of American citizens who are frantic to move forward on change.

If what we need is a President with the fine mind, listening skills, and good judgment necessary to consider and evaluate and act confidently upon a blurringly-fast array of hugely complex and pressing problems almost instantaneously, while offering continuous, passionate, vigorous leadership, then we would be wise not to entrust our future into the hands of someone who responds to difficult questions by nervously squeezing out yet another familiar, practiced, safe, distantly-related soundbite-of-choice.

Make no mistake, only a President embodying a combination of trustworthiness, charisma, confidence, and instantaneous brilliant articulation of principled policies can lead everyday Americans into pressing Congress for sweeping policy reforms in a multitude of urgent issue-areas. A trustworthy, kick-ass leader unafraid to lead will cut through the crap and point us toward truth and away from hucksterism, using his reputation for straight-shooting to aggressively and successfully pursue policy changes.

Consider that, if a (theoretically) beloved and trusted President Obama pushing for health care reform informed us on television that “Harry and Louise are lying,” ordinary citizens with faith in his judgment and good heart would inundate Congress with supportive phone calls. The primary reason our citizenry is currently apathetic is our universal paralysis arising from fear and confusion from too-much conflicting “information”; we're so overwhelmed we don't know who or what to believe. Only a universally-trusted President can lead us confidently toward real change.

Relatively few Americans share Mr. Huckabee's doctrinal and theological beliefs and assumptions. Nevertheless, I would (almost) rather see Huckabee become President than endure another four years of listening to yet another political hack, another timid pawn owned by today's national political and corporate power elites, mouthing appropriately soothing platitudes and selling a self-interested agenda.

We need a President committed to change, one who is brilliant, knowledgeable, a non-polarizing problem-solver who loves grappling with complex issues, who easily, persuasively, and usefully reframes and explains issues and solutions, who will use the bully pulpit to convincingly build the citizen consensus and power-base so necessary to moving forward to solve today's global pressing problems.

And only one candidate meets that description.

My Credit Card and I Just Gave Barack Obama’s Campaign a Nice Christmas Present

Barack Obama can become a truly great U.S. President–and we so sorely need one.

 

His hopeful youthful perspectives and his calm quiet strength can soften our imminent crash-landing into tomorrow’s unbelievable array of global and national problems.

 

Obama gets it that we’re all in this together on our tiny, fragile, shared blue planet. He has the values, the vision, the words and the charisma to lead all of us—ordinary citizens and world movers-and-shakers alike—away from the fear that paralyzes and divides us, toward faith and courage, caring and cooperation, towards reconciliation within and among nations. 

 

Whatever Obama hasn’t learned yet, he’ll learn on the job, because he knows the complexity of the questions, knows who to ask, and how to listen. He's confident, his own man, not easily frightened or manipulated. And yes, he’ll make mistakes (all the candidates will, being human) but Obama will be honest about them, correct them, and move forward.

 

Obama is smart and creative and determined. He’ll find inventive ways to do whatever needs to be done. He’s open, a problem-solver, unafraid to throw away what doesn’t work and try something different. He'll persist and get it done.

 

Obama has a good heart, a good head, and a humble gentle spirit.

 

Yes, I admit I'm hoping, praying, and dreaming that Barack Obama will one day be remembered as a great statesman, a great humanitarian, a great healer for all the ages. So I'm taking responsibility for creating and contributing to that lovely possibility.

 

Peace on Earth, Good Will to All (especially Obama) and God Bless Us, Every One (especially Obama.)

Roadmap to Peace

Peaceful political arrangements in the Middle East are a good place to start, but real and lasting peace will come only when, one-by-one, we in the United States and Iran and Iraq and China and Israel and Palestine and everywhere else, we Christians and Jews and Muslims and Buddhists and atheists alike, first humbly strive to embrace peace in our own hearts, endure injustices without adding to their sum, renounce violent resolution of conflicts, and offer to all others in this and every nation that same forgiveness, acceptance, and love we so long for ourselves (the universal “Golden Rule.”)

Questioning the Wisdom of Secret Biowarfare Research at Fort Detrick, MD


The Expansion of Biowarfare Research
Laboratories at USAMRIID, Fort Detrick:

A Call to attend a Public Forum before the Frederick Board of
County Commissioners (BOCC)
Monday, November 19 at 7 pm, 1st Floor Meeting Room,
Winchester Hall 12 East Church Street Frederick

This is
the time, the only public opportunity to persuade our Commissioners
that we want them to obtain a Court Review of the USAMRIID Environmental Impact
Statement. A court review will hold the Federal Government accountable for complying with
NEPA- the National Environmental Policy Act, which is designed to protect communities
from development harmful to health and safety.
The Commissioners are holding this public forum
to hear from us about the public health,
safety and environmental concerns associated with the expansion of biological research
laboratories at Fort Detrick. USAMRIID is planned to be the cornerstone of a massive
expansion of such laboratories, involving at least 6 different Federal agencies on what would
be named the National Interagency Biodefense Campus (NIBC). NIBC would occupy 200
acres at Fort Detrick. This would be by far the largest biowarfare research complex in the
world.

What can you do?

1.
Come to the forum, whether or not you plan to speak. We need to fill the room! You
will learn a lot about the issue, and your presence is very important.
2.
Learn more (resources and contacts below), and consider speaking. This meeting is
about the need for a court review, because health, safety and environmental impacts are
NOT
properly addressed in the Environmental Impact Statement (EIS).
NEPA requires, and the
USAMRIID EIS does not:

Evaluate alternate, less densely populated locations for these labs.
Provide a comprehensive evaluation of the cumulative impacts of the entire National
Interagency Biodefense Campus.

Address the many burdens upon our community’s public health, safety, growth, taxes and
infrastructure.

Use your own unique background to talk about your concerns in your own words. Comments
will be limited to five (5) minutes per speaker and ten (10) minutes for recognized organizations.

3.
Persuade everyone you know to come to the forum! Pass this on, BUT– talking
to people is much more effective!

4.
E-mail the commissioners and tell them what you think. If you can’t come, tell
them you would be there if you could…..
Jan Gardner: jgardner@fredco-md.net David Gray:
dgray@fredco-md.net
Kai Hagen: khagen@fredco-md.net Charles Jenkins: chjenkins@fredco-md.net Lenny
Thompson:
lthompson@fredco-md.net. Send letters to the editor: letters@newspost.com
letters@gazette.net

Learn More:
Informational meeting, open to all
: Viewing of recent PBS
documentary “The Living Weapon”, followed by discussion of the current situation
. 7 pm Monday
11/12
in the Notre Dame Room, Parish Center of St. John the Evangelist Church, 118 East 2nd St
Frederick. The parish center is two buildings to the right of the church. Sponsored by St John’s Peace
and Justice Committee
.
STATEMENT BY FREDERICK COUNTY COMMISSIONER DAVID GRAY:
August 24, 2007

“It has been pointed out to me, by those that have read it thoroughly, that the Environmental Impact
Statement (EIS) for the USAMRIID expansion does not adequately examine the following very
important question:
Why has an alternate location for the new BSL 3 and BSL 4 labs not been thoroughly examined? This
would be an ideal time to move these labs. They have been a source of concern in this county for
years. They will house the most dangerous pathogens known to man (ie Ebola, Marburg, etc).
Presently they are planned to be again located in the high population area where Fort Detrick is now
located. Public safety fears would be greatly alleviated if they were moved to a more remote and safe
location.
I understand that the EIS is now subject to a court review if requested. I am willing to call for such a
court review before construction commences. I have also been informed that such a review by the
courts was requested when BSL 4 labs were planned to be installed at Boston University which is in a
similar high population area. In that case, in 2006, both the Massachusetts state court as well as the
U.S. District Court ordered that the labs not be operated until alternate (less populated sites) are
properly considered, and simulation of real-world disease transmission is properly analyzed. (This risk
analysis is expected to address in detail the potential threats to the community arising from the use of
several BSL 4 agents that are planned to be studied in the Boston labs. This risk analysis will examine
the effects of a laboratory-acquired infection of a laboratory worker with Ebola; the transportation of a
vector-borne agent, such as tick-borne encephalitis; an aerosol event involving a hemorrhagic fever;
and the use of rDNA in monkey pox.) Our situation in Frederick County seems very similar.
In October 2001 there was an anthrax attack on postal workers, members of congress and the media,
resulting in 5 deaths. This was the first known biological attack on US citizens. It is widely believed
that the source of that anthrax (the Ames strain) was Ft Detrick.
Last December I and four other County Commissioner were sworn into office and we took an oath to
“Preserve and protect the health, safety and welfare of the citizens of Frederick County”. I am
committed to that oath.”

Much more information is available about this issue. Contact:
Beth Willis:
mcbeth@mac.com
Barry Kissin: barrykissin@hotmail.com. The BOCC obtaining a Court Review has been
endorsed by: Citizens for Quality of Life, Friends of Frederick County, St. John the Evangelist Peace and Justice
Committee, Sierra Club Catoctin Group, the Fort Detrick Watchdog Group, Women in Black Frederick, the Frederick
Peace Resource Center, FredPac, and many many citizens like you.

Breach of trust
Originally published November 07, 2007
 
<?xml:namespace prefix = v ns = “urn:schemas-microsoft-com:vml” />
By Katherine Heerbrandt

A week before Sen. Barbara Mikulski visited Frederick County extolling the economic promise of Fort Detrick's expansion, Keith Rhodes, chief technologist for the Government Accountability Office, told members of Congress that the proliferation of high-level biolabs raises serious questions about public safety.
“The more BSL-4 labs there are, the more opportunity for mistakes and the more opportunities for release,” Rhodes told the House Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations on Oct. 4.
Since 9/11 the number of labs researching the most virulent pathogens — those with no cure — grew from two to 15. With no central oversight of the growing number of labs, and disincentives inherent in reporting safety breaches, the security and operations of BSL-3 and BSL-4 labs are in question.
The oversight of these labs is “fragmented and relies on self-policing. High-risk labs have health risks for individual lab workers as well as the surrounding community. The risks due to accidental exposure or release can never be completely eliminated, and even labs within sophisticated biological research programs, including those most extensively regulated, have had and will continue to have safety failures,” Rhodes said.
Burning to spend the billions unleashed for biodefense research, the feds rushed to act with little consideration of the consequences. A sadly familiar refrain.
The U.S. Army War College's 2005 “Assessing Biological Weapons and Bioterrorism Threat” concludes money was spent with no analysis of the bioterrorism threat, which it called “systematically and deliberately exaggerated” by this administration.
More probable than a bioterrorist attack is that we infect ourselves by theft, design or mishap. With every new lab opened, every square foot added, the risk increases, according to the GAO.
The Associated Press produced an interactive map that reveals biolab breaches in the U.S. (http://hosted.ap.org/specials/interactives/wdc/biohazards/)
As recently as June, anthrax bacteria was found on a freezer handle, light switch and shoes in a changing room at USAMRIID.
With stories of accidents, breaches of protocol and incompetence from biolabs emerging with disturbing regularity, Detrick's refusal to participate in a public meeting isn't surprising.
Why subject itself to more national attention when biolabs are under assault?
The request came from County Commissioner David Gray, who issued a statement in August saying that federal officials ignored policy in their Environmental Impact Statement by not seeking alternate sites for the labs.
Detrick agreed to meet, then backed out, offering a private meeting with county commissioners. Gray wanted to bring community members and the press. Detrick declined that offer, too.
Detrick has already done its duty, says spokesperson Eileen Mitchell, providing ample opportunity for public comment and complying with federal regulations.
Maybe they weren't counting on anyone actually reading the EIS, but local attorney Barry Kissin and Beth Willis have made a thorough study of it, culminating in a 17-page statement including tough questions for Detrick officials. At best, the EIS is a cursory attempt to comply with federal guidelines. At worst, it ignores documented breaches and blithely concludes that any danger is “negligible.”
The lack of serious effort in such a critical report is yet another example of the arrogance characterizing the federal government's tactics in the name of keeping America safe from terrorists.
Wave the flag and our brains shut down?
Undeterred by Detrick's refusal, Gray will have his forum at 7 p.m. on Nov. 19 at Winchester Hall. But it will take more than the usual 20 to 25 regulars to convince a majority of commissioners that the EIS is severely flawed and deserves a court review.
It's your last chance. Make it count. kheerbrandt@yahoo.com

 
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Why a Court Review on the USAMRIID Expansion?  
What would it do, and why support it?
 
The people and government of Frederick County need a court review of the Final Environmental Impact Statement (FEIS) for the USAMRIID expansion, because the FEIS does not comply with The National Environmental Protection Act (NEPA).   A court review would provide an independent, binding assessment and judgment about the specific ways the FEIS does not meet NEPA requirements in assessing whether Frederick is an appropriate location for these laboratories, and for adequately evaluating the health and safety issues these laboratories would bring to the community.
 
The purpose and spirit of NEPA requirements assume that a full and thorough environmental assessment is needed to properly make fundamental decisions about site location and risk mitigation.  A complete and thorough analysis of alternative sites is required in order to compare those alternative sites, leading to:
¨      information adequate enough for local elected officials to develop a full and informed understanding of  impacts, risks and issues
¨      information adequate enough for  citizens of the county and other affected parties to do the same
¨      a sound decision on the proper site, based on legally specified health, safety, environmental  and economic factors
 
The current FEIS does not provide the information needed for decision-makers to determine if these programs should be located in Frederick County.  It does not provide the information needed for officials and citizens to be adequately informed about the risks and impacts, as intended by NEPA.
 
A court review would, at a minimum, address the following NEPA-related FEIS defects:
 
¨      the failure during the FEIS process to squarely address fundamental issues raised repeatedly, verbally and in writing by residents of the community.
 
¨      the failure to properly identify alternatives sites, including one in a less populated area.
 
¨      the failure to provide credible and serious evaluations and comparisons of such alternatives.
 
¨      the failure to analyze the cumulative environmental impacts of the entire National Interagency Biodefense Campus (NIBC). Facilities for NIH, DHS, USDA, CDC, BRAC (Naval and Army Bio-Labs), as well as USAMRIID are planned to be located on NIBC. NEPA clearly requires a “Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement” (PEIS) with respect to the NIBC, which has never been done.  Rather, there have been only cursory references to the full program in the USAMRIID EIS.
 
¨      the failure to adequately analyze the environmental impact of  BSL-3 and BSL-4 pathogens escaping from containment.
 
¨      the failure to evaluate potential environmental impacts of genetic engineering of BSL-3 and BSL- 4 pathogens.  The Army’s own regulations specifically refer to genetic engineering as an action that demands evaluation for potential impacts.
 
¨      the failure to explain in specific detail how the cumulative program would satisfy its water requirements, which would at least double the current water requirements of the Fort.
 
¨      the failure to analyze potential scenarios related to transport of bio-agents to and from facility and failure to include a threat and vulnerability analysis for a terrorist attack or infiltration.
Tell our County Commissioners:
You want them to obtain a Court Review
of the latest Fort Detrick Biocontainment laboratory expansion Environmental Impact Statement.
Women In Black, Frederick commends Commissioner David Gray for his statement questioning the thoroughness of the Environmental Impact Statement  (EIS) on the proposed USAMRIID expansion, especially as it pertains to site location, and calling for a court review of the EIS before construction commences.
The function of the planned Biosafety Level 4 labs scheduled for construction as part of the expansion is to house experiments on infectious pathogens for which there is neither vaccine nor cure. Activities planned at some of the new Fort Detrick labs include the acquisition, growth, modification, storage and packaging of those pathogens most adaptable to being used as bioweapons.
One does not need to read voluminous documents to question the wisdom of locating such a facility in a highly populated area of robust growth such as Frederick County, especially in light of the previous record of failed safety procedures and accidents. This is a rational and logical question and one the citizens of Frederick County cannot afford to take lightly. Once built, this facility will be a permanent part of our community environment. Do we really want to risk the health and safety of our families?  Many accidents at such labs have recently been in the news.  Congress is now holding hearings investigating safety failures in the nation’s 400+ biowarfare laboratory system, for which Frederick will be Headquarters. 
We thank Commissioner Gray for his integrity and commitment to his oath of office,  “to preserve and protect the health, safety and welfare of the citizens of Frederick County.” We urge all our elected officials to meet this same standard, and we urge all Frederick County residents to hold them to that standard.
 
Please contact ALL of our County Commissioners now, and tell them you want them to protect our health and safety by calling for a legally binding, impartial Court Review of the Army’s USAMRIID expansion Environmental Impact Statement.  Tell them you want them to act on our behalf, and hold the Federal Government accountable for complying with the requirements of the National Environmental Protection Act, which is designed to protect communities from development that is harmful to health and safety. 

Call: : (301) 600-9000   Email:
Jan Gardner: jgardner@fredco-md.net
David Gray:  dgray@fredco-md.net
Kai Hagen: khagen@fredco-md.net
Charles Jenkins: chjenkins@fredco-md.net
Lenny Thompson: lthompson@fredco-md.net

War Was My Path to Peace

Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth…. Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy…. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God….

                                                                        – The Beatitudes, Matthew 6

 

I grew up loving a gentle, funny, talented man who was also a highly-decorated war hero and career military man—my father. Many long nights I lay awake listening to the sad bugled tones of “Taps” floating through the quiet night air of the far-flung military stations where we were posted, worrying and wondering about whether my darling Dad might be called away again at any moment, to fight, to suffer, maybe even to die. My deep respect and affection for this dear man made my lifelong fascination with war and my search for alternative paths to peace inevitable.

 

But war itself no longer seems inevitable to me. I’ve come to believe that, while human conflict is completely natural, and while our many differences and disagreements offer the necessary challenges leading to growth, learning, and change, violent responses to conflict only complicate issues, making them that much more difficult to resolve. In fact, I’ve come to believe that violence itself, and the fear which begets it, is the greatest threat both to our nation and to mankind.

 

Rather than a religious or utopian ideal, cooperative harmonious relationships are a very practical goal, critical to our national security. Peaceful responses to conflict can be learned and taught as easily as destructive ones.

 

The enormous costs of domestic and international violence—to our children, to American society and the world—are unsustainable. The World Health Organization estimates that the effects of domestic violence in the U.S. alone annually cost us over $300 billion. Annual defense expenditures in the U.S. top $500 billion. Roughly 100 million lives were lost during the 20th century to war. We can sustain neither a desirable standard of living nor our well-loved freedoms at such levels of spending; yet the problems we face in a violent, unstable world relentlessly compound.

 

We can no longer kid ourselves that America can shoot its way out of a world full of angry, well-armed enemies and criminals. Growing cycles of hatred, injustice, and violence increasingly threaten the very survival of mankind, while other serious problems on our fast-shrinking planet go unaddressed.

 

Establishment of a cabinet-level Department of Peace would be a huge step toward solving our nation’s biggest and most costly problem—domestic and international violence—because despite our many prisons, laws, and police forces, despite our huge nuclear and conventional arsenals, our vast military, and our seemingly limitless expenditures for espionage, we are becoming less safe with each passing day.

 

Department of Peace legislation would be a unifying, groundbreaking, even visionary legacy for the Bush presidency, because it is in essence a conservative idea, conserving lives, resources, good will, money, health, principles, and values, our American ideals and traditional way of life, our environment and talents, our time, energy, and property.

 

If we the people don't stand up for peace and against violence, what do we stand for? Peace and stability, both within and among nations, has matured to be a practical mainstream political goal for generations of Americans. What better way could we find to show our troops our appreciation and support for their past and future service than to express our debt of gratitude to them by giving them a Department of Peace charged with partnering with our defense and diplomatic leadership to insure that American soldiers never again march into an ill-planned or unnecessary war?

 

The common goal of Defense, State, Homeland, and Peace departments alike is to insure peace and stability, even if each has a different strategy for achieving this common goal. A strong military force is considered by many to be a deterrent to war, but without a cabinet-level Department of Peace, political leaders turn too quickly to military forces to resolve political problems, and too easily allow war profiteers to manipulate them into wars of aggression, greed, and domination. A Department of Peace offers a strong counterweight to such commonplace misuse of military might.

 

Our present approach to national defense is not working. We’re strong in conventional military operations, but weak in alliance-building (win-win negotiations and diplomacy) and very weak in the use of the many innovative, well-tested non-violent peace-building technologies used so successfully by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Gandhi, and other peaceful non-violent activists around the world.

 

A Secretary of Peace can nurture a growing culture of peace both nationally and internationally, partnering with the President and his cabinet to provide necessary alternative non-violent conflict-resolution strategies for every possible conflict area in the world, asking hard questions when war seems inevitable, and preventing, reducing, ameliorating, and de-escalating conflicts before they boil over into deadly violence.

 

Domestically, a Department of Peace can support and strongly disseminate best practices originating in neighborhood and faith-based programs, addressing drug and alcohol problems, crime, incarceration and recidivism, the spread of weapons, school bullying and violence, gangs, racism, ethnic and homophobic intolerance, child, elder, and spousal abuse, and other pressing domestic violence problems, through proven programs of peer mediation, violence-prevention counseling, restorative justice, and other successful non-violent approaches.

 

Like other past social grass-roots protest movements (e.g., civil rights, women’s suffrage, emancipation of slaves, etc.) non-violent peace-building may not have seemed obvious at first. But there is no reason why the long-held American dream of “peace in our time” should not be the business of a government charged with insuring domestic tranquility, a more perfect union, justice, the common defense, the general welfare, and the blessings of liberty.

 

We no longer live in our fathers’ world. We cannot find solutions to tomorrow’s problems using the same approaches that got us into trouble in the first place. In today’s small, interconnected world, what we do to others comes back quickly to help us or to harm us, as we have chosen. As in WWII, we cannot avoid suffering some injustices, but we canavoid adding to their sum. We no longer have a choice of changing or not changing. Our only choice now is whether to change for the better, or for the worse. Our fathers once risked war; it is time for us to risk peace.

 

(Please read about H.R. #808, establishing a Department of Peace, at www.dopcampaign.org, and let your members of Congress know where you stand.)

 

 

Please send comments to njcpace@epharmony.com . Thx 🙂

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Is Islamic Extremism ‘the Problem’? Is Endless War ‘the Answer’? How Can We Stop Terrorism?

We can’t just turn the other cheek to angry Islamic extremists, and we can’t fight an endless, economy-breaking, un-winnable war against terrorists either. Talk show simpletons say “just nuke ‘em all,” but even President Bush admits that America must “change the conditions that moved nineteen kids to come on airplanes to murder our citizens.”

 

And we’d be upset too, if Islamic nations had done to our country what we’ve done to them. To the world’s Muslims, our attacks have not been isolated incidents, but part of a long chain of conspiracies in a war upon Islam itself.

 

Western powers have indeed killed and wounded millions of Muslims during the last century, blighting their livelihoods and dreams with little consideration for justice, political freedom, and tolerance. Most of us in the West aren’t even aware of this tragic history of Western interference in Islamic nations. Our mainstream press has tiptoed around topics unpopular with their corporate sponsors, and TV and radio send out a torrent of xenophobia from reckless demagogues portraying Islam as a destructive ideology that has brought all its problems upon itself.

 

Americans express outrage at attacks on American soldiers, but turn a deaf ear to the pleas of millions of Iraqi war refugees desperate for asylum from our wars. We express indignation when an Israeli dies, but can’t be bothered to count—much less mourn—the untold Muslim victims of our Middle East wars. This double standard would shock us if the oceans of propaganda we swim in daily did not prevent our awareness of it.

 

Terrorism, like war, is a continuation of politics “by other means.” Grieving and jobless Muslim youth “join up” with terrorist forces in hopes of prevailing against regional and international foes, just as American youths patriotically join the armed services to donate their young bodies in service to their government’s many goals, and end up killing innocent strangers, or dying, or being maimed, only for the mercenary protection and expansion of far-flung corporate/economic interests.

 

Our country has never been invaded by Muslims, nor, credibly, by anyone else. We spend an annual military budget larger than the next fourteen largest nations combined–in total, 45% of the entire military spending in the whole world–on attacks on and within the homelands of foreigners who have never come anywhere near our homes. We have over 600 military bases all over the world. All this pretense of “defense” of America…even though former Secretary of State Madeline Albright guilelessly admitted after 9/11 that “…’homeland security’ is something people hadn’t really thought of before.”

 

For years, we’ve been instructed that our wars against Islam were fought defensively in response to 1400 years of aggressions in adherence to obscure Islamic scriptures urging global conquest and the spread of Islam by the sword. Few Americans realize that the Crusades were an unimaginably cruel and bloody centuries-long Western invasion of Islamic lands, or that for more than three hundred years, English adventurers penetrating Middle Eastern society have drawn up elaborate plans for assuming control through colonization, plans later pursued by a newly imperialistic America.

 

Some think our attacks on Islam well-intentioned—i.e., we hope to save misguided Muslims from themselves—so blind are we to the failings of our own brash young culture, and to the glories and losses of ancient Islamic ones. Of course Muslims/Arabs long for many changes of various kinds—but only those changes which arise from their own efforts, not from external interference, and certainly not from foreign aggressors. Americans wouldn’t appreciate foreign occupiers telling us how to live either. Different cultures with long separate traditions and histories, with different assumptions about values, beliefs, practices and ideals, have no business forcing themselves on other cultures. Many Muslim women, for instance, await the day they can move about more freely without their coverings; nevertheless, without exception, there are no Muslim women who want strangers to come from far away to shoot their fathers, sons and brothers in order to secure their “rights” for them.

 

In today’s brave new world of the internet, freedom of information is no longer a luxury, but a requirement for economic growth—so change will come to every remote corner of the globe, faster than puny humanity can thoughtfully adapt to it. The important question is not “Will things change?” but “How will things change?” While some people will always be more resistant to change than others, change will come to everyone, everywhere, inevitably. No one can stop it. We will all ultimately influence one another, for the better or for the worse, as we choose.

 

As long as we strove to live up to our ideals, America was a beacon to the world, effectively marketing our highest values of freedom and human rights worldwide. However, since we’ve begun to rely primarily upon our military, and not our moral strength during the last century, since we have used our might primarily to support the greedy ambitions of unscrupulous corporate profiteers, we have temporarily lost our persuasive influence for positive international change.

 

We now have only a “shrewd” Secretary of State who refuses dialogue with opposing states, and who bribes and bullies our nervous “allies” into tolerating our unfair international practices. Where is our strong, cabinet-level U.S. Department of Peace, promoting global peace and harmony? Where are our official national ambassadors of compassion and justice, sharing our expertise, riches and good will with all nations and all peoples? How do the puny efforts grounded in our highest patriotic and religious ideals and heritage stack up against our unlimited expenditures for endless war?

 

The literate class in the Muslim world certainly blames the U.S. for oppressing Muslim states. As cruelly and certainly as war kills both body and spirit, so do economic and political exploitations kill, maim and warp lives. Western nations have been meddling politically, financially and militarily throughout the twentieth century, repressing democratic movements and political freedoms throughout all Arab nations, propping up Western-friendly dictators, failing to promote good governance and economic advancement, and neglecting to address rapidly-changing social, demographic and economic developmental challenges. Islamic extremism will continue to thrive until Muslim youth everywhere are offered real hope of political and economic improvements.

 

During the twentieth century, U.S.-based international corporations backed by powerful military forces reliably insured a steady flow of oil westward at bargain basement prices, while suppressing the economic development and progress of the countries which owned that finite, precious resource. Increasingly, our goal has been military and economic hegemony in the Middle East, by way of incursions into Iraq, Afghanistan, Lebanon, Syria, Israel/Palestine, Somalia, Western Sudan, Kashmir, the Philippines, Bosnia, Chechnya, Assam, and East Timor. Besides fighting to insure “our” cheap, reliable oil “supply,” we’ve insisted on favorable trade advantages, prevented the spread of nuclear weapons (with the exception, of course, of our own thousands of weapons, and those of our allies) and supported and protected our friend Israel, in part because such support offers us a conveniently aggressive military wedge/base into the Middle East.

 

Angry Muslims believe that we want to weaken and divide the Arab world, shake the foundations of Islamic belief, and dismantle the structures of Muslim society—their culture, traditions, and their approaches to justice, government, rights, and freedom, however controversial. They believe we want to lead their young people astray, control and limit their use of and profit from their resources, and emasculate and neutralize all opposition to our agenda by spreading our competing western values and influence.

 

Many Muslims believe that we in the West very much want to keep their countries backward, afflicted, poor and miserable, so we can more easily exploit their riches—their oil, land and human resources. They attribute America’s historical political and economic success not to a morally, economically and politically superior system of government, but to a two-hundred year exploitation of the richest swath of virgin territory and resources that the world has ever known, on the backs of slaves and slaughtered Native Americans, using a form of government primarily supportive of the growth of wealth (the U.S. was originally settled by capitalist business ventures in Jamestown, Plymouth, etc.) and backed up by a growing military force which turned next to support for similar profitable exploitations in the third world.

 

The West’s war against Islam is considered criminally immoral by the millions of peaceful/innocent non-“enemy” Muslims who have been the “collateral damage” of western aggressions. Like Americans, Arabs have the right to keep and/or sell their resources whenever and at whatever price they prefer. They feel their only hope is to resist and endure Western onslaughts until their undeserved suffering redemptively earns them international sympathy and respect—and/or breaks the American economy—as their resistance broke the national economies of the late great Soviet and British empires.

 

Muslims pray that the U.S. will lose their political will for unending war, that media backlash from our allies will eventually convince us of endless war’s tragic and wasteful effects. A survey of 47 major nations by Pew Research recently demonstrated that “global public opinion (is) increasingly wary of the world’s dominant nations (and) disapproving of their leaders. Anti-Americanism is extensive, as it has been for the past five years…. Global support for the U.S.-led war on terrorism is shrinking, and distrust of American leadership and foreign policy is growing. Not only is there worldwide support for a withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq, but there also is considerable opposition to U.S. and NATO operations in Afghanistan.”

 

The biggest problem with fighting an endless war on terrorism is that such a war does nothing at all to resolve the terrorist problem, while creating more terrorists. Wars on terrorism are wars no one wins and everyone loses.

 

Nevertheless, U.S. war profiteers continue to press for expanded wars throughout the Middle East and elsewhere, opportunistically portraying Islam not as a peaceful religion practiced variously by a billion people, not as a tolerant, moderate, ancient faith with a rich tradition of scholarship, compatible with political democracy and religious pluralism, but instead, as a fundamentalist terrorist cult different from all other religions in its aggressive global political agenda, solely responsible for atrocities, civil wars, attacks on Americans, the 9/11 tragedy, and for disgusting practices such as stonings and beheadings–an “evil religion” deserving of annihilation by “the pure gospel of Jesus Christ.”

 

Stereotypes of Islam as a monolithic religion predisposed to violence simplify the realities of a complex, multi-faceted religion. Some Islamists, like some fundamentalist Christians, pervert what is in essence a peaceful religion, through violent cults bent on universal conversion and conquest—but we can’t blame the whole of either Islam or of Christianity for such aberrations. As in Christianity, there is simply too much diversity within Islam, which has its own versions of Jesus Freaks and criminally violent cults, but also its spiritual mystics and its vast majority of family-centered, civic-minded, peaceful—if very human—communities. As with Christianity, the educated (or uneducated) conscience of each individual Muslim determines his interpretation about “what is Islam” and what is “true Muslim practice.” Like Christians, Muslims can find congregations and leaders who support just about any strain of peaceful or reactionary religious practice, in both secular and Islamic societies.

 

Millions of Christians currently live in Arab countries, sharing very much the same culture as their Muslim counterparts, just as Muslims in America share much of our American culture. Unarguably, some Muslim leaders are intransigent and fearful, and some fundamentalist Muslims are as crazy as loons—just like some of our own crazy leaders and fundamentalist Christians, who would nuke whole Arab nations right now. But just because each culture has its crazies doesn’t give anyone the right to attack all Christians or all Muslims in “self-defense.” No society can prevent all senseless, tragic injustices, but we do not have to add to their sum.

 

Some Muslims believe an Islamic state best-suited to achieving Islamic ideals, just as Americans are partial to their own familiar political systems–however imperfect all these political systems are. Some Muslims see Al-Qaeda jihadists as legitimate martyrs, just as we honor the sacrifices and good intentions of our own fallen soldiers even when their wars are discredited. Some Muslims believe stoning and beheading to be true Islamic practices, just as some of our own Christians sects still practice exorcism, voodoo and other bloody or satanic rituals. Most otherwise-peaceful Christians would react violently if America were invaded, just as, during wartime in Arab lands, otherwise-peaceful sects react with what appears to be religiously-inspired violence, making it difficult to consistently distinguish among essentially peaceful groups.

 

Religion can be misused in any land, whether Christian or Jewish or Muslim—to win votes, to gain political power and control, to further various nationalist and ethnic motives. Just as political electioneering in America relies upon familiar, emotion-stirring patriotic and Judeo/Christian words and images, politics in Arab lands come clothed in the garb of Islam. Like our own neoconservative opportunists, radical Islamic opportunists urge their political ideologies and associated plans—whether for a utopian future embracing Sharia law and rejecting secularism and all things foreign, or for world domination and a global empire run by international corporations—all these unscrupulous politicians (whether clerical or secular) urge their dark visions using religion as a motivator for change, and not the other way around.

 

In their worst forms, both Islam and Christianity encourage violence and persecution. At best, both are cooperative, tolerant religions. Surprisingly, within contemporary American society, Muslims often seem to be almost more christian than Christians, since modern Christianity has stripped down (to the distress of some and the satisfaction of others) under the influences of modern media, academia and consumer economics to the two primary commandments of “love God and love your neighbor”—while encouraging widely varying interpretations about what these two commandments might mean.

 

Like most traditional Christian congregations, most American Muslim congregations resist the blandishments of Western media and money which are making so many inroads into modern Christian lifestyles. Most Muslim congregations in America remain deeply devoted to traditional moral principles and values, to avoidance of evaluating people on the basis of what they produce and consume, and—for better or worse—to clearly-defined gender expectations, including a firm rejection of sodomy, pornography, gay lifestyles, abortion and birth control. American Muslims also strongly commit to generous giving, to volunteerism, large families, and to other related traditions embraced by many Christians. Islam’s firm resistance to the biblically-forbidden practice of usury (lending at interest) has long remained a thorn in the side of American capitalists.

                                     

Some Christians are concerned that American Muslims will parlay their success in resisting modern/Western temptations in order to lure new converts from Christianity, and thus conquer the West via a sort of stealth attack through immigration without assimilation. Unfortunately, such paranoia is often stoked by demagogic Christian ministers fearful of losing their congregations (and their livelihoods), pastors who might better serve their flocks, their Saviour, and God by trusting in them and turning their examples and service toward higher, more inclusive, more loving goals.

 

If we stop “warring” on terrorism, we can still firmly resist the crime of terrorism wherever it occurs in the world, by partnering with criminal justice organizations in all governments, most especially those in need of our good example and support.

 

The very best way to reverse Islamic terrorism, though, is step-by-step, the same way it was created, by reversing the causes of anti-Americanism and extremist violence. Step-by-step, we can move away from a foreign policy of violence-based international competition toward one embracing non-violent global cooperation. Neither approach to ending terrorism is simple, obvious or guaranteed. But only one has any chance of succeeding.

 

Our first step can be to recognize Islam’s highest priority, after the practice of their faith: to repel aggressors whom they fear will corrupt their religion or Muslim way of life. Out of respect for this principle, Western powers can withdraw their unwelcome pressure and influence along with their troops, and attend instead to the business and pleasure of dwelling and working in Islamic lands, as polite, invited guests respectful of different cultures and traditions.

 

We can find ways to work against religious and ethnic xenophobia, educating ourselves about historic predations in Arab lands, and promoting understanding and acceptance of Islamic perspectives.

 

A change of heart toward Islam can support expenditures for reparations to Iraqis and other injured parties, which will go a long way toward rebuilding good will and positive relationships among nations.

 

We can expand our diplomatic missions to so-called “hostile” nations, spending the money freed from foreign wars on more diplomacy and open dialogue, which will increase mutual understanding and respect, and diminish the likelihood of future wars.

 

We can demonstrate our good will by welcoming Iraqi refugees into the U.S., helping them create peaceful Muslim communities, and integrate into American civic life.

 

We can reform our own political system so that the will and welfare of the people can be heard above the demands of big business, the wealthy, corporations, lobbyists, and the military-industrial complex.

 

We can offer our generous support across the world only for indigenous, peaceful, representative political movements and leaders, whether or not they follow our familiar western parliamentary and constitutional models. We can promote dialogue and better understanding with regional and national organizations which have turned to violence under the pressure of wars and occupations, and together find peaceful, just solutions to conflicts.

 

We can work together to reduce the spread of nuclear and conventional weapons, first reducing our own to provide a convincing example.

 

We can purchase land in exchange for peace in Israel/Palestine, and offer our financial assistance only to peaceful leaders on all sides who reject the politics of fear and violence, who respect all ancestries, beliefs, and traditions, and who embrace inclusivity and equitability.

 

We can work toward respectful, peaceful, just and equitable trade relations with all nations.

 

We can build good will by respecting local ownership of resources, and offer our principled support in resolving problems of development, production and distribution.

 

We can work to redirect and downsize our military forces to those necessary only for homeland defense, reduce the global spread of arms, and end the global influence of our own home-grown American military/industrial complex.

 

We can generously fund the establishment and stated goals of the proposed cabinet-level U.S. Department of Peace

 

We can reform and rebuild the U.N. into a universally trusted and respected world body, effective in furthering its noble goals.

 

We can fully fund national peacekeeping armies to work with the U.N. to prevent the rise of national and regional military powers, wars of aggression, war crimes, and violent interferences with the sovereignty of nations.

 

We can create a U.S. military health system, a sort of national Doctors Without Borders, maintaining its readiness for national emergencies (such as acts of terrorism, pandemics, natural disasters, and military invasions) by sending it everywhere else on the globe where such emergencies may occur.

 

We can support the most-cherished projects of the peoples of all nations whom we have formerly distrusted, misunderstood, and feared.

 

We can work together to build a world culture of peace and non-violent conflict resolution, a culture that fits comfortably within all religious and secular systems, that is tolerant of all religions and ideologies, that can be gradually institutionalized into international law, universally taught, and culturally supported through exchanges.

 

Please send your comments to njcpace@gmail.com . Thx! 🙂

 

 

 

 

 

 

Lick ‘Em or Join ‘Em? Predictions and Warnings About Republican and Democratic Campaign Strategies for 2008

I predict that unscrupulous and frightened campaign schemers and strategists within the Republican Party (such as Karl Rove) will convince their followers of the necessity of focusing the 2008 presidential campaign on xenophobia—fear of outsiders. Like all good fascists throughout history, they’ll find themselves “reluctantly forced” to flood the airwaves and internet with compelling commercials, “information,” “news stories,” “facts” and “statistics,” convincing a nervous American public that the only thing standing between “us” and a fatal, up-close-and-personal, all-out collision with a horde of terrible “others” so not-like-us as to be sub-human, is to vote Republican.

 

Unless the Democratic party immediately plans strong opposing strategies to defang and declaw this deep-pocketed “terrorize and divide” media onslaught before it “takes,” Republicans—and the corporatocracy—will win in ‘08. They have already begun their incessant, highly effective drumbeat of fear.

 

Right-wing talk-show extremists—politicians, preachers, “experts,” business leaders—terrorists all—are already terrorizing the public with their visions of danger, scarcity, and death, hammering their variations on their single essential theme: “If you don’t vote Republican, you and your loved ones, sooner than you think, will be left alone to live and die, poor and horribly, because of  “outsiders.’”

 

A host of demagogic hacks have already been at it for quite some time, arguing their “common-sense practicalities” of greed and hate, urging the xenophobic exclusion, rejection, marginalization, and dehumanization of Muslims, “illegals,” many legal immigrants, all non-English speakers, non-Christians, “strange people,” “different” people, foreigners in general, and non-traditional Americans in particular—that is, everyone they want us to fear and hate, especially those whose national resources the corporatocracy covets.

 

Presenting themselves as tough-guy loners and unselfish freedom-fighters, they glamorize pre-emptive, retaliatory, and vengeful violence, justify torture, cruelty, and state terrorism, and rationalize putting the constitution on hold. They talk about our ever-more sadistic, cruel, irrational new adversaries, and invent new even-badder-guys (to keep war profiteers smiling) whenever the terrifying old enemies (whether the Krauts, Japs, Reds, Gooks, Slopes, Ragheads, terrorists, etc.…) no longer terrify.

 

Americans are increasingly urged by such effective and costly advertising to join whatever shaky, convenient and temporary political alliances-of-the-day can be scraped up, to fight pointless no-holds-barred trillion-dollar wars against everyone-not-like-us who is trying to steal “our” (Middle-Eastern, African, South American, East Asian…) oil, gold, plutonium, copper, etc.

 

We’re incessantly warned of the imminent dangers of diversity—the perils that follow welcoming foreigners, the menaces lurking in helping the poor, the risks inherent in sharing our neighborhoods and lives with those of different colors, religions, political beliefs, traditions, heritages, nationalities, and ethnicities.

 

We’re urged to wedge ourselves, however inappropriately and temporarily, within the fat-cat Republican-insider club, in hopes of staying alive and safe for at least a little while longer within their smug, prosperous ranks. They’ll meanwhile insist that we also embrace every political decision that widens the gap between haves and have-nots, and that promotes the interests of the wealthy at the expense of “them”—that is, “us”—while urging us, one more time, to look away in fear from the real political issues that matter most to people everywhere, the issues without borders, for at least just long enough for the Republicans to be re-elected for four more catastrophic years.

 

Yes, Virginia, there really are some very bad terrorists out there, and not a few of them are currently holding top positions in the Republican Party.

 

One of the toughest sub-plots in planning an effective, pre-emptive anti-fear campaign strategy to carry us through the 2008 campaign will be making our message of unity and inclusiveness so convincing and compelling that it will win over even current Republican leaders and gather them back into our forgiving, accepting fold, along with the rest of the world’s lost lambs. Yes, that means even Karl Rove, Dick Cheney, and George Bush….

 


Most of the complexity and confusion in politics these days arises from misunderstandings about a competitive concept of “us” and “them.”
 
There is no “them.” There is only “us.”
 
Barack Obama is right about Hillary’s foreign policy: it’s a rehash of the same-old Bush/Cheney fear-and-greed nonsense, the same tired politics of in-crowds fighting to hold back the great-unwashed.
 
Unfortunately, too many of us still warily regard ourselves as alone and under attack in the world, when in reality, we are all one, a big happy eternal family, inseparable parts of a spiritual whole, even though we often don't recognize this truth. The great-unwashed are not “them;” they are “us,” and cannot be held back, nor should they be. When parts of our family can’t go much longer without food, when they need energy to stay warm or cool and to move their bodies to necessary places, when we feel separated at the level of basic needs of physical organisms, then we need national political leaders like Mandela, Gandhi and Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., who see us all as one, who represent all of “us,” who can lead all people everywhere to deeper recognition of their wholeness.
 
Even the “haves” today are coming reluctantly to realize they can no longer hide behind their bodyguards, or the gates of private schools and guarded enclaves, because technology has shrunk our planet down to a marble. The world’s problems now hit home faster than ever.
 
The great threats mankind faces today ignore borders, arising as they do from a sense of disunity. These threats, which cannot be solved competitively, but only through global cooperation, include nuclear proliferation, organized crime, poverty, infectious diseases and unsupportive health conditions and attitudes, environmental degradation, armed conflicts of all kinds, including wars both within and among nations, terrorism, the global arms trade, mass migrations, injustice, hopelessness, hunger, greed, natural disasters, ignorance, addiction, prejudice, pornography, homelessness, hate, fear, anxiety, civic alienation, loss of conscience, excessive taxation, crumbling infrastructures, more and more “enemies,” violence itself…. The list of threats without borders is long and continues to grow rapidly.
 
Our catastrophic and costly bumbling-world-cop approach to stemming the inexorable insistence of the world’s irrepressible have-nots only further burdens our children and grandchildren with unpayable debts for political wars of greed and fear which have a great many losers, and no winners.
 
The only way to lick ‘em is to join ‘em. Instead of holding at arm’s length the world’s hungry, envious and angry, instead of arming dictators or beating enemies into submission or bombing them flat, we can change the way we feel and act toward “others.” We can learn to view all people as our brothers and sisters, and to see all hostile actions as a cry for help.
 
We can follow the second commandment—“Love your neighbor as your self.” The best way to get rid of an enemy has always been to turn that enemy into a friend. Following Jesus’ example, we cannot give up until we have found and taken in even that last lost lamb, knowing tihat if we lose that one, if we leave behind even one “outsider,” then all are lost.
 
Our only real scarcity is our temporary scarcity of trust in our own and one another’s caring. There are plenty of goods, there is plenty of love and generosity, plenty of appreciation and gratitude for kindnesses large and small, plenty of everything that is needed to go around, when we learn to pull together. As Jesus taught us when he shared the loaves and fishes, there will be enough for all of us when we all give of what we have….
 
Our identity as a nation cannot rest upon a dusty list of yesterday’s ideals. We create our national identity every day; it emerges moment-to-moment from our chosen relations with the earth, water, and sky, with other species, with our families and neighbors, co-workers and leaders, fellow-citizens and those in every land across the globe, including the powerful and the poor, the wealthy and the weak, the sick and the old, the fearful and the vengeful; yes, even Republicans….
 
How we choose to view and treat others—however well or ill—inevitably comes from how we see ourselves. And how we see ourselves determines how we will see and treat others. If we see ourselves as spiritually isolated and threatened, then that’s how we’ll see others. If we know our best selves to be caring, accepting and forgiving, we will know that people everywhere are the same, even if some of us have leaders who are temporarily insane.

 

Please send comments to njcpace@gmail.com . Thank you! 🙂 Nancy

 

 

 

 

 

 

Rachel Corrie Uncensored, Bullies and Martyrs, Lambs and Lions, AIPAC, and Messianic Voices Off

I was privileged to recently attend a one-woman play called My Name is Rachel Corrie, about a young American tragically killed by an Israeli bulldozer as she protected Palestinian homes from destruction. Art-upon-art lavishly swirled in layer upon layer, as a dedicated actor-artist nurtured a compelling script crafted by two talented playwright-artists from the lyric insights of writer-activist Corrie—herself one of God’s great artistic creations….

 

After the play, I was grateful to Rachel and her parents, to the actor and playwrights, to the director and leaders of the Contemporary American Theatre Festival in Shepherdstown, West Virginia, for collaborating so beautifully to share Corrie’s insights as she matured into a loving, idealistic, modern-day David out to slay her Goliath-of the-moment.

 

Rachel Corrie had no affection for bullies. Burning with a wish to stand up to power and deadly violence, she seemed born to resist injustice. I think she would have been just as eager to oppose Palestinians attacking innocent Israelis, were she drawn to their plight first.

 

I was saddened to think that some who cherish holocaust narratives like The Diary of Anne Frank would try to censor Rachel’s inspired voice and words for partisan reasons. I doubt any peaceful Jew seeing this play would urge such censorship.

 

But after it opened successfully in London, extremist Jewish organizations protested its further production, and it was dropped in New York City, Florida, and Boston. The Shepherdstown festival lost a $100,000 pledge and risked a boycott for their decision to stage it. During production, the protest in West Virginia continued in several purchased and prominent playbill pages presenting the Israeli-extremist side of the story, including six touching photos of Israeli “Rachels” tragically killed by Palestinian violence (implying an erroneous six-to-one death toll of Israelis to Palestinians,) along with a dehumanizing and demonizing suggestion about how all Palestinians want only to kill Israelis and put an end to Israel, while all Israelis want only peace.

 

Christians, Jews, and Muslims have found relative safety from prejudice in America, and I can understand why each of these groups would want to zealously guard such hard-earned respite, especially in view of their respective ghastly historical memories of exploitation and persecution. Which is why, wherever Muslims in America gather to air grievances, polite, respectful Jews show up to tell their side of the story.

 

American Muslims, however, rarely feel welcome to speak at Jewish events which accede to violent solutions in Israel/Palestine. In both America and Israel, the Jewish-extremist viewpoint is so well-funded and orchestrated as to saturate media and government; it also has much to answer for, in egging on the Bush administration’s current war on Islam, or should I say on Iraq, or should I say on terror…all of which have worked out to be pretty much the same thing. To the extent that nearly every influential comment opposing extremist policies in Israel is instantly reprimanded, often with accompanying accusations about the speaker’s anti-semitism—to that extent is the Palestinian/Islamic world-view grossly under-represented and out-of-balance in America, and of course in Israel/Palestine.

 

Considering all the pre-play controversy, I was nervous myself about attending it, and hoped I wouldn’t be thought anti-Semitic. I still hope to avoid that charge, although I welcome the labels of pro-peace and anti-violence.

 

The voice in the Israeli-Islamic conflict consistently drowned out in America and Israel is the moderate/peaceful Islamic voice, although peaceful Muslims are working hard to change this. AIPAC, the Anti-Defamation League, and other American Jewish organizations are too vigilant for their own good, defending themselves too assertively against slights both perceived and real, and attacking perceived attackers. An anti-Jewish backlash in reaction to such strategies, and to Israel’s typical knee-jerk disproportionate violent responses to aggression seems sadly inevitable.

 

Peaceful Christians, Jews, Muslims, and other Americans are often so aggressively intimidated by their own extremist factions that they rarely speak out publicly against the vengeful actions, bloody rhetoric, and sheer barbarism of all they see, on all sides. Caught within the context of a violent century’s heightened emotions, most moderates—peaceful Jews and Christians and Muslims and citizens of all nationalities everywhere—are too frightened even to say “Enough” to the extremist voices within their own groups.

 

As long as demagogues and partisan extremists freely pressure and intimidate moderates, worldwide anti-Islamism, anti-Semitism, and anti-Americanism will continue to grow. And if the hot-blooded AIPAC successfully pushes extremists in America and Israel into another bloodbath, this time against Iran, the potential for anti-Semitic, anti-American, and anti-Islamic blowback upon moderates in all these groups everywhere will be as terrible as the cataclysmic impact upon the direct victims of the war.

 

The Bible does not say “the lamb shall lie down with the lion,” but,“ the lion shall lie down with the lamb”—meaning, the powerful shall offer peace to weaker opponents as a wise first step toward peaceful resolution of conflicts. Even the mega-powerful United States is finally learning that everyone’s interests are best served when the mighty dare to humble themselves to acceptance and generosity toward weaker “others,” and truly begin to see—and treat—their neighbor as they would want to be treated, to love their neighbor as their own self. Our learning curve in America, meanwhile, has been excruciating for Muslims worldwide.

 

In the peaceable kingdom, the powerful will “lie down with” (a tender, intimate metaphor) all their lambish neighbors. This means that the biggest and toughest of the terrorizing thugs on every block, whether they be the American or Chinese nations, whether Iranian, Jew, or Muslim, Irish or British, a strong band of criminals, a tough group of insurgents, whether militias, tribes, national armies, navies, air forces, or even the marines, all the mighty and powerful will come to realize that their job is to protect the weak from those who would hurt them, and not to push the weak around in order to prevail in conflicts, however troublesome or longstanding.

 

Lambs, too, are opening their eyes to the fact that the terrible lions they so fear may in fact be more fearful themselves than fierce, and desperately in need of peaceful perspectives from ancient cultures and wise elders willing to patiently remove the painful thorns of ignorance and fear from their dripping paws.

 

Extremist Jewish leaders preaching the wisdom of ten-eyes-for-an-eye, and depicting Israel as a tiny beleaguered island within a vast sea of murderous Muslims all wanting to kill Jews and “erase Israel from the map” (please see the writings of Arash Norouzi) are as repellently manipulative as extremist Palestinian leaders claiming to be nothing more than a defenseless band of ragtag refugees confronting the combined wrath of the world’s largest and most powerful military forces, or American Christian-extremists sounding the alarm of American invasion from rapacious outsiders and infidels, or American patriots bristling with nuclear arms, self-righteously claiming to be the potential victims of nations working frantically to develop even a single one.

 

Violence, or violent extremism, or terrorism—that is, resorting to violence to resolve conflicts—turns out to be “the problem” itself, and not, as many have tried to persuade us, any particular ideology, ethnicity, religious tradition, or national affiliation. The burning question is always: who is committed to non-violent resolution of conflicts, and who isn’t?

 

Whether Bin Laden or Bush, Communism or Capitalism, Shiite or Sunni, Hamas or Abbas, Judaism or Islam, the U.S. or Iran, Saddam or Arafat, Hirohito or Mao or Eisenhower or Hitler—it is increasingly evident that “the good guys” are the ones who are committed to resolving conflicts non-violently, while “the bad guys” are the extremist zealots who turn to the use of violence to resolve their conflicts, whether through conventional warfare, street-fighting, or assassination, whether by suicide-bombing, napalm, nuclear weapons, torture, or IEDs. The choice of violent extremism IS the problem; and violent extremists ARE the terrorists.

 

Disproportionate retaliation against aggression makes sense only for cornered wild animals fighting for survival against overwhelming odds. Unfortunately, this is the very vision offered up by violent extremist leaders, regardless of affiliation, who deliberately stoke up fears and urge violent responses by perceiving all situations through dire scaredy-cat doomsday lenses.

 

Fortunately, the world seems to be developing new improved crap-detectors, and violent tactics in our small, interconnected, and media-rich world don’t play so well in Peoria anymore. People now recognize man’s-inhumane-violence-to-man for what it is, regardless of context, and despite all the varied ideological, ethnic, religious, and national colors and flavors that violence so often comes wrapped up in—whether it be bulldozed homes, the shattered bodies of innocent children, or maimed and traumatized young soldiers from every land.

 

The sanctity of human life has finally emerged to be the world’s highest human value, rising ever more clearly above even the most rabble-rousing words of demagogues and ideologues bent upon stirring their fellow-citizens to torture and murder.

 

In the promised land we are approaching, constructive criticism of the policies and actions of various peoples and organizations won’t be called anti-semitic or anti-American or anti-Islamic or un-patriotic. Instead, powerful, messianic, moderate voices of Jewry and Christendom and Islam and all other isms will speak freely and softly of peace, cooperation, and compromise in all our holy lands, where we will all work side-by-side, undivided by ancestry or belief or tradition, letting go of old grudges and offering olive branches of reconciliation, as we non-violently resolve each day’s natural conflicts freshly and openly, as they arise.

 

May we learn without having to endure more lessons from ever-greater tragedies, wars, and environmental catastrophes, and may we all awaken together to begin with a convert’s zeal our great shared task of peacefully saving our tiny blue planet, and all our brothers, every one.

 

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Shall We Quibble Over Competing Ideologies? Or Choose Love Over Fear?

President Bush stumbles over the nuances of that thorny word “ideology,” just as he struggles to understand the concept of “democracy.” Together with Humpty Dumpty, he wishes words could mean just what he chooses them to mean, neither more nor less….

 

Unfortunately, the word “ideology,” a “bad” word he once thought applicable only to evil, foreigner-type “isms” such as Communism, terrorism, extremism, Islamism, and facism, turns out to be nothing more than: “an organized collection of ideas…a comprehensive vision…a way of looking at things” (Wikipedia)— a definition far friendlier than Mr. Bush first envisioned, equally applicable to the many isms he rather approves of, such as Americanism, free market capitalism, Methodism, and certainly the organized collections of ideas constituting “democracy” or “freedom.”

 

Since all political thinking seems to fall under various ideologies, it would seem unwise to let ourselves become so caught up within our own peculiar favorite ideological flavor/s that we withdraw our support for human life anywhere in the world in the name of that ideology—whether it be democracy, freedom, liberty, utopianism, capitalism, nationalism, Islamism, fundamentalism, Zionism, Protestantism, patriotism, conservatism, liberalism…. After all, that's how all the bad guys in history justified their scummy actions, by insisting that their chosen ideologies were “righter” than others.

 

The thing is, one can go so far wrong searching for moral consistency within an ism, because isms and other ideologies always shut out some of the people some of the time, making them less than fully human, less than deserving of humanitarian concern—certainly all those who think differently than “we” do, who aren’t like “us” because “they” don’t think believe as “we” do, etc. Inevitably “we” come to oppose “them,” choosing “us” over “them.”

 

Ideologies can be a useful, interesting, creative way to organize one's thinking, but when taken too seriously–as “the truth”–they are very polarizing. 

 

It is neither possible to decide how rightly to treat other human beings by looking to ideologies and isms for one’s standards, nor safe, nor ethical, to decide on an ideological basis whether to support or reject that highest and most sacred value, the sanctity of human life.

 

“Treat all others as you would wish they would treat you” remains the most widely-accepted, time-honored, one-and-only gold-standard rule of ethical conduct ever conceived; it is found in every world religion and every moral, ethical, and justice code everywhere in the world, superseding all ideologies and isms, and consistently useful in every ethical or moral decision.

 

Ideologues of every stripe, every day, everywhere in the world, try to manipulate people into voting, killing, and even dying for whatever admirable-sounding preferred ideology their audience is familiar with, justifying their most horrific recommendations—invasions, occupations, terror, bombing, napalming, maiming, stealing, starvation, murder, neglect, torture, indoctrination, abuse, imprisonment, exploitation, coercion, manipulation—always in the name of some heart-stirring and noble-sounding aspect of a popular ideology.

 

Whenever demagogues (“those who gain political power by appealing to popular prejudices, fears, and expectations, typically via impassioned rhetoric and propaganda”—Wikipedia) anywhere in the world attempt to persuade fellow-citizens to act unsupportively toward others, they always cover their dark deeds with a soft, cozy, comfortable cloak of locally-popular ideologies. (H. L. Mencken called a demagogue “one who preaches doctrines he knows to be untrue to men he knows to be idiots.”)

 

Whenever anyone in any country has done something injurious to any other, or left undone what could have helped another, no matter who we were, no matter in the name of what ideology we acted, no matter how noble we thought our actions, we were wrong. And whenever we chose to support human life, we were acting aright.

 

Politics is as simple—and as complicated—as that.

 

We either contribute to another’s fear, or we offer them loving support. We either perceive their anger and wrong-headedness as an anguished cry for help, or we attack and punish them. We reject them, or we contribute to their acceptance and well-being. We light a candle or leave them in darkness. We offer them war or contribute to their peace. We lift them up or we abandon them. We share their dreams or take them away. We help them or we hurt them.

 

We choose love over fear, or we quibble amongst ideologies to gain power, and end up losing shared life itself on our tiny blue planet.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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