Tuesday, May 04, 2010

Spontaneous anti-war resistance on campuses nationwide

Spontaneous anti-war resistance on campuses nationwide. Spread. Word.

In remembrance of the students who came before us
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ywKe8ezL8vI

May 4, 2010 is the 40th anniversary of the Kent State massacre.

This effort is being supported by:
Alan Canfora, Alliance of the Libertarian Left, Angela Keaton, Antiwar.com, Campus Antiwar Network, Cindy Sheehan, Copblock.org, Cop Watch Los Angeles, Diversity of Thought UCSB, James Cox, Mariana Evica, May4.org, SB Anti-War, Students for Justice in Palestine, Students for Liberty, Students for a Voluntary Society, The Love Police, The Peace, Freedom, and Prosperity Movement, Tom Ⓐ Ender, UC Strike, We Are Change, World Can't Wait

Please send a note if your organization is helping to get the word out and we'll add you to the list.

FAQ
1. Where is the student resistance happening?
Everywhere

2. Who is organizing it?
Each of us.

3. Who is the leader?
See answer to 2.

In this morning's New York Times, Tim Arango reports that Nouri's refusal to bring the Sahwa into the process is frustrating many Sunnis. Sahwa aka "Awakenings" aka "Sons Of Iraq" are Sunnis who were paid by the US military not to attack the US military or the US military equipment. These payments are credited by many -- including Gen David Petreaus and former US Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker -- for diminishing the number of attacks on US forces. Nouri was supposed to absorb the Sahwa but despite the press repeatedly announcing he had or he was going to, that never really happened. Arango reports Sahwa was not able to promote a united front in the March 7th elections and are feeling further unmoored:

Now, under threat from insurgents they once battled and facing a government they say has not kept its promise to give jobs to the fighters, the Awakening seems to be a force whose strength is waning, as it looks for a way to cling to any rung of power it can. Some wonder if this is the beginning of the end of the Awakening.
The ramifications could be stark. Most worrisome would be an increase in violence, should disenchanted Awakening fighters become insurgents again. Whether Mr. Aiffan and others accept their electoral defeat and go quietly is a question that could determine how peacefully power changes hands here.

On the topic of the elections, we'll note this from Jane Arraf's "Iraq election: Baghdad recount begins with a hitch" (Christian Science Monitor):

Just hours into the start of a recount expected to take up to two weeks, officials from Mr. Maliki’s State of Law coalition moved to try to force the Independent High Electoral Commission (IHEC) to examine the voter records and check voters’ signatures against their ballots in addition to re-checking more than 2 million votes. The IHEC quickly rejected Maliki's newest complaint.

The recount has been widely seen as an attempt by Maliki to delay certification of election results that gave his slate two fewer parliamentary seats than leading coalition Iraqiya and weakened his chances of heading a coalition government. Both the United States and the United Nations said the voting process had been credible.


Meanwhile Nouri al-Maliki and his Whores among the press corps are trumpeting the claim that the 'network' being the April 4th bombings while tossing in as an aside that a supposed suspect "was later reported to have died in detention." Of the Ebola Virus? Nouri runs torture cells and forces fake confessions and his pay off is that a number of Press Whores repeatedly pimp his claims as facts -- despite the fact that his abusive relationship with the truth is well known.

Two Circles Net is reporting something the Press Whores aren't, "Iraqi authorities have started the construction of a security wall around the capital Baghdad, reports the country's Al-Iraqiya TV citing a Baghdad security spokesperson. The concrete wall with eight checkpoints is to be completed in mid-2011." Apparently Nouri's one-time hope for a moat around Baghdad is no more.

Reuters notes a Mosul car bombing injured thirteen people and 2 Baghdad sticky bombings injured three people and claimed 1 life.

Surveying the landscape domestically in the US, Chris Hedges concludes "No One Cares" (Information Clearing House):

Liberals, who failed to grasp the dark intentions of the corporate state and its nefarious servants in the Democratic Party, bear some responsibility. But even an enlightened liberal class would have been hard-pressed to battle back against the tawdry emotional carnivals and the political theater that have thrust the nation into collective self-delusion. We were all seduced. And we, along with thousands of innocents in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and beyond, will all be consumed.

No, Chris, it's not that easy. I won't sweet talk it. I'm not going to blame the people but I'll be damned if the Liar Class gets off. The Liar Class like Tom Hayden (who got real bitchy about Chris in 2008 because Chris wouldn't hop on the Obama float) who pretended to give a damn about the Iraq War but dropped it like a hot potato. The Liar Class which includes a large number of WHORES that Chris is praising. CODEPINK? What a laugh. Trina addressed that last night. David Swanson? You mean "KILL HILLARY" David Swanson? You mean the lying sack of s**t who did everything to pimp Barack and now wants to act as if he didn't s**t himself all through 2008?

Not in the mood, not in the damn mood. Jeremy Scahill? Really? We're going with F.S. Scahill? Mr. Scat? We're going with him? The little liar who insisted that the Dem candidates should make a pledge re: Mercenaries. What happened there? Barack refused to (and War Hawk Samantha Power used her questionable wiles on Scahill) but Hillary did promise. So Jeremy savaged Hillary. Yeah. Scahill's a joke and has made himself that.

The liars who got us into the current situation cannot get us out of it. Grow up, Chris. The peace movement's rebuilding and doing so just fine without all the lying whores of 2008. Those people don't need to be let back in. What kind of an idiot would let them back in? We're two years away from a presidential election! Of course those whores want back in so they can try to manipulate the movement again. All of them exposed themselves and none of them are getting back in. It's not up to me. And it's not up to Chris. It is up to the youth of America and speak to any campus and you'll quickly discover those who care about ending the illegal wars are very aware that Tom Hayden whored, that Leslie Cagan whored, that Joan Baez whored, that CODESTINK whored, . . . The list never ends because there are so many of them.

Students take the lead today. World Can't Wait issues the following press release on the actions:
This Tuesday, May 4, 2010 students on high school and college campuses nationwide will take a decisive stand against the war machine.
Estimates are that over 100 campuses will be participating. Autonomous campus clubs and individual activists have been mobilizing with no central organizing committee, in what has been described as a leaderless and spontaneous anti-war resistance.
With so many older anti-war liberals still hypnotized by Obama, students feel it is up to them push the movement full speed ahead.
"Things are really starting to spike," says Nicholas Di Masi, a third year World History major, who earlier this year was struck by Karl Rove's get-away car as students chased the former Bush advisor from UC Santa Barbara's campus. "Today I went to a rally about SB 1070, and for the first time in a while I found myself amongst students who were also passionate about resisting Obama's wars and fighting the police state."

When asked what she thought about students' May 4th resistance, Emma Kaplan of World Can't Wait remarked, "I think the May 4th resistance should be the beginning of putting the government on notice, to send it the message that With or Without You, We Will Stop These Wars. Students need to be part of a sustained movement of protest that doesn't back down, give up, or go away until the powers that be are forced to respond." As a national student coordinator Kaplan observes that "there are some students who are unsatisfied with the world as it is, recognizing that the things they would like to change could never be changed with Obama as president. At the same time, many students have also started to accept crimes under Obama that they would have opposed under Bush."

Some students are beginning to take action into their own hands rather than depending on presidents and politicians. We Are Change, a decentralized peace movement with many student members, has recently come to something of a forefront in this new breed of student activism. "It's up to this generation to carry the anti-establishment spirit of the 60's and 70's to new heights," said one member. "This is the same establishment that dropped atomic bombs and agent orange on unsuspecting women and children, it is the same establishment that now murders innocents in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan. Voting in a new front man for the establishment is clearly not going to change anything." Another member added, "I've found that many students are on the lookout for fearmongering or manufactured crises that could be used by the state to lure us into a war with Iran. Today's students also have the advantage of open communication online, where one person's activism could reach thousands without being spun by mainstream media outlets."

Noor Aljawad, a first year Sociology and Middle East Studies major who plans to join students on the 4th, believes that one of the changes Obama made was to expand Bush's wars. "There is little difference in the foreign policy of democrats and republicans. Like Bush, Obama is a corporatist acting in the interests of oligarchical financiers. May 4th should be a message to Obama that our dissent is going to continue until these imperialistic wars are ended."

Whether it's escalating the wars in Afghanistan and Pakistan, continuing the criminal occupation of Iraq, or working toward an attack on Iran -- many students have had enough with George W. Obama's warmongering. May 4th, 2010 marks the 40th anniversary of the Kent State massacre, when 13 unarmed students were gunned down by the national guard for protesting the Vietnam war. In remembrance of them, we fight on.


This effort is being supported by:

Alan Canfora, Alliance of the Libertarian Left, Angela Keaton, Antiwar.com, Campus Antiwar Network, Cindy Sheehan, Copblock.org, Cop Watch Los Angeles, Diversity of Thought UCSB, James Cox, Mariana Evica, May4.org, SB Anti-War, Students for Justice in Palestine, Students for Liberty, Students for a Voluntary Society, The Love Police, The Peace, Freedom, and Prosperity Movement, Tom Ender, UC Strike, We Are Change, World Can't Wait.


Also in the US, the Senate Democratic Policy Committee continues to highlight the economy and finances in a number of videos this week. Click here to be taken to the DPC video page. We'll note Senator Chris Dodd.




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