VOICES FROM ISRAEL

"I refuse to take part in the war crimes committed by my country. Violence will not bring any kind of solution, and I shall not commit violence, come what may."

Omer Goldman, age 19, Tel Aviv

First Prison Sentence: 22nd Sept. - 10th Oct. 2008 (18 days)
Second Prison Sentence: 12th - 24th Oct. 2008 (10 days)

Omer Goldman, has had to confront the values of her own family. She is the daughter of the former deputy head of Mossad, the Israeli intelligence service and who is still considered one of the most powerful men in the Israeli security system. Omer, without her fathers permission visited a Palestinian town in the West Bank and at a check-point, alongside Palestinians, her supposed enemies, was fired upon by Israeli soldiers

TALK ABOUT HOT

* Climate change activist Ted Glick was sentenced in Washington DC yesterday to $1,100 fine, one year probation, and 40 hour community service for helping to drop two banners (Green Jobs Now and Get to Work) in a U.S. Senate office building. In his statement Ted talked about the escalating reality of global warming.

I’ll begin with a quote from a March 4th, 2010 press release from the U.S. National Science Foundation. It concerns the emission of methane, a greenhouse gas 70 times as strong as carbon dioxide over the first 20 years after it is released into the atmosphere. This release begins:

“A section of the Arctic Ocean seafloor that holds vast stores of frozen methane is showing signs of instability and widespread venting of the powerful greenhouse gas, according to the findings of an international research team. . .

“The research results show that the permafrost under the East Siberian Arctic Shelf, long thought to be an impermeable barrier sealing in methane, is perforated and is starting to leak large amounts of methane into the atmosphere. Release of even a fraction of the methane stored in the shelf could trigger abrupt climate warming.”

This melting of frozen methane on the sea floor is one of several climate tipping points that scientists have long identified as of great concern. The others are: the release of methane frozen in the permafrost in the earth’s northern latitudes, the accelerated melting of the Greenland and West Antarctica ice sheets such that sea level rise would be much more rapid than currently expected, and the drying out of the Amazon rain forest because of drought and the release of much of the estimated 120 billion tons of carbon sequestered there.

What is a climate tipping point? It’s a point at which there has been so much heating up of the atmosphere that we experience drastic and runaway heating with truly catastrophic implications for the whole world, especially for the poor people of the world who are most vulnerable to respiratory diseases, heat stress, droughts, floods, major storms, water scarcity and disruption of agriculture.

* In the meantime, instead of dealing with these harsh environmental realities facing us, most governments continue on their break-neck pace of militarization. It appears to me that they are accepting the coming climate change and marshaling their forces to be in competition for declining resources like water and oil. This alarming trend, unless interrupted by coordinated global citizen activism, will certainly ensure fight-to-the-death scenarios all over the planet.

Instead our governments should be taking frantic and coordinated international efforts to reshape our fossil-fuel dependent economies. This can only be done by converting the military industrial complex. I am still astounded that most key environmental groups are not articulating this absolutely obvious strategy for survival. But then I shouldn't be surprised, many peace groups are not either.

* Russia is again sounding the alarm about U.S. deployments of "missile offense" systems in Poland. On July 3, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and her Polish counterpart signed amendments to the Bush-initiated agreement on these deployments which will be about 35 miles from the Kaliningrad, Russia border. "We are convinced that neither presently nor in future there were missile threats to justify that an anti-missile defense system must be deployed near Russian borders," a Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman said on Tuesday.

This deployment agreement indicates Obama's priority. Despite his lip service to dealing with climate change he is continuing the military encirclement of Russia and China. And sadly, the Democrats in Congress follow him over the cliff like lemmings.

* There are quite a few articles appearing in various Washington political journals saying that the Democrats will likely take a severe beating in the House of Representatives during the November elections. This is largely because the Dems "base" is highly disillusioned by Obama and their party leadership's strategy of saying one thing but doing another. The base is going to stay home or look for alternative candidates. At the same time the Republicans are getting their base fired up and organized. Expect some last minute "show boat" attempts by the Dems to reel their base back to the voting booth but it will be too little and far too late.

* On the plus side my tomato plants like the heat. They are doing quite well. But I'd rather have the usual cool Maine summers than this stifling heat.

TRYING TO BRING THE KINKS BACK ONE MORE TIME

Do It Again Film Reviews from Geoff Edgers on Vimeo.

They said no one could get The Kinks back together.
But that isn’t stopping one man from trying.

I am going to see this film on Saturday night in Waterville, Maine at the annual film festival.

ICELAND FIGHTS THE BANKSTERS

Very interesting story about how the banksters took Iceland down and how the people there are now fighting to take back control of their banking system. This was an early test of the banksters operation to take the global economy to its knees so they could steal the savings of people all over the world.

Let the banks fail......stop bailing them out.

PARADE IN BATH

Thirty-five of us made up the PeaceWorks group in the Bath, Maine July 4 parade yesterday. I was the one inside the huge puppet in the top photo. It was hot inside it but I had a great time.

Thousands of people lined the more than mile-long parade route and we got a generally good response from folks. Behind the Bring Our War $$ Home banner were a series of signs that said things like: Child care; Public transit; Affordable housing; Health care; Schools & teachers; Solar power; Wind turbines; Clean environment; Roads, Bridges & Snow plows; and other such messages giving people a glimpse at our vision for life after we stop wasting our money on war.

At the end of the parade, as we all gathered, our Congresswoman Chellie Pingree marched by and we all yelled congratulations to her for her good votes the other day on the war spending supplemental in the House of Representatives. So it was good for her to see us still out there working the issue and that we are committed to staying on the case.

Climate change is indeed real as yesterday and today it is about 90 degrees Fahrenheit here. The usual Maine weather of sunny and cool summers seems to be a fading memory. When we first moved here in 2003 we only used a fan once that first summer. Now we use them almost every day.

All the more reason that we need to end the wars and convert the military industrial complex to peaceful and sustainable production.

THE BIG PICTURE

Fascinating animated overview of our economic "troubles"......radical sociologist David Harvey asks if it is time to look beyond capitalism towards a new social order that would allow us to live within a system that really could be responsible, just, and humane?

TEA BAGGER ANTHEM

By Emma's Revolution - they will be singing at the Veterans for Peace convention ending march and rally in Portland, Maine on Sunday, August 29 from 9am til noon.

OP-ED IN LOCAL PAPER TODAY

Gangjeong villagers trying to protect the water, the fish, the coral, the rocks, and their farmlands

As you see the Gangjeong coast today
The so-called "vision" for the Gangjeong village

Times Record Opinion Page (Brunswick, Maine)
By Bruce K. Gagnon
Friday, July 2, 2010

I have recently returned from a weeklong trip to South Korea, where I visited several communities that are experiencing major expansion of U.S. military bases. Several farming and fishing villages, each more than 400 years old, are either being completely destroyed or severely impacted as their lands are taken for the enlargement of U.S. bases.

The Washington Post reported several years ago that the U.S. would be doubling its military presence in the Asian-Pacific region in order to “manage” China. Thus we now see U.S. base expansion on Guam, Okinawa and in South Korea.

One such case is the small Gangjeong fishing village on Jeju Island in South Korea. The South Korean Navy is ostensibly building this base, but when members of our organization called the South Korean Embassy in Washington, D.C., to support the opposition to the base by local residents they were told, “Don’t call us, call your own [U.S.] government. They are pushing us to build this base.”

The U.S. wants to deploy Aegis destroyers, built here at Bath Iron Works, at the base on Jeju Island largely because of its strategic proximity to China. China imports 80 percent of its oil on ships and a Navy base on Jeju would help give the U.S. ability to “control” this vital shipping lane in the Yellow Sea. While the declining U.S. economy can’t compete with China anymore, the Pentagon is embarking on a strategy that says if we can control access to declining supplies of oil then we will still hold the keys to the global economic engine.

A very provocative strategy indeed.

Gangjeong village is famous for growing tangerines and for its fishing and soft coral reefs. UNESCO has named the sea coast there as one of the world’s environmental jewels. The building of a Navy base in Gangjeong, to serve as a port for the growing U.S. Aegis destroyer fleet, will require dredging of the sea bed and destruction of the coral.

Gangjeong’s rocky coast reminds me much of Pemaquid Point here in Maine. The Navy plans to completely cover the rocks, now full of aquatic life, with cement in order to build docks for the ships.

The village of 2,000 people held a referendum where 94 percent of the residents voted against the Navy base. Sadly, though, the right-wing South Korean government is moving forward with plans for the Navy base construction, carrying out the will of the U.S. Navy. Already more than 50 of the residents have been arrested for their nonviolent sit-ins as they attempted to block construction equipment from beginning work.

Next month Gangjeong residents will do their third weeklong pilgrimage around the entire Jeju Island in order to plead with their government to cancel plans for the Navy base. They are doing all they can to protect their fishing and farming culture. They talk about the need for someone to fight for the water, the coral, the fish, and their lands.

The Maine Veterans for Peace recently held another protest at the latest “christening” of an Aegis destroyer at BIW. Few in our state think about where these ships go once they leave Maine’s waters.

But I have now seen one community in South Korea that does not want these ships to come there. Gangjeong’s mayor told our visiting international delegation that “Jeju Island is at a crossroads — either eco-friendly or militarized.” When he said that, I wondered how Mainers would feel if the Navy wanted to pour concrete on the rocks at Pemaquid Point? I bet Mainers would fight to the bitter end.

That is what the villagers in Gangjeong intend to do.

Bruce K. Gagnon is the coordinator of Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space. He lives in Bath.

DEMOCRATS RAZZLE-DAZZLE PASSES WAR $$ SUPPLEMENTAL

I watched several hours of the "debate" and voting on the war $$ supplemental bill early last evening. To say it was a convoluted process would be an understatement.

Activist David Swanson blogged throughout the vote and this morning sent around a good piece trying to explain the maze of votes that Democratic party leadership constructed in order to ensure passage of the war bill.

"Congress has long tended to pass unrelated measures in combination with war bills, and usually some of these measures, such as funding schools, jobs, veterans care, or disaster relief, provide excuses for some "anti-war" Democrats to vote for the war funding. But including good things with war bills can lead the Republicans to vote No. When they all do that, as they did last June, no more than about 40 Democrats can vote No or the bill fails. Last June, the leadership and the White House were able to threaten and bribe enough Democrats to vote yes on a bill that funded both war and an IMF banker bailout. Only 32 Democrats voted No. On Thursday the House leadership couldn't do that because over 40 Democrats refused to be bought off. In fact, at least 51, and reportedly 80 to 90 had committed to voting No.

"In theory, this should have resulted in separating the pig of war funding from the lipstick of domestic spending. Both would then, in theory, have easily passed the House as separate bills, with the domestic spending facing an uncertain fate in the Senate as long as the leadership over there keeps the filibuster rule in place. It would also have forced the Democratic leadership to pass the war funding with more Republican votes than Democratic.

"But that's not what happened. Instead the Democratic Leadership produced something called a self-executing rule. Typically, the House will vote on a rule for how a bill will be voted on, vote on amendments if the rule permits any, and then vote on the bill. In this self-executing rule, the bill was to be considered passed if at least one amendment to it was approved. Otherwise it was to be considered dead. Either way, there would be no vote on the bill. There was, however, a vote on the rule. But here's the catch: it isn't considered polite and appropriate to vote against a rule, and Americans are not expected to notice how anyone votes on a rule. It's not a bill, but a procedural matter -- never mind if the procedure is to pass war funding without another vote.

"In the end 38 Democrats, including very few progressives, voted No on the rule, which passed 215 to 210. That's suspiciously close, and suggests that the leadership permitted those votes but no more."

According to the Washington Post:

"And before they approved the war funding, a block of Democrats insisted on holding votes on a series of measures to show their disapproval of the war.

"One hundred fifty-three House Democrats and nine Republicans voted for an amendment, sponsored by Rep. Jim McGovern (D-Mass.), that would require Obama to present a plan by next April for the 'safe, orderly and expeditious redeployment of U.S. troops' and allow a vote in Congress to stop additional war funding if withdrawal does not start by next July, the time administration officials have said they will start reducing forces in Afghanistan.

"Ninety-three Democrats, along with seven Republicans, backed an even more restrictive amendment from Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.) that would allow the war funds to be spent only on withdrawing troops from Afghanistan."

Neither of those anti-war amendments passed because many Democrats and Republicans joined together to defeat them.

Here in Maine our two members of the House of Representatives voted against the war funding bill (and the rule) which is a big victory for our Bring Our War $$ Home campaign.

But we still have much work to do. We have two Republican senators in Maine and have to work on them next. But first we must convince our two Democrat members of the House that they must take an active leadership role in further educating Mainers about the costs of war to our state. They could play a key part in helping move the public consciousness to the point that our Republican senators must move against further war spending.

We either work together to make this happen or it goes no where. One good vote does not end an expensive and immoral war. Cooperation, good planning, and hard work is the only way out of Iraq-Afghanistan-Pakistan. The sooner we get started the better.

GOOD WORDS FROM ORLANDO

Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Orlando, Florida) makes a brilliant presentation about the true costs of war spending.

It's hard to believe that the Republican bastion in muggy Central Florida has elected such a strong peace advocate but it is delightful to see.

I lived there for 20 years and can only imagine how much things are changing politically. It's the big growth that did it, with all the folks coming there looking for work in the "Magic Kingdom" it was bound the change the local politics. Maybe Orlando becomes a great working class cauldron of discontent - it's possible because of all the low-wage tourism industry workers that are hanging on by a thread.

It's obvious those are the folks that Grayson is speaking to and for.

IT'S THE BIG ONE

STAND UP FOR SOMETHING!

* The video just below this blog post really got to me. I did not realize they were burning the oil slicks offshore to this extent. The man who made the video asks, why aren't they out there with big tankers sucking this oil out of the ocean? It's likely a matter of $$$, always cheaper to do it the easy way. To hell with the consequences.

* One of my younger sisters called me the other day and was venting about the Gulf. She's lived in Florida for most of her life. At one point though she started getting into a bit about how we were all going to die, nothing could be done, etc. I've been hearing more of that talk lately and I can't stand the sound of that tune. Years ago I remember showing an anti-nuclear weapons film at a senior citizens center in Florida and some of them were saying the same thing. "Oh, we are going to die soon anyway, the world is screwed." That kind of crap. I remember telling them that "Hey, you have children and grandchildren. You still have life in you, stand up and fight for the future generations." I told my sister the same thing. Who the hell do we think we are, that after thousands of years of human life on this planet, that we think we can just arrogantly give up the ghost? Burns my britches.

We have a responsibility to protect the future generations and to protect our relatives in the plant and animal world. We made this mess and now we have to deal with it. Stand up and fight for something! Fight for life!

* Yesterday I taped by public access TV show with Maine Veterans for Peace (VFP) leader Tom Sturtevant. We talked about the August 25-29 national VFP convention that will be held in Portland, Maine. Tom is a Korean War veteran so we also talked about his experiences on an aircraft carrier during the war as the planes took off and bombed virtually every building in North Korea. We also went into some of the history of U.S. support for a series of right-wing (fascist) dictatorships in South Korea following the Korean War. It was good to be able to air some of these issues after having just returned from Korea.

* Then last night co-host Peter Woodruff and I did our weekly radio show on WBOR at Bowdoin College in Brunswick. We covered the oil disaster (Peter has found some great music on the Internet that has been written since it happened); we talked about Jeju Island and the Aegis destroyer deployments planned there at the proposed Navy base; we went over the expected House of Representatives vote today on another $37 billion war supplemental; the upcoming Veterans for Peace convention; and we concluded with coverage of the G20 police violence in Toronto. A packed show it was. One of our better ones I think.

* This Sunday will be the annual July 4 parade here in Bath. I am told it is the biggest in the state - thousands come to watch it. Our local peace group (PeaceWorks) always participates and this year we are making a much bigger effort to get folks to join us to help carry two big puppets, big banners, and signs. We will be holding the Bring Our War $$ Home banner and making signs with symbols of things we want to fund - education, health care, food, public transit, wind turbines, etc.

The Navy is having the entire crew of the USS Maine Trident nuclear submarine in the parade in order to promote the joys of a nuclear weapons delivery system. We are calling on all available Mainers to join us in Bath at noon for the parade. Stand up and be counted for peace!

THE REAL STORY FROM THE GULF OF MEXICO

Absolutely shocking video from airplane of fires burning off the oil slicks in the Gulf of Mexico. Forget the Clean Air Act. This is all about illusion, burning the oil miles from shore to create the impression that all is well on the beaches but in actuality our air becomes toxified.

Obama is allowing this to happen.

The hands along the beach movement needs to expand its message to include all the consequences of drill-baby-drill. And while doing this they should also talk more about creating energy alternatives and the need to convert the military industrial complex so that we have to $$$ to do the most needed jobs.