Organizing Notes

Bruce Gagnon is coordinator of the Global Network Against Weapons & Nuclear Power in Space. He offers his own reflections on organizing and the state of America's declining empire....

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Location: Brunswick, ME, United States

The collapsing US military & economic empire is making Washington & NATO even more dangerous. US could not beat the Taliban but thinks it can take on China-Russia-Iran...a sign of psychopathology for sure. @BruceKGagnon

Saturday, June 08, 2019

Left out of the party....



A UK summit to mark the 75th anniversary of D-Day on Wednesday included US, Canadian and European leaders, including German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

But Presidents Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin were conspicuously absent, holding their own WWII commemoration event in Moscow, Russia instead.

Former US diplomat Jim Jatras joins Rick Sanchez to discuss. He argues that European states are US satellites and that Washington isn’t used to powers like China and Russia, independent poles who require “respect.”

Sanchez reminds us that the former Soviet Union lost 27 million  people and China 20 million during the WW II fight against fascism.  That historical reality still didn't get them invited to the big party.

Why not?

Friday, June 07, 2019

V-P Pence calls for global war



Idiot Pence declares on Memorial Day at the US Army West Point academy that those graduating this year should expect to serve in wars in the Middle East, on the Korean peninsula and against China, against Russia in Europe and even in 'this hemisphere' likely threatening a US invasion of Venezuela.

Maybe Pence and Trump are planning to put on uniforms and go into battle themselves because so many wars will surely require that virtually every able bodied man and woman in the US will be needed to serve at the more than 800 Pentagon bases around the globe.

It is a fact that America's role under corporate globalization of the world economy is 'security export' so it makes sense that as Washington (along with its military appendage NATO) attempts to control the planet on behalf of western resource extraction corporations they realize that a global war will be necessary to vainly attempt to secure 'full spectrum dominance'.

Anyone left back home had best do two immediate things.  First, plant a big garden to feed yourself because there won't be much of a domestic economy left during such a disastrous global war.  Secondly, be sure to freeze dry the food you grow and get a canoe because the neglected reality of climate catastrophe will mean that you'll need to be paddling for the rest of your remaining life as the sea rises to engulf us.

These psychopaths running this nation are dangerous war criminals - both Republicans and Democrats alike.  

Bruce

Dud Hendrick in Portland on militarism & climate



Maine Veterans For Peace member Dud Hendrick (Deer Isle) made a presentation last night at Portland PechaKuchaNight Summer 2019 on our conversion campaign.

He also promotes the next civil resistance action planned at Bath Iron Works on June 22 beginning at 8:00 am.

The links between expanding US militarism and climate crisis are inescapable to anyone who is playing the slightest attention to our world.

Thursday, June 06, 2019

Talking sense.....



Chris Hedges talks to Howie Hawkins, who has sought elected office through the Green Party, about the history of third parties in the US whose platforms are often coopted by the two-party system while being denied participation in televised debates.

Wednesday, June 05, 2019

Rail is a better idea



China has the world’s fastest and largest high-speed rail network — more than 19,000 miles, the vast majority of which was built in the past decade. Japan’s bullet trains can reach nearly 200 miles per hour and date to the 1960s. They have moved more than 9 billion people without a single passenger causality. casualty France began service of the high-speed TGV train in 1981 and the rest of Europe quickly followed. But the U.S. has no true high-speed trains, aside from sections of Amtrak’s Acela line in the Northeast Corridor. The Acela can reach 150 mph for only 34 miles of its 457-mile span. Its average speed between New York and Boston is about 65 mph. California’s high-speed rail system is under construction, but whether it will ever get completed as intended is uncertain. Watch the video to see why the U.S. continues to fail with high-speed trains, and some companies that are trying to fix that.

Tuesday, June 04, 2019

I want you to act....


Monday, June 03, 2019

Friday peace vigil in Brunswick


Every Friday since 9-11 citizens in Brunswick, Maine have held a peace vigil on the town green at 5:00 pm.  This has been in the summer, fall, winter and spring since 2001.  It's a dedicated group of folks under the name of PeaceWorks.

When MB and I moved to Brunswick in 2003 we of course joined the weekly vigil.  But then we moved to Bath in 2007 and didn't continue attending.  But having moved back to Brunswick again in January of this year enabled us to be out on the street again with these great people.

I can say from personal experience that the public has really come around after all these years.  They honk like crazy these days as they pass by.  It helps that former Navy pilot (and VFP member) Bob Dale (95 years old) holds a 'Honk for Peace' sign.

I'm told that when the vigil first began in September of 2001, calling on the US not to retaliate after the false flag attack on the twin towers in New York City, about 90 people gathered for the vigil each week.  After George W. Bush launched the invasion and never-ending occupation of Afghanistan many of those 90 vigilers stopped coming but the truly determined souls kept the vigil going.

Presently about 8-12 people come each week.


I like to frequently change my sign and lately have been holding three different ones about the US regime change effort in Venezuela.  In the photo at the top you can see the last sign at the end that reads 'No war in Venezuela'.  Despite the non-stop propaganda on mainstream media about Venezuela I'm encouraged by the honks and waves I see in reaction to these signs.  Maybe folks are finally learning after all these years that the US first demonizes, then creates chaos, then attacks and forces regime change.

I just wish they could see the same script now being played out when it comes to Russia as well.

I'm trying to breathe deeply, stay in the moment, and remember these immortal words:

“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed, citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.”
                                                               ~ Margaret Mead

Bruce

Photos by Dan Ellis 

Sunday, June 02, 2019

New Prez in Ukraine - war on Donbass continues....



Two houses sustained damage as a result of shelling on May 29th carried out by the UAF (Ukraine military) on the settlement of Golubovsky, which is a part of front-line Kirovsk.

The president of Ukraine, Volodímir Zelensky, in his meeting with the US Senator Robert Portman (R-Ohio) declared that his country is waging two wars, one against Russia and the other against corruption, reports the official website of the president.

How does Ukraine dream they can actually beat Russia?  And why?

So there is a new president in Ukraine (who won by a huge margin of 70-some percent). During his campaign he indicated that the war should end.  But words are cheap - results matter.

It's obvious to me that the US wants to continue the destabilization and chaos along the Russian border in eastern Ukraine.  Thus the Ukrainian troops (funded, armed, trained, directed by US-NATO) continue their attacks on the innocent civilians.  These are war crimes but who in the west cares to notice?

I found this video on The Saker and below are some comments by folks on the page:

  • Did people really believe that Zelensky [new president] stood for peace? Really? That one doesn’t even need hindsight. So long as they are infested with Nazis, Oligarchs, and foreign powers like US, Canada, UK, and extremist volunteers from there and the Baltics… Did they suddenly leave? Nothing will change yet.

  • Once Germany puts its house in order (Rhineland, Sudetenland, Austria, Danzig etc) Hitler will be ready for peace.

  • People voted not for Zelensky but against Poroshenko [old president] & C. (both inside and abroad), and the politics and results of that. He (Zelensky), willing or not, is trapped to continue as before, so massively deluding the biggest part the population. This is good, however, since, in the end, will mean the disintegration of the artificial territory that is actually called (U)kraine and the freedom and well being for the great part of the peoples living there.

  • First Zelensky has to put his house in order, and then he may be able – if he really means it- to stand for peace. But I do not have a great hope…
Bruce

Sunday song





Look Through Any Doorway

Written by: Dave Davies (The Kinks)

Look through any doorway,
Each life will tell it's story.
See the joy and heartbreak,
For all the world to see.

She's on the city streets,
On her face is desolation.
Just a kid from out of town,
In the land of hope and glory.

Look through any doorway,
Each life will tell it's story.
See the joy and heartbreak,
For all the world to see.
Open up your heart.

Open up the highway,
The road will stretch before you,
For there will be a new day,
Where love will show the way.
Only shadows of the world we left behind,
Open up your heart,
Many shadows of the past, so don't look back.

Look at the wars,
A part of greed affects us all
There's a better way, despite what they do or say,
People of the world.

Look through any doorway,
Tell me what you see.
Open up your heartache,
And love will show the way.

Searching for the way,
Through all the doubt and sorrow.
Days turn into years,
But we'll build a new tomorrow.

Look through any doorway,
Each life will bear its treasure.
Open up your heartache,
And love will show the way.

All the shadows of the world we left behind,
Open up your heart.
Many shadows of the past, so don't look back,
Open up your heart.
Open up your heart.
Look through any doorway,
Tell me what you see.
Look through any doorway.