Can We See the Links Between Militarism and Eco-Decay?

Handing out flyers to workers at Bath Iron Works with an activist from Jeju Island, South Korea a few years ago.  The warships being built here in Maine are helping lead to the destruction of a 500-year old fishing and farming community in Gangjeong village. 

• I'm back to work and trying not to get stressed over the workload after having been away for the peace walk and then trip to NYC.  Lots of new emails to add to the lists - not my favorite thing to spend time on.  I'd rather read articles and write blog posts.  But that side of my work is important and makes it possible for the whole Global Network operation to fit together.  I can partly thank the Air Force for training me how to administer an organization but most of the credit should go to my mother.  She was highly organized (kept lists of things to do) and trained me how to plan and delegate.  We moved every 2-3 years and with six kids she knew how to make it happen.  She had the skills to run any organization and it is a shame that she lived in a time that did not reward women for their talents.  In many ways she was disillusioned by society and became bitter in her old age.  Having come from parents who both immigrated from Italy she also had to deal with the killing of her culture - at home taught to honor the old ways but at school and everywhere else the message was to fit into the melting pot and join the rat race.  She was torn from the start and had a hard time getting her feet to land in one safe cultural place.  Like often happens to immigrants Gaetana Amelia Ruth DiCapua was dazed and confused.

• Having just come from the Techno-Utopianism conference in NYC I am particularly in tune with the massive global corporate plan to wreck the planet.  One current example is Gangjeong village on Jeju Island.  The Korean government is talking about building two Ramada Hotels in the tiny farming and fishing village.  The Navy also wants more village land for military personnel housing.  The plan is to destroy the entire village.  The people are now in their 8th year of daily active non-violent resistance against the base.  As the word gets out more and more people from all over the world are going to Gangjeong in acts of solidarity.  When people go they learn more than just Navy base protesting - they are also transformed on a spiritual level as the resistance there is grounded in a deep love for nature and the overall web of life.  The Jeju struggle connects all the dots for me: save the environment, stop militarism, protect civil liberties, stop corporate power, and reestablish our spiritual nature to Mother Earth.

Ramada Hotels have their sights on Gangjeong village on Jeju Island.  Sailboats would replace fishing boats and hotels would replace fields for farming.  Where will we get our food if things keep going this way?

• One disappointing aspect of the Techo-Utopianism conference was the fact that other than our one, last of the night, panel on high-tech militarism there was virtually no mention of war and the many Pentagon bootprints around the planet.  I heard only one passing reference to war during the other 20 hours of speakers.  It's hard to figure but appears to be evidence of the fact that people (even leading minds) get stuck in their silos and can't see beyond them.  The friggin war machine controls so much these days - most scientific research and development, Congressional funding priorities, and ultimately a growing segment of the national economy where people have jobs.  Too many environmental groups and leaders avoid the military story and there is a reason for it.  Much of the funding for these kinds of organizations comes from sources that at some level are often linked to the Democratic Party - either as members, donors, or ideological housemates.  The Democrats keep a tight lid on how much one is allowed to speak about our militarized society.  So while I am grateful for having been invited to bring that piece into the puzzle, I was also surprised that as global eco-leaders identify the 'problems' and look for solutions they rarely consider war and war preparations as key elements in any real organizing strategy or even discussion.  I think that is a big mistake.

Notes from the Techo-Utopianism Conference

We are on the train heading north to Maine.  The 22-hour marathon of speeches ended last night at 8:00 pm at the Techno Utopianism conference.  MB and I faithfully sat through all but two hours when we had to take a break.  The mind, and rear end, can only take so much.

I took lots of notes and won't bother writing up a full report.  Instead I think I'll just post some of the more interesting bits that various speakers had to say.  I'll not try to remember which speaker said what - it's the content that counts anyway.  They are in no particular order either.

• Last year Monsanto spent $402 million on public relations marketing their product illusions
• The average American watches 4.5 hours of TV per day and sees 30,000 commercials (that remain in our minds forever) per year
• Land speculation (particularly in the developing world) is the new gold
• The five largest banks hold more than one-half of total banking assets in the U.S.
• A systemic analysis is crucial before successful political action can be taken
• The more environmental desolation we create the more our soul becomes desolate
• Nature is in us - ancient primal wisdom is a part of us
• We living beings are of the metabolism of the universe
• Geo-engineering is a fundamental strategy, and in the U.S. we do not have institutions that are strategic except the military
• Bill Gates is a major funder of geo-engineering research
• Gates' group is led by former Star Wars promoter Lowell Wood (Edward Teller was his mentor)
• Learn more about Strato-Shield
• Right-wing climate deniers now suggest geo-engineering as the way to deal with carbon emissions 
• Unless something goes terribly wrong there won't be any real federal regulation of nano-technology.  The risks are huge but profits are equally enormous
• We don't have technological assessment in our society
• Bio-tech industry claims their GMO products are the solution to our problems
• 70% of the planets fresh water is sucked up by industrial agriculture
• Most genetically engineered crops today are used for bio-fuels to feed cars
• Synthetic biology is extreme genetic engineering and would use DNA codes to produce various food products
• Synthetic biology means a massive change in production that would displace millions of indigenous farmers around the world
• Human genomes would be used to produce certain kinds of people
• The world is turning against GMO products and corporations are having to spend huge amounts of money to campaign against labeling laws
• There are now 300,000 cell towers across the U.S. 
• There are biological effects of electromagnetic radiation from cell phones, Smart Meters, Wifi, and cell towers
• All great movements started with just a few people and only needed about 1% of the population to have success
• Corporate science is secret, not peer reviewed, politically powerful, internationally connected, driven by narrow commercial pursuits, and is out to crush academic science
• We can't write off left-right coalitions especially on issues like surveillance, civil liberties, sacredness of food, and geo-engineering of humans
• 300-400 tons of radioactive water per day pours into the Pacific Ocean from the damaged Fukushima nuclear reactor in Japan
• Conversion of the military industrial complex creates more jobs when we build rail, solar, wind power and the like
• The Pentagon has the largest carbon boot print on the planet
• There has been a 50% decline in world wild life populations in recent years
• War has become like cooking - we like to do it but don't like cleaning up the mess
• We are living on the planet of the Apps!
• We live in a state of perpetual on-line interruption
• The reactionaries are the ones holding up the edifice of corporate capitalism
• Climate chaos
• We need to broadcast suspicion and caution against technology
• Culture is used as a means of social control.  It can also be used as a means of resistance
• What is real?
• Corporations bought up climate data, bought up the land and now want to buy our intelligence
• Higher values don't come from technology, they come from human and ecological values
• GMO's are anti-food because it is killing us
• Globalization can only deal with uniformity, localization is bio-diversity
• We need a global movement to deal with the global problem of a global economy
• We are talking about the 99% waking up to the techno-global juggernaut
• Localization is a systemic shift away from the epidemic of economic empire
• Shift corporate subsidies to support local bio-diversity
• As things become more localized they become more transparent and accessible to the public
• Competition and envy are the end result of the corporate consumer model
• 70% of those who work on farms in the U.S. are not citizens
• When capitalism crumbles the land will remain
• How can young organic farmers, saddled with massive education debt, ever buy the land they farm on?
• Where are we going with all this?
• We have a society so addicted to fossil fuels that we do extreme things to get the oil and natural gas out of the ground
• We've never changed our level of energy consumption
• We need infrastructure for people not for oil companies.  We need decentralized power controlled by us rather than corporations
• A key part of our movement is stopping the bad so the good can replace the destructive system
• The Koch Brothers Industries have more wealth ($100 billion) than Bill Gates does
• Koch Brothers ideological 'freedom' is an extreme form of cancerous capitalism which funds and directs the Tea Party movement
• We have an ego problem that says one progressive organization is better than another.  Our division begins at that level
• After 200 years of industrial capitalism we must continue our resistance against the dehumanizing and planet destroying machinery that is hurtful to community
• Work should be a joyful experience where we give back to nature which gives us our life
• We are on the verge of the inevitable transition from an economy based on new development to one based on restorative development.  Restoring local people to local places.  It is people who need restoring
• Belonging is core
• Our environmental laws don't work because they are based on a flawed concept of dominion over nature rather than community well being
• One way to change the systemic problem of infinite growth on a finite planet is to recognize nature's right to exist
• Nature is not property but a community member with an inherent right to exist
• You can imagine an asteroid hitting the Earth but you can't imagine the end of capitalism.  Why do we imagine that economic ideas from previous centuries are forever relevant?
• Modern civilization is killing us and we have to replace it with something else
• Ecological economics puts the Earth first and humans as one species in a diverse natural system
• Putting economic value first has to end
• Changing our mindset is critical...neo-liberal capitalism has to go
• The constituency for eco-degrowth is very small but it is going to happen
• We need cooperation not competition.  Markets lead people to act selfishly.  Capitalism stimulates the wrong kind of behaviors
• Rewilding the Earth and rewilding ourselves is the way out

Techno-Utopianism at Cooper Union

MB and I are staying at a hotel along Korea Way in New York City.  Yesterday we spent a 12-hours listening to speeches at the Techo-Utopianism & the Fate of the Earth conference inside the Great Hall at Copper Union.

My panel (along with old friends Dr. Helen Caldicott and Gar Smith) was the last of the day beginning at 7:45 pm.  After we finished MB and I took a cab back to Korea Way and went inside an all-night Korean restaurant just across from our hotel and had a beer and steamed dumplings.  Perfect late night snack.

The podium used by all the speakers at the conference was the same one used by Abraham Lincoln when we spoke at Cooper Union in 1860.

Ralph Nader and Bill McKibben spoke just before my panel - it was that kind of a day.  One excellent speaker after the other on the great challenges facing our Mother Earth.  The main point of all the speeches is don't expect technology to bail us out of our current ecological mess - we've got to quit being sold the bill of goods that technology equals progress and should never be questioned. 

Things continue again today until just after 7:00 pm.  MB and I will then have dinner with Global Network board member Alice Slater who is also attending the conference.

We are back on the train to Boston early Monday morning.  I'll have time to write more about the conference then.  It's really been an honor to have been invited to speak along with such leading scholars and activists.

Sunday Song

U.S. Itching for Fight with Moscow

• On the train from Boston to New York City catching up with emails and reading.  All signs are showing that the US-backed regime in Kiev, Ukraine is preparing to relaunch attacks on the eastern part of their nation - the area closest to the Russian border where the citizens have been repeatedly killed by shelling and death squads in recent months.

• So-called liberal US Senator Carl Levin (D-MI) has joined with right-wing fanatic Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK) in calling for Washington to send stockpiles to weapons to the Kiev forces that are increasingly under fascist control.  

• The goal?  Obviously the plan, much like in Libya, Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen, and Somalia, is to create chaos as the precondition for the US-NATO forces to gain control of territory.  In this case the goal is expanding NATO bases into Ukraine and Georgia right on the Russian border.

• Yes indeed one should call it a provocation.  If Russia or China were establishing military outposts in Canada and Mexico the US would be in a rage and would be engaging in direct warfare to remove them.  But when the US reverses the story line and moves military forces near Russia's border it is supposed to be accepted as if nothing at all of significance was happening.

• When the US controlled Russia after the fall of the former Soviet Union all was fine.  Back then Russian leader (and alcoholic) Boris Yeltsin did the bidding of Wall Street and the CIA by turning over Russian economic sovereignty to the west.  Vladimir Putin is not playing along with that game anymore and thus is being demonized in the western media.  It's all quite easy to see if we just open our eyes - the writing is on the wall.  The US war machine is itching for a fight with Moscow - a fight none of us should feel good about.

Extreme Weather Event in India Devastates

Global Network board member J. Narayana Rao sent me these photos and wrote the following:

In your first visit to India you visited Visakhapatnam also. This city is a green city with full of trees every where. But few days back there was a cyclone with wind at 180 KM (112 miles) per hour. Due to this more than 80,000 trees, 6,000 electrical poles were uprooted and blown off, huts and roofs of many houses. After 15 days the electricity and water supply could not be restored to many areas. Not only in Visakhapatnam, the havoc caused in three Districts -  Visakhapatnam, Vizianagaram and Srikakulam. Even now the TV and radio broadcasting could not be restored due to lack of electric supply.

We are going to see more and more of this due to climate change.   India already has massive numbers of people living in poverty and now many more will suffer.

$elling War to the Public

Post by Brave New Films: Security.

It's a well known tactic - create the enemy by funding, training, arming, and directing it.  Then spray the media non-stop with fear.  Next bring in the ice men to sell the deal.  Ba-boom profits rise for the military industrial complex and lands are taken under corporate control. 

It's called freedom - but only for Mr. Big - freedom to rape and pillage.  A modern day Genghis Khan.

This is the Gladio script in action.....

Walking in New Mexico for Corporate Free Election$

Sally Alice Thompson lives in Albuquerque, New Mexico and is 91 years old. She is a veteran and a long-time loyal member of Veterans For Peace.  On several of my trips to speak in her state over the years she drove me around from event to event.

I learned that Sally is now leading a Walk to Get the Money Out of Politics.  She's walking from Albuquerque to the state capital in Santa Fe at the rate of six miles per day.  As you can see in the photo she is drawing a crowd of followers.  She carries a mop with dollar bill$ pinned to it.

Friend Bob Anderson from Stop the War Machine (and Global Network board member) writes:

That woman at 91 has more energy than I do…. she just goes from thing to thing and keeps writing songs for the Raging Grannies.  She has a new one for this to the tune of 'Hit the Road Jack' by Ray Charles.  Hope I live as long and well as her…Thursday 10/23 is day 11 of the Walk. 

Close U.S. Overseas Military Bases

It's election season here - we even have yard signs in our front yard supporting two local candidates.  Last night I watched the Maine U.S. Senate candidates debate: Shenna Bellows (D) up against the three-term incumbant Susan Collins (R).  Collins is called a moderate but she is not.

On the topic of foreign policy Bellows did a nice job on the question of ISIS.  She talked about endless war and the costs back home.  But then later in the debate Bellows was asked in a 'yes-no' round of questioning if she would support the closing of any U.S. military bases.  Much to my surprise and dismay Bellows said 'No'.  Collins responded the same.

How will we ever cut military spending if we don't close bases overseas?  I've seen different numbers on how many there are - somewhere between 800-1,000.  You can pick the right number.

We are witnessing growing domestic conflict at home over the destruction of social progress....the Democrats get that and talk about it.....but they are unwilling to do what it would take to actually solve the problem.  Close the oversea$ military base$.  The Democrats won't touch that issue.  They  essentially say, "We will get South Korea to build us a Navy base on Jeju Island and save money that way." To me the words from Democrats about defending social progress ring hollow.  Another half-measure.  We've had enough of that already.

We are in our long but steady slide back into feudalism.  Except this time we get color TV and a credit card.  Plastic slavery.

Along the peace walk one could see the signs of physical decay and broken spirit.  I think my own transformation can come when I feel and touch those moments....and do what I can to heal the tattered circle.

The State of American Democracy

Journalist Chris Hedge interviews political philosopher Sheldon Wolin, who says democracy requires continuous opposition and vigilance by the citizenry.

How Do We Have a Sustainable Future?

Along the rocky coast of Gangjeong village on Jeju Island, South Korea before the blasting began and concrete was poured to build a Navy base that will be used by the US to target China.  The Koreans are paying for the base as part of the Pentagon strategy to 'off load' the growing costs of American military empire onto the colonized hosts where US forces are deployed.  See an article on this very subject here

• I am back to work in the office catching up on Global Network administrative tasks and preparing for a trip to New York City to speak at a conference called Techno-Utopianism and the Fate of the Earth this coming weekend. Mary Beth is coming along and we'll take the train from Boston to get there.  I am honored to have been invited to speak at this event, organized by Jerry Mander, and look forward to hearing from loads of leading scholars, authors and activists.  My piece of the pie will be to share the story about full spectrum dominance by the US using space warfare technology.  I'll end the talk with another appeal for conversion of the war machine.

• Another memory flash from our peace walk through Maine is a guy (about 40) who was selling apples and cider along a rural road.  He turned out to be a veteran of past US wars and told me, "I'm fucking sick of war."  He gave us a free bag of apples as well.  

• We just have no political power to make our 'majoritarian' peace view a reality in Washington.  So we need to turn to our moral and spiritual power to stand against war.  It's our last best hope.

• Our movements (in most countries) are heavily balkanized, split apart, each working on their own issue and safely guarding their territory (donations, volunteers, media contacts, etc).  It's the business model in action.  Competition even at the grassroots level for 'power' with our natural allies.  It's not the best approach.

• In his book called The Education of Little Tree, author Asa Earl Carter wrote: "Gramma said when you come on something good, first thing to do is share it with whoever you can find; that way the good spreads out where no telling it will go.  Which is right."

• Our only hope for survival on this planet is to end competition now and turn to cooperation as our primary operating ethic.  Only through cooperation can we find a sustainable future.

More Walk Photos

Walking from Saco to Pratt-Whitney

Rosemary from Montana carries the banner

Starr embracing the return of Dud Hendrick

Lunch stop in Kennebunk

Sally Breen calling the local media

The banner returns

VFP members from Massachusetts

The whole gang at the end

Photos by Peter Woodruff

Healing Time

Walking Underneath the Curtain of Censorship

Nipponzan Myohoji monks and nuns drumming and chanting yesterday at Pratt-Whitney F-35 fighter engine facility.  We learned that the company moved to North Berwick in order to get rid of the union at their previous location.  There is still no union at the Berwick weapons plant.

The walking
would not be possible
for me
without the drums
and chanting
Na mu nyo ho renge kyo

I don't often chant
out loud
it comes
and goes
in my mind
as I walk
other thoughts
pass my way
politics
personal issues
my connection
to the natural world
and to all
my relatives

The Nipponzan Myohoji
monks and nuns
are all in
their whole lives
walking for peace
grateful for food
grateful for other walkers
grateful for life

Each step
a statement
we all need to speak up
we need to create community

Our isolation is our defeat
allows the dark forces
to gain and hold power
 
the story of humanity's
long struggle
to be free
is largely unknown
we've lost our griots
storytellers
traditions

the walk is a story
told in many ways
by many people
slipped underneath
the curtain of
censorship
and neglect

Images of the People

The core walkers

One of our best lunch spots during the walk

I am home now after our big finish at Pratt-Whitney in North Berwick.  We walked from the UCC church in Saco where we were hosted last night in a supper of more than 50 people....music by church members, great food, words and music from walkers.  Then this morning the church minister and his staff (about 7 in all) walked nine miles with us.  Walking with us too were a good bunch of Veterans For Peace (VFP) members from Massachusetts so our walking line was impressive - particularly with the white VFP flags. 

As we walked the last two miles to Pratt-Whitney (where they are building the expensive F-35 fighter jet engines) the many cars going by were more supportive than I would have expected so close to a military industrial facility. One local man rode up on his bicycle to join us - he lives next door to the weapons production plant.

The wayward boondoggle at Pratt-Whitney will cost the taxpayers more than $1 trillion (I can't imagine that sum.) 

Overall I feel that Mainers are fed up with war.  They just don't see any way out - they don't trust that the politicians will do a damn thing about it. 

I don't yet have photos from the last two days so pulled out these above from a couple of days ago.  The top picture is of our core walking group. Here are a few other mental images from the walk:

• Don from New Jersey drove a truck for a living and since he retired is doing some peace walks.  His best moments were when he carried our red warning flag ahead of us on country roads and would bow to truckers with hat in hand.  He got us alot of honks.

• We handed out 1,000 flyers along the walk.  It was a working community - people carried signs and helped with the extra walking it took to take flyers to people we passed along the way.  Morgana from Maine was an incredible help in this distribution.  She worked on her fear of rejection in the process and got better at it as we went along.

• Sally from Maine helped host us in Portland and then showed up today in North Berwick for the protest at Pratt-Whitney.  She has been fighting cancer for several years and pushed her walker across the street in front of the weapons plant several times - once stopping the guys in monster trucks as they left work in a hurry during the 3:30 pm shift change.  There is fierce love and determination in this woman who originally hails from the lone star state (Texas).

• It was an honor to have several of the young vets from VFP in Massachusetts who walked with us today.  One read two poems last night at the church in Saco. They say they want to come back next year.

• Music every night helped unite us and inspire us.

• Lots of donations of apples along the way.  Our lunches were simple peanut butter, bread, cheese, and any left overs from the night before.

• Two little girls outside of Saco as we approached town yesterday inspired me with their enthusiasm and love.  It's like they were watching the circus come into town and they were jumping for joy and cheering us on.

• A woman tourist from Montana joined us for two days and threw in like she was part of the family.  She gave a massage to Jun-san the Buddhist nun, handed out flyers on the opposite side of the street in Biddeford, and carried the lead banner for a few miles.  She kept saying, "If I'd only known....."

• The former mayor of Biddeford heard the drumming this morning as we walked past her house and came running out to cheer us on.  A few years ago while mayor she invited our whole walking group into her office to talk politics.

• Many of the faces inside the cars, stopped at traffic lights, who refused to take a flyer still appear in my mind.  They watched us walk by and their mental gears were turning.  I wonder what they were thinking?

• The many honks, cheers, thumbs up, waves, and peace signs from folks driving by was always like a warm mug of cider on a cold night. The largest percentage of them were younger folks.

• If you want to have contact with the people of America trying walking across the highways.  They are in their cars.

• The guys at a hard, dirty job site this morning that I approached as they sat outside at picnic tables during their break time touched my heart.  They looked worn out, poor, forlorn, but took the flyers I offered them and said, "Rangeley to Berwick....that's a long way."  Many people said that to us and I knew they would read the flyer and talk to each other about it....and they would understand.

• Up and down the highway for 125 miles some folks took a ride with us - even for a brief moment - they were swept away in the moving Occupy movement.  It was fun and satisfying.  And I even gained one pound.

Photos by Peter Woodruff

Peace Walk Arrives in Saco

We walked 17 miles today from downtown Portland to Saco where the UCC church will host a pot luck supper and provide home stays for all of us.  Bob Klotz, a leader of Maine 350.org, did the first three miles with us and took this photo. and some others that he posted on Facebook.

Also this morning, just as we were starting from Monument Square in Portland, a woman from Montana saw us and walked two miles with us.  She is in Maine on vacation.  Surprisingly she just turned up at the church here in Saco and is going to walk with us tomorrow.

We are expecting a large group of Veterans For Peace from the Boston area to arrive here this evening.  They plan to join the pot luck supper tonight and walk with us tomorrow as well.  Several others who have walked with us earlier in the week will also come back for the final day.

After the vigil at Pratt Whitney we will be hosted for dinner by our friends Karen Wainberg and Brown Lathem who live in North Berwick.

Sunday Song

 

Oklahoma U.S.A.

Written by: Ray Davies

Lyrics:

All life we work but work is bore,
If life's for livin' what's livin' for,
She lives in a house that's near decay,
Built for the industrial revolution,
But in her dreams she is far away,
In Oklahoma U.S.A.
With Shirley Jones and Gordon McRea,
As she buys her paper at the corner shop,
She's walkin' on the surrey with the fringe on top,
Cos in her dreams she is far away,
In Oklahoma U.S.A.,
She walks to work but she's still in a daze,
She's Rita Hayworth or Doris Day,
And Errol Flynn's gonna take her away,
To Oklahoma U.S.A.,
All life we work but work is a bore,
If life's for livin' then what's livin' for.



Originally written by Ray Davies of the Kinks, this song is performed by the Preservation Hall Jazz Band featuring Clint Maedgen on vocals. Filmed mid-2005, this music video features Clint Maedgen, the Preservation Hall Jazz Band and a guest appearance by the New Orleans Bingo Show.

Peace Walk: Cars, Oil & Endless War

Walking along the road slows everything down.  Today I noticed a bird at the top of a tree on the other side of the road singing as we passed by.  We heard a big pack of dogs at a 'doggie daycare' howling as we went by - they were pleading to come along with us but the chain link fence prevented their act of solidarity.  Four graceful and powerful horses moved in unison as they intently watched us pass them by.  We were hosted for lunch by an organic farm family that gave us fresh tomatoes, peppers, lettuce, melons and a comfortable place to relax under a warm sunny sky.

But the overwhelming thing we have experienced during the walk is the car culture.  Cars and trucks zoom by us and rarely slow down even though we have our red flag waving ahead of the walk.  Everyone is in a hurry and god forbid they have to slow down for fifteen seconds because of this unusual band of people walking along the highway.

Today as I walked I made a point of looking for signs of this dominant car culture that so completely engulfs us.  Here we are in the US with 5% of the world population using 25% of the planet's resources.  We like our cars and we like them big!

Along the way I could see why we are in a constant state of war - because our entire way of life - our economy - our entire identity and being is wrapped up in the car culture.  As I walked I scribbled down the following signs of this addiction to the automobile:

• Car insurance agencies
• Auto detailing shops
• Auto repair shops
• Auto sales dealers
• Auto body shops
• Disabled van renovation shop
• Auto parts stores
• Gas stations
• Truck stops
• Road paving companies
• Drive thru lanes at fast food outlets
• Road crossing guards at schools
• Expensive bridges over rivers

I know I must have missed some but you get the idea.  There is no enterprise in rural or urban Maine that is more pervasive than the automobile related industry.

Most people say they want to end wars though we keep using our cars.  We are all responsible for endless war.

We are killing people all over the world because we 'love our cars' more than we love our planet or the people living on it.

Update:  WERU radio here in Maine covered the walk and you can listen here.  Also the Biddeford Courier ran a nice story here

Video from the Peace Walk

Video by Vietnam veteran Eric Herter from Brunswick. Day six of the walk from Rangeley to North Berwick. This day was from Lewiston to Gray.

NATO Expansion: Chicken or the Egg?

Rear Adm. John Kirby battled with Associated Press reporter Matt Lee at the State Department’s daily press briefing on Thursday. The Pentagon press secretary stated by positioning forces within several kilometers of the Ukrainian border, the Russian army was encroaching on NATO’s “doorstep.” Lee pressed the spokesman on this statement, seeking to clarify whether Ukraine is in fact a member of the Western military alliance, and whether NATO’s eastward expansion over the past 15 years is a factor in the escalating tensions.