The Morning After

By Cindy Sheehan

As I sit sipping my morning cup of coffee and reflect on the anti-war protests sponsored by the Oct27 coalition (where I saw some good collaboration between UFPJ and ANSWER---at least in San Francisco---yea!), I have a few thoughts.

Yesterday, tens of thousands of activists from around Northern California, Northern Nevada and some from Southern Oregon attended the rally in my new hometown, San Francisco. Despite weather in the Eastern part of the country, I hear that the rallies all over the rest of the country were extremely well attended and the energy was high.

The throngs of humanity in San Francisco stretched out between the Civic Center to Dolores Park in a line that was over two miles long and it took over an hour for the last marcher to reach the endpoint. However, what does this all mean?

We have marched. We have done sit-ins in Congress Reps offices all over the country. We have written letters, emails and sent faxes. Some of us have camped in ditches in Central Texas for weeks at a time. CODEPINK is doing a marvelous job of keeping the pressure on in DC. We have had countless numbers of rallies, teach-ins and candlelight vigils, but the occupation is continuing and people are still dying and are forced from their homes by the ongoing and unremitting violence.

In November of 2006, the peace movement scored a major coup but we later discovered that the Democrats had only used our vibrant, angry and deeply committed movement to regain both Houses of Congress. Some of us erroneously thought that we could relax a little and allow the 110th Congress to take some of the slack from us hard-working activists to end the war and hold BushCo accountable. After all, that’s what we pay them for, isn’t it? I, and my organization, was roundly criticized by many people for going to Congress in January to demand that the Dems do the job we elected them to do. “Give them a chance.” “Shut the f**k up.” These and harsher epithets were hurled at us. I understand, because we wanted to relax, too. In November, we were as shocked as everyone else was, though, when Nancy and Harry (Bush Enablers Number One and Two) took impeachment “off the table.” We knew there would be no rest for the weary with this Congress, and, unfortunately, I think we have been vindicated…very regrettably for democracy around the world.

Where do we go from here?

George has asked Congress for 45 billion (to add to the 200 billion Congress already handed him) more Chinese lent dollars for 2008 to sustain his bloody occupations and Congress will unconditionally yield to his request because they are puppets of the Supreme Puppet. Coincidentally, this will keep the bloody mess going until the ’08 elections where the Dems can point their blood-stained fingers at the Repugs not even realizing that we are not buying that load of crap anymore. Both parties are culpable; both parties are supporting war crimes; both parties must be held accountable. We need to run Peace Candidates against the Bush Enablers and we need to support the Peace Candidates we already have like Dennis Kucinich that are floundering on the decks of the USS Main Stream Media.

The peace movement must also be held accountable. We wrangle for a limited amount of funds and guard our “listservs” jealously and fiercely. It is way past time that the peace movement share resources, gifts and talents to force the established elite in DC to do our will. We are the moral majority in this country; we are in the right; we need to work together to funnel and focus our energies. So many times we are on parallel paths going the same direction but rarely walking together towards our common goals. We can be sure that the Corporatocracy is walking lock-step toward their goal of US global hegemonly which is neither peaceful nor benevolent.

In March of ’08 we will be mourning the 5th anniversary of a “war” that was going to take six months (Donald Rumsfeld), 50 billion dollars (Paul Wolfowitz) and zero American lives (George Bush). Obviously, this is unacceptable. The Camp Casey Peace Institute is calling for a Peace Summit in San Francisco on the weekend of Martin Luther King, Jr’s birthday to bring the leaders of the movement together so we can find ways to support each other to our common goals of peace, sustainability and accountability and to plan for relevant and effective actions all around the 5th anniversary.

With US aircraft carrier groups in the Persian Gulf and Turkish forces poised on the border of Kurdistan, if there ever was a time to put differences aside and celebrate similarities, as BushCo in tandem with Congress, Inc has brought our world to the brink of World War III, it is now.

Cindy@CindyforCongress.org