What I Do

By Leslie Harris

We met up at Ferris Plaza for a rally, before heading over to the Hyatt Regency, where Cheney was to speak at the World Affairs Council.

Several people got tickets to the luncheon, including Fort Worth Code Pinker Doreen Geiger, who interrupted and was escorted out, wearing her Texans for Peace "Out of Iraq" t-shirt.

This article was AP, so it should go out to lots of other venues.

The media is focused on the peace movement after Desiree Fairooz of CODEPINK confronted Condoleeza Rice in the Senate on Wednesday. Desiree, her hands stained red with faux "blood," accused Rice of having the blood of thousands of Iraqis on her hands.

The Bush administration has murdered and maimed hundreds of thousands of innocent people in our name. We've all been bloodied by it!!

Tomorrow, on October 27th, I'm marching for peace with red "blood-stained" hands. Until this war is over and these murders are stopped, I, as an American, am culpable, too.

Yesterday, being the 3rd Friday of the month,was Iraq moratorium. Of course, World Can't Wait has their wear ORANGE every Friday. I hope that all reading did something yesterday!

We went to stand in a very busy intersection during afternoon "drive time." Not just any intersection, this one is in a very heavily populated military area. To be fair, it is also a beachy, trendy, ecclectic area as well.

Several months ago, it was learned that Congressman Duncan Hunter had pulled strings and prevailed upon the County Board of Supervisors to consider a mercenary training camp in San Diego's pristine east county area. This was done without any public scrutiny. Objectioins were raised and it was discovered that the area in question was not in Hunter's district at all, but in Congressman Bob Filner's.

On Thursday, the corporate media turned out in impressive numbers to cover the pro-justice march in Jena, Louisiana. But last Saturday, just five days before, that same corporate media barely addressed the anti-war march in Washington DC.

Personally, I'm thrilled the mainstream corporate media covered Jena, but I'm not delusional as to WHY:

For the Bush-crony corporate media, which owns profitable "defense" industry businesses and serves the military industrial complex in myriad ways, the march in Jena was viable to promote. It served the interests of both the Bush administration and American media corporations by providing a global view of Bush's exportable democracy. Unlike the anti-war movement that directly targets George Bush and Dick Cheney, the Jena march targeted local officials and local injustice. It never mentioned George W. Bush or his administration. Thus, the Jena march was covered and the anti-war march was not.

Furthermore, if Bush put a media kibosh on the Jena march the way he does on anti-war marches, he would ensure an even greater divide between Black Americans, the Republican party and his administration. Activists know the success of public demonstration is judged by the attention it gets. If the Jena march generates media attention, the march is deemed a success. If the Republicans and George Bush want to keep any faith with Black Americans, they had better let the media do its work.

BY SUSAN ROBERTSON

Week 10 report:

* At least 37 people attended today's rally. 3 of our 4 corners were barricaded, but did that stop us? OF COURSE NOT! They were useful! Please see attached photo! (More photos to come)

* We are SO LUCKY! The "World's Greatest Signmaker, Peter, the Freeway Blogger, sent a bunch of his most excellent signs with Linda, the "World's Greatest Video maker!" So we looked even better than usual! We even had more signs than people, for a change! Check Peter's photos out at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/87444429@N00/

By Kevin Martin

While visiting her sister in Cheboygan, Michigan, Barbara Cummings of San Diego joined the local peace movement
at the biggest event in Northern Michigan. Every year tens of thousands of people arrive in two small tourist towns.
On the north side of the Straits of Mackinac (in the upper peninsula of Michigan), in St.Ignace, and on the south side of the straits in Mackinaw City (in the lower peninsula). They gather to walk the Mighty Mack Bridge which spans the straits,
which separate the two Michigan peninsulas. This is THE annual Labor Day event.

This year the estimate is 57,000 persons walked the five mile span from St.Ignace to Mackinaw City. Barbara and her sister,
Karen Martin of Cheboygan were in the first wave of walkers, following close behind the Governor Granholm group.

At the end of the walk were members of several Northern Michigan Peace groups. They were there to protest the war in Iraq, and to show desire for IMPEACHING the criminals in the White House. In the photo is Barbara Cummings getting a "high five" from one of the 57,000 walkers.

In addition to hundreds of thumbs up, peace signs, "thanks", and "wooos" some of the specific comments included:
"Impeach Bush, torture Cheney", "Impeach Bush then hang him at the White House", "you people can't handle prosperity",
"drop the BIG one", "shot 'em all", "I fought for your rights to do this, and I'd take them away in a minute if I could", "you're gonna end up wearing a burka" and in addition several of the National Guardsmen, present for security, whispered to Barbara "love your shirt, and the message" (Barbara wore her Impeach Bush-Cheney shirt).

Last Thursday, a rumor was heard that KLSD 1360, the only progressive, talk radio staion would be flipped to a sports format in the very near future. San Diego already has 2 sports stations, 4 very conservative stations, and a couple of Christain stations.

Clear Channel owns KLSD. Clear Channel has already flipped several progressive cities in the last couple of years. Only 2 cities, Phoenix and Madison have saved their stations. We are determined to save our station.

Lynda Hernandez reports:

Huntington Beach, CA - our efforts continue to encourage the Huntington Beach City Council to add a City Impeachment Resolution to the agenda. We have held two impeachment rallies and have presented to the H.B. City Council twice during the public comment period. We continue to gather signatures and plan to return for a third time to the City Council chambers. One of the Council members must be willing to sponsor before it can be added to the agenda. This is one of the most conservative cities in CA if not the U.S.; passage here would make a profound effect on other cities. Our work in Huntington Beach is spreading from Laguna Beach and moving into Santa Ana, Anaheim and other Orange County cities. www.ocimpeachmentsite.org

There will be a live show at www.kpfa.org on from 7-8pm Pacific time this Friday, August 24. The theme of the show is "Solutions For Peace," and the main solution is impeachment. There will be a short version of the interview I did with David Swanson included in the show. The LONG version will be posted at www.kpfa.org/impeach at that time.

cellphone photo by Carol Huhs

Report by Anne Pritchett and Carol Huhs

In case you haven't heard, last night Kansas Representative Dennis Moore and Kansas Senator Pat Roberts met for a little "kaffeeklatch" at Johnson County Community College (JCCC) near Kansas City, Kansas. It was an attempt at bipartisanship - - a blue dog Dem talking with a Repub - - trying to make all the problems go away. They sat and talked about nothing for about an hour and a half. They took questions from the audience that were written on postcards and screened by the evening's moderator - - who made sure that all questions asked of the gentlemen in public were totally inane. You all know the view of the American public on the war - - an overwhelming majority want it OVER - - and there was NOT ONE WORD mentioned about the w-a-r.

Well, about 9pm as they were wrapping up, there was a sudden unveiling of the truth! The audience heard a "thud-thud-thud" and turned around to find to the dismay of Moore and Roberts, no doubt, a HUGE banner which you will see in the pictures.

Kaedden [last name unknown], an employee of JCCC, willingly "fell on his sword," as activist David Quinly put it. He knew he would be fired from his job working for the theater at JCCC, but still climbed up on the catwalk to push the banner out so everyone could see it. He was taken to the Security office and questioned for about an hour. David asked him later if he had been water-boarded or otherwise tortured. Kaedden wasn't sure if they would press charges of any type. He said that the college threatened to "ban" him from the campus. We were ready to post bail!

Hopefully, this may help to open some folks' eyes.

By Vastleft, http://www.correntewire.com/lets_active

I recently spoke with Mimi Evans, a New York-based progressive activist whose day job is raising money for non-profits.

She’s so passionate and articulate about the peace and impeachment movements that I wouldn’t have felt right about chopping her comments into textbites. So, this runs somewhat longer than I usually post.

Here, she introduces herself:

By Anne Pritchett

I am a teacher and have been trained to remember the power of a visual message. You can tell someone something over and over but real learning takes place when you show them. So I try to be visual in spreading a message.

I have this friend named Barbara Cummings. (Hi Barb!!) She sells IMPEACH t-shirts. I have bought 2 black shirts from her, a green, 2 pink, a (gorgeous) lime green and a blue. I have a variety of short sleeved, long sleeved and sleeveless IMPEACH shirts. So regardless of the weather, I have an IMPEACH shirt to wear. I also have an ARREST BUSH and ARREST CHENEY FIRST.

By Barbara Cummings

I began calling radio programs a few years ago. Even tried the Limbaugh show a few times which was a bit stressful the first time. It gets easier and if you are prepared, it can be rewarding and fun. No, really.

In the summer of 2004 I was recruiting people to canvass and call for John Kerry. He was not my guy, probably not yours either, but he was what we had. There are never enough volunteers it seems and we were looking for people to go to Yuma AZ to register voters. Have you been to Yuma? The Padres baseball team had spring training there. Spring training, not when it reaches 117 during the day in the summer.

I protested the war before the war. My family thought I was crazy when I predicted what would happen in Afganistan. Who remembers all the big promises that were made to the Afghani people? We would rebuild that which we destroyed. We would provide alternative crops to replace poppies. We would keep the civilinas safe from the Taliban.

It was around that time that friends and family started taking sides. It was so bad that long time friends stopped speaking to one another. I got the idea to seek out 3 new people a day to talk to. Every human encounter was fertile ground; picking up grands at pre-school, store, vet, neighbors, lines of any kind.

My mother always told me "No good deed goes unpunished!" So, never listening to my mom, I thought she was nuts. As I grew older, and wiser, I realized she was right! So here I am, a crazy activist, doing my best to end the war and get Bush and Cheney impeached.

I thought it would be a great idea to show the Eyes Wide Open Exhibit at the National Night Out Against Crime in Staten Island. Check out their website: http://www.nationaltownwatch.org/nno/history.html