Matthis Chiroux Openly Resists in DC

Matthis Chiroux delivered this speech today, Father's Day, the day he was ordered to report from the IRR for deployment to Iraq. Instead, he is openly resisting from the IVAW house in DC. We are giving him sanctuary here and will assist him in physically resisting if necessary. Should any military or law enforcement personnel come here, to MY house, they will not be welcome, nor will they find removing him from the premises to be physically tenable.

Matthis Chiroux:

We gather here this Father’s Day on a very somber note.

The American occupation of Iraq, an illegal, immoral war which is ripping this nation apart, as well causing immeasurable harm to the Iraqi people and the people of the world alike.

We gather in remembrance of the sacrifice of many whose Fathers’ weep on this joyous day, for they know their own flesh and blood has been torn and siphoned from them for what we collectively hope will be this last blunder of American military might.

We gather here in hope that our fathers will forgive us for the wrongs we’ve perpetrated on our bodies, hearts and minds alike in this cruel decade of disaster, which stems from the very city in which we stand.

This Father’s Day, we gather here to calm the Vicious and the Vengeful alike.

The first time I came to Washington D.C. was less than one month before I shipped out to basic training. I was so moved by this country and it’s history, that it reinvigorated my belief in the righteousness of what I was doing…joining the Army in search of not only personal progress, but to participate in efforts to bring justice to the individuals responsible for 9-11.

I remember standing at the base of the Washington Monument…and watching the fireworks explode in the sky that 4th of July… and wondering how was it that we could have come under attack on American soil, and believing firmly that I would be participating in dealing justice for Sept. 11th.

I remember standing before the Lincoln Memorial and feeling the presence of not just the former president and emancipator, but of Martin Luther King and his dream for a brighter and more united future for the children of this nation.

That young me could not have known where he’d be standing almost six years later and what he would have to be saying…this Father’s Day.

I am Sgt. Matthis Chiroux, and tonight at midnight, I may face further action from the Army for refusing to reactivate to participate in the Iraq Occupation.

This fact hangs heavy on my heart as I look back at my five years of service in uniform, but I understand that what I am doing is in keeping with the values I shared with my friends-in-arms while we wondered if things could really get any worse.

Today I stand in resistance to the occupation of Iraq because I believe in our nation, its military and her people. I resist because I swore an oath to this nation that I would not allow it to fall into decay when I may be serving on the side of right.

And my country is in Decay, and in these times of crisis, as Thomas Paine once said, the summer Soldier and Sunshine Patriot will flee from service to our nation.

I stand here today, as a Winter Soldier, to serve our nation, its military and its people in this dark time of confusion and corruption. I stand here to make it known that my duty, as a Soldier, is first to the higher ideals and guiding principles of this country, which our leaders have failed to uphold.

I stand here today in defense of the U.S. Constitution, which has known no greater enemy, foreign or domestic, than those highest in this land who are sworn to be governed by its word.

I stand here today in defense of those who have been stripped their voices in this occupation, for the warriors of this nation have been silenced to the people who need to start listening.

We are here to honor the memory of our fathers, who more than two centuries ago brought forth upon this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal, as Abraham Lincoln once noted.

We are here to honor the struggle of our fathers and their fathers, and their fathers before them to build this nation and bring it together, through slavery and poverty to sexism and racism to materialism and imperialism. They built this nation and struggled to keep it alive as we’ve blundered and learned and blundered again.

We owe it to our fathers to stand for this nation now, when a dark cloud has descended upon it in the form of an administration who is stealing the lives of us all to wage an illegal war, conceived in lies, and birthed of manipulation.

As a Soldier, I was told it was not my place to question the orders of those appointed above me. I had that lie trained into me from my first day of basic training to my last day of active duty.

But I have learned the truth. The truth that the occupation of Iraq is inherently illegal, and that it is my duty as a Soldier to refuse illegal orders to reactivate and deploy in support of it.

I have learned that in times of crisis, one must look deep into their own values to know the path they must walk.

I have learned that feeling, and thinking, and speaking and acting in keeping with courage and honesty and preservation of a righteous cause is blessed and may give a person strength to utter truths…that may calm…the vicious and the vengeful alike.

I believe that this nation and its military may come to know the same truth, that the rule of law has been forsaken, and we must return to it or be doomed to continued disaster.

I believe in the goodness of the American people, and I believe that justice is not dead.

Because we as a people believe that as a people living in the United States it is our responsibility to resist the injustices done by our government in our names.

We know this truth to be self-evident, that our nation can unite to oppose an illegal occupation which is killing and scarring and shattering the lives of our youth and the Iraqi people.

On this Father’s Day, know America that your children need you. We need you to care for us and to care for our country, which we will inherit when you are finished with her.

We need you to end this occupation of Iraq, which has destroyed a country and scattered its people to the winds like ashes in a tempest, a tempest that has engulfed the nation of Iraq and scrubbed any sign of peace and prosperity from the surface of a civilization older than history itself.

Fathers, we need you to care for your children and the children of Iraq, for they know not why you fight and carry no fault in the conflict.

Fathers, your sons and daughters need you now to embrace peace, for though we were attacked, we have dealt in retaliation that same suffering one thousand times over to a people who never wronged us.

This nation will know little healing until we first stem off the flow of blood and human life, for justice and healing will never be done by a blade, or a bullet, or a bomb or a torture cell.

By continuing to participate in the unjust occupation of Iraq, we as servicemembers are contributing to that flow of human life, and we can not now nor could we ever call the Iraqi people an enemy in the fight against the use of terror.

But terror is all we know now. We are terrified by the prospect that we have been lied to. We are terrified by the idea that we have killed for nothing. We are terrified to break the silence. We are terrified to do what we know is right.

But never again will I allow terror to silence me, nor will I allow it to govern my actions.

I refuse terror as a tactic for uniting a people around an unjust cause. I refuse to allow terror to motivate me to do violence on my fellow man, especially those who never wronged me in the first place.

I refuse to be terrified to stand in defense of my constitution, and I refuse to be terrified of doing so in the face of great adversity.

As a resister to the Iraq occupation, I refuse to be terrified by what may come, for I know those who stand against me are in terror of the truth.

But I will speak my truth……and I will stand firmly by it……and forever will my soul know peace.

Major General Kelly Blatanly Lied to Marines in Fallujah on Memorial Day

On Memorial Day, a group of IVAW (Iraq Veterans Against the War) members including myself were at Alien Art Tattoo in Jacksonville, NC right outside of Camp Lejeune getting tattoos to memorialize our fallen comrades in one of the best ways to remember someone. Meanwhile, at Camp Fallujah, Iraq, Marine Corps Major General Kelly was taking advantage of the opportunity to lie to the troops and spew more of the kind of propaganda that is leading them to die for a worthless cause. I found the text of his remarks at The Sandgram where an anonymous blogger has lied about me before.

Below are excerpts of Kelly's bullshit, and some of my responses:

“With all this service and loss, we as Americans can be proud of the kind of people we are as we have never retained a square foot of any country we have defeated, we possess no empire, nor have we enslaved a single human being. Memorial Day was established three years after our terrible Civil War that finally established what kind of nation we would be.”

Ok, where are the bases in Germany? Japan? Iraq? Afghanistan? I guess they're just magically floating in midair, not occupying a single square foot of any of these countries. What a relief. We never enslaved a single human being? That's good to know, because I thought that this country's economy was founded on slavery. I guess all the African Americans here today are just descendants of migrant workers on some kind of guest worker program. And the Civil War had NOTHING to do with aforementioned mythological slavery of course.

“Like it or not America is engaged in a war today against an enemy that is savage, offers no quarter, whose only objectives are to either kill every one of our families in our homeland, or enslave us with a sick form of extremism that serves no God or purpose that rational men and women can understand. Given the opportunity to do another 9/11, our vicious enemy would do it today, tomorrow and everyday thereafter.”

Actually, most of “the enemy” in Iraq just want us to get the fuck out of their country. And if they want another 9/11 so bad, why are we giving them exactly what they want, having made it relatively easy for them to kill thousands of American soldiers in the Middle East? And if 9/11 was the work of some 19 guys with some money behind them, why invest in a resistance in Iraq?

“I don’t know why they hate us, and I frankly don’t care and they can all go to hell, but they do hate us and are driven irrationally to our destruction. The best way to fight them is somewhere else and that is why we are here.”

Nevermind that in his mind, “they” is probably “all Muslims.” Now we have to put up with “fight them there so we don't fight them here” bullshit from the general himself. Nevermind that we are making enemies faster than we can kill them. Hey, if it made sense, it wouldn't be part of the government, and definitely not part of the military.

“For whatever reason they want to destroy our way of life our countrymen at home should be on their knees everyday thanking God we still have enough young people in America today willing to take up the fight as our Veterans did from the earliest days of our nation.”

Does this guy even have the sense to listen to “the enemy?” I don't mean listen to as in cup of coffee and small talk, but in the Sun Tzu sense, “know your enemy.” But again, if it made sense . . .

The real fight is here at home, where we have an administration that wants to destroy our way of life (as in the free way of life with rights enumerated in the US Constitution) with things like the PATRIOT Act, warrantless wiretapping, and a tax system that amounts to slavery. “Our countrymen at home” should not be on their knees, but on their feet and up in arms! But then this is how the military/fascist leadership would like Americans to behave: servile, subservient, and submissive.

“They should know that they are protected today by men and women as good as have ever served; as good today as their fathers were in Vietnam, and their grandfathers were in Korea and World War II. In this my third tour in Iraq I have never seen an American hesitate, or do anything other than lean into the danger and, with no apparent fear of death or injury, take the fight to the enemies of our way of life.”

Kelly is clearly in denial about the lowered standards for enlistment and “search and avoid missions.” Clearly, this kind of ignorance of the people under his command would suggest he is unfit for duty. And at least in my time in Iraq, I didn't see any enemies of my way of life, except for the “invade and occupy a foreign country” way of life.

“Any one of us could have all stayed in school or gone another way, but yet we chose to serve knowing full well Iraq and Afghanistan was in our future.”

I signed up in 1999. The only people that knew Iraq was in my future were the NeoCons. A lot of the folks that have joined since then have been straight up lied to by recruiters. And as crazy as our military is today, I'm pretty sure this Major General didn't make his rank in less than the five plus years we've been in Iraq or six and half years in Afghanistan, so in his own words here, he is not, “one of us.”

“And the sacrifice continues as three Americans have gone to God since we all went to bed last night and slept free and protected.”

AMERICANS ARE NOT FREE! We have more laws in this country than on any other on earth telling us what we can and can't do. We have a tax system that our founding fathers would call slavery. We have more people in jail per capita that any other country. We still have selective service registration. Our government tells us what we can or can't say on TV and radio, what drugs we can put in our bodies, what kinds of guns we can, or more often can't, own, how much mileage our cars have to get, and some arrogant deluded assholes are still out there perpetuating the myth that this is a free country! And we give them guns! Lots of them. And lots of Marines with guns to do their bidding. These “leaders” aren't just created by the military system, they are selected. They are selected by militaristic politicians that want nothing more than to stay in power and want loyal soldiers who will use their myths to manipulate society.

These people aren't stupid, they are deluded, and that's what is really the greatest tragedy of American militarism. They have the courage to face the horrors of combat, and lead men into battle, (though I don't know if Kelly himself was able to make rank without facing combat – it has happened) and yet they don't have the courage or freedom of mind to question authority and to question their own beliefs.

Perhaps our society has been conditioning mental freedom out of students for so long that people in the military today don't have the basic critical thinking skills necessary to exercise the full freedom of mind that their creator has bestowed upon them. With the intstituionalization of government-run schools, it should be no surprise. The No Child Left Behind Act gets teachers doing nothing but test prep with students, and now they don't even have time for basic PhysEd let alone the kind of rigorous education that develops critical thinking skills. Ask any Drill Instructor or Drill Sergeant if his new recruits are getting fatter with every cycle and you'll know that they don't have the skills I'm talking about.

There was so much more in Kelly's remarks for me to rip into, but there are only so many hours in a day. These were just the ones that could be deconstructed in a reasonable number of words. I hope you have enjoyed this glimpse into the mind of a fascist General who has no qualms about lying to the troops, and the kind of propaganda we have been subjected to as members of the military.

Why Facebook is Better Than MySpace

A friend of mine recently asked me why I preferred Facebook to MySpace. This was my answer:

If Facebook and MySpace got in a fight, Facebook would start off by looking MySpace right in the eye, causing MySpace to get a queasy feeling before soiling itself. Facebook would then give MySpace a punch in the stomach, causing it to vomit retarded profile layouts, excessive ads, and error messages all over itself. Then Facebook would kick MySpace in the gunch, creating a new asshole from which it could shit people that can't get with the times. Facebook would roundhouse kick MySpace's head off, but then Facebook would use it's laser beam eyes to cause it to explode while still in mid air. Then, Facebook would grab MySpace's body, grind it into dust with one hand, and snort it. And that's why you should try Facebook.

FACEBOOK ME!

Iraqi weddings not as joyous as Jenna Bush's

Dahlia Wasfi sent me this editorial from PSL. If this doesn't get your blood boiling, I don't know what will. General Mattis' comment defending the attack it ridiculous if you look at the numbers. Two dozen "military-age males" is what you would expect at a wedding party, and with 12 women and fourteen children killed, you might expect more. We have literally made being a military-age male at the wrong place and the wrong time a crime punishable by death. You want me to think we're there liberating still? General Mattis, let's not be naive.

Tuesday, May 13, 2008

PSL Editorial

On May 10, President Bush gave his daughter Jenna's hand away in holy matrimony. The ceremony was held at sunset, in a tranquil section of his 1,600-acre Texas ranch. Before the night concluded, a 10-piece party band played a whole host of soul and funk classics for the Bush family and their closest friends to boogie down to. George W. called the evening "spectacular" and after a moment of reflection told reporters, "We're mighty blessed."

Almost four years earlier to the day, another wedding took place 7,500 miles away from Texas in Makr al-Deeb, close to the Iraq-Syria border. It ended quite differently.

After the nuptials, the wedding party was in full swing, with dinner just finished and the band playing traditional Arabic music. Suddenly, U.S. fighter jets roared overhead and U.S. vehicles started shining their high beams into the party. The worried hosts abruptly shut down the gathering. The men stayed inside the wedding tent, while women and children scattered to a nearby house.

Five hours later, shortly after 2 a.m., while most were sleeping, the tent came under air attack. The air assault was followed by volleys from ground troops who arrived in helicopters and armored personnel carriers. Panicked women and children fled outside, where they, too, were hit.

Iraqi eyewitnesses claimed that U.S. soldiers went through the wreckage at dawn and killed several of the wounded. At the end of the assault, 45 Iraqis lay dead, including 12 women and 14 children. Some reports claim that both the bride and groom were among the dead. The wedding singer was killed while sleeping. There were no reported U.S. casualties.

Mr. Mahdi Nawaf, a shepherd who attended the wedding, said his daughter and his grandchildren were killed. "Mothers died with their children in their arms. One of them was my daughter. I found her a few steps from the house, her two-year-old son Raad in her arm. Her one-year-old son Ra'ed was lying nearby, his head missing," Nawaf said.

U.S. military officials defended the strike entirely. Implying that the gathering was not a wedding but a clandestine meeting of smugglers and foreign fighters, Maj. Gen. James Mattis asked, "How many people go to the middle of the desert 10 miles from the Syrian border to hold a wedding 80 miles from the nearest civilization?" Mattis continued, "There were more than two dozen military-age males. Let's not be naive."

Videotape was released a few days later that showed the wedding guests singing and dancing, and showed the bride, wearing a Western-style white dress and veil stepping out of the bridal car decorated with colorful ribbons.

How many more weddings have been disrupted, ruined, or attacked in Bush's war of aggression? Five months after the Makr al-Deeb massacre, a U.S. air strike killed 11 people and wounded 17 at a wedding party in Fallujah.

In April 2006, 27-year-old Media Majeed was struck in the head by a stray bullet as she sat in the passenger seat of a car headed to her brother's wedding. At the March Winter Soldier event held in Washington, D.C., Private Clifton Hicks testified that his unit "had fired automatic weapons into the middle of a wedding party, wounding and killing several guests, and [they] were told to drive away and forget about it."

The wedding celebration has long been one of Iraq's most important community events, involving hundreds of guests in parties that lasted through the early morning. Despite the war, Iraqi couples "still want everything to be perfect," according to Nadia Habib, a wedding planner in Baghdad.

But now, the wedding crowds are smaller and the parties are hurried, since the occupation forces keep the country under strict curfew and the threat of brutal violence always looms. Habib organizes only half the weddings she did before the war. The wedding tradition, like so many others that made up the fabric of Iraqi life, has been violently ripped apart.

The U.S. corporate media insisted that Jenna Bush wanted her ceremony to remain "private." Yet somehow, by the time of the big day, we had learned every detail of the bride's dress, the ring, the wedding attire and pre-wedding events. Bush and the capitalist ruling class that stands behind him continue to flaunt their decadent lifestyles after having ruined countless weddings and having left so many Iraqis grieving for their lost partners.

The Iraqi occupation cannot go on a day more. Any politician who prolongs the tragedy—even one more day—is a de facto war criminal and should be held responsible. Every time the corporate media distracts us with the details of another lavish wedding, let us remember the massacre at Makr al-Deeb. Let us remember Media Majeed who arrived at the hospital with bloodied wedding flowers still in her hands. Let us remember Sean Bell, gunned down in 2006 in a hail of police bullets the night before his wedding was to take place.

Let us remember them, and let us bring justice to them all.

Gone

Contributed by fellow IVAW member Clifton Hicks

When you leave for Iraq they put you in a great long file stretching all the way from the terminal to the door of the airplane which will ferry you to the battlefield. The uniforms are new, the colors bright and un-faded, un-blemished by the howling dust, un-spattered by the midnight oil, yet to be torn by the razor wire, yet un-christened by the ignorant sweat and the innocent blood.

As you trudge on, ever forward toward the stair case and the cockpit, you chance to look around at your surroundings. Not much to see really, the back of a helmet before you, a blank stare behind, tarmac beneath your boots and flood lights to blind your eyes. But do look around, and remember what you see, for everything you witness will surely be for the last time. Once you step onto that plane you leave in your footprints forever your entire life and the world as you once knew it, for the person who goes to Iraq can never be the person who returns.

By now the uniforms are threadbare. Tattered pockets flicker in the breeze, back and shoulders bleached white from the glaring rays, caked and coated in a year of rusty dust, scarred fingers peering through chewed up splitting gloves, cigarette holes smoldering on the collar, smears of black and drops of red on the boots. The skin of the face, neck, and hands appear dry, dark, leathery; the eyes dwell in shadows, the feet drag forward.

As one appears on the outside, so too has one become on the inside; faded and worn, shredded and stretched, nearly to the limit, forever torn apart. Never again will you gaze upon what once was, never again will you smell the same rain or feel the same breeze. Still the boots tramp on, forever forward, on to the next slaughter.

An Active Duty Marine Tells Me, "The war is total bullshit, and everyone knows it."

A googlechat conversation I had last night with a Marine I know from Camp Pendleton:

X: hey whats going on

me: holy shit, where are you?

X: I am in Colorado right now...I leave June 5 [to go back to Camp Fallujah]

me: no shit, where in colorado?

X: [name of city], at my parents house.... where are you at?

me: I happen to be in Dallas right now

X: nice...you bounce all over the place dont you? lol

me: i do get around. are you still shipping out of Pendleton?

X: I flew into Dallas when I came home... I have already been over there for 6 months, I had to go to CPEN for shit [details of shit redacted] and then they let me come home for a week to see [Z]. [X's son]

me: from where?

X: from Kuwait

me: jesus. what is CPEN?

X: Camp Pendleton

me: ha! never saw that acronym, guess i was never one of the cool kids

X: shut the hell up cool kids lol

me: you know who you are. [Z] is with your parents?

X: yeah, since I have custody of him, he stays with them while I am deployed. what do you mean you know who you are?

me: you cool kids know who you are

X: whatever dude, I guess you were apart of us "cool kids" then, since you were always with us...

me: yeah, for a while, but only because I knew you . . . but now all the cool kids are in IVAW

X: yeah yeah....how is all of that going for you? You know you came up in my investigation when I did my lat move? ["Lat move" is military parlance for lateral move, or a change in your MOS, military occupational specialty, that happens mid-carreer.]

me: really? they asked you if you knew me?

X: yeah, they said that they knew you [redacted] with me and that I kept in contact with you currently over email and myspace and wanted to know my involvement with you

me: HOLY SHIT! are you afraid to speak out now? because of that bullshit?

X: yeah it was pretty crazy...not really. because of my job now they know everything anyways, so Its not like I can hide anything.

me: so are you going to join ivaw anyway?

X: I got 3 years left buddy...Once I get out the war will be over lol PROBABLY NOT!! Even though the war is total bullshit, and everyone knows it.

me: ok, so you accept that it's bullshit. Do you really want to sit back and just watch more marines die for that bullshit?

X: not at all...and it is sad to see it happen. I dont know I am very confused on the whole subject...we need to pull us out so we dont lose any more, but if we do leave, that place will get ran the fuck over. Ive been in Basra and Sadr to see what is happening there so I dont know... I am totally against this war and us being over there, and seeing how much money we are spending, the lives that are lost and for what? So these fucking doon coons can make no progress in a modern society and as soon as we leave go back to the way they were thousands of years ago living their primitive lives

me: they have been in the business of civilization a lot longer than we have, they will manage

X: these people are never going to change. NEVER. Its not our place to make a little USA of them.

me: It is almost racist to presume that the arabs inhabiting the longest-civilized part of the world won't figure shit out with out our help!

X: agreed. let them do it on their own as everyone else in the modern islamic world has.

me: Well then fucking do something about it!

X: i am one person bro, with my hands tied. i have 3 years to keep low and a son to worry about, i dont need any crazy shit going on in my life right now...i just got rid of the crazy shit i dont need anymore.

me: and what kind of world do you want your son to grow up in? evil only triumphs when good men do nothing.

X: im moving him to switzerland when I get out...LOL

me: well, maybe we'll get around to nuking switzerland before we get over this whole fascism thing

X: yeah. well...I dont know. You make my head hurt thinking about all of this! :)

me: that is the pain of weakness leaving the soul [A take-off on the popular Marine expression, "Pain is weakness leaving the body."]
you have to get past the cognitive dissonance
you have to exercise your full freedom of mind without fear

X: yeah well maybe in 3 years i can have that luxury...for now...I keep lo pro

me: excuses are like assholes. no offense, it's part of being human, it's just not the best of our nature. the opposite of love is not hate, but rather fear

X: you are CRAZY. you have nothing to fear, I on the other hand do. For good reason

me: nothing to fear but fear itself, right?

X: oh man, I really dont want to go down this road...ill be back in a second, its 9, time for [Z] to go to sleep. If you are on we will talk more. If not you can reach me at ***-***-**** or my parents house ***-***-****. Try cell first.

me: i'll be here

A Music Video Tribute to Adam Kokesh

Very flattering, somewhat embarassing:

Alien Art Tattoo Offers Deal For Camp Lejeune Marines, IVAW

Help Us Get the WSIA Documentary Out by September!

HELP MAKE A NEW FILM AND A DIFFERENT FUTURE

This year, a scrappy, determined band of soldiers and veterans turned this country on its head.

On March 13-16, Iraq Veterans Against the War (IVAW) held Winter Soldier: Iraq and Afghanistan / Eyewitness Accounts of the Occupations in Washington, DC. Over one hundred active duty soldiers and veterans publicly testified—from their own experience–about what they consider to be the immoral and illegal nature of those occupations. They demanded immediate and unconditional withdrawal, and intend to force this issue onto the national stage.

Displaced Films and Northern Light Productions are producing the only documentary film that will be made about this historic moment, and the intense battle leading up to it. If you liked Sir! No Sir! you will love this new film. Winter Soldier/Iraq and Afghanistan will answer the question “Can a new GI Movement happen today?” with a resounding “Yes!”

The Winter Soldier Investigation was by any account a powerful, explosive, and controversial antiwar event, timed to mark the anniversary of the invasion of Iraq five years ago. No one who witnessed it could come out the same. But just as importantly, it transformed everyone involved in profound and unexpected ways. That transformation, both large-scale and deeply personal, is the subject we explore in our film.

WE NEED YOUR HELP

We are in a desperate race to make the film and have it in the world by September this year, right in the height of the election campaign. We cannot make it without your financial support, and the more money we raise the faster the film can be completed. Every donation of $50 or more will get an advance copy of the DVD when it is available. Donations of $1,000 or more will be credited in the film.

But don’t limit yourself. This is a chance to play a direct, critical role in making history and forging a new future.

ALL CONTRIBUTIONS ARE TAX DEDUCTIBLE.

Send a check to:

Pangea Productions
c/o Displaced Films
3421 Fernwood Avenue
Los Angeles, CA 90039

For secure credit card donation, go to: https://secure.groundspring.org/dn/index.php?aid=24841

PROUTness, IVAW Speaks Out, a Survey, a Break Up, and a Fat Army F*** In a Chow Hall in Iraq

Yesterday, I broke up with my girlfriend (long distance, Santa Cruz) of nearly one year by text message. Before you start throwing vegetables, let me explain. I was in California recently, and for a long time, the plan had been for her to move in at least for the summer, and she was going to fly back to DC with me. Well, I found out two days before leaving for California that she had not yet bought her ticket, and was not planning on coming out at all. Apparently, she was not ready.

I had rearranged a lot of my life for her, both literally and figuratively. I had even gotten her the furniture she had asked for and made room for it, including a desk in what would have been “our” bedroom. However, it was not the first time that she had made me feel foolish. There had been various times that she would seem to disappear for a week or so and not answer phone calls, emails or text messages.

We used to send each other a dozen text messages or so a day just to keep up and remind each other of our love. I would call her every night before going to bed and she would usually call me every morning when she woke up, even if just to say, “I love you. Have a great day. I'll be thinking about you.” So when she stopped answering my calls, I would always get worried, only to find out that she was just sick or something and was embarrassed, and did not want to speak to me.

Then, I decided to give her another chance after coming back from California, alone. Of course, all of my house mates asked where she was. She said she could come out for three weeks in June and for a while it seemed like things were patched up and we were going to go back to our lovey dovey calling and texting mode, but then she started ignoring me again, and I could not take it. Then she texted me, but would not call me, or answer when I called her, or respond to my text messages. I could not take it any more. After realizing that, I tried to call her several more times to no avail, and even left a few messages. Then I broke up with her by text message, and she finally texted me back to say she would mail me the things I had left with her, including my dog tags.

I still love her, and I think that I always will. Tragically, we had a close call, but as much as the stars seemed to be aligned in our favor, perhaps it was not meant to be.

So, on to lighter fare. “What is PROUTness?” I can hear you asking yourselves. Well, while I was breaking up with my girlfriend, I was driving down to Radford, VA, from Washington, DC for the World PROUT Assembly “Building a New World” Conference. I had committed us to doing a panel and a truth-in-recruiting workshop so I dragged along James Gilligan, James Morriss, Ray Curry, and Bill Main to help me out. Jason Hurd also hitched a ride up from Asheville with Dahlia Wasfi. We got in Thursday in plenty of time to get settled before the opening session.

In her keynote address, Lynne Stewart, quoted John Brown very poignantly, “Had I interfered in the matter which I admit, and which I admit has been fairly proved . . . had I so interfered in behalf of the rich, the powerful, the intelligent, or the so-called great . . . and suffered and sacrificed, what I have in this interference, it would have been all right. Every man in this Court would have deemed it an act worthy of reward rather than punishment.” When the conference organizer, Garda Ghista introduced us, she said that we had affirmed we were no longer soldiers of the rich and corrupt powers in America.

And it occurred to me that we as members of Iraq Veterans Against the War are not just witnesses and advocates. We are people who were all at one point ready to commit our lives to something we believe in. And we still are. And in “the movement” there are many warriors and we by no means have a monopoly on this role. Or as Camilo Mejia said at the end of Winter Soldier: Iraq & Afghanistan, “We are your new winter soldiers.” I don't know if he meant it that way, but I get it in a new way now and it really makes me want to shave my head again and get IVAW doing more close order drill.

So we did our panel yesterday and it was a resounding success. We tried an entirely different format from what we would normally do and it created an amazing energy in the room. That's the only way I can describe it without spilling the beans, but it was recorded, so hopefully the video will be posted soon. A significant chunk of the conference attendees were there, and it seems to have created quite a buzz. Apparently, they will all be at the workshop this afternoon. I'll let you know how it goes.

Take the Washington Post Survey "Should Veterans For Peace be allowed to march in the Memorial Day parade?"

This photo was sent in from a Marine buddy of mine, who also happens to be an IVAW member. The image says a lot, but the best part by far is the smirk on the Marine's face. Hoorah!