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Although rain was pelting down, the view
of the New York skyline was magnificent from the 22nd floor of the
SEIU Building in lower Manhattan, where a group of activists from
across the country gathered recently to take a sober look at the direction
the United States is taking.
About 75 members of World Can’t Wait (WCW) from California,
Ohio, Illinois, Colorado, Michigan, New York and Minnesota met to
discuss the possibilities and ramifications of having the Bush regime
step down.
Organized nine months ago, the group has issued a Call citing seven
statements about the current government.
Addressing the people of the United States, this Call claims “Your
government is waging a murderous and illegitimate war in Iraq, based
on lies; your government is openly torturing people and justifying
it; your government puts people in jail on the merest suspicion, refuses
them lawyers and holds them indefinitely or deports them; your government
is moving each day closer to a theocracy, where a narrow and hateful
brand of Christian fundamentalism will rule; your government suppresses
the science that doesn’t fit its agenda; your government is
moving to deny women here and all over the world the right to birth
control and abortion; and your government enforces a culture of greed,
bigotry, intolerance and ignorance.”
Serious charges, but ones that 18,000 people across the country have
agreed with. They have signed this Call online at www.worldcantwait.org
<http://www.worldcantwait.org/> .
Based on these conditions, the organization is demanding that Bush
step down.
Throughout two days of meetings, Debra Sweet, national director of
WCW, kept bringing the group back to two important questions: are
the statements cited tolerable, and is getting the regime to step
down the only way?
“Some say people are too cowardly, ignorant or brainwashed to
act,” Sweet said. “We feel it is more complicated than
that. We have to convincingly argue for what we’re supporting,
and we have to match the conviction of the religious fanatics in this
country.”
WCW has set Oct. 5, 2006, as a day of reckoning. People from across
this country, and other countries as well, are being asked to stay
home from school and work and march in the streets, showing the strength
of those who are unwilling to live with the current political beliefs
that are being espoused by this nation.
“The majority of the country is learning to live with torture
and accept it,” Sweet said. “We have to convince people
this is wrong.” She cited the victims of Katrina, the potential
loss of women’s abortion rights in South Dakota, the detainees
being held in eastern Europe as further evidence of the problems within
the United States.
“The Bush regime says openly that international law does not
apply to them,” Sweet continued. “There are not any checks
and balances in Bush’s world, and if you dissent, you’re
a traitor.”
James Rudin, in the book “The Baptizing of America: The Religious
Right’s Plans for the Rest of Us,” describes a systematic
destruction of government organizations. Each step taken is so small,
no patriot would dissent.
Looking at the current administration, one can identify the numerous
changes, large and small, that have been made in recent years. Ideas
and actions that would have been unimaginable just a few short years
ago are today tolerated and accepted.
Sweet said that many claim protest does not make a difference, and
it has not stopped the Iraqi war. “But without protest,”
she said, “the situation would likely be so much worse.”
She talked about the groundswell of immigrant protests that have arisen
in the past few weeks surrounding the Sensenbrenner bill and its ramifications
for the immigrant population.
“Without protest, the immigrants would have been demonized,”
she said. “They hit the ground running. How did they mobilize
that quickly?”
Many WCW members want to look at individual struggles and unite them
into one struggle, citing the need for abortion rights, gay marriage
rights and immigrants’ rights. Others want to focus on only
one mission, ending the Bush regime.
“We have to go with what we can win,” said Mike, a chapter
member from Chicago. “If we get rid of Bush, then what? We still
have a fascist theocracy. We can win on impeachable offenses; eight
months ago no one was even discussing impeachment.”
Mikael Rudolph, founder of the Minneapolis chapter of WCW, said he
believes in finding the common ground that most people will agree
with.
“We must take a prosecutorial mindset,” he said, “and
focus on the impeachable crimes of this administration, the violations
of American law first and international law, second. We must insist
on answers and the truth, first and foremost.”
Rudolph said he believes other issues must be put aside until the
Bush regime is out and future leaders know that the people will not
tolerate the actions that have been undertaken in this administration.
“When that is done, we can return to fighting the individual
political battles,” he said.
As well as planning for Oct. 5, a Bush Crimes Commission Tour is scheduled
to start in August, with a bus tour of noted individuals hitting the
campuses and speaking about what has been happening in this country.
Another major planned event is a speech by scientist Niles Eldridge
May 2 at Columbia University. Eldridge is a renowned evolutionist.
The discussions continued in the New York skyscraper, and individuals
voiced their thoughts. There were high schoolers, expressing their
political opinions for the first time, as well as the seasoned activists
who started their protests with the Vietnam War. Some appeared to
be college professors, others were aging hippies. But they are all
fighting for what they believe is a just cause.
“The problem,” said Sweet, “is not that Bush is
an idiot. The problem is that he is guilty of crimes against humanity.”
The Minneapolis chapter of WCW meets Tuesdays at 7:30 pm, and the
Saint Paul chapter meets Thursdays at 7. For further information check
the local website, impeachforpeace.org. You can also contact Mikael
Rudolph at 612-302-9252.
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"I just want you to know that, when we talk about
war, we're really talking about peace."
Bush, June 18, 2002
"War is Peace"
George Orwell in "1984"
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