Dear Colleagues and Comrades:
Today theflyers and banners say STOP THE WAR ON IRAN. Two weeks ago they said,STOP THE WAR ON VENEZUELA or STOP THE WAR ON CUBA or STOP THE WAR ON GAZA. And of course weeasily recall theones that saidSTOP THE WAR ON IRAQ/AFGHANISTAN/YEMEN/SOMALIA/VietnamETC. ETC.
By Mike Ferner, Navy Corpsman 1969-73 - Veterans For Peace
Personally, when I see those banners parading through my lifetime, I get sick to my stomach.
How many yearsdecadesand for some of us GENERATIONS will we be OKtaking to the streets in righteous anger, maybe get arrested here and there, forming bucket brigades for one fire after another?
With many valiant, dedicated movement colleagues for over50 years I've done all the above. Most recently, on March 4, a jury refused to convict five of us who blocked our U.S. Senators office here in Toledo for over two hours. But I also firmly believe we have to talk about and act on fire prevention instead of just fire fighting.
There is no question we are experts at fire fighting, at opposing the serial horrors rolled out by the U.S. empire. For that matter, we are experts at fighting what the highway lobby, the health insurance industry, the toxic waste industry, Big Ag, andthe chemical industry throw at us, too.
Im talking primarily about working for peace, but also including our struggles for universal health care, mass transit, sustainable agriculture, an energy policy based on more than just how quickly we can burn our planet.
So when do we start striking at the root of the problem and not just the branches? What can we do topreventthe empires murder and arson sprees instead of just reacting to them? How long do we want to walk in circles with the same signs expecting something different to happen? This is the question that bedevils me and it is not a rhetorical question.
The U.S. doesnt cause every evil in the world, just a hugely disproportionate share. We, and so much of the Earth, struggle to survive these crises because, myths aside, we do not govern this country. Most people reading this would agree we are run by corporate elites with enormous wealth at their disposal, enabling them to do all the aspects of governing. They buy the politicians, write the legislation, insure it is interpreted for them and their shareholders benefit to the exception of all else. Marine Corps General Smedley Butlers pamphlet,War Is A Racketlaid it out clearly almost 100 years agoand it has only gotten worse.
Our health care policy is written by insurance companies, our foreign policy is written by weapons manufacturing corporations, our transportation policy is written by the Highway Lobby. Corporations have achieved this privileged status primarily because the Supreme Court has usurped for them all the constitutional protections originally meant only for human beings. That story has beencarefully tracedand laid out inbrief, plain language.
The way to reverse that history of corrupt usurpation is also laid out in plain language. Heres former Transportation Secretary, Pete Buttigieg boiling it down toone minute, 15 seconds.
As he clearly says, it will not be a quick fix. There arent any. But if we can change the constitution so you cant drink beer, and then change it back so you can, clearly its possibile, as suffragists proved with a persistent campaign to get voting rights for women and the NAACP proved with a decades-long strategy to abolish Jim Crow.
The critical part of endingcorporate rule isin our minds. Thats where the bars of the prison are. When we break out of those prison bars and seeourselves not just as taxpayers or customers or consumers or workers but as We the People, from which all authority flows according to the Constitution, then we can accomplish anything. On the way there, victories like in Minneapolis when people came together to provide for their neighbors,booted out ICE, and even held ageneral strike, wewill seeourselves not just asvictims of the system but as people ableto democratically run the show for the good of all.
That requires, however, that we learn this history and find ways to articulate it, while we makeour demands for peace, health care, clean air, clean water and a sustainable planet. Its not hard to do. Heres my attempt to include it at aGaza ceasefire rally in two minutes.
To answer a question I often get: I amNOT suggesting activists drop whatever particular campaign or firefight theyre engaged in. Its important work we must continue. But if you think about it, there are many opportunities to not only rail against the latest horror, but articulate, even briefly, why they keep coming. The videos linked above are examples. Youll be able to craft one that works for you.
ThenTHEN when lots of people are talking about taking constitutional rights away from corporations, we will be in a good place to join withMove to Amend.orgto promote the amendment that will do just that.
We did it so women could vote. We did it so Blacks, under law, would be equal citizens. We did it (twice) for beer. We can do it for democracy and the planet!
Pressenza New York
