Walkin' For Peace-Justice-Tolerance-Survival-Understanding-Love-Compassion

The week leading to the third anniversary of the start of the Iraq Illegal Invasion two Very Important Actions took place, lasting that whole week, ending on that Important Date of the Start of the Carnage.

One was a 241 mile walk from Mexico to San Francisco that, like many of the Actions taken by the citizens of this Country wasn't Covered as it should have been by the MSM.

The other was a 'Walkin' to New Orleans' carried out by Survivors of Katrina and Veterans of a number of U.S. Conflicts including Iraq/Afgan Vets.

These are extremely important because of the Sacrifice Involved and the Messages meant by both. Combining those Sacrifices and Messages, of both, they Spoke for the Well Over 700 Registered Actions taking place Around the Country, with 10's of Thousands Partcipanting, Voicing their Combined Opposition of the Direction of this Country and it's So Called Leadership, Totally Corrupt at that.

Below are Links to Video's and Photo's of both these actions. The Latino March for Peace I had posted at a few sites, the one here has a couple of more links, and with the Immigration Bill now in Congress and being Widely Protested, this weekend, this shows the Sacrifice of the Latino for this Country. And a Thought for you, before the Borders and Names these so called Illegals Inhabited Much of what is now called America!!

Pass these on as many don't know about them and the Video's and Photo's Speak for themselves, Especially the ones contained in the 'Walkin' to New Orleans' six months after the Devestation!!

Photos/Videos from the Walk


Photographer - Diane Lent - Vets/Survivors 1

Photographer - Diane Lent - Vets/Survivors 2

Union County Labor VFP

Veterans For Peace NY

Walkin' to New Orleans - Videos - These are in Quicktime Video - video links below

Monday's Press Conference Video
Michael McPhearson, executive director of Veterans for Peace

Tuesday's Video
Leaving Mobile

Tuesday's Camp Host Video
Mamie H. Mackey, storm survivor and the campsite host

Wednesday's Video
Mississippi Vietnam War Memorial

Thursday's Video
Iraq Veterans Against the War send greetings to the president

Friday's Video
Kelly Dougherty co founder of Iraq Veterans Againt the War.

Saturday's Video
House Gutting Vets

THE SUNDAY VIDEO
On the 3rd Anniversary of the 2nd Iraq War, Iraq veterans clearly spell out the problems with words and song. Words by Camilo Mejia and Michael Blake; song by VOICE.

Related Links:
VOICE
Vietnam Vetrerans Against the War
Iraq Veterans Against the War
Camilo Mejia
More About the March
More Coverage of the March

More Photo/Information/Reports Links:
New Orleans Voices For Peace documented the march from Mobile to New Orleans on video for airing on T.V. Radio and Internet. Stay tuned to this site for daily updates from this historic march!

Iraq Veterans Blog

Photo Gallery:
Android Designs photo album 1
Android Designs photo album 2
For photos and videos and blogs on the march, please visit:
New Orleans VFP
Stan Goff
Bring Them Home Now
Union County Labor-Veterans For Peace
For More:

Stories and Photos From The March

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Latino March for Peace - 3rd Anniversary of Iraq Illegal Invasion


VIDEO SPECIAL | Latino March for Peace
A film by Scott Galindez and Ted Sapphire



On March 12, 2006, Fernando Suarez del Solar and Pablo Paredes started a march with a coalition of the willing across 240+ miles in a quest for peace that aims at raising the Latino voice of opposition to the war in Iraq. The March will run from Tijuana, Mexico, all the way to the mission district of San Francisco, making strategic, symbolic and ceremonial stops along the way. The 241-mile march is inspired by Gandhi's 1930 Salt March protesting British imperialism and will serve as a loud cry for an end to the bloodshed in Iraq.

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Mexico to SF 'March for Peace' Rallies Fresno - Photos

Fallen Heroes of Operation Iraqi Freedom

Guerrero Azteca Peace Project Homepage

Swift Smart Veterans

Latino March for Peace

Latino Voice of Opposition to the War

bush&repug Congress & America 'Supporting The Troops' Who They Damaged - PTSD

Iraq War veteran who received Purple Heart says Army is making him repay money

By SHEL SEGAL




Uncle Sam giveth, and apparently Uncle Sam can taketh away.

When Fontana resident and 2001 Fontana A.B. Miller High School graduate Kevin Stonestreet joined the U.S. Army in the summer of 2001 as a member of the infantry, he was given a $20,000 bonus to be paid out over his six-year enlistment.

However, when Stonestreet was honorably discharged from the Army in 2005, he found out he needed to repay $3,800 of that bonus because he did not complete his six years.

But Stonestreet, who is now 23, said he was kicked out of the Army because he was diagnosed with post traumatic stress disorder, anxiety and depression from serving in Iraq.

In addition, Stonestreet, who was awarded the Purple Heart and was considered for the Bronze Star for bravery in combat, said the amount he was to pay back was originally $6,000, but the government repossessed his final paycheck of $2,200.

"They were nice enough to take out the $170 for my child support," Stonestreet said, laughingly.


Stonestreet added his unit was referred to as an "inconvenience to the government,' probably because of my condition, a personal disorder."

STONESTREET JOINED THE ARMY right out of high school and was first stationed at Ft. Benning, Ga. He said he was first attracted to the infantry because of the kind of work it did.

"We did raids, searches, observations, all the good stuff," he said.

He received his first installment of his bonus -- $7,000 -- in February 2002, he said, adding the rest of the money would come over time.

However, in September 2003, he was sent to fight in Iraq, and that's when everything changed for him.

STONESTREET WAS STATIONED near Fallujah, Iraq in April 2004 when an insurgency was being put down by U.S. military personnel.

On April 6, 2004, Stonestreet said he was riding in a Bradley fighting vehicle, which can seat up to 13 soldiers -- albeit not comfortably -- when it was hit by a rocket-propelled grenade.

"We were providing security for the Marines as they were pulling out (of Fallujah) when they just got ambushed," Stonestreet said. "My platoon leader lost his leg and his gunner lost his right hand."

Stonestreet also was wounded. He was hit by shrapnel in his neck and was grazed by a bullet on his left arm. The shrapnel is still in his neck.

"I was a centimeter away from bleeding to death if it had hit my jugular," he said.

He was later recommended for the Bronze Star as he gave up his machine gun to a buddy when he went to get first aid for the injured -- but that's now all but forgotten, he said.

"I went on top of the Bradley to give them first aid," he said. "We were apparently under heavy fire, but because of the blast, I didn't hear anything. I was surprised there wasn't a fire, just a lot of smoke -- a lot of smoke -- and our uniforms smelled like ammonia for days."

STONESTREET CAME BACK to the States in September 2005. Now stationed at Ft. Riley, Kan., he came back to Fontana where he was welcomed with a big party, he said.

But his world had been turned upside down by the war.

"When I first got home I had insomnia," he said. "When I could sleep, I had flashbacks, nightmares and cold sweat.

"I'm a world better being away from the Army. I miss my friends, but they'll be all right, hopefully."

THE GOVERNMENT IS still interested in recouping its $3,800 it believes it is entitled to. Stonestreet, who works as a clerk at Pep Boys in Rialto, said he has been contacted by a collection agency on the government's behalf and will soon be owing interest on that amount if something isn't done soon.

He added while he feels he shouldn't have to repay the money, he doesn't have it in the first place.

"They ended my contract for me and I'm being forced into paying this," Stonestreet said. "I tried to hold up my end of the bargain."

In addition, while Stonestreet said the government contends it paid him his entire bonus, Stonestreet said he never received the final payment and his bank has no record of ever receiving it.

Stonestreet said he has written a letter to Congressman Joe Baca (D-Rialto), but hasn't heard anything back. In addition, Baca's office did not return phone calls from the Herald News to discuss this issue.

Stonestreet added he has also written letters to Senators Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, with no one getting back to him.

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And This Diary: Purple Heart recipient forced to repay signing bonus (Updated), over at Daily KOS, Read The Comments!!!!!

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"Never again shall one generation of veterans abandon another."

Walter Cronkite | Documentary Sends Warning to Congress

"Political correctness is really a subjective list put together by the few to rule the many -- a list of things one must think, say, or do. It affronts the right of the individual to establish his or her own beliefs." Mark Berley - Source: Argos, Spring 1998

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Didn't This Call for Withdrawal From Iraq Merit Attention?

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" In the beginning of a change, the patriot is a scarce man, brave, hated, and scorned. When his cause succeeds however, the timid join him, for then it costs nothing to be a patriot." - Mark Twain

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Walter Cronkite | Documentary Sends Warning to Congress

Walter Cronkite writes: Not unlike the Vietnam quagmire on which I reported in 1968, we are today presented with the Iraq quagmire. The threat of world communism has been replaced by international terror as a pretext for another misbegotten and mismanaged war, but the falsehoods, broken promises and withering national faith are too familiar.

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"The fact is that every war suffers a kind of progressive degradation with every month that it continues, because such things as individual liberty and a truthful press are simply not compatible with military efficiency. . . . " George Orwell - Homage to Catalonia

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Prominent Former Insider Breaking the Silence

Andrew Natsios has taken a lot of flak over his role in Iraq. In the ensuing three years, Natsios, a lifelong Republican, has played the loyal soldier for the administration, regularly defending the US reconstruction effort in Iraq. For the first time, Natsios publicly gave vent to his long-suppressed frustrations over the Bush administration's handling of the Iraq occupation. In an interview with Newsweek he harshly criticized the administration.

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"All forms of tampering with human beings, getting at them, shaping them against their will to your own pattern, all thought control and conditioning is, therefore, a denial of that in men which makes them men and their values ultimate." : Isaiah Berlin - (1909-1997) - Source: Two Concepts of Liberty, 1958

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Bush's Requests for Iraqi Base Funding Raises Skepticism

Even as military planners look to withdraw significant numbers of American troops from Iraq in the coming year, the Bush administration continues to request hundreds of millions of dollars for large bases there, raising concerns over whether they are intended as permanent sites for US forces.

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People have not been horrified by war to a sufficient extent ... War will exist until that distant day when the conscientious objector enjoys the same reputation and prestige as the warrior does today: John Fitzgerald Kennedy

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Every American Should Be Required To Watch This Video The Road To Guantánamo How three young men from the UK, ended up in the world's most notorious prison. This movie shows the sadism and stupidity of the US and British soldiers. The guards behave with the same cruelty you expect to see from SS officers in lurid second world war movies. It takes a moment or two to realize that these events reflect the reality of those held in Americas notorious gulag.

Click here to view: HERE

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The pioneers of a warless world are the youth that refuse military service: Albert Einstein

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It's Criminal

By Scott Ritter

The rallying cry of the Democratic Party must become impeachment. Given the magnitude of the crimes committed by the United States in Iraq under the direction and leadership of President Bush and his administration, there is simply no other recourse that can bring a halt to the madness in Iraq, and the insanity being planned in Iran and elsewhere.

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When a whole nation is roaring patriotism at the top of its voice, I am fain to explore the cleanness of its hands and purity of its heart." : Ralph Waldo Emerson

Latino March for Peace - 3rd Anniversary of Iraq Illegal Invasion

VIDEO SPECIAL |

Latino March for Peace

A film by Scott Galindez and Ted Sapphire

On March 12, 2006, Fernando Suarez del Solar and Pablo Paredes started a march with a coalition of the willing across 240+ miles in a quest for peace that aims at raising the Latino voice of opposition to the war in Iraq. The March will run from Tijuana, Mexico, all the way to the mission district of San Francisco, making strategic, symbolic and ceremonial stops along the way. The 241-mile march is inspired by Gandhi's 1930 Salt March protesting British imperialism and will serve as a loud cry for an end to the bloodshed in Iraq.

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Fallen Heroes of Operation Iraqi Freedom


Guerrero Azteca Peace Project Homepage

More children dying in Basra since Iraq invasion, says aid worker

We have now sunk to a depth at which the restatement of the obvious is the first duty of intelligent men: George Orwell

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Gotham Gazette

Back From Iraq
by Joshua Brustein
19 Mar 2006
Faced with homelessness, about forty veterans call Jason Ortiz each month looking for help. Ortiz is a caseworker at New Era Veterans, a residence for previously homeless veterans in the Soundview section of the Bronx. Most of the residents there left the military decades ago, Ortiz says. But recently about five of the 40 calls he gets every month are from veterans returning from Iraq.
Ortiz's voicemail has the same discouraging message for all those who dial his number: There is no more room.

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They could be made to accept the most flagrant violations of reality, because they never fully grasped the enormity of what was demanded of them, and were not sufficiently interested in public events to notice what was happening : George Orwell

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Source: Deutsche Presse Agentur (DPA)
Date: 21 Mar 2006

More children dying in Basra since Iraq invasion, says aid worker
Vienna_(dpa) _ More children than ever before are dying of diarrhoea-related diseases in the British-occupied Iraqi city of Basra, an Austrian aid worker said Tuesday.
Vienna physician Eva-Maria Hobiger, initiator of the medical aid project Aladin's Lamp for children with cancer, said the health system in Basra was in a grave crisis.
She said the health care situation in Basra was decimated by the international sanctions against the Saddam Hussein regime, but since the war the situation had become even worse.
Not even the most necessary items such as infusion solutions were available, and there was scant prospect of improvement, she said on Vienna's Radio Stephansdom, according to the Catholic press agency Kathpress.
Not a single medical consignment has reached children in Basra, she said, adding that "without Aladin's Lamp and our deliveries, the children would die."
The situation of water supplies in the city was also catastrophic, Many who survive diarrhoea-related diseases contracted from contaminated drinking water were severely undernourished.
For months, only 40 per cent of the water needs in the city of 700,000 people had been covered from the mains. The rest had been taken from the Shatt al-Arab, a river which besides bacteria carried huge quantities of poisonous substances, Hobiger said.

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Political language. . . is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind: George Orwell

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A Time for Heresy {Another Must Read From Moyers}
by Bill Moyers, TomPaine.com
It is time to drive the money changers from the temple of democracy.


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The nationalist not only does not disapprove of atrocities committed by his own side, but he has a remarkable capacity for not even hearing about them: George Orwell

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Bush's Skunktails
by Robert B. Reich, TomPaine.com
George W. Bush will harm a few Republicans this fall's elections -- but he has damaged the cause of good government for years to come.


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Number Of Iraqi Civilians Slaughtered In America's War? As Many As 250,000

Number of U.S. Military Personnel Slaughtered (Officially acknowledged) In Bush's War

2319

The War in Iraq Costs $249,019,818,285 See the cost in your community

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Scott Galindez | Someone Should Tell Bush Why We Went to War

Scott Galindez: After yesterday's presidential news conference, I am beginning to wonder if George W. Bush knows why we went to war with Iraq. He should just come clean and admit that we went to war because Dick, Wolfie, and Rummy told him to.

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"Never again shall one generation of veterans abandon another."

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Robert Scheer | Bush Continues to Deal in Denial

Robert Scheer writes: On the third anniversary of the beginning of his Iraq catastrophe, President Bush yet again dealt in denial, but this time the carefully screened audience at the Cleveland City Club wasn't buying it. Perhaps most on target was an elderly gentleman who cited what he said were the three main reasons for going to war in Iraq - WMD, Iraq's ties to the September 11, 2001, terrorists and the alleged purchase of nuclear material from Niger - and then noted dryly that all three of these rationales turned out to be false.

This Was Just On The PBS 'NewsHour'

Audio Link To Listen To Wyatt's Own Words




HONOR ROLL POEM

March 21, 2006

Wyatt Prunty, who served in the Vietnam war, was inspired to write a poem based on the NewsHour's Honor Roll of soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan.



The poem is called: "The Returning Dead."

The Returning Dead
Each night I make a drink and wait for them
They have become the day's concluding news,
Installments from a world without anthems
Or children, unfocusing eyes

A question that repeatedly rejects
My easy terms. They are ones who believed
And acted in the narrow and select
Ways handed them, while ordinary lives

Ran on without interruption
Or bad pictures, as though nothing had changed
Change is the one unanswerable question
Of these faces. The world can rearrange

Itself repeatedly, but these remain
The same, silent in everything they lack;
That's what they've come to, in places with names
Like Afghanistan, Iraq,

And this is the way it happens: the words
Are old - mother, father, home - and will catch
Surrounding currents in the slow absurd
Descending will of any river etched

Out of a landscape history refines
To myth. The TV blanks between
Segments, but every static face defines
Itself, holds stubbornly its private scene…

Fixed, publicly, as we are led
Back to that little negative whose lack
Is each of us, staring the staring dead,
Leaning, sometimes like grief itself; then straightening back.
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The 'HONOR ROLL' {Link Also At Poem Site}:

This is a Silent Honor Roll shown on the PBS 'News Hour', now Almost Daily, that was started at the Beginning!

As of Today, 3-21-06 there are 58 Pages with 5 'Honor Roll' links per page!

If you take the Time to View 'ALL' the Pages/Photo's and Information Instill This Thought Into Each American Military Face You See, 'Try and Picture 30, 40, 50, 60 or More Iraqi Faces, Children-Women-Men, Killed for Each Of These Faces You Are Looking At'

Some Pics of Fayetteville NC March 18th '06 Rally

See the photos HERE


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I like to believe that people in the long run are going to do more to promote peace than our governments. Indeed, I think that people want peace so much that one of these days governments had better get out of the way and let them have it.
Dwight D. Eisenhower
US general & Republican politician (1890 - 1969)

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"Never again shall one generation of veterans abandon another."

In the Path of a Storm, Vets Protest War...

Published on Monday, March 20, 2006 by The Nation

by Christian Parenti

A column of American military veterans of wars in Iraq, Vietnam and points in between, as well as parents and families of soldiers, marched into New Orleans Sunday chanting radical cadences and flying a 1776 version of the American flag.
Young Iraq vets led the column of roughly 250 through the grey wrecked landscape, many wearing their desert camouflage uniforms, with upside-down American flag patches on their shoulders, sporting shades, beards, kaffeeas, and chests full metals. At night and along the roads the conversation frequently turns to PTSD, poverty, depleted uranium-caused cancer, unpaid student loans, Ramadi, Tikrtit, IEDs and the intense camaraderie of this new movement.

Older veterans, mostly from the Vietnam war, who helped a younger generation of soldiers to launch Iraq Veterans Against the War (IVAW) are still as angry as they were thirty years ago, but their once-youthful anger and grief has been tempered by a generation of struggle. And it is upon this platform that the young Iraq vets are now building their piece of the movement.
"Our motto is that never again will one generation of veterans turn their back on another," said Dave Cline a long-time activist and early member of Vietnam Veterans Against the War.

The column spent the six days prior to arriving in New Orleans tromping and caravanning from Mobile, Alabama through the devastation that is, still, the Gulf Coast. Along the way the vets and their supporters left teams to help "muck out" some of the trashed homes along the small towns of the Gulf Coast. But the protest's larger aim was to make the connections between the devastation here and the ruin of Iraq. The protesters say corruption, incompetence and inhumanity mark both.
"All the money that is going to Iraq could be going down here," says former Army sniper and IVAW member Garrett Reppenhagen.

According to the IVAW, the invasion and occupation of Iraq could cost $2.65 trillion. Other numbers mentioned along the march were the more than 2,400 American troops and 100,000 Iraqis killed.

At times the connections between Iraq and the Gulf Coast became all too real, or even surreal. The ruined homes, lack of water and sporadic electricity along the way reminded many vets of the war zones in Iraq and Afghanistan that some had left only months before.

"In Gulfport I heard a pop or a snap and looked back and one of my guys took a knee," said Navy corps and combat vet Charles Anderson, referring to the common military position of kneeling on one knee in preparation for action. "I went back to him, put my hand on him and told him: 'It's OK, we're in Mississippi now.' "

On Thursday, the thirty-eighth anniversary of the My Lai massacre, the marchers were camped deep in the wrecked bayou country east of New Orleans and the mouth of Lake Pontchartrain. In a clearing by a brackish creek, among a forest of dry, ashen-colored, half-toppled pine trees, the vets listened to the stories of local residents who spoke from a small plywood stage about the horrors of the storm and the abandonment that followed. Bereft of state or federal aid, many of the people there were still in bare survival mode.

A local man named Raymond Couture broke down in tears as he told his story of finding thirty-four corpses in a local nursing home. "They ain't done nothing for us here yet, so I know they ain't done nothing for them people in Iraq." Then the vets and military families spoke. Tina Garnanez, a young Navajo, lesbian and vet, spoke of her experiences in Iraq. She described the track record of lies, broken promises and rising violence in Iraq as mirroring the history of broken treaties, genocide and poverty that shape reservation life in the United States.
Dinner in the broken forest was alligator gumbo; the IVAW kids partied out and then slept under the stars.

Later, in the Lower Ninth Ward of New Orleans, Demond Mullins, who returned from heavy combat in Iraq only five months ago, looked out at the ravaged, filthy wreckage in a quiet fury. "I can't believe this. This is worse than Baghdad. What my country has become sickens me."

The march from Mobile to New Orleans marks a new stage in organizing among Iraq veterans and thus a new stage for the peace movement. A year ago IVAW was, in reality, mostly just a good idea and a small speakers bureau. Now it is a real organization and a key piece in the larger coalition of groups like Veterans for Peace and Military Families Speak Out that make up the heart of peace movement.

Christian Parenti, a frequent contributor to The Nation on international affairs, is the author of The Freedom: Shadows and Hallucinations in Occupied Iraq (New Press).

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I like to believe that people in the long run are going to do more to promote peace than our governments. Indeed, I think that people want peace so much that one of these days governments had better get out of the way and let them have it.
Dwight D. Eisenhower
US general & Republican politician (1890 - 1969)

Symbols of Sacrifice

Arlington West a stark reminder of lives lost

By Rob Varela,
rvarela@VenturaCountyStar.com
March 20, 2006
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Rob Varela / Star staff

During a recent visit to the Arlington West memorial, Army Sgt. Trinidad Rangel of Oxnard visits the crosses of two soldiers he knew who were killed in Iraq. Rangel had just returned from Iraq after his second tour of duty.
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Sunday morning, on the eve of the third anniversary of the start of the Iraq war, 2,315 small white wooden crosses were to be set up again in neat rows just west of Stearn's Wharf in Santa Barbara.
Each cross bears a placard with the name, rank, hometown and cause of death of American military personnel who have fallen since the U.S. invasion and occupation began three years ago.
Taking up three-quarters of an acre of sand, the temporary war memorial has been set up Sunday mornings by members of the Santa Barbara Veterans For Peace and other volunteers and taken down every afternoon. It is called Arlington West, after the national cemetery with rows and rows of similar markers that is the burial place of the unknown soldier and President Kennedy.
The local memorial is the brainchild of longtime antiwar activist Stephen Sherrill, a semi-retired carpenter and member of the Santa Barbara VFP chapter. Sherrill made the original 340 wooden crosses used when the memorial was first displayed on Nov. 2, 2003, six months into the war.
It was meant originally as a one-time display, but the overwhelming response motivated VFP members to continue the display weekly. Crosses have been added as the number of war casualties grows. A flag flies permanently at half-staff as taps is played over a loudspeaker nonstop.
Vietnam veteran Michael Cervantes, 56, of Oxnard, president of the Ventura County VFP chapter, has helped set the memorial up and staff it most Sundays since December 2003. Cervantes has first-hand knowledge of the effects of war. Drafted at 20, he served in the Army infantry in Vietnam for a year. Two point men were killed while his squad of 24 soldiers was on patrol, and Cervantes had to harness up one of the men as he was airlifted out. He has seen what his generation had to go through; he doesn't want it to happen to the next.
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Rob Varela / Star staff

A flag flies at half-staff as taps is played at the Arlington West memorial on the beach just west of Stearn's Wharf in Santa Barbara. The temporary memorial is styled after the national cemetery in Virginia and was set up by members of Veterans For Peace.

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He has watched countless veterans and family members visit the crosses in Santa Barbara. Some leave mementos — stuffed toys, pictures, dog tags and flowers to decorate the barren crosses. Recently, he stood nearby, ready to offer words of encouragement to Army Sgt. Trinidad Rangel of Oxnard, who visited while on leave after returning from his second tour of duty in Iraq. An obviously emotional Rangel visited the crosses of two soldiers from his company. Soldiers like Rangel come to honor buddies and pay last respects. They continue to fight while their comrades returned home under an American flag.
Arlington West is intended to be a place to mourn, reflect, grieve and meditate, a place to honor and acknowledge those who have lost their lives, and to reflect upon the costs of war. Critics say it is no more than a war protest, but Sherrill and VFP members maintain that it is an alternative to impersonal casualty reports on the nightly news and that the crosses are simply a way to honor fallen heroes who did their duty.
As for Cervantes, he said he hopes that Arlington West will be "put out of business" for good, which will happen when the war ends. He said he hopes that he and fellow VFP members can leave the sands of the beach clear, much as it is after the water washes away any footprints.
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RELATED STORIES
Wounds of war

RELATED LINKS
VIDEO: Purple Heart Veterans
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"Never again shall one generation of veterans abandon another."

Organizing Voters to End War

“To initiate a war of aggresion…is not only an international crime, it is the supreme international crime, differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole.”
Nuremberg Tribunal

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Three Years After U.S. Invasion Two Wounded Iraqi Children and Their Fathers Tell Their Stories * On the third anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq, we hear about two Iraqi children who suffered near life-threatening injuries in the war: 8 year-old Ahmad Sharif lost his eyesight and right arm after being caught in crossfire and 3 year-old Alaa Khalid Hamdan was seriously injured when a U.S. tank opened fire on her family's home. Their fathers join them to tell their stories and two activists speak about their efforts to bring the children to the U.S. for medical treatment.
Listen/Watch/Read

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"the US-led invasion of Iraq was an illegal act that contravened the UN charter."
UN Chief Kofi Annan - -September 2004. Source BBC

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They Called It "The Black Room"

An elite Special Operations unit in Iraq, Task Force 6-26, beat detainees and used them as target practice. Their motto? "No Blood, No Foul."


Task Force 6-26
In Secret Unit's 'Black Room,' a Grim Portrait of U.S. Abuse

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"Knowledge makes a man unfit to be a slave."
Frederick Douglass

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March 18, 2006
The 'Long War'? Oh, Goodie
by Molly Ivins
AUSTIN, Texas — President Bush has once more undertaken to explain to us "Why We Fight," which is also the title of an excellent new documentary on Iraq. According to the president, "Our goal in Iraq is victory." I personally did not find that a helpful clarification.
According to the president, we are doomed to stay in Iraq until we "leave behind a democracy that can govern itself, sustain itself and defend itself." That's not exactly getting closer every day. But, the Prez sez, "A free Iraq in the heart of the Middle East will make the American people more secure for generations to come."


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Number Of Iraqi Civilians Slaughtered In America's War? As Many As 250,000

Number of U.S. Military Personnel Slaughtered (Officially acknowledged) In Bush's War

2317

The War in Iraq Costs $248,302,671,361 See the cost in your community

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The star-spangled fantasyland of the fake and home of the bogus

US politicians aim for rugged, macho images because insecure voters want to feel that real men are in charge

Linda Colley
Saturday March 18, 2006


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"As a result of the war, corporations have been enthroned and an era of corruption in high places will follow, and the money power of the country will endeavor to prolong its reign by working upon the prejudices of the people until all wealth is aggregated in a few hands and the Republic is destroyed. I feel at this moment more anxiety for the safety of my country than ever before, even in the midst of war. God grant that my suspicions may prove groundless."
U.S. President Abraham Lincoln, Nov. 21, 1864 - (letter to Col. William F. Elkins)
Ref: The Lincoln Encyclopedia, Archer H. Shaw (Macmillan, 1950, NY)

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The farcical end of the American dream
The US press is supposed to be challenging the lies of this war
By Robert Fisk
Mr Welshofer, it transpired in court, had stuffed the Iraqi General Abed Hamed Mowhoush head-first into a sleeping bag and sat on his chest, an action which - not surprisingly - caused the general to expire. The military jury ordered - reader, hold your breath - a reprimand for Mr Welshofer, the forfeiting of $6,000 of his salary and confinement to barracks for 60 days.

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They (corporations) cannot commit treason, nor be outlawed, nor excommunicated, for they have no souls
Lord Edward Coke

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Pledging to Vote for Peace
By The Nation
How many Americans would pledge to cast their votes in November only for candidates who want to end the war in Iraq?


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criminal, n. A person with predatory instincts who has not sufficient capital to form a corporation
Howard Scott

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Organizing Voters to End War

Protests and Petitions are Not Enough
"I will not vote for or support any candidate for President or Congress who does not make a speedy end to the war in Iraq, and preventing any future war of aggression, a public position in his or her campaign.?
Click here to make a difference."
PASS THIS ON

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It is part of the moral tragedy with which we are dealing that words like "democracy," "freedom," "rights," "justice," which have so often inspired heroism and have led men to give their lives for things which make life worthwhile, can also become a trap, the means of destroying the very things men desire to uphold.
Sir Norman Angell (1874 - 1967), 1956.

Riverbend - Three Years.....

Baghdad Burning


... I'll meet you 'round the bend my friend, where hearts can heal and souls can mend...
Saturday, March 18, 2006

Three Years...

It has been three years since the beginning of the war that marked the end of Iraq’s independence. Three years of occupation and bloodshed.

Spring should be about renewal and rebirth. For Iraqis, spring has been about reliving painful memories and preparing for future disasters. In many ways, this year is like 2003 prior to the war when we were stocking up on fuel, water, food and first aid supplies and medications. We're doing it again this year but now we don't discuss what we're stocking up for. Bombs and B-52's are so much easier to face than other possibilities.

I don’t think anyone imagined three years ago that things could be quite this bad today. The last few weeks have been ridden with tension. I’m so tired of it all- we’re all tired.

Rest At Riverbends Blog: HERE

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Twin Cities VFP
After Downing Street
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"Sow Justice, Reap Peace -- Strategies for Moving Beyond War" 2006 VFP Annual Convention August 10-13, Seattle, WA
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"Never again shall one generation of veterans abandon another."