Jane Evershed> Pay Me in Cherry Blossoms

Pay me in Cherry Blossoms

Turn around and take
That last look at the family farm’s wake
Fast dying to BIG interests
That never, ever rests.
What do they want that land for?
They want it for the water rights!
And a place to run all kinds of pipes…

Pay me in cherry blossoms,
In this world that does not yet 
Revere nature above all else
It is up to you and I,
To give those cherry blossoms 
Their true worth
For in so doing
We give value to the rest of the earth.

Cherry blossoms look good
But they have no power,
Like the women of this world,
Family farmers now going the way
Of the Sioux and the Ojibway.

Coleen Rowley> Senator Webb Challenges Obama’s Humanitarian Interventionism

Senator Webb Challenges Obama’s Humanitarian Interventionism

Posted on Democratic Underground by annm4peace

Thank goodness that Senator Webb and House Rep. Jones are challenging Obama’s (and Samantha Power’s) “humanitarian intervention” powers.

The irony is that the (former military official who is no dove) Senator Webb has to challenge the (non-military experienced) executive’s unbridled power to wage “preventive war” while “progressives” like Keith Ellison praise the illegal Libya war as a great example of (Samantha Power’s) theory of “humanitarian intervention”!

http://www.startribune.com/opinion/commentaries/150245825.html

Something’s orwellingly rotten in Denmark, folks!!!

Rep. Walter Jones has a House Concurrent Resolution 107, which re-asserts Congress’ sole authority to declare war, and invokes impeachment proceedings against any President who takes the country to war without first obtaining Congressional approval.

In a recent hearing of the House Armed Services Committee, Defense Secretary Panetta again confirmed that the Obama White House policy is that Congress need not be consulted before launching war.

Many consider the “Atrocity Prevention Board” a dangerous extension of the unitary executive power grab by Bush and Cheney, exceeding all of their assertions by now claiming that the U.S. has the right to launch preventive wars–a violation of the United Nations Charter.

Thank goodness that Senator Webb and House Rep. Jones are challenging Obama’s (and Samantha Power’s) “humanitarian intervention” powers.

The irony is that the (former military official who is no dove) Senator Webb has to challenge the (non-military experienced) executive’s unbridled power to wage “preventive war” while “progressives” like Keith Ellison praise the illegal Libya war as a great example of (Samantha Power’s) theory of “humanitarian intervention”!

Something’s orwellingly rotten in Denmark, folks!!!

Rep. Walter Jones has a House Concurrent Resolution 107, which re-asserts Congress’ sole authority to declare war, and invokes impeachment proceedings against any President who takes the country to war without first obtaining Congressional approval. In a recent hearing of the House Armed Services Committee, Defense Secretary Panetta again confirmed that the Obama White House policy is that Congress need not be consulted before launching war.

Many consider the “Atrocity Prevention Board” a dangerous extension of the unitary executive power grab by Bush and Cheney, exceeding all of their assertions by now claiming that the U.S. has the right to launch preventive wars–a violation of the United Nations Charter.

Comments from Coleen Rowley:

The irony is that the (former military official) Senator has to challenge the (non-military experienced) executive’s unbridled power to wage “preventive war” while “progressives” like Keith Ellison praise the illegal Libya war as a great example of Samantha Power’s “humanitarian intervention”!

Something’s orwellingly rotten in Denmark, folks!!!  I just got the following e-mail.  Coleen R.

The critical backdrop to Senator Webb’s legislation (see his office press release and statement below) is that President Obama, in August 2011, signed Presidential Study Directive 10 (PSD-10), establishing the Atrocities Prevention Board, to bypass the U.S. Constitution and assert unitary executive authority to launch preventive wars, justified by humanitarian interventionism.  He created an Atrocities Prevention Board, to set the criterion for U.S. launching of preventive wars–without seeking Congressional authorization under Article I, Section 8, Paragraph 11 of the U.S. Constitution. 

Two weeks ago, the President spoke at the Holocaust Museum and announced the launching of the Atrocities Prevention Board and appointed Samantha Power as its head.  She is a George Soros ally and a radical proponent of the “R2P” doctrine (“Responsibility to Protect”).  The Board claims broad powers to launch preventive military action, without consulting with Congress. 

Though largely below the radar screen, this dangerous extension of the Carl Schmitt idea of absolute power of the sovereign, has been noted by some people in Congress, as reflected below in Sen. Webb’s action, and in Rep. Walter Jones’ House Concurrent Resolution 107, which re-asserts Congress’ sole authority to declare war, and invokes impeachment proceedings against any President who takes the country to war without first obtaining Congressional approval. 

In a recent hearing of the House Armed Services Committee, Defense Secretary Panetta again confirmed that the Obama White House policy is that Congress need not be consulted before launching war.

This is a very dangerous extension of the unitary executive power grab by Bush and Cheney, exceeding all of their assertions by now claiming that the U.S. has the right to launch preventive wars–a violation of the United Nations Charter.

Press Releases
Senator Webb: “Humanitarian Interventions” Must Have
Congressional Approval http://webb.senate.gov/newsroom/pressreleases/2012-05-09.cfm?renderforprint=1

“The most important constitutional challenge facing the balance
of power between the Presidency and the Congress in modern times”

May 9, 2012

Washington, DC—Senator Jim Webb today announced he will introduce legislation to require Congressional approval before the President could take military action for so-called “humanitarian interventions,” where U.S. armed forces might respond to crises abroad but American interests are not directly threatened. The legislation would require the President to obtain formal approval by the Congress before using military force, and would also require that debate begin within days of such a request and that a vote must proceed in a timely manner.

Senator Webb, a member of the Armed Services and Foreign Relations Committees, has repeatedly voiced concerns over the Administration’s evolving policy of humanitarian intervention since the lead-up to U.S. involvement in Libya. In June 2011, he introduced a Joint Resolution with Senator Bob Corker (R-TN) to require the Administration to justify its actions in Libya, to prohibit U.S. troops on the ground, and to call for Congressional authorization of continued operations. More recently, he has raised similar concerns regarding possible U.S. intervention in Syria.

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Lea Foshee> Who Will Save Our Children?

Who Will Save Our Children?

 By Lea Foushee     WAMM Newsletter    May 2012

  It’s predicted that the next battles in the world will be over water, and indeed in some places they have already begun. We tend to think that scarcity of clean water is more of a problem on other continents. Yet, with 10,000 freshwater lakes in the state of Minnesota, the destruction of our water is well under way. Now is a good time to focus on this: The month of May marks both Mother’s Day and the state fishing opener—and there’s something fishy going on that mothers need to know.—Editor’s note

 Times are tough and maybe your food budget is a little thin. Maybe this causes you and your family to eat more fish as a less expensive protein source. If so, you should be aware that eating fish even two or three times a week creates a significant health hazard because virtually all fish, whether caught from Minnesota lakes and rivers or tuna from the store, are contaminated with mercury. Even with very small dosages, mercury is extremely destructive once it gets inside the body. It is a powerful neurotoxin that destroys brain tissue and the nervous system.

 Women of childbearing age, children under 16––and especially unborn fetuses––are most at risk because brain tissue and nervous systems are most susceptible to mercury poisoning during life’s early growth and development phases. This is of extreme importance for indigenous peoples in our Great Lakes region that have relied on fish for protein for countless generations. National Institutes of Health in their landmark study in 2005 documented that indigenous, Asian, and Pacific Islands adult women have 17 percent, or a three times higher blood mercury level than other ethnic groups, who were reported at 5.08 percent. Unemployment, the resulting poverty, lack of access to fruits and vegetables, and a diet high in fat, sugar, salt, and carbohydrates are contributing factors. A mother’s body burden of mercury can be transferred to her developing fetus as it crosses the placenta; mercury is also excreted in breast milk. The North American Water Office (NAWO) has documented the problem in its pilot nutrition study published in our educational curriculum, “Sacred Water, Water for Life.”

 Mercury contaminates our environment globally. Elemental mercury is in coal, taconite and metal ores, and oil. When coal is burned, when taconite and other metal ores are smelted, and when oil is refined, the heat involved evaporates the mercury and spews it into the atmosphere. Over time, the mercury settles out of the atmosphere into the oceans, lakes, and rivers, and on the land. But there is so much of it already in the atmosphere that even if all new contributions stopped today, we would not see reductions of mercury in fish tissue for 20 years.

 After mercury settles out of the atmosphere it interacts with methanogenic bacteria, bacteria that produce methane. Such bacteria exist in sediments in waters and in soils all over the planet, and the interaction causes methylation of elemental mercury. Methylation makes mercury biologically active and readily available for incorporation into body tissues. Methyl-mercury from soils washes into waters and concentrates in the water column of lakes and oceans where fish become mercury blotters, absorbing methyl-mercury in the water instantaneously as it passes through the gills, and metabolizing it throughout the body. Then bigger fish eat smaller fish, further concentrating the mercury. This is why predator fish that are most popular in human diets, such as bass, walleye, and northern pike, are also the most contaminated. The bigger the fish, the greater the contamination.

 Mercury contamination can also come from several other sources, including agricultural products such as pesticides and fungicides that contain mercury compounds, and consumer products such as pharmaceuticals and beauty creams for skin lightening or freckle creams. Processes such as cremation release elemental mercury from dental fillings. Additional contamination comes from garbage incineration of industrial, medicinal, and household wastes containing mercury products.

 Once a given amount of methyl mercury enters the body, half of that mercury will still be in the body 50 to 70 days later. Fifty to 70 days after that, one quarter of the original dose will still be in the body. With this understanding of how long it takes for methyl mercury to get metabolized out of the body, it becomes easy to see why eating even a couple of fish meals a week can add up to unacceptable levels of contamination, particularly for children and pregnant women. In fact, walleye throughout the Minnesota region are so contaminated with mercury that the Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) warns women of childbearing age and children under 16 against eating more than one meal a month of walleye from a Minnesota lake that is 20 inches long or smaller. Walleye larger than 20 inches should not be eaten at all. Adult sport fishermen should also be aware of the MDH fish consumption guidelines, but they do not have the same risk factors as people and cultures that rely on fish as a staple in their diet.

 The threat from mercury becomes a greater concern when additional sources and kinds of mercury are compounded in the same child. Every fish meal must be counted––store- purchased and lake- or river-caught fish, including fish sticks and tuna fish. Families that eat fish in excess of the MDH recommendations whether because of cultural preference, ceremonial practice, or economic necessity should take special precautions to eliminate any other mercury exposure from consumer products, specifically dental mercury fillings or pharmaceuticals.

 Unfortunately, mercury reduction efforts in Minnesota, throughout the country, and around the world are in disarray. Mercury releases to the Minnesota environment were calculated by the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA) to be about 2,626 pounds in 2010, and the MPCA projects a release of 1,948 pounds in 2018, assuming that the mercury emitters comply with the ongoing mercury reduction efforts. Over half is from coal-fired power plants. Seven new permits to release mercury in Minnesota have either been approved since 2010, or are still in the process of being approved by the MPCA. These numbers are truly alarming when one considers that even a small fraction of a gram of mercury is sufficient to contaminate a medium-sized lake to the point where its fish are inedible.

 Further, mercury reduction technologies and strategies capable of reducing mercury releases down to levels that would begin reducing the threat some 20 years from now either don’t exist or are blocked by industrial managers more concerned with profits and preserving their market share. Meanwhile, the federal Center for Disease Control reports that as of March 2012, 1 in 88 children from 14 states in their study is now affected by autism.

Environmental factors have long been downplayed as a cause of autism, but improved diagnosis, genetics, and immune disorders combined cannot account for the exponential increase in autism without adding the environmental component to the list of multiple causes. Autism is a neurological disorder; mercury is an extremely toxic neurologic poison that is pervasive in our waters, our air, our fish, in our mouths, and in our consumer products. Make the link!

 Educators, students, environmental organizations, and the public interested in learning more are urged to see “Sacred Water: Sacred Life,” a solution strategy and call-to-action plan, available through www.nawo.org

 Lea Foushee has researched and educated the public on the many aspects of mercury contamination for the last 30 years. She holds a self-designed bachelor of science degree, the Social and Cultural Factors Affecting Human and Natural Resource Management, from the University of Minnesota.

 Resources:

 Sacred Water, Sacred Life

Educators, students, environmental organizations and the general public interested in learning more see: “Sacred Water: Water for Life,” a solution strategy and call-to-action plan. Provides facts and a spiritual and cultural context about the threats of mercury and other toxicants that contaminate our water. Offers ways to regain health. Available through www.nawo.org

 Mothers of Young Children and Mothers-to-Be

For women who are or want to be pregnant and/or have children under the age of 15: County by county data from the Minnesota Department of Health on mercury and other toxicants in lakes: www.health.state.mn.us/divs/eh/fish/eating.pdf

 Leaks In Our Own Backyard

“What’s going on at Prairie Island? There’s been one screw-up at the plant followed quickly by the next for the past many months…At a minimum, we would do well to reflect upon the recent acknowledgement of Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda. He said on March 2, 2012, that the government shares the blame for the Fukushima disaster because officials had been blinded by a false belief in the country’s technological infallibility. From our perspective, that is just one of several intertwined false beliefs required for continued commercial nuclear operations.”

—NAWO News, Spring 2012 edition

 Special Prairie Island Edition

On the 30th anniversary of NAWO News, a special edition is dedicated to immediate concerns about the Prairie Island nuclear power plant on the Mississippi River, just south of the Twin Cities.

 © 2012 Women Against Military Madness. All rights reserved.

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Perlstein> How FBI Entrapment Is Inventing ‘Terrorists’ – and Letting Bad Guys Off the Hook

How FBI Entrapment Is Inventing ‘Terrorists’ – and Letting Bad Guys Off the Hook

POSTED: May 15, 3:10 PM ET | By Rick Perlstein   Rolling Stone

Mark McGowan, Patricia Faella, Marcus Faella, Kent McLellan, Jennifer McGowan, Dustin Perry, Richard Stockdale and Christopher Brooks of the American Front arrested in Florida.  REUTERS/Osceola County Jail /LANDOV

This past October, at an Occupy encampment in Cleveland, Ohio, “suspicious males with walkie-talkies around their necks” and “scarves or towels around their heads” were heard grumbling at the protesters’ unwillingness to act violently. At meetings a few months later, one of them, a 26-year-old with a black Mohawk known as “Cyco,” explained to his anarchist colleagues how “you can make plastic explosives with bleach,” and the group of five men fantasized about what they might blow up.

Cyco suggested a small bridge. One of the others thought they’d have a better chance of not hurting people if they blew up a cargo ship. A third, however, argued for a big bridge – “Gotta slow the traffic that’s going to make them money” – and won. He then led them to a connection who sold them C-4 explosives for $450. Then, the night before the May Day Occupy protests, they allegedly put the plan into motion – and just as the would-be terrorists fiddled with the detonator they hoped would blow to smithereens a scenic bridge in Ohio’s Cuyahoga Valley National Park traversed by 13,610 vehicles every day, the FBI swooped in to arrest them.

Right in the nick of time, just like in the movies. The authorities couldn’t have more effectively made the Occupy movement look like a danger to the republic if they had scripted it. Maybe that’s because, more or less, they did.

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A Time-Lapse Map of Every Nuclear Explosion Since 1945 – by Isao Hashimoto

Uploaded by aConcernedHuman on Oct 24, 2010

Japanese artist Isao Hashimoto has created a beautiful, undeniably scary time-lapse map of the 2053 nuclear explosions which have taken place between 1945 and 1998, beginning with the Manhattan Project’s “Trinity” test near Los Alamos and concluding with Pakistan’s nuclear tests in May of 1998. This leaves out North Korea’s two alleged nuclear tests in this past decade (the legitimacy of both of which is not 100% clear).

Each nation gets a blip and a flashing dot on the map whenever they detonate a nuclear weapon, with a running tally kept on the top and bottom bars of the screen. Hashimoto, who began the project in 2003, says that he created it with the goal of showing”the fear and folly of nuclear weapons.” It starts really slow — if you want to see real action, skip ahead to 1962 or so — but the buildup becomes overwhelming.

http://www.ctbto.org/specials/1945-1998-by-isao-hashimoto/

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Democracy Now!> Journalist, Plaintiff Chris Hedges Hails “Monumental” Ruling on NDAA Indefinite Detention

Published on May 17, 2012 by democracynow

DemocracyNow.org – In a rare move, a federal judge has struck down part of a controversial law signed by President Obama that gave the government the power to indefinitely detain anyone it considers a terrorism suspect anywhere in the world without charge or trial — including U.S. citizens. Judge Katherine Forrest of the Southern District of New York ruled the indefinite detention provision of the National Defense Authorization Act likely violates the First and Fifth Amendments of U.S. citizens.

We speak with Chris Hedges, a journalist who filed the suit challenging the NDAA along with six others, and Bruce Afran, the group’s attorney. “This is another window into the steady assault against civil liberties,” Hedges says. “What makes [the ruling] so monumental is that finally, we have a federal judge who stands up for the rule of law.”

To watch the complete daily, independent news hour, read the transcript, download the podcast, and for more information, visithttp://www.democracynow.org/

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ACLU> Protesting NATO: What to Know About the Secret Service and H.R. 347

H.R. 347

Protesting NATO: What to Know About the Secret Service and H.R. 347

By Gabe Rottman, Washington Legislative Office at 12:58pm   ACLU

The forthcoming summit of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, set for May 20 and 21 in Chicago, could be the first public test of H.R. 347, the recently passed law that expanded the ability of the Secret Service to suppress protests in or around certain restricted zones near individuals under its protection. We’ve written about H.R. 347 here and here.

NATO summits are interesting affairs. Unlike the periodic meetings of member nations, the summits are more stately and elaborate events, meant to introduce major policy changes or new members to the strategic alliance (among other things). This means lots of Very Important Persons, and lots of Very Controversial Issues. Both of these things mean lots of expected First Amendment activity.

As far as H.R. 347 goes, the NATO summit has been declared a “National Special Security Event” by the Department of Homeland Security. This puts the Secret Service in charge of the overall security plan. My understanding is that the FBI chips in with counterterrorism and counterintelligence assistance, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (another DHS agency) is in charge of emergency preparation. It also means massive security preparations and infrastructure—and lots of opportunities for the suppression of lawful protest.

The entire area around Chicago’s McCormick Place—the main site for the summit—will be off-limits to unauthorized personnel, and I believe will qualify as a restricted zone under the federal law that was amended by H.R. 347. Additionally, the Secret Service plans to close parts of Lake Shore Drive and I-55 near the summit as well as other locations in the Loop.

For protesters, this means a couple of things. First, be aware of the types of conduct covered by the law amended by H.R. 347 (all of this stuff was actually illegal before the recent revamp, which is partially why the bill sailed under the radar). That is, you cannot:

(1) Enter or remain in one of these zones without “lawful authority”;
(2) Engage in “disorderly or disruptive conduct” in or near one of these zones that “impedes or disrupts the orderly conduct of Government activities or official functions” (but you must intend to impede or disrupt those activities or functions);
(3) Block or otherwise impede an entrance or exit to one of these zones (but you must again intend to disrupt government activities or official functions); or
(4) Engage in any act of physical violence against person or property in any restricted zone.

Second, note this is where the lowered intent standard in the law, which we explained here, could come into play. Previously, per the one case discussing the scope of the law amended by H.R. 347, there was a question about whether you had to affirmatively know your actions were unlawful under federal law before you could be convicted under the relevant federal statute. Under H.R. 347′s amendments to that statute, I think it’s safe to say that requirement is gone. All you need to know are the “facts underlying” the offense, meaning that you merely need to be aware you’re engaged in the conduct described above in one of these zones, but not that it’s illegal.

In practice, this could mean that protesters who inadvertently find themselves in one of these areas could be arrested and charged under H.R. 347. That said, the law also requires that the area be “posted, cordoned off, or otherwise restricted,” meaning that it would have to be obvious based on signage, a cordon of police officers surrounding the area or some other means that the area is a federally restricted area. If not, it would arguably be difficult to form the required intent to commit the crime. That will not necessarily, however, stop the authorities from arresting you.

What will be particularly interesting (read: alarming) is if the Secret Service starts to use the law to get at protests that are physically removed from the event. For instance, if a lawful protest that is within earshot of the summit gets rowdy enough that it “disrupts” the “orderly conduct of Government business or official functions,” does that trigger the statute? We just don’t know. The Secret Service certainly has the ability and obligation to secure the individuals it protects, but it also must permit lawful protest to be seen and heard. It cannot use H.R. 347 to “sanitize” the summit.

GET INVOLVED

Sign the letter: Respect protestors’ rights to free speech

ACT NOW

In any event, . . . time will soon tell how “big a deal” the law is. As always, if you hear anything on H.R. 347, let us know, and you can also personally urge the Secret Service to respect the First Amendment here.

H.R. 347

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Steve Clemens> Punished for Exercising Our Constitutional Rights?

Punished for Exercising Our Constitutional Rights?

by Steve Clemens   May 16, 2012    Mennonista

Trial on May 14, 2012 of nonviolent protesters at Alliant Tech Systems, manufacturer of weapons and war profiteer.

The contrast between the two Judges couldn’t have been starker. Judge Peter Cahill and Judge Ronald Abrams both serve on the Hennepin County’s Fourth District Bench. Both Judges were assigned criminal trespass cases for nonviolent protest at the entrance to the corporate headquarters of Minnesota’s largest war profiteer, Alliant Techsystems (ATK).

The same defense arguments were made in both courtrooms, the former in 2010, the latter this week. The same Eden Prairie Prosecutor, different Judges. The results were significantly different: Judge Cahill thanked the defendants for interesting and enlightening testimony and fined us $1 or one hour of community service – hopefully at a local children’s hospital, he added, noting in our testimony about our concern over civilian causalities of war.

While Judge Abrams treated us courteously and thanked both the defense and prosecution for our behavior in court, the sentencing differed widely. 10 days in jail; two days in jail; 68 hours of community service; 32 hours of community service. When is the last time you hear a Judge order 90 days in jail for an 89 year-old nonviolent defendant who is a nun in declining health? Yes, he stayed 87 of those days for a year in mandating the 32 hours of community service but his sentence was the maximum allowed under the trespass law of Minnesota.

To further add to the disparity, the 12 nonviolent defendants were repeatedly offered a plea bargain deal if we chose to forgo our right to a jury trial and enter a no contest plea to the charges: any amount of self-reporting community service to any local non-profit organization would be the prosecutor’s recommendation to the court. All we had to do is take the guilty plea.

“Don’t do the crime if you can’t do the time” is an adage I’ve heard (and repeated) many times. In fact, if we choose to engage in civil resistance for the sake of peace and justice, we would do well to always be prepared to face the legal consequences of our actions.

The Constitution gives us the right to a jury trial of our “peers” but the way the system operates when one looks closely from behind the defendants table in the courtroom is a process which often removes citizens with well-formed, educated opinions when the jury pool is whittled down to who will actually hear the case. Strict rules of evidence and what testimony will be allowed in front of a jury controls the process – treating as “hearsay” and “irrelevant” the years of study and investigation done by principled protestors. The jury is instructed to follow the precise letter of the law, the spirit of which be damned.

One can go “pro se”, act as one’s own attorney but you aren’t invited back to the inner sanctum of the courtroom where the prosecutor can huddle with the judge, planning out sentencing strategy. When one co-defendant tried to go through the back door to request that the microphones be turned off during a break in the proceedings so the defendants could discuss issues without them being recorded or overheard, he was briskly told he could not be “back there” because of the security risk – even though he had gone through the same security checkpoint on the second floor as any prosecutor would.

We are told by the Prosecutor that “more than 95%” of all his cases are “settled out of court” with a type of plea bargain. The number of cases overwhelms the Court as the budgets for the judicial branch continue to face cuts to both staff and finances. The entire system would collapse if only a few more defendants would request their right to a jury trial. Judge Cahill asked his defendants if they were will to accept an official “hearing” rather than a jury trial and I suspect his sentence reflected his appreciation for our willingness to avoid the more confrontational style of a jury trial.

But defendants shouldn’t have to make such choices when a trial by jury is a constitutional right. I went in to the Courtroom this week a skeptic about the type of “justice” I’d receive. I remain skeptical. The Judge was given input from the Prosecutor about my past convictions (although Patrick Leach, the Prosecutor, probably didn’t do a thorough search of all the defendants) but I’m certain he did not mention that 3 times Hennepin County juries have acquitted me of the same charge for the same type of protest. In jury trials for this offense, I’m still 3 wins (not guilty) with now two losses; a batting average of .600, not bad for a non-lawyer.

I’m glad to do the 10 days in jail if it exposes our “judicial system” for what it is: straining at gnats while swallowing a camel (Matthew 23:24) when it continues to fail to challenge illegal wars, indiscriminate weapons, and predatory bankers but instead fills our jails and prisons with those who are predominately on the margins of our society. Our jails are filled with people who are mentally ill and/or physically addicted but instead of treatment, we specialize in punishment. A friend of mine in Georgia who recently was jailed because of his nonviolent support of immigrants told me he experienced his jail time as a sacrament. His friend told him, “Being imprisoned for the Gospel is sacramental.” Lets hope I can keep that in mind when it is time to “do my time”!

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Coleen Rowley> Militarization of the Mothers: You’ve Come a Long Way, Baby, from Mother’s Day for Peace

Militarization of the Mothers: You’ve Come a Long Way, Baby, from Mother’s Day for Peace

Coleen Rowley    Posted: 05/14/2012 12:55 pm  
Huffington Post

 (Author’s note: Perhaps it’s a good thing I was obviously too late in submitting this to run on Mother’s Day so as not to cast a pall over the sentimental celebration. But it’s not too late to think of next year! Given the notion that’s been ushered in of “endless war” and its daily taking of so many children’s lives, perhaps we need to proclaim every day to be Mother’s Day?! Yes, every day should be Mother’s Day….and Children’s Day, too! WAR….WeAre Responsible!!)

Recall that Mother’s Day was originated by Julia Ward Howe not to fill restaurants or boost the stock of Hallmark cards, but as an anti-militarism effort to further the cause of peace. In her 1870 Proclamation, Howe, after witnessing the suffering and horrors of the Civil War, laid the foundation for the theory that women as the more “tender” sex and better teachers of charity, mercy and patience, would naturally, if they gained power, put an end to the senselessness of wars.

Reading of Howe’s “Mother’s Day for Peace Proclamation” filmed by bravenewfoundation

142 years later, we see that the five most powerful women thus far in U.S. history (at a time when the United States has climbed to “military superpower” status in the world) are Madeleine Albright, Condi Rice, Hillary Clinton, Susan Rice and Samantha Power — all of whom are mothers (except Condi Rice), proving Howe’s theory completely wrong with their pronounced attitudes, actions and instigation of wars during the last two decades. The war-hawkishness (and some would add ruthless cruelty) of the first three female Secretaries of State and the two on Obama’s short list to become next Secretary of State (but who are already powerful, as advisors on Obama’s National Security Council, his UN Ambassador and chair of his new “humanitarian war” program) would probably make the founder of “Mothers Day for Peace” turn over in her grave.

In fact, defining aspects of these five most powerful women’s career stances and orientation towards military power jump out of their Wikipedia bios to vie with Henry Kissinger’s cold calculated Machiavellianism. (If you already know their backgrounds, you can skip the following brief highlights.)

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Mary Beaudoin> The Myth of Humanitarian Intervention

[Editor's Note: This article is taken from a talk given by Mary Beaudoin at the forum, "The Myth of Humanitarian Intervention," sponsored by the WAMM Middle East Committee on May 9, 2012 in St. Paul, Minnesota.]

Leaders have always sought ways to justify wars to the public. They are not usually going to say we’re going to go to war to grab land from another country or steal their oil or lay a pipeline across their country for easy access to oil or grab a geographic foothold to prevent China from trading with that country. No, in order to get people to allow the use of their country’s name and tax money and the sacrifice of lives, they have to appeal to some deep passions within people. This usually involves convincing them that there is a need to protect—protect our own nation from outside threats or protect people in other countries from the internal threat—often of their own leadership.

 Humanitarian intervention is based on the belief that people in other countries need to be protected from the threat of their own leadership. It involves the use of force by a nation or group of nations against another nation with the main publicly-declared aim of ending human-rights violations.

 The nation under attack has not committed an act of aggression against another nation but the attacking nation or group of nations, by proclaiming a moral right, ultimately may intervene in the internal affairs of a sovereign nation by taking military action against that nation through land, sea and area, without permission of its government. Usually this is preceded by a series of measures such as economic sanctions, embargoes, no-fly zones and failed diplomacy.

 Humanitarian intervention provides a benevolent face to war but at the same time broadly speaking it results in undermining the concept of sovereign nations. The nation state has been the form of organization and governance of people throughout the modern world and is the basis for international law. Humanitarian intervention changes that concept so that forces external to the borders of a nation make determinations for it.

Many political analysts and observers believe that the US is an empire in decline and there is certainly a lot of evidence—the current economic conditions and histories of countries with expansionist objectives–or imperial ambitions–certainly point that way. But a few analysts have the view that before, or if, that is going to happen, that the US is gathering NATO partner and aligned countries around it and arming them so enormously that it is becoming NATO itself and that’s the new form of world government that is the plan for the future (though there are other countries that may have something to say about that).

 The attacks by US-led NATO countries on Yugoslavia were the test for humanitarian intervention that began this trend. The sovereign nation of Yugoslavia was broken into pieces, the proverbial village bombed to save it and humanitarian intervention in this form began to be established.

 There are two significant doctrines that set out the principles of humanitarian intervention:

 At the 2005 World Summit of the United Nations

(High-Level Plenary Meeting), the United Nations an initiative was formed that was called:

I. THE RESPONSIBILITY TO PROTECT (R2P)

It called for clear and unambiguous acceptance by all governments of the collective international responsibility to protect populations from four acts of atrocity: genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity. It asked for the willingness to take timely and decisive collective action through the Security Council, when peaceful means prove inadequate and national authorities are manifestly failing to do it. (in other words the use of military to prevent atrocities).

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