Vets protest at NATO by throwing their medals away

i know there will be a lot of people who will condemn the vets for their actions but, no surprise, i'm not one of them... as a vietnam vet and a civilian worker in afghanistan, i have had the opportunity to see the effects of the endless war mentality of the u.s. in person... and as one who receives his health care from the va, i am all too well aware of our own domestic human wreckage caused by that same mentality... i say cheers for those vets for having the courage to speak out...

from msnbc...

Dozens of anti-war veterans tossed their medals onto a Chicago street Sunday near where NATO began its two-day summit, calling them “representations of hate,” “lies” and “cheap tokens,” and with some making emotional pleas for forgiveness from the people of Iraq and Afghanistan.

With many dressed in military fatigues, they had filed through the streets in formation, chanting "N-A-T-O, NATO has got to go," and “No NATO, no war, we don't work for you no more,” leading about 2,000 protesters on a 2.5-mile march.

After “retiring” an American flag they carried through the streets and giving it to a woman whose soldier son committed suicide, they began hurtling their war service medals into the air -- a rare form of protest that was last done on a large scale by 900 Vietnam veterans in 1971.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Submit To Propeller
Tweet

[Permalink] 1 comments

Jim Hightower: a right to protest? In your dreams...

Submit To Propeller
Tweet

[Permalink] 0 comments

"War criminal! ... War Criminal! Take her to the Hague"

i am of very limited means, but i'd be glad to purchase her airline ticket...

"Blood of millions of Iraqis is on your hands," the protester told Rice, who was President Bush's national security adviser when he decided to invade Iraq.

"War criminal! ... War Criminal!" the black-clad, "blood"-soaked protester screamed as authorities dragged her from a hearing room on Capitol Hill. "Take her to the Hague."

Rice was testifying to the House Foreign Relations Committee Wednesday, where she continued what some critics see as the Bush administration's drumbeat to war with Iran.

none of that seems to bother condi who was there to add her cadence to the drumbeat for war with Iran that's picking up tempo and growing ever louder...

Iran's nuclear program and alleged backing of terrorism represent "perhaps the single greatest challenge" to US national security, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Wednesday.

"We are very concerned that the policies of Iran constitute perhaps the single greatest challenge to American security interests in the Middle East and around the world," she said at a hearing in Congress.

After recent bellicose US remarks, including President George W. Bush's warning that a nuclear-armed Iran evoked the threat of "World War III," Rice said that Washington remained committed to talks to end Iran's atomic drive.

Submit To Propeller
Tweet

[Permalink] 0 comments

Larisa on the beginning of our national nervous breakdown

powerful... articulate... chilling... and written out of personal experience... here's some and here's some more...

The nation is tumbling toward pandemonium with each scandal and each lack of response from the other branches of government. With each outrage and abuse of power, more and more quiet disillusionment is turning into chaotic emoting.

Do you feel this as acutely as I do? Perhaps not, but I have the benefit of my own experience, living in a country of jackals who found themselves amidst a seething nation far too long abused, frightened, and angry. When the Soviet Union finally fell, it did not fall peacefully; and worse, it fell into chaos and into the hands of criminals. But it was still the oppressive regime that fell and the good guys - that is, us - who won the Cold War. What happens when the good guys fall, imploding under the weight of mass corruption and a populace teetering near deranged anger? Does it matter that Rosie and Elizabeth had a spat, when the rest of the nation is barely keeping a grip on its sanity, trying to cope in a fabricated reality in which 2 + 2 = whatever we are told?

What is next, then, in this land of mass media produced fuel for a fire that is already raging strongly in our national conscience? I am unsettled and fretting, because I have been here before and the smell of it frightens me... the smell of the desperations of those in power and the smell of "enough" from the powerless.

damn, she's good...

Submit To Propeller
Tweet

[Permalink] 0 comments

A heckuva anniversary

and nothing at all to celebrate...



May 1, 2003



April 30, 2007

At an event held in front of the White House grounds today, Americans United for Change and Americans Against Escalation in Iraq unfurled a version of the infamous "Mission Accomplished" banner, with one notable difference: Theirs ended with a question mark.

The "Mission Accomplished?" protest comes in advance of tomorrow's fourth anniversary of the speech President George Bush made on May 1, 2003 on the USS Abraham Lincoln to declare major combat operations in Iraq complete.

Submit To Propeller
Tweet

[Permalink] 0 comments