Pink Tucson's Peace Travels

I am amazed that any of the pics from yesterday turned out... because my hands were unsteady because I was shivering and my fingers were numb.   But one did turn out well and Farida, the webmistress for the main CODEPINK website, posted one of the ones I sent to her on the Mandate for Peace Action Photo Gallery.   Check it out!

January 27 approaches.  On that day Americans from all over the country will converge on Washington D.C. for the United for Peace and Justice coordinated March -- Act Now to End the War.  It could end up being quite large.  People are pissed.  We sent a different House and Senate back to D.C. in November to Bring the Troops Home NOW.   If we have to cut off funds in order to do that.... so be it. 

COME TO D.C. and join us.   March on Saturday the 27th.  Get training on how to Lobby on Sunday the 28th.   Lobby Congress on Monday the 29th. 

And if you are so inclined -- the CODEPINK House will be available for women wishing to stay on for a few days or through February 20th for our PEACE IN - PULL OUT month of actions and reminding those folks that they are there to enact the will of the people not to convince the people that corporate created policy is what the people should want. 

Tucson will support this mass action with a March on Thursday, January 25th.  See the details on the Tucson Peace Calendar.

I am going to get to D.C. come hell or high water.  Liz from Phoenix will be there.   And I hear that our friend Lee will be there too.  I'll be reporting back to Tucson via this Blog. 

For me this action really began today.  Zanne - aka Sam - from the East SF Bay area stopped in Tucson today on her way across the country to the D.C. events in her biodiesal CODEPINK Truck .   We met up at Grant and Campbell for a Bring the Troops Home Now protest.    Susan, Gretchen, Joyce, Liz, Zanne and I froze our buns off for peace from 5-6 p.m.  We only saw two middle finger salutes and received hundreds of flashed peace signs, thumbs up, and honks.   Zanne stopped in Phoenix earlier in the day for an action.    Tomorrow she will be on the road early and stop for actions in Las Cruces, N.M. and El Paso, TX.   Her blog is codepinkjournals.blogspot.com. and I think you can follow along on her trip there. 

I'll try to post pics from the action tomorrow.

More entries to follow.   This blog will be active again for at least a month.   

Peace. 

June 23rd already.  Geesh.  I had intended to write up several actions I didn't have time to write up when I was in DC.  And I had intended to post about actions that happened after I left DC and to stay up to date via interviews.  But things were pretty crazy back here in Tucson and how to achieve de-escalation of actions of some very nasty paramilitary thugs who call themselves counter-demonstrators but are not for anything as much as against us.  They've escalated to fairly consistent assault of peace demonstrators and our local police are clearly taking sides with their military buddies.  Very serious situation.  We want the peace keepers to keep the peace but they are clearly making political statements and taking sides.  We all have a right to protest and demonstrate.  They do not have a right to mash toes, hit us with flag stanchions and poles, to call us lewd and obscene names, or to cover our placards with their flags.  We are working with other levels of officialdom on ways to diffuse the negative emotional energy of these guys and have the police enforce a reasonable distance between the pro-war and pro-peace groups. 

So anyway... I will be doing the vacation thing soon and giving myself a couple weeks away from protesting and stress and just dedicate myself to writing and playing and I am really, really looking forward to having some down time.  For several years now every vacation I've taken has been a working one and I need a real recuperative one now.  Maybe if the mood strikes I will write up a few more things from Mother's Day Month.  I will want to write about Troops Home Fast I'm sure. 

powered by performancing firefox

CODEPINK and Women Say Enough went to Fort McNair Monday morning to protest torture by the military. There was supposedly an ongoing trial that was happening there.... but the info directing folks there was wrong.  You can't always beleive what you read in the papers.  The action was worth it though....even though Ann Wright, former ambassador and Army Colonel, was detained on base and charged with sedition for distributing postcards for a historical documentary, Sir No Sir, that is playing at the E Street Cinema,  You can hear her describe the event to Amy Goodman's on today's Democracy Now.

I left D.C. yesterday morning to return home to AZ, but my dynamic and courageous matriotic sisters in demonstration had a busy day -- proclaiming that Hillary Clinton just doesn't get the connection between war and energy when she gave a good talk on environment and energy at the National Press Club but exhibited a disconnect between our energy needs and dependency to the war in Iraq.  Medea Benjamin and Ann Wright who were at the talk unfurled a banner that said, "It takes a bomb to raze a village."  Other CODEPINK Women demonstrated outside. 

Another group of CODEPINKERS held a "die-in" at Diane Feinstein's office to protest her continuing support of the Republican controlled administration's and legislature's lip service per troop removal from Iraq.  The American people do not want staged slow withdrawal... we want out troops out NOW. 

You say you aren't seeing this stuff on regular news....well, they have chosen not to cover these actions because we know they received the same press releases that Amy Goodman's staff chose to act on to get interviews and more news.  Write your local and national news stations and tell them you want to know all about what is happening and not recieve filtered pablum that is intended to offend no one in power. 

Women from CODEPINK Mothers Day Month walked up and down and around the commencement exercises on the Mall today when George H. W. Bush (King George Ist) addressed the George Washington University Grads.  Desiree proudly carried her umbrella that was adorned with two peace signs, and slogans that stated "No More War, "& "Stop War."  She had a ticket, a gift bag and an "auntie of a graduate" attitude that allowed her access to the actual commencement.    Earlier bannering plans had to be shelved after the banner carriers were warned to stop (this after several security folks decided quiet demonstration was okay, but  one officer finally made it clear that any further action would mean arrest.  Desiree managed at least 30 minutes in the commencement seating area proper (during the entire time GHWB was speaking), as well as a couple cameos in front of the bank of news cameras, and   a shout of "War Criminal" when King George the 2nd was mentioned. 

Notable folks among protestors included Ann Wright.  (If you don't know her, check her out.  She was one of three diplomats to resign at the beginning of the Iraq War.)   A senior citizen couple wanted to take a picture of banner and tprotestors and thanked them for countering GHWB although members of their families were not pleased with their actions.  The pro-peace folks are coming out more and more in vocal support of protestors here. 

At least two graduates stood with backs turned to GHWB so that he could see the peace signs painted on their mortar boards.   After ceremonies ended one of these folks gave Desiree a two sided flier called "Why I refuse to attend my graduation." by Christian Langdon Wright, Senior, GW Class of 2006.   I will scan this and link to it within a few days. 

I'd write more about the activities of the morning, but our valiant  ladies have headed off to The Vietnam War Memorial to make a statement that they do not want , and the country really doesn't need any more War Memorials.

Today the Women of CODEPINK Mothers Day Month dressed in somber black and carried pictures of the faces of war --- Iraqi parents with severly injured children and children grieving over a deceased sibling--- they carried large graphics through the tourist filled mall, museum areas, and nearby streets at a slow somber pace to the beat of a drum.

Silent vigil was made on the Capitol Steps.  At street corners  the wailing of a member punctuated the air with the pain and grief of mothers who have lost their children in this war. 

Passersbys took pictures, talked and thanked the women, gave donations out of the blue, and Vietnam Vets gave thumbs up, a quiet and welll spoken wounded Iraqi War Veteran just released from Walter Reed seemed quite glad to be given the contact information about Iraq Veterans Against the War. 

Mothers Day Month pinkers, DC pinkers, Pinkers helping with the CODEPINK Table at the Network of Spiritual Progressives conference,  and even a woman we met on the metro who decided to come along with us all gathered at the E Street Theatre for the DC premiere of Sir No Sir an absolutely essential documentary for remembering what the zeitgeist for soldiers returning from Vietnam really was as told by the men who were those soldiers. 

While it is always difficult for me to believe that history is written to serve those in power, this film definitely shows there has been a skewing of perception that is difficult to accept. 

Toby is back at the Pink House.   Her experience was much worse than Katy's.  She was held for over 24 hours without food or water, was questioned after Miranda rights were given -- and that was typical of the treatment of the 20 other women with whom she was being held. 

I'm sitting next to Katie who was arraigned for Unlawful Entry (Federal charge) at Rumsfeld's house (at the CODEPINK Action)  even though she didn't enter the house (nor did anyone else)  and Disorderly Conduct (City charge) even though she was cooperative.  Toby was being arraigned la bit later so she isn't back yet.   Their court date is June 1 for both Federal and City charges. Katie has been fed, is very tired, and her left shoulder is giving her some difficulty due to rough handling by the arresting officers. 

The restrictions placed on her -- through June 1st -- are that she cannot be near Rummy's House, across the street from his house, nor can she call, email, mail Rummy or go anywhere near him nor have anyone do any of these things on her behalf. 

More when I hear more.

They were in court today -- but I haven't heard as yet what the judge decided this p.m.  

But to see the video of the actions yesterday afternoon that resulted in their arrest watch this.

Video: Protesters Arrested on Rumsfeld's Front Door A group of peace activists marched from the White House to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's house to tell the Bush Administration "Don't bomb Iran." While at Rumsfeld's house, police arrested a handful or protesters for trying to get to Rumsfeld's front door. PoliticsTV has exclusive video which can be seen by clicking here. Use the forward feature at the bottom of this email to share this video with your friends. See the video for yourself PoliticsTV comments: info@politicstv.com watch the video: http://politicstv.com/dspan.php

Oh, and by the way, they didn't storm the door.  Katie delivered a personal letter from CODEPINK through the mail slot of Rummy's door demanding that he bring the troops home from Iraq and that he not attack Iran. 

I’ve been very bad about blogging these past few days.  So much going on with Mothers Day Month actions here in D.C.   The mornings usually start out with a small group of women marching from the Pink House to the House or Senate Office Building that will be the focus of the day’s actions.  Today is probably fairly typical.   Women living in the pink house marched to Dirksen Senate Office Bldg. Other women either from the DC area or who are staying elsewhere   met up with the main group.  From the listings of the hearings it seemed to us last night that heading for a Foreign Relations hearing at which Kenneth Pollack was to speak would be our most pertinent opportunity for bird-dogging the rightwing nutso contingent.   So we all went into Dirksen 419 for a Senate Foreign Relations meeting.   Kenneth Pollack was  to testify and he was worth bird-dogging.  I met some great activist women from a high school in Petaluma, CA.  The generation coming up is wonderful, inspiring and we will be in good hands in the future if these girls, Yaz, Bianca, Evelyn, and Kylie  are any indication.   I hope they do start a CODEPINK group in their school… they are naturals and the intelligent woman activist thing.  A well-spoken and obviously very savvy staffer tipped me off that Rummy was in the building and that I should be down in Appropriations.  No one had to tell me twice.  I ran down and got in line to enter the hearing.  Unfortunately I didn’t get to hear all the lies that poured from his mouth, but I did catch enough of his summary to hear the totally false propaganda theater that was entered into the record as testimony. I only caught the last few words of his closing where he was speaking about two soldiers headed of to Iraq who typified the great American support for the war.  I just couldn’t help myself… here is a man who has never put his life on the line for his country, who helped build the very cozy and supportive relationship the USA had with Saddam, and who has personally orchestrated the bogus war, and reasons for it, that has resulted in the deaths of scores of thousands of individuals – here he is using handcrafted imagery of our sons, brothers, husbands or fathers to support his request for a 2007 budget for war that was crafted an entire universe away from the death, dismemberment, disability, agony and horror that is war. Those few words were enough to have me find myself shouting “Liar” at the man a few seconds after his last words at the hearing.  Of course I was escorted out of the building by a guard after they figured out where the shout had come from.  I went peaceably although I did extend my arm and flash a  peace sign as I walked out.  A half-hearted attempt was made to push my arm down, but there was a barrage of press camera flashes as this happened and I suspect they didn’t want to be seen as bullying me.  Once in the hall I just leaned up against a wall while the guards on the other side of the hall decided what to do.  A very nice security guard then came up to me and asked me what I said.  I am not ashamed of yelling at Rummy and I believe that truth is essential so I told him, “Liar.”  I meant no disrespect to the Senate body which I value, but Rumsfeld is evil.  I said I just couldn’t stand the lies and no one was telling the truth.  I found the security guard who escorted me from the building to be a gentleman, and I’m sure I detected the I’m on your side but this is my job vibe. I could have been arrested for disturbing the Senate, but they chose not to. While I was civilly disobedient, I meant no disrespect for the process of my government, only for its usurpers.   Once outside the Senate I found one of the Mothers Say No to War signs that were not allowed in the building so I stood there with it.   A number of people came up to me and thanked me profusely for what I was doing.  Many, many members of high school groups flashed peace signs as they walked by.  I then had the great pleasure to speak through a very nice young gentleman translator to a group of dignitaries (including Mps) from Vietnam who were waiting for their driver.   We spoke of the similarities between the War in Vietnam and the War in Iraq.  I spoke of my transformation into a person who stands against war when I was a child and saw the devastation of their country via news programming.  One gentleman spoke of how the recovery of the devastation of the war is only now really happening.  They asked if I had traveled to Vietnam, and I said no, but that my step-daughter had traveled throughout the country last summer and how much she enjoyed the beauty and culture.  For me this was such a powerful combination of events that contained such personally powerful metaphors and juxtapositions of events that I have been saying that the Goddess gave me the morning as a beautiful birthday present for my attempts to do what is right, to follow my heart, and to accept opportunities when they are presented to me.  Another post/entry will report on the wonderfully creative action other women were carrying out in another part of the building as I was attempting to get into the hearing where Rumsfeld was testifying.

As I was being escorted out of the Appropriations Committee meeting and the Senate my another group of CODEPINK Women attended the Foreign Relations committee hearings on Iran Nuclear Programs.  Early in the session Sam from CA announced from the gallery that America will not tolerate the invasion of Iran.  Later, Toby from CA rose and stated that she would like to testify about the absurdity of discussing the invasion of Iran because they are 5 to 10 years away from developing nuclear weapons and that it is the US that has a history of unjust invasion of other countries as well as the use of WMD.  As Blome was escorted from the Senate, Desiree Farooz from Texas walked in front of the committee with a banner that read,” Don’t Iraq Iran.”   At that point the singing of “We don’t want your dirty war machine” to the tune of Yellow Submarine began by women dispersed throughout the gallery and clad in pink within the room began to clean up with pink feather dusters, cloths and bowl brushes.   All were eventually made to stop cleaning up the Senate and were escorted from the building.

Whew.
I’ve been at Lafayette Park for 7 and a half hours now, and I feel like I could stay here forever. I’m sitting facing the White House, and there are circles of pink all over the park of people meeting, and eating together, talking strategy, and just making new friends.

I’ve seen Medea, Jodie, Gael, Diane Wilson, Rae, Cindy Sheehan, and given them all hugs, and they all send their love to Portland. (Patch Adams is here and he’s wearing a huge pink wig, and a custom made pink dress with a hoop skirt, and he’s about 7 feet tall, well, you’ll see the pictures.)

This afternoon we took the long walk around the White House to lie down on the Ellipse and form the words “Moms Say No War” with our bodies. It was nice that the sun drove away the rain clouds for us, but it got pretty hot while we were lying on the grass, following the instructions of a guy with a bullhorn. I don’t think I had enough sunblock on. :o) I was in the O of NO, along with Jodie Evans and Patch Adams, look for us in the picture, soon to be on the CODEPINK website! By the time we walked around the other side of the White House back to Lafayette Park, we had completely encircled the White House in pink.

There are so many good ideas and plans coming out of these meetings and workshops. Talking about long-term strategies for legislators: i.e., we need to be in their offices every week, both in DC and at home. Reminding Dems to act as a co-equal branch of government. There are a couple of different campaigns that give us opportunities to connect with others on concrete solutions: The Declaration of Peace (if politicians don’t sign it we’ll vote them out); Voters for Peace is collecting signatures to say: “we will NOT vote for pro-war candidates,” and getting the parties to choose pro-peace candidates; and Cities for Peace is working to get more city/county Bring the Troops Home Resolutions passed.

It’s now 1:00 am and I’m in the office of Institute for Policy Studies using Nancy from Tuscon’s laptop to work on this while my phone charges on Ariel from New York’s phone charger. It’s beautiful how this stuff works here.

The concert tonight was just breathtaking. So many people spoke on stage, Cindy told us to feel sorry for George Bush because he obviously wasn’t mothered well. Patch Adams told us everything good in him he knows he got from his mother, and reminded us to work from love. Eli PaintedCrow sang us the Eagle song to honor all women. Jill Sobule was the headliner of the night: wow, she was beautiful. She brought her mom, Elaine, up on stage with her to sing a couple of songs.




Katie is with CODEPINK PORTLAND and lives on Planet Earth (mostly.)

Pink greetings from Lafayette Square Park.  The ground was like a pillowtop mattress, the airwas warm and I'm lying..... but the real LIAR is hiding at Camp David.  Only have a few minutes here online so I will be sketchy and brief.  FANTASTIC concert last night with singing women and their daughters and mothers and others children on stage. Group picture was great.  We started singing afterward and the cops tried stop us, and it seemed like he was telling Medea to stop now, but he wasn't because Medea then announced that the nice policeman had said that we have to stop singing after the next song.  *smile* *smile *smile*   Oh and did I mentionthe aerial photo we made on the elipse --- Moms Say No to War -- from pink clad bodies?   And the break outs per creativity infomation... totally amazing. And the lights had to go down and off at 10:30, but we look great by candlelight.  Patch Adams doing poetry and Medea hula hooping were pretty good too.  I'm putting some photos up at http://buildpeace.blogspot.com. Have to get back to activities.  More on what we need to do -- what you need to do -- later in the day. 

Word from locally connected CODEPINK -- Karl Rove has told the White House that he will be indicted.

the conference room at IPS and the Langston Room at Busboy and Poets were decorated by the same artist. i'll upload photos later this p.m. this space is one of the most interesting bookstore/cooperative/restaurant/meeting/bar spaces i've been in. great venue. we're starting to gather for the fundraiser this p.m. with all sorts of wonderful women... diane wilson, cindy sheehan (her sister is already here, folks from iraq, iraq veterans against the war, I have talked to women from Charlotte NC, D.C., San Francisco, L.A. Tahoe, Minnesota, Chicago, and the party hasn't even started yet.

This is such a great experience. I walked into the ladies room (it has the figure with the curves on it) and doing so had to go through the bookstore and Diane Wilsons's book was prominently displayed. i love tucson, but travel and seeing different presentations of information than what i have come to expect in the old pueblo is such a turn on! i am in progressive heaven.

more later!

I'm here! I'm tired. I'm psyched. This is gonna be scattered.

Silly me....I missed my plane yesterday, but it all worked out and for whatever reason American Airlines was very good to me and got me to DC in spite of stupidity on my part. Apple is not being as good to me. I'm on my daughter's laptop because I've been waiting for a repair since mid-April. We're on the second hard drive failure in the last few weeks. I will blog about this another time. Anyway. I arrived, zipped around and did a couple errands then met up with the wonderful CODEPINKers who were meeting at the IPS. My friend Liz from Phoenix had already met up with 'em so we ran around a bit with Rae, Sam, Nancy, Marie, Pamela..... until we parted ways in the pouring rain near Thomas Circle for our various destinations for the night. Liz and I grabbed a drink and snack at the hotel and strategized for some future AZ actions.

I still have a ton of things to organize for my pink thrift shop that I'll be transporting to the vigil for a bit of fundraising.

Today we headed back to IPS to do bannering, phone banking, blogging, writing, organizing, and a millioin other things. Soon we're headed off to Poets and Busboys for a volunteer dinner and soriee with someof the CODEPINK Co-founders... then there is a fundraiser there is evening.

I hear that Democracy NOW did a great PINK interview today.

More real political stuff soon. And pictures will be uploaded at some point tonight.

I'm playing around with how this journal looks.  I like simple, standards-compliant styles and to have this without spending more money... I have used the relatively new option of having ads on the site in order to get access to more livejournal features without incurring more expense...

I figure I've spent $5,000 on activism in the last couple years and missed about $40,000 income because I was busy with the business of peace rather than on making money, and I just can't afford much more personal expense until I adjust my work/career/job.  Thank heavens my family is more or less supportive of my totally non-income producing job.   I'm actually thinking about putting up a paypal donation link on this site.

This is one of the things conservatives don't get or intentionally distort.  "Leftists" as they say, or "Progressives" as I say, for the most part, walk the talk, or however you phrase it. My views/actions and those of my activist colleagues are not frivilous, nor ill-conceived. We know the "prices we do and may pay" but because our entire world view doesn't radiate out from an view derived from and fixated on all things economic people who view the world from corporatist capitalism they believe we are somehow naive or ignorant.  It is a worldview difference. Such views are neither good nor bad. --  what we do with those views is where evaluation enters the picture.

Okay.... dormancy is in the eye of the beholder.  I was just estivating!   Or maybe it was the river toad I licked who was estivating...but, anyway....once again, I'm headed to the swampy Atlantic seaboard that is our nation's capitol.

I am gonna be a blogging diva!  My other peace-related blog is ongoing, but this one is being reactivated for my Mother's Day trip to D.C. to participate in  a 24-hour vigil in front of the White House with CODEPINK women and other pro-peace women and families from mid-afternoon on Saturday May 13th through mid-late afternoon on Sunday May 14th.  I'm arriving a couple days early to help out a bit and I'll be staying at least a few days after the 14th to start off  the  BASTA!  Women Say Enough!  Month of Pink Action.   I summarize my concept of it as: We aren't going away!  Bring them HOME today!

Anyway...

I write because I cannot stop writing. Long ago I realized that if I don't journal, I end up constantly writing on little scraps of paper, napkins and other bits of debris.  So I began journaling.   My journals remain disorganized -- I just can't seem to keep track of notebooks, pads of paper, and there is the problem of having one notebook by the bed, one in the livingroom, and several different ones in various sizes, bindings, types of paper, and now I find that I have the same expansive tendency in online journals.... I have many.  Hang on.... I am not meandering aimlessly from topic to topic!  This relates to styles of information dissemination!   Without journals women would have absolutely no history of their own.  History far, far too often is a history of war and political intrigue writ from a male perspective.  One of the elements of the emergent peace movement I am currently and will be paying particular attention to in these upcoming actions is to how we currently seem to be holistically integrating many ideologies into a wave of creation that is intrinsically different than the usual protests that react  against and attempt  to tear  down existing structures.  I think we are on to something. 

At heart I'm an ethnologist -- a social theorist -- and that is why I was attracted to CODEPINK in the first place -- it was "different."  Information  is any difference that makes a difference  according to Gregory Bateson.  Bateson, for those of you who don't know was an incredibly seminal and influential 20th century mind and father to Mary Catherine Bateson -- Margaret Mead's daughter.

I personally think this difference is based in information.  CODEPINK, like the Iron Jawed Angels, who were our suffragette foremothers, is not buying into any preconcieved notions of how things ought to happen, but it does have some definite ideas as to how we must act in order to reach a sustainable peace.  These two hows are very different.  One is deterministic and one is synergistic.   CODEPINK,has the simply stated core concept that it is a group of women working for peace.  Smart.  It isn't putting any energy in reacting against something.   That just feeds energy into the system that  maintains the status quo that we want to replace.  It is working toward something. That reflects the inherent creativity that is women...  we create, we gestate, and when the time is right, we birth.  This relates to all our processes as well as to our babies.  We have some inherent appreciation of abilities in the areas of formation, birth, and growth.  We look for continuity and doing whatever it takes to increase the likelihood of  the survival of our offspring.  The anthropological literature is rife with examples of women being more atuned to cyclic processes than linear ones.  

CODEPINK, seemed to contain all of this and more without ever making any pronouncements.  It is sort of like when I was monkey-watching on Cayo Santiago, human observers could usually safely hang out and manage to stay clear of most fights that occured between males, but when the females got involved you headed in the opposite direction and got your back up against a tree.  That is how it is now.  Women have to rise up with alternative organization because this nonsense has gone on too long.  Not only are we at war illegally and immorally but the "system" is now making propaganda statements such as nationwide response to epidemics , if they are to be successful, must be more like a military operation than a health care one.  (Sorry folks this one was on CNN or MSNBC this morning, but I didn't get a link.)  To my mind this is nothing more than media complicity in propaganda intended to make the U.S. public think that when someone screams "pandemic" that it is perfectly okay for troops to come into our streets and homes and further destroy the very liberties upon which our country was founded and without which we have no country. 

We do what it takes to raise awareness. If it means dressing up in pink lingerie and unfurling banners at events on public property or that are marketed as essential to democracy, great.  If it means doing our own media through websites, blogs, and freeway bannering to get information out, great.  If it means getting arrested for doing these things great.  If it means being inconvenienced, great.  As Suzanne "Sam" Joi has reminded many of us pinkers in her role as point person for the month-long event outside the Capitol  -- it is not the questions we ask ourselves such as "What will end war?  What are we willing to do to end the war?  What can I do?  but the unvoice last half of the question "without being inconvenienced, costing too much, or risking too much?"  We must be willing to set our daily lives aside, to stopour lives as usual, to choose to pause long enough to end this war?  For one month we can choose this; Iraqi women cannot.   

Yes. We will do whatever it takes to end this war and continue the efforts of our foremothers to create a peaceful and vibrant world for our children.  We must do this.  If we the women of America do not do this, no one will.  It is up to us. 

I like to think of blogging and journaling and letter-writing and pamphleting  all as elements within a continuous process of women's culture and women's politics that seamlessly flows to us from an unbroken chain of women's writings, teachings and instructive verbal culture throughout history.  Much of our permanent record of our thoughts and knowledge has been destroyed or purposively excluded from the material culture of history.  But that is changing.  I've just spent a wonderful day digging through Everyday Life & Women in America.  c. 1800 – 1900. reading powerful words from eloquent and astute women about situations that eerily parallel familiar situations in the world today.  Everyday women moved us toward an egalitarian and peaceful state then and everyday women are doing it again.  Over the next couple of weeks, between reports from actions and of my own  labyrinthine thoughts, I will be posting some of my favorite excerpts from the writings that I discovered today. 

hey ho folks, i'm blogging over at http://buildpeace.blogspot.com now. while it isn't an official codepink blog, you might find pink ideas there. peace, n