I came home from a wonderful dinner with friends Thursday night to read on my email that Nancy Boyda, a freshman Democratic Congresswoman from Kansas, stated on ABC News Tonight:
"I think we're going to vote to support what the commander in chief and head of military asks to do. At least, I am certainly going to vote to support it."
This is our new House of the People! The fresh blood we all thought was going to make ending the occupation in Iraq a priority. These are the new Democrats we all worked so hard to get into Congress. They were NOT elected to blindly support the Commander-in-Chief, they were elected to support US!
The Democratic Party doesn’t get it! This morning I received a fundraising email from Howard Dean for Democracy Bonds. In it, he touts the difference a contribution to a Democracy Bond can make, by using, you guessed it, Nancy Boyda as an example! He wrote:
"And that U.S. House seat we won in Kansas? Freshman Representative Nancy Boyda says that she decided to run for the seat specifically because our 50-state strategy was in place to support her."
The email from Dean starts with "Elections have consequences." Yes, Gov. Dean, elections DO have consequences – and those elected are supposed to honor the will of the people who elected them and the promises they made when they were running. So how come we’re not hearing our elected officials echoing the people’s cry to get our troops out of Iraq now?
Sadly, many of the Democratic Representatives who raised their hand on Wednesday to be sworn in to serve us, were the ones the Democratic Party decided were "electable". That same Party, along with their handmaiden groups like Move-on, sabotaged the campaigns of outspoken peace candidates. I can tell you this from personal experience because I ran as a Democrat in a largely Republican district. I was not deemed electable and was NOT helped one bit by Dean’s 50-state strategy. What’s more, Move-on organized precious volunteers in MY district to make phone calls for other candidates OUTSIDE my district – CANDIDATES WHO WERE IN EVERY CASE NOT SPEAKING OUT AGAINST THE WAR.
As I type this, I notice that the word electable keeps showing up as misspelled. It’s not even a word! I suggest we take it out of our vernacular now, before Microsoft realizes that it’s being used sufficiently to give it official wordship status. And the next time someone tells you a candidate is not electable you should point out to them that there is no such word and there is no such thing as an unelectable candidate. If you want a real peace candidate, like Dennis Kucinich, all we have to do is vote for them!
I fear that the newly selected torchbearers in Congress have no intention of ending the illegal occupation of Iraq. The will of the people be damned! As they play politics, American troops continue to dye for a lie, billions of dollars that should be allocated to solving urgent needs, including the development of alternative energy, are being funneled through the war to line the pockets of war profiteers. Genuine, heroic efforts to negotiate a peaceful reconciliation in Iraq are being sabotaged, (see U.S. Attack on Iraqi Peace Parliamentarian - Saleh al-Mutlaq was one of the Iraqi Parliamentarians I met with as part of a peace delegation in Jordan last August) while that terrible trifecta of tragedies looms on our horizon: global warming; peak oil; and global economic collapse.
I met with my former opponent, Rep. Darrell Issa, just before Christmas. To be perfectly honest, from our conversation I sensed in him much more of a willingness to oppose George Bush than I heard in Nancy Boyda’s ABC News interview. He said that if there is no timeline, then there is no plan, and he wants to see a plan to end the war.
A "surge" is neither a timeline nor a plan. Throwing good money after bad is NOT a plan. We must demand that this new Congress shows us a REAL plan for ending the occupation of Iraq now!
We in the peace movement must also have a plan. We must be relentless in holding our elected officials accountable to the will of the people. To that end, we need a powerful follow-up to the vigils honoring the 3,000th death we held on Monday and the actions in DC this weekend and the massive rally & lobbying planned for January 27 – 29th. We need to galvanize the people of our nation and stop Congress from approving any increase in troops or funding for the war.
On Nov. 25, 2005, I helped to organize the first Bring Their Buddies Home Vigil in Carlsbad, CA, where hundreds of people, dressed in black, stood in silence, each wearing the name of one of the fallen troops. It wasn’t a protest or demonstration, it was an Act of Art because art communicates on an emotional level and can be an effective catalyst for change. People still talk about the event. It had a profound effect on those who participated – many developed an emotional bond with the person whose name they wore and their families. It was covered extensively by the press. To see more about this event, go to www.BringTheirBuddiesHome.com.
By duplicating this event, in hundreds of places throughout the country, on one day, it will send the new Congress the unmistakable message that the vast majority of Americans expect them to end the occupation of Iraq and to cut off all further funding.
My plan is to organize Bring Their Buddies Home Vigils throughout the county on Feb. 19th – President’s Day. You can help make this happen and be part of this historic event. We need three things to make this a reality: Organizations interested in sponsoring the event; local coordinators to organize the vigils in their area; and participants.
If you are interested in any of the above, please send an email to jeeni@criscenzo.com. We are in the process of re-vamping the BringTheirBuddiesHome.com website to use it to organize these vigils throughout the country. Watch for details very soon.