I'm glad Martha Stewart is in prison. Not just because of some vengeance trip against greedy capitalists, but more because Stewart's celebrity status brings much needed attention to another inmate in the same prison. She's a Dominican nun named Carol Gilbert and she's my kind of hero.
We all know why Martha's there, but why is this 57 year old nun in prison ?
Gilbert and Sisters Ardeth Platte and Jackie Hudson went to the N-8 Minuteman III missile site in rural northeastern Weld County on a mission to nonviolently and symbolically inspect, expose and disarm what they branded an illegal and immoral weapon of mass destruction.
Clad in white jumpsuits identifying the trio as a "citizens' weapons inspector team," they cut through a security fence, smeared crosses in their own blood on the silo lid, and tapped on the rails - on which the 110-ton cover would move in the event of a missile launch - with ball-peen hammers in a symbolic attempt to beat swords into plowshares.
The stark contrast between Stewart and Gilbert is enlightening, and in many ways highlights the signs of our times. Rocky Mountain News
Here's more background information from
Globenet
27 May 2003
Three Nuns and a Test for Civil Disobedience
-- Antiwar protesters resigned to prison in Colorado case --
by Chryss Cada
Boston Globe
DENVER -- Three Catholic nuns facing prison time for an act of ''civil resistance'' and their supporters say the government is persecuting them in order to quiet the antiwar movement.
''This is a dark time in our country, a time when there is only one truth in the government and very little tolerance for dissent,'' said Ardeth Platte, one of the nuns found guilty of sabotage for her actions at a Colorado missile silo in October. ''We were speaking out against the crimes of our government and they intend to punish us for that.''
Another irony to the story is how Carol Gilbert is now "placed in the strange position of indirectly supporting the military machine whose mission she fundamentally opposed.
Through a federal program created by Congress to provide job training for inmates - and cheap labor to the government - Gilbert had reported to friends in October that the prison garment factory - which she said manufactured, among other things, the flight jacket worn by President Bush during his "Mission Accomplished" aircraft carrier landing early in the Iraq war - was about to be converted into a prison-operated telemarketing center.
The next month, however, Gilbert reported, "The women had started to dismantle the sewing machines, when they were abruptly told to reassemble the machines, as the factory would be open another three months to complete a 10,000 order for military flight jackets.
"No explanation was given."
There's even more behind this story ..... another very compelling reason to lobby hard against Patriot Act II
from http://www.kurtnimmo.com/blogger.html
"Patriot Act II would deem civil disobedience a felony," writes Kevin
Merickel of the Daily Trojan, a newspaper published by the University of
Southern California. "Such civil disobedience would include nonviolent
demonstrations or protests. The act would consider such behavior as
threatening to human life, and a charge could be punishable by death."
Execution of dissidents convicted of civil disobedience may seem a bit
far-fetched. Nonetheless, last year Ashcroft wanted three elderly nuns sent
to prison for 30 years for spray-painting six crosses on a concrete silo
dome in their own blood at a remote Minuteman III nuclear missile site in
Weld County, Colorado. In essence, Ashcroft was asking for a death
sentence.
SPREAD THE WORD!