Democracy for New Mexico

Elevator 9 Trial Postponed

From Bud and the Elevator 9:
The Elevator 9 Trial has been POSTPONED. There will also be NO PROTEST against the war at the courthouse scheduled for January 25th so please pass this on. We as of yet do not have a new trial date scheduled. To quote from the court document "hearing is vacated and that the matter will be
rescheduled at the Court's convenience." We appreciate all the help and sympathy and concern over
our impending trial that we have received from many, many people - THANK YOU!!! - and we ask that you be with us again when we receive our new court date.  --Pace e Bene! Bud Ryan

Editor's Note: See our original post on this for more information.

Progressives to Introduce End the War Bill in U.S. House

There are a number of stop the war or stop the escalation resolutions -- some binding, some not -- floating around Capitol Hill this week. There's also an effort being organized by Progressive States Network and others to get state legislatures to approve a resolution urging Congress to reject Bush's escalation plans. The Nation has more on this.

One of the strongest bills will be introduced by Reps. Lynn Woolsey and Barbara Lee, co-chairs of the 64-member Progressive Caucus in the U.S House. The proposed bill has reportedly been co-sponsored by 13 others including Reps. Barney Frank, John Conyers, Jim McGovern, Dennis Kucinich, Diane Watson, Maurice Hinchey, Jerry Nadler and Raul Grijalva.

According to a Jonathan Tasina article on Huffington Post:

1. The bill fully funds a 6-month withdrawal of US forces and military contractors (from the date of enactment of the bill) from Iraq.

2. It repeals the authorization for the use of force. This is key, in my humble opinion, because it takes away any remaining authority to wage war in Iraq and, hopefully, reestablishes the Congress' power to wage war.

3. It prohibits the building of any permanent military bases in Iraq, which has clearly been the Pentagon's plan.

4. It provides economic and political aid to the Iraqi people and their government. Whenever I've written and spoken about this issue, I've been clear that, while the U.S. cannot play any military role in Iraq, we are morally obligated to help rebuild a country out government destroyed.

5. The bill fully funds the VA Health Care system for all military veterans.

6. As I understand it, the bill draws on language from other bills aimed at an exit from war to peace and puts it into a package they hope to rally lawmakers and grassroots behind.

You can read about other resolutions in my previous posts here and here. And this New York Times article summarizes the ongoing efforts in both the House and Senate to get a bipartisan resolution against Bush's escalation. A UPI article discusses Sen. Levin's recent call for a new war authorization and troop caps, as well as Sen. Kennedy's bill to cut off funds for more troops.

Sign Up for 1/27 Iraq Protest March in DC

From NM Coordinator, United for Peace and Justice:
Hello New Mexicans who want to end the Iraq war and stop the proposed escalation! United for Peace and Justice (UFPJ) is organizing a nationwide mass march on Washington, DC on January 27th to protest the war in Iraq and stop the escalation. Please come to Washington DC on January 27th to join in the march! People are asked to meet on the Mall between 3rd and 7th Streets at 11:00 AM, and the march will start at 1:00 PM.

Now is the time to let your voices be heard and to get the message out, again, to Congress. Ron Kovic, the Vietnam war veteran who wrote 'Born on the 4th of July', said just last week:

"...it was Martin Luther King Jr. who said in April 1967 - a year before he was assassinated, during the height of the Vietnam War - A time comes when silence is betrayal."

Ron is rallying Americans to take a visible stand against the Iraq war. If you would like to attend the march, go to the UFPJ website, www.unitedforpeace.org, and scroll down to where it says something like "Connect with people from your area who are attending the march..." I have volunteered to be the state coordinator for New Mexico, and my zip code is 87506. But you could put in your zip code and have it cover a larger area, e.g. 200 miles. Then you can enter your information to sign up for the march.

Buses?
Right now, no buses or vans have been organized from New Mexico, but if enough people are interested I will gladly help to coordinate.  I will be flying due to time contstraints.  At present, buses are going to the march from more than 20 states and from 72 cities. Flights from ABQ to DCA (Reagan Airport ... formerly National) are still available in the $250 range through Southwest ... good fare + hotel packages are also availab le through hotwire.com and travelocity.com.

Please sign up on the website if you will be attending, because national media are trying gauge the interest in the march by website signups. Note also that a citizen lobbying day is planned for Jan 29th, and training/coordinating for the lobbying day will occur on Jan 28th. You can read all about the scheduled events at www.unitedforpeace.org.

Thank you so much ... and if you aren't able to attend the DC march, you can still participate in several ways:

1. by donating to UFPJ who really needs financial support right now to pull this off,
2. holding local protests in conjunction with the nationwide protests, and
3. spreading the word to as many people as you know so we can make a strong presence in DC.

Carol Craiglow, Santa Fe, NM

Editor's Note: An Albuquerque march and rally will be held on January 27th as part of this nationwide protest. See our previous post for more info.

JOIN IN: Help PSN, Moveon & Kennedy Launch the 50-State Response to Bush's Iraq Escalation Plan

From David Sirota:
A press release was just issued by the Progressive States Network (PSN) about the kickoff of a 50-state legislative response to President Bush's Iraq escalation plan. Tomorrow, January 17th at 9:30 AM MST, PSN will be holding a conference call with Moveon.org, other grassroots groups, Sen. Ted Kennedy and legislators from all over the country to launch the campaign to have state legislatures introduce and pass resolutions demanding Congress stop Bush's escalation. You can join the call by RSVP-ing at here. (I just did.)

Editor's Note: A previous post reports that NM Sen. Gerald Ortiz y Pino will be introducing a Memorial calling for the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq. Ortiz y Pino also plans to introduce a resolution that calls for the impeachment of Cheney and Bush. I imagine he would want to participate in this 50-state escalation fight at the legislative level. Are you ready to join in and contact NM legislators to gain their support as well? We'll keep you posted.

Gov. Richardson Supports Cutting Funds for Iraq Escalation

Let's hope Gov. Richardson's views prevail with the Dems. As reported by digby from a CNN transcript:

BLITZER: Are you in favor of using the power of the purse that Congress has to try to stop this war?

GOV. BILL RICHARDSON (D), NEW MEXICO: Yes. I believe because the president has not listened to the Congress, he hasn't listened to the bipartisan Iraq Study Group and to the American people, that overwhelmingly want a change of course, I believe that's the function of the Congress, to deal with the appropriations process, find ways to at least this surge, to deny the funds to make it happen, because this is going to add to sectarian violence.

I would support a phased withdrawal, tie it to a political solution. There is no military solution. I would also organize a regional conference to get other states to help with the security and civil administration. I would talk to Iran and Syria to try to get the situation to at least a stable level.

I just believe that this is an ultimate decision by the Congress. But since the president doesn't listen, he's off in, I think, his own bubble. Unfortunately, that's the course I believe the Congress needs to take.

And digby also says:

Richardson is not given to shrillness. He's probably running for president and he's running as a national security specialist, which he is. This is no joke. If he's saying this then Bush is in for trouble in the congress.

However, he goes on to explain why Cheney would almost certainly just ignore any effort by Congress to stop the useless "surge" or impose any limitations whatsoever on presidential war powers, citing his views about the Iran-Contra scandal back in 1987 as just one example of his disdain for the rule of law.

Honoring Dr. King

Martin Luther King, Jr., Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break Silence, delivered 4 April 1967 at a meeting of Clergy and Laity Concerned at Riverside Church in New York City:

A few years ago there was a shining moment in that struggle. It seemed as if there was a real promise of hope for the poor -- both black and white -- through the poverty program. There were experiments, hopes, new beginnings. Then came the buildup in Vietnam, and I watched this program broken and eviscerated, as if it were some idle political plaything of a society gone mad on war, and I knew that America would never invest the necessary funds or energies in rehabilitation of its poor so long as adventures like Vietnam continued to draw men and skills and money like some demonic destructive suction tube. So, I was increasingly compelled to see the war as an enemy of the poor and to attack it as such.

Not much has changed in the intervening years, has it? Today it's the Iraq occupation that is the "demonic destructive suction tube." Today it's a debacle in Iraq which will end up costing at least a trillion dollars when all is said and done. A trillion dollars charged to future generations, adding to an already monstrous debt created by the right-wing plot to ensure that our wealthiest citizens and biggest corporations pay next to nothing in taxes for the common good.

Think what a trillion dollars could do to help build a just society here in America, with excellent schools and health care and services for the elderly and housing and communities and opportunities for all. Instead Bush will be asking for more than $10 billion to pay for a jobs program -- in Iraq, not here in the U.S. Instead the government is asking for another $100 billion to impose our oil-hungry will on a nation we are dismantling and attempting to rebuild so it serves our needs, not those who call it home.

The Reverend King would have been 78 this year. I imagine he is rolling painfully in his grave, as the saying goes. Our nation's leadership vacuum, its debt, its warmongering, injustice and imperialism have far surpassed what he criticized in the 60s. We seem to have lost all shame about tolerating sweatshops, tolerating torture, tolerating profound dishonesty in the service of greed and hubris around the globe, tolerating broken down schools, ruined neighborhoods, decimated housing stocks and wars of choice. It is we who allow them to direct outrageously more to the haves by taking everything of value from the have nots.

How can we best honor Reverend King this year? One way is to speak out, to refuse to maintain a frightened, cowed or cynical silence in the face of injustice and violence. In King's words:

... I knew that I could never again raise my voice against the violence of the oppressed in the ghettos without having first spoken clearly to the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today -- my own government. For the sake of those boys, for the sake of this government, for the sake of the hundreds of thousands trembling under our violence, I cannot be silent.

... Now, it should be incandescently clear that no one who has any concern for the integrity and life of America today can ignore the present war. If America's soul becomes totally poisoned, part of the autopsy must read: Vietnam. It can never be saved so long as it destroys the deepest hopes of men the world over. So it is that those of us who are yet determined that America will be are led down the path of protest and dissent, working for the health of our land.

... The war in Vietnam is but a symptom of a far deeper malady within the American spirit, and if we ignore this sobering reality, we will find ourselves organizing "clergy and laymen concerned" committees for the next generation. They will be concerned about Guatemala and Peru. They will be concerned about Thailand and Cambodia. They will be concerned about Mozambique and South Africa. We will be marching for these and a dozen other names and attending rallies without end, unless there is a significant and profound change in American life and policy.

Substitute Iran, Syria, Lebanon, Israel, Palestine, Venezuela, Cuba, Sudan, secret prisons in Eastern Europe and even "detainment camps" within our own borders. Silence = collaboration. We need to get up and stand up. We need to speak up and demand that our elected representatives do the same. Ignoring the horrors of today's Bush policies will permit more escalation, more calculated inhumanity, more horrific violence in our names in more and more places, here and abroad. We must break the silence at every level and do it now. We must challenge the current sickly orientation of the nation. We must heed the warnings of Dr. King when he said:

We must rapidly begin the shift from a thing-oriented society to a person-oriented society. When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights, are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, extreme materialism, and militarism are incapable of being conquered.

... A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death.

... America, the richest and most powerful nation in the world, can well lead the way in this revolution of values. There is nothing except a tragic death wish to prevent us from reordering our priorities so that the pursuit of peace will take precedence over the pursuit of war. There is nothing to keep us from molding a recalcitrant status quo with bruised hands until we have fashioned it into a brotherhood.

... We still have a choice today: nonviolent coexistence or violent coannihilation. We must move past indecision to action. We must find new ways to speak for peace in Vietnam and justice throughout the developing world, a world that borders on our doors. If we do not act, we shall surely be dragged down the long, dark, and shameful corridors of time reserved for those who possess power without compassion, might without morality, and strength without sight.

Links to King resources.

PS: I find it admirable that presidential candidate John Edwards is evoking King's 'Beyond Vietnam' speech today, at his own speech at the Riverside Church.

No More Wars

(Click on image for larger version.)

NM Sen. Ortiz y Pino to Call for Withdrawing Our Troops from Iraq

The New Mexico Senate Democrats have issued a press release announcing that NM Sen. Gerald Ortiz y Pino will introduce a Senate Memorial this session calling for withdrawing our troops from Iraq. Click to download a PDF of the document. Excerpts:

In announcing his decision, Senator Ortiz y Pino pointed to the service and sacrifices of New Mexico's National Guard troops who have been placed in harm's way by the federal government. The Memorial is designed to draw the attention of the public and the federal Administration to the difficulties US troops are facing both abroad and at home. Over 72 cities have endorsed resolutions of their own calling for an end to US involvement in Iraq.

... New Mexico has felt the heavy impacts of the war in Iraq. Because President Bush deployed New Mexico's Army and Air National Guard to seek nonexistent weapons of mass destruction and on the basis of a pretended link to September 11th, over 3,000 New Mexican Guardsmen have already served in Iraq -- some more than once. Nationally, the Department of Defense has reported that National Guard and Reserve troops are being called up at three times their sustainable rate.

... According to Senator Ortiz y Pino, "What was once paraded before the American public as the most serious threat facing our national security has now become a tar baby that needlessly threatens American lives and our national solvency." The intractable nature of the Iraq war has diminished the federal budget resources that could otherwise be employed to address other national budgetary priorities. In an attempt to control the resulting surge of deficit spending, the new Congress has decided to employ the continuing resolution process.

"It is time for us to forthrightly face the truth that confronts us and to bravely do what that truth calls for -- and so I am introducing a Memorial to do just that. And one that points out that the President may also have violated federal law by his actions" concluded Senator Ortiz y Pino.

NM Sen. Ortiz y Pino to Introduce Impeachment Bill at NM Legislature

NM Sen. Gerald Ortiz y Pino plans to introduce a NM Impeachment Resolution at the NM Legislative Session that begins on January 16th in Santa Fe. Click to download a draft copy of the bill (PDF), which will be cosponsored by Sen. John Grubesic. The title of the bill is "A Joint Resolution Petitioning Congress to Commence the Investigation of and Impeachment Proceedings Against President George W. Bush and Vice President Richard B. Cheney."

A story on this effort in New Mexico is front-paged on Daily Kos today, and includes an excellent description of how the process works when a state legislature approves such a measure.

The proposed resolution also gets a mention in an article by David Swanson of AfterDowningStreet.org:

In New Mexico, a leading light of that state's politics, State Senator Gerald Ortiz y Pino of Albuquerque, will be leading the way on impeachment. He deserves the support of all the world, and you can thank him at jortizyp@aol.com or 505-986-4380. Let's help him make New Mexico the land of enchantment and impeachment.

If you'd like to urge your legislators to support this resolution, you can find contact information at the NM Legislature Website.

Expert? No. Yes Man? Yes.

Apparently a modern day Mad Hatter testifed at yesterday's Mad Tea Congressional hearings, as reported by the AP:

At one point [Defense Secretary Robert] Gates, just three weeks on the job, told lawmakers, “I would confess I'm no expert on Iraq.” Later, asked about reaching the right balance between American and Iraqi forces, he told the panel he was “no expert on military matters.”

And then there's this. You can't make this stuff up.....