The Cost of War - Rep. Tulsi Gabbard for Bernie Sanders

WAR IS ASININE!

Veteran of 30 years just shown me the rock he used to contemplate suicide on.

 8,000 vets kill themselves every year in the US.

Those are the ones we know of.

I HATE WAR!

GAZA

I need to express my horror and absolute condemnation of those that believe that there can be any justification for resorting to industrial strength violence, war or genocide as may be the case here. People using deadly weapons on people is WRONG. The civilized, humane means of resolving conflicts are negotiations.

 Peace Is Possible

The human race got this far, not by waging war, but by cooperation.

My photos here were taken from a July 23. 2014 rally held in Santa Fe, New Mexico in protest of the unanimous support of Israel (to the detriment of the Gazan civilians) and resolution 498 co-sponsored by Senator Martin Heinrich and not objected to by Senator Tom Udall. The letter below was delivered to both Senators amidst the usual singing and chanting, even while it slightly rained.

"Each year, the United States gives Israel about $3.1 billion in military assistance, a commitment that stems from the 1978 Camp David accord that led to peace between Israel and Egypt. Those billions are roughly divided into two funding streams. About $800 million underwrites Israeli manufacturing of weaponry and military products. The rest finances what is essentially a gift card that the Israeli military uses to procure arms and military equipment from US military contractors. It can be safely assumed, says a US expert on aid to Israel, that all units of the Israel Defense Forces benefit from US assistance—and this obviously includes those units fighting in Gaza. So to a certain degree, the destruction in Gaza does have a made-in-the-USA stamp." - Mother Jones

My Mom, a WW II veteran used to iterate in unbecoming cynicism I thought, but have come, not to accept, but slowly understand: 

 War Is Profitable!

US taxpayers are in the absurd place of partly paying for the Israeli military action in Gaza and funding the cleanup. No doubt the US profits from war, New Mexico's National and Sandia labs are our major players, invested still too much in defense and too little in green technology. Place people and their lives above profit and greed. Sign the Amnesty International Petition for the US to stop arming Israel: "All states (particularly key suppliers, for example USA for Israel) must suspend all transfers of weapons, munitions and other military equipment and technology to all sides until there is no longer a substantial risk that such items will be used for serious violations of international humanitarian law or serious human rights abuses. The suspension should include all indirect exports via other countries, the transfer of military components and technologies and any brokering, financial or logistical activities that would facilitate such transfers."

Inflammatory rethoric, signs and chants I personally do not deem very helpful,

but standing up and speaking out for what we believe is of the essence. 

If we don't, we simply are complicit.

"All of us,who consider ourselves friends of Israel, must call on the Israeli government to use its wisdom to change course and to stop this escalation, to demonstrate a level of compassion born of moral clarity, not only for the benefit of innocent Palestinians, but to protect Israel from the destruction of its own reputation which would deprive it of world solidarity necessary for its own survival." - Dennis Kucinich

Some pointers:

Hamas dropped call for the destruction of Israel in 2006! It is imperative for Hamas to update their outrageous preamble of their founding document: "Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it." The state of Israel needs absolute acceptance. Once clearly stated Israel will no longer have the excuse of self defense in their attacks, which currently looks a lot more like genocide (most certainly expressed in comments in the Jerusalem Post: "Barak Tom Salakoff - Wipe Hamas off the map.)

The right to defend ought to be a last resort only. Israel has by far not exhausted it's options to respond to the Gazan rebellion, understandable when we hear of their horrific conditions they have to endure.

Surprise, Gaza seems to have great oil potential of which some corporations seem well aware of!

I was shocked to learn only the other day that the denial of the holocaust was not just a hair raising notion coming from the prior Iranian president, but a position still held by many, including factions that make up Hamas. With todays technologies such absurd notions ought to be able to be corrected with relative ease. Hold town hall meetings where such nonsense is challenged by real people with real feelings and experiences, rather then through more propaganda. Candid, civilized conversations can be part of the solution.

Follow Denny Cormier's live report from Gaza and find him on facebook, twitter and flickr. Denny is a Santa Fean I seen last this spring, right before he left for Gaza where now he found his home and where he chose to stay even as the war started.

Proportionality applies with numbers like 1000 Gazan fatalities - 40 Israeli soldiers. 

1 Gazan child by the hour! The average age of Gazans is 17!

We mourn for every life lost regardless of nationality, race, color or faith. 

War is a barbaric, outdated mode of inflicting suffering through generations yet to come.

Finally, an oppressed people will rebel, they will undermine, literally, unfair boundaries and no doubt will seek to liberate themselves. End Israel's control over Gaza, it's borders, waters, space and goods,

End The Occupation!

New Gallup Poll: 42% of Americans say Israel's actions in Gaza are justified; 39% say unjustified.

The American Nightmare

Today, after yesterday's execution of Troy Davis, after in fact two more applications of so called justice, of the irreversible, unreasonable, unconscionable, barbaric practice of vengeful injustice, in only one day, I have more reasons yet to hang my head in shame and seriously question the wisdom of my choice of having become an American citizen. The American Dream has become The American Nightmare! Maybe it always was and I just had not noticed?

shame, shame, shame, shame, shame, shame, shame, shame, shame, shame

Here I want to mention only a few of what could make up a very long list of misgivings, not necessarily in order of importance or severity of impact. For me the death penalty is an abhorrent practice that, do you realize, would preclude the US from joining the EU. The US would not qualify, shocking and shameful! The resort to wars in response to terrorism, despite world wide protests, despite Saddam's lack of culpability, despite Afghan's history of resistance - shameful! This acceptance of violence as a way of resolving conflict seen on all levels, political and personal - shameful! This living in an old, outdated paradigm of competition rather then cooperation, a cowboy mentality (personified in Bush) where the stronger win and the weaker perish, where the US has to demonstrate it's exceptionalism while in the pursuit of it's imperialistic expansive endeavors, shameful! America sets itself above international law when it accepts torture and rejects international treaties, such as the Kyoto one, and rejects science, but ridicules efforts to deal with Global Warming, shameful!

shame, shame, shame, shame, shame, shame, shame, shame, shame, shame 

Sadly even our big hope, President Obama, the Peace Nobel Price Winner,  with his proclamation for change, continued a path of violence when he ordered the killing, rather then the apprehending of Osama Bin Laden. I can not believe that those highly trained and skilled Navy Seals would not have been able to apprehend this old, unarmed guy, so as to bring him to true legal justice, maybe in an international court of law, in the proper way of dealing with war criminals as established after World War II in the Nuerenberg Trials. But wars are not waged on a bunch of extremists, wars a waged against other countries, we never have been at a war! We just needed a pretext to assert ourselves and protect those precious resources that are not ours but that we need so badly, oil, shameful!

shame, shame, shame, shame, shame, shame, shame, shame, shame, shame

to be continued ...