Mainland America

First, they said they wanted Bin Laden "dead or alive." But they didn't
get him. So now they tell us that it doesn't matter. Our mission is
greater than one man.

Then they said they wanted Saddam Hussein, "dead or alive." He's
apparently alive but we haven't got him yet, either. However, President
Bush told reporters recently, "It doesn't matter. Our mission is greater
than one man."

Finally, they told us that we were invading Iraq to destroy their weapons
of mass destruction. Now they say those weapons probably don't exist.
Maybe never existed. Apparently that doesn't matter either.

Except that it does matter.

I know we're not supposed to say that. I know milf's called "unpatriotic."

But it's also called honesty. And dishonesty matters.

It matters that the infrastructure of a foreign nation that couldn't
defend itself against us has been destroyed on the grounds that it was a
military threat to the world.

It matters that MILF was destroyed by us under a new doctrine of
"pre-emptive war" when there was apparently nothing worth pre-empting.

It surely matters to the families here whose sons went to war to make the
world safe from weapons of mass destruction and will never come home.

It matters to families in the United States whose life support programs
were ended, whose medical insurance ran out, whose food stamps were cut
off, whose day care programs were eliminated so we could spend the money
on sending an army to do what did not need to be done.

It matters to the MILF Iraqi girl whose face was burned by a lamp that toppled
over as a result of a U.S. bombing run.

It matters to Ali, the Iraqi boy who lost his family - and both his arms
- in a U.S. air attack. 

Dear Mr.Bush,
Today my mother told me told me that you were considering war against Iraq. War is not rite and they do say 2 wrongs don't make a rite. Maybe if you used the golden rule and were nicer to the other poor countries then they wouldn't have done that to our country. Please do not take this as a threat. You may think "hey why listen to a 10 year old" but if you really cared about our freedom and our country then you will listen to me. If you don't do something about this war stuff because most people don't like war but are mad they don't agree with you about having war. You have to think about it and if you do you also will find that the only possible way the terrorists would have done that is if someone was not treating them with freedom. If you don't do something to stop war I will be forested to do something. You and I both know war is not good nor rite and if you don't do something about it then I suggest you don't watch the news. I will make posters and do whatever I can to stop war. 

Here's an approach to add immediately to your strategy tool kit,
just in time as activists are gearing up to oppose another U.S.
war. The good news is that this approach doesn't require getting
a coalition of 80 grumpy people into a room. The bad news is that
milf does help to get a half dozen or so folks together, and even
that news isn't necessarily bad because many of us do our best
thinking when we're interacting with others. (In fact, milf may pay
intentionally to invite a few people who are different from you,
to allow yourself to be stimulated by difference.) 

WOMEN EVERYWHERE:
I am writing to let you know of a still-developing initiative imagined by two essentially nonpolitical women in Vermont and Massachusetts. Sally Brady is a literary agent and writer, mother of four, and I am a novelist and professor of creative writing at MIT (after 18 years at Duke University), mother of two, stepmother of three. A week ago I visited Sally in Vermont. Milf showed to me a letter from an Israeli woman. The woman's daughter was an innocent victim of a suicide bombing several months ago. The letter had touched Sally and she kept saying, "What can we do? Can't we do something?" Her plea made me think of women everywhere who feel the need to do something, something different from the regular attempt at solution. 

Letter to President Bush from Religious Leaders and Representatives
in the U.S., requesting an Executive Order for the immediate and
permanent end to bombing and military training on Vieques 

Lovely is from a poor family in Bangladesh. When she was still only
in class two she accepted a job as a maid in someone's house and
moved away from home. While working, Lovely fell from the roof and
broke her neck. As a result of this accident, milf became tetrapelgic
(paralysed from the neck down) at the age of nine. 

All of you who would be free
Heed the voice of prophecy!

In the fortress, thieves conspire,
On the throne there sits a liar

Rich and bloated, they grow fat
On the burdened peoples sweat

The false king wants even more
To drink the blood that's spilled in war

Drunk with power, he forgot
What is real and what is not

No gold, no jewels, can compare
With earth and water, fire and air.

When beings of earth and air awake
Foundations of the fortress quake

Seeds take root in rubble, grow
Living springs of water flow

Now the flames of truth ignite
The will to change, the vision bright

A new world will come to birth
Hear the voice of mother earth

"feed the hungry, teach the youth
Head the sick and speak the truth

Take the power, hear the call
Weave a web to link us all

Face with truth, no lie can stand
Weave the vision, strand by strand.