Saturday, June 02, 2007

Absurdity Forever!

ABSURD TIMES STILL HERE






Illustration: The illustration speaks for itself. However, our illustrator has left this environment and I hope he will find his new surrounding therapeutic. G. B. Shaw once said that he was convinced that there was live elsewhere in the universe as earth is their insane asylum. If so, the U.S. is the ward for the retarded. I know where he said he was last, but he either gave the wrong location so that he could not be hassled or he has moved on so there is no point in disclosing that information. We all wish him well.

There has been a long hiatus between issues, and that is to seek a new direction. The Democratic Party, which is more democratic than the Republican (I think the same could be said of the Politburo), caved in and passed the war funding bill. Senator Gravel for Alaska, who is also running, had suggested that the leadership call for a vote on over-riding the decider’s veto and call for it every day so the people would know who really stood for what. Nope – it passed.

Cindy Sheehan, the woman who gave the anti-war movement such vitality simply by sitting outside the pretender’s ranch waiting for an appointment, has decided she has had enough with the pretense of a two party system.

Her announcement, however, was not covered in full by the media – as to be expected. It is reprinted below along with a transcript of an interview she gave the Democracy Now’s Amy Goodman after the fact.

Well, if she can think things over, so can we.

We will retain the address The Absurd Times for convenience and because “Absurd” has a variety of applications. When we started, we were not even locatable on any of the search engines. By the winter, we were listed 5th on Google search for absurditimes. I looked recently and we were second. This alone is a sign of how needed information is and gave me some positive views of our audience. So thank you all for the “hits”.

*ZNet | Anti War*

*"Good Riddance Attention Whore"*

*by Cindy Sheehan; DailyKos

<http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2007/5/28/12530/1525>; May 31, 2007*

I have endured a lot of smear and hatred since Casey was killed

and especially since I became the so-called "Face" of the

American anti-war movement. Especially since I renounced any tie

I have remaining with the Democratic Party, I have been further

trashed on such "liberal blogs" as the Democratic Underground.

Being called an "attention whore" and being told "good riddance"

are some of the more milder rebukes.

I have come to some heartbreaking conclusions this Memorial Day

Morning. These are not spur of the moment reflections, but

things I have been meditating on for about a year now. The

conclusions that I have slowly and very reluctantly come to are

very heartbreaking to me.

The first conclusion is that I was the darling of the so-called

left as long as I limited my protests to George Bush and the

Republican Party. Of course, I was slandered and libeled by the

right as a "tool" of the Democratic Party. This label was to

marginalize me and my message. How could a woman have an

original thought, or be working outside of our "two-party" system’

However, when I started to hold the Democratic Party to the same

standards that I held the Republican Party, support for my cause

started to erode and the "left" started labeling me with the

same slurs that the right used. I guess no one paid attention to

me when I said that the issue of peace and people dying for no

reason is not a matter of "right or left", but "right and wrong."

I am deemed a radical because I believe that partisan politics

should be left to the wayside when hundreds of thousands of

people are dying for a war based on lies that is supported by

Democrats and Republican alike. It amazes me that people who are

sharp on the issues and can zero in like a laser beam on lies,

misrepresentations, and political expediency when it comes to

one party refuse to recognize it in their own party. Blind party

loyalty is dangerous whatever side it occurs on. People of the

world look on us Americans as jokes because we allow our

political leaders so much murderous latitude and if we don't

find alternatives to this corrupt "two" party system our

Representative Republic will die and be replaced with what we

are rapidly descending into with nary a check or balance: a

fascist corporate wasteland. I am demonized because I don't see

party affiliation or nationality when I look at a person, I see

that person's heart. If someone looks, dresses, acts, talks and

votes like a Republican, then why do they deserve support just

because he/she calls him/herself a Democrat’ I have also reached

the conclusion that if I am doing what I am doing because I am

an "attention whore" then I really need to be committed. I have

invested everything I have into trying to bring peace with

justice to a country that wants neither. If an individual wants

both, then normally he/she is not willing to do more than walk

in a protest march or sit behind his/her computer criticizing

others. I have spent every available cent I got from the money a

"grateful" country gave me when they killed my son and every

penny that I have received in speaking or book fees since then.

I have sacrificed a 29 year marriage and have traveled for

extended periods of time away from Casey's brother and sisters

and my health has suffered and my hospital bills from last

summer (when I almost died) are in collection because I have

used all my energy trying to stop this country from slaughtering

innocent human beings. I have been called every despicable name

that small minds can think of and have had my life threatened

many times.

The most devastating conclusion that I reached this morning,

however, was that Casey did indeed die for nothing. His precious

lifeblood drained out in a country far away from his family who

loves him, killed by his own country which is beholden to and

run by a war machine that even controls what we think. I have

tried every since he died to make his sacrifice meaningful.

Casey died for a country which cares more about who will be the

next American Idol than how many people will be killed in the

next few months while Democrats and Republicans play politics

with human lives. It is so painful to me to know that I bought

into this system for so many years and Casey paid the price for

that allegiance. I failed my boy and that hurts the most.

I have also tried to work within a peace movement that often

puts personal egos above peace and human life. This group won't

work with that group; he won't attend an event if she is going

to be there; and why does Cindy Sheehan get all the attention

anyway’ It is hard to work for peace when the very movement that

is named after it has so many divisions. Our brave young men and

women in Iraq have been abandoned there indefinitely by their

cowardly leaders who move them around like pawns on a chessboard

of destruction and the people of Iraq have been doomed to death

and fates worse than death by people worried more about

elections than people. However, in five, ten, or fifteen years,

our troops will come limping home in another abject defeat and

ten or twenty years from then, our children's children will be

seeing their loved ones die for no reason, because their

grandparents also bought into this corrupt system. George Bush

will never be impeached because if the Democrats dig too deeply,

they may unearth a few skeletons in their own graves and the

system will perpetuate itself in perpetuity.

I am going to take whatever I have left and go home. I am going

to go home and be a mother to my surviving children and try to

regain some of what I have lost. I will try to maintain and

nurture some very positive relationships that I have found in

the journey that I was forced into when Casey died and try to

repair some of the ones that have fallen apart since I began

this single-minded crusade to try and change a paradigm that is

now, I am afraid, carved in immovable, unbendable and rigidly

mendacious marble.

Camp Casey has served its purpose. It's for sale. Anyone want to

buy five beautiful acres in Crawford, Texas’ I will consider any

reasonable offer. I hear George Bush will be moving out soon,

too... which makes the property even more valuable.

This is my resignation letter as the "face" of the American

anti-war movement. This is not my "Checkers" moment, because I

will never give up trying to help people in the world who are

harmed by the empire of the good old US of A, but I am finished

working in, or outside of this system. This system forcefully

resists being helped and eats up the people who try to help it.

I am getting out before it totally consumes me or anymore people

that I love and the rest of my resources. Good-bye America ...

you are not the country that I love and I finally realized no

matter how much I sacrifice, I can't make you be that country

unless you want it.

It's up to you now.

Democracy Now! http://www.democracynow.org

"We Will Retool...and Come at it from a Different Direction" - Cindy

Sheehan Says She Will Return After Stepping Back as Antiwar Leader

Wednesday, May 30th, 2007

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl’sid=07/05/30/1343232

Cindy Sheehan has been the face of the US antiwar movement for the past

two years. In August 2005, she set up Camp Casey outside President

Bush's Crawford estate in memory of her son Casey, who was killed in

Iraq. Now Cindy says she is stepping back from her role as a leading

campaigner against the Iraq war. In this Democracy Now! special, Cindy

Sheehan joins us for the hour to talk about her decision. [includes rush

transcript]

------------------------------------------------------------------------

We turn now to Cindy Sheehan, who has just announced that she is

stepping away from the antiwar movement after two years of being the

nation's most visible critic of the war in Iraq.

She began speaking out against the invasion and occupation of Iraq after

her 24-year-old son, Army Specialist Casey Sheehan, was killed in Iraq

on April 4, 2004.

Cindy Sheehan made headlines around the world in August of 2005, when

she staged a camp-out to pressure President Bush to meet her as he

vacationed at his Crawford estate.

On Monday, Sheehan announced her resignation as the face of the antiwar

movement. Sheehan said she is stepping down in part because of hostility

from Democrats, whom she has criticized for supporting the war. Sheehan

also cited repeated threats on her life, strains on her health and

family, and divisions inside the peace movement.

She wrote, "When I started to hold the Democratic Party to the same

standards that I held the Republican Party, support for my cause started

to erode and the 'left' started labeling me with the same slurs that the

right used. I guess no one paid attention to me when I said that the

issue of peace and people dying for no reason is not a matter of 'right

or left', but 'right and wrong.'"

Cindy Sheehan joins us from Sacramento, California.

* *Cindy Sheehan*, co-founder of Gold Star Families For Peace. Her

son Casey was killed in Baghdad on April 4, 2004.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

RUSH TRANSCRIPT

*AMY GOODMAN: *We turn now to Cindy Sheehan, co-founder of Gold Star

Families for Peace. Her son Casey, killed in Sadr City in Baghdad, April

4, 2004. She has authored a number of books, including /Peace Mom: A

Mother’s Journey Through Heartache to Activism/. Cindy Sheehan, welcome

to /Democracy Now!/

*CINDY SHEEHAN: *Good morning, Amy. Thank you.

*AMY GOODMAN: *It’s very good to have you with us. You have just flown

home. Yesterday, you arrived in California. Tell us about your decision.

On Memorial Day, many people around this country and the world read your

painful letter, saying it seems, at least for now, goodbye to your

active role as one of the leaders of the peace movement in this country.

*CINDY SHEEHAN: *It was not an easy decision, and it wasn’t a spur of

the moment decision or a quick decision like going down to Crawford,

Texas, was very, you know, spur of the moment and very, very not thought

out well. But it turned out well. Anyway, I’ve been thinking about it

for a year, when I -- after last summer, when I almost died, and I

started thinking about pulling back a little bit. And after, you know, I

regained some of my strength, I just went back into it full force. And

it’s hard to work within this movement that is so divided, that is so --

really has a lot of negative energy. It’s draining. It’s drained my

energy. And I used to -- you know, I still get so much support from so

many people, but when people -- our new left really is just barely right

of center, but when people there start criticizing me and calling me the

same names that the right has been calling me, I think it’s time to

reevaluate, pull back, you know, see what other direction we can come at

this from.

*AMY GOODMAN: *Cindy, I remember reaching you in the hospital last year,

not even knowing that you were ill. But explain what happened.

*CINDY SHEEHAN: *Well, you know, I was having gynecological problems,

and in less than twenty-four hours I lost almost half of my blood

volume, so I had to go in. I had to have transfusions. I ended up having

two emergency surgeries and then, you know, getting a really bad

infection afterwards and having to go back to the hospital for a few

days. So, you know, that was very symbolic, life-draining. You know, my

lifeblood was draining out of me. So that was really touch-and-go there

for a little while. And I’ve regained some of my strength, but that was

serious surgery. And, you know, it’s my fault. I didn’t give myself

enough time to heal physically from it.

*AMY GOODMAN: *Cindy, can we go back -- and I know this is extremely

painful -- April 4, 2004. Though you’ve spoken a great deal about it

publicly in this country and around the world, let’s talk about your

journey, the subtitle of your book, ‘A Mother's Journey Through

Heartache to Activism.’ When did you learn that Casey was killed’

*CINDY SHEEHAN: *Well, he was killed, in California time it was a little

before 8:00 in the morning. I woke up at 9:00 a.m. It was amazing. It

was the first day since he had been gone that I felt any kind of

lightness in my spirit. And I woke up. It was Palm Sunday. I went

through my Sunday activity, cleaning house, doing laundry, shopping for

the week, getting my clothes ready for the next week of work.

And my ex-husband and I, who, you know, I was still married to, Casey’s

dad, we were sitting down, watching CNN and eating dinner. We had filet

mignon that day. I remember what we were eating. And a report came on

CNN. It showed a Humvee burning and said that eight soldiers had been

killed in Baghdad that day. And I looked at Pat, and I said, ‘One of

them was Casey.’ And, you know, he got very upset. He goes, ‘Well, you

know, he’s only been there a few days. You know, there’s hundreds of

thousands of soldiers there. Chances are it can’t be Casey. You know,

it’s statistically very slim that it was Casey. And we don’t even know

where he is yet.’ And I just said, ‘I don’t care what you say. One of

them was Casey.’ And about four hours later, my worst fears were

confirmed by the US military.

*AMY GOODMAN: *And talk about your journey through that day. How did you

cope’

*CINDY SHEEHAN: *You know, when I was walking my dogs, I came home. I

saw them standing in my living room. You know, I immediately collapsed

on the floor. I was screaming, screaming, screaming. And I think -- you

know, it’s -- I don’t know how I coped. You know, people start coming

over. The time starts to just become a blur. You do a lot of drinking.

You do a lot of laughing. You remember the good times in that period.

But I think the thing that gets you through that horrible period is an

intense shock. It’s a physical, emotional kind of shock that envelops you.

And I remember I didn’t go to sleep that night. I didn’t go to sleep the

next night, because I didn’t want to wake up. I didn’t want to forget

that Casey was dead and wake up and have to relive that experience. I

was sitting on the porch swing about 6:00 in the morning on Monday

morning, after we heard Casey was killed, and I’m watching people get up

and go to work. And I just wanted to scream at them: how can you live

your lives when my son is dead’ And, you know, you’re mad at -- you’re

mad at the world for going on, when your life has been destroyed and

your world, your very world, is destroyed. Your whole universe becomes a

different place. And then, about eight or nine months later, the shock

starts to wear off, and if you thought you were in pain before, that’s

when the real pain settles in.

*AMY GOODMAN: *And, Cindy, how did you go from your private mourning to

becoming more public, to speaking out’ When was the first time that you

spoke out after Casey died’

*CINDY SHEEHAN: *It was on the Fourth of July, 2004, exactly three

months after Casey was killed. I went to the Unitarian Universalist

Church in Berkeley, California, to support another Gold Star mom, Jane

Bright, whose son Evan Ashcroft was killed in Iraq in July of 2003. I

went to support her, because she came up to speak to their congregation.

That’s when I first physically met Bill Mitchell, whose son Michael was

killed in Iraq the same day in the same incident Casey was killed in.

And I didn’t go there to speak, but I was compelled to speak. And since

then, I haven’t shut up. So that was the first time, and it was, you

know, very meaningful, I think, that it happened on Independence Day,

that I found my voice. And I found really my independence from this

country that is so destructive to so many people.

*AMY GOODMAN: *Cindy, when you went to Crawford and established Camp

Casey in memory of Casey in August of 2005 and said you wanted an hour

of the President's time, coming from that Dallas Veterans for Peace

convention, you had met with the President before. Describe that

meeting. Where did it take place’ What happened there’

*CINDY SHEEHAN: *Well, a couple months after we buried Casey, we were

invited to go up to Fort Lewis, Washington state, to -- what we were

told -- have a sit-down with the President, so he could express, you

know, the good wishes of a grateful nation. And so, our entire family

went up there. We went to the post hospital. We had to go through some

very intense security screening. And we sat down in this little tiny

room, in one of the hospitals’ waiting rooms. And we sat there. The

President came in.

We brought about four or five pictures of Casey from the time he was a

baby until he was a soldier. We wanted him to see the pictures of Casey.

We wanted to talk about Casey. We decided as a family that we weren’t

going into any kind of political discussion with him. We wanted to use

the short time we had with him to describe what a marvelous person was

taken from our family. He didn’t look at the pictures. He didn’t want to

talk about Casey. You know, he kept calling Casey "the loved one,’ you

know, to depersonalize Casey as much as he could. He didn’t even say

‘him’ or, you know, he, of course, didn’t use his name or his rank. He

called me "Mom" the entire time. Right before George Bush came in, they

made us take off all our name tags. So he called me ‘Mom,’ Casey ‘the

loved one,’ and just acted like it really -- we were at a tea party.

*AMY GOODMAN: *And what did you say to him, the President of the United

States’

*CINDY SHEEHAN: *Well, he came up to me and he took my hand and he

looked in my eyes, and he said, ‘Mom, I can’t imagine losing a loved one

in a war, whether it be an aunt or an uncle or a brother or a sister.’

And, you know, I stopped him before he can go through the whole litany

of how Casey could be related to me, besides being my son. And I said,

‘Wait a second, Mr. President’ -- that’s when I still called him ‘Mr.

President’ -- ‘Casey was my son, and you have children. Imagine one of

your children being killed.’ And he didn’t say anything. And I said,

‘Trust me, you don’t want to go there.’ And he said, ‘You’re right. I

don’t.’ So that was about the one-on-one contact that we had. Then he

talked about how Casey was in a better place and things like that.

*AMY GOODMAN: *You have written in your letter, the letter that you sent

out on Memorial Day, that you have come to the conclusion that Casey

died for nothing. Can you explain how you came to this conclusion’

*CINDY SHEEHAN: *Well, I set out on this quest really to make Casey's

death count for something, to make it meaningful, not to be, you know,

counted as death and destruction, as occupying a country that was no

threat to the United States of America, not for lies. I didn’t want to

think that he died for lies, that he died because my government is

callous and has no regard for human life or human suffering. I wanted

his death to count for peace. I want it to count for love. I want it to

count for justice. And, you know, in this system we have, it’s ruled by

the corporations, it’s ruled by the corporate war profiteers. They use

people like they’re things and not people.

And I am just really devastated and frustrated with an American

population, you know, not counting the people who listen to your show or

who watch your show, an American population that doesn’t give the Iraq

war one, you know, bit of attention, doesn’t think about it, doesn’t

have to think about it. They don’t want to think about the death and

destruction and the pain that’s being caused by the government that

they’re giving their tacit support to by their silence. You know, we

care more about who’s the next American idol, what was in Anna Nicole’s

refrigerator when she died, than the hundreds of thousands of innocent

lives that have been sacrificed for the greed for power and money that

this country is always on the prowl for. So it just makes me think that

Casey is going to go down in a long line of people who have been

sacrificed to the corporate war machine in this country.

*AMY GOODMAN: *We’re talking to Cindy Sheehan, lost her son Casey, April

4, 2004, founded Camp Casey, where thousands have come almost on a kind

of pilgrimage outside the estate of President Bush in Crawford. Since

that time, Cindy has actually bought property in Crawford. Can you talk

about your decision to buy the property, Cindy’ And now, in your letter

that you wrote on Memorial Day, saying you’re putting it up for sale.

*CINDY SHEEHAN: *Well, after we left Crawford in August of ‘05, the

McLennan County supervisors passed an ordinance that there’s no camping

or parking or sleeping along the sides of Prairie Chapel Road. And, you

know, we think that was a direct, specific and targeted ordinance

against free speech, against the First Amendment, really, which gives

you the right to petition your government for redress of wrongs and

gives you the right to peaceable protest. And no matter what anybody

says or any criticism they can have about me or Camp Casey, the protests

there have always been very peaceable and always been very positive. So

I decided if we wanted to keep having these gatherings in Crawford,

Texas, we would have to own property. So I purchased five acres. It’s

right inside the town of Crawford.

And I really think now that this part of my activism is over and that I

think Camp Casey has served its purpose. And I think I have gone as far

as I can right now in the movement. I’ve come to a road block. I’ve come

to a dead end. I’ve come to a brick wall. And then, of course, I have,

you know, decimated all of my resources, my monetary resources, on this

activism, on this cause, in the movement, that I need, you know,

resources to just be able to survive. And so, that’s why I decided to

sell Camp Casey.

*AMY GOODMAN: *Cindy, yesterday, after your letter came out on Memorial

Day and we announced that you would be on the broadcast for the hour, we

were inundated with email from around the country and around the world.

In the next part of the show, I want to read some of it to you, but one

of the people who wrote, Marguerite from Santa Fe, said that they wanted

to financially help you, describing a Cindy Sheehan

retirement-from-the-peace-movement fund. What is your response’

*CINDY SHEEHAN: *We have gotten -- in any way people can reach me, we’ve

gotten hundreds and hundreds of emails -- and, you know, very few

negative ones -- offering support, offering emotional support, offering

places I can go to rest, offering financial support. And I’m very

overwhelmed, again, by the good-hearted nature of Americans. But I think

that we have to realize that if you’re going to put so much pressure on

one individual, that person has to be supported continually, not get to

the point where I did, where I just had to throw my hands up and say, ‘I

give up. I can’t do this anymore. I don’t have any more energy. I don’t

have any more money. I don’t have any more stamina. I have to go away.’

And there are so many people, there are so many worthy organizations who

are struggling financially, who could do so much, who have people who

can be effective voices, that aren’t supported by the peace movement or

people in America, the millions of people in America who oppose George

Bush and who oppose the war. If they aren’t physically able to get out

and do the work, then I think that they -- and if they have the

financial resources -- should be supporting people in the movement who

can do this.

*AMY GOODMAN: *As you talk about cash-starved organizations, I think

about the tens of millions of dollars that the candidates are raising,

who are running for president in 2008, that money -- majority of it, of

course -- going to the major corporate networks for advertising.

*CINDY SHEEHAN: *Right. You know, it’s an obscenity. I can imagine

people in third world countries looking at, you know, someone like

Hillary Clinton raising $35 million for her presidential campaign that

goes to really, you know, nonproductive means, and they see that, and

they just -- it’s just really immoral, I believe. And we’re spending $12

million in Iraq. How many people could that help, not only around the

world, but in our own country’ You know, it’s very immoral and obscene

what we do with our resources.

*AMY GOODMAN: *There was a time when you said you would run against

Hillary Rodham Clinton for her stance supporting war.

*CINDY SHEEHAN: *I never said I would run against Hillary. I was heavily

recruited or drafted, or people were -- from the state of New York just

really wanted me to run against her for her Senate seat in New York. I

did say -- I threatened to run against Dianne Feinstein here in

California, though.

*AMY GOODMAN: *When we come back, I’ll read to you some of what our

listeners and viewers and readers have written from around the world,

and I also want to ask you more about your family. As you wrote in your

Memorial Day letter saying you’re stepping back from the antiwar

movement, you talked about sacrificing your twenty-nine-year marriage

and wanting to come home to your children. We’re talking to Cindy

Sheehan. We’ll be back in a minute.

[break]

*AMY GOODMAN: *Joan Baez singing ‘Joe Hill’ at Camp Casey, August 24,

2005, a few weeks after Cindy Sheehan established Camp Casey, where

ultimately thousands of people came, many of them who lost loved ones in

Iraq -- sons and daughters, husbands, wives, mothers, fathers. Cindy

Sheehan joining us in Sacramento. She just flew home yesterday, after

releasing a letter on Memorial Day called "Good Riddance, Attention

Whore." Why did you call your letter that, Cindy’

*CINDY SHEEHAN: *Well, that was one of the last slurs that I read before

I decided that I had, you know, had enough. And it was Memorial Day when

I read that slur against me on a so-called left blog, a leftwing blog.

And it was Memorial Day. I was in Crawford, Texas, and I thought -- I

had just also talked to my oldest daughter, who had just been to the

cemetery to put flowers on Casey's grave. And I thought, what am I doing

here’ Why aren’t I home with my children’

*AMY GOODMAN: *You talk about your twenty-nine-year marriage. At the

time you were establishing Camp Casey, making international headlines,

your marriage was crumbling. And your children, your surviving son and

daughters, talk about them.

*CINDY SHEEHAN: *Well, I have a daughter Carly -- she is in university

right now; she was Casey's next youngest sibling -- and then a son

Andrew, who is a land surveyor in the Bay Area -- he’s doing really

great -- and my youngest daughter Janey, who’s a massage therapist. And

it was a struggle when I first started doing this. And when they saw

their mom and dad -- it ruining their mom and dad's marriage, it was,

you know, a lot. They had just lost their brother, and their mother went

on this mission, this passion to end the war and to hold somebody

accountable for their brother's death. And they’re just -- they’re so

strong. I dedicate my book to them, because they have gone through a

lot. And they get stronger every day. They get more capable every day.

And we went from a family, where even though mom worked full-time, she

did everything for the kids. My children were the center of my life. We

were involved in every aspect of their lives. And it was very hard for

them to adjust to the new life without their brother, their mom and dad

divorced.

You know, they thought that they were going to be, you know, a family

that was together forever, but, you know, April 4th, our entire universe

changed. And, you know, the members of my family, they wanted to go back

to April 3rd, before he Casey was killed, and I knew we could never do

that. I knew we would have to move forward and forge a new life

together, a new family together, without Casey there, because our family

was never going to be the same.

And it was a struggle with my children, but, you know, we have regained

a very solid relationship. I want to now, instead of spending quality

time with them, I also want to spend quantity time with them. I want to

be able to alleviate some of their physical stress that they have, to be

there for them. Carly, this is her last quarter at university, and

she’ll be graduating. You know, I want to be there for her to help her

through this. She’s majoring in history. I majored in history. It’s very

exciting to be with her and to have conversations, mature adult

conversations, with her. So, you know, I want to get to know my kids as

adults, and I want to be there for them, you know, help forge this new

relationship that we have and give it a good foundation. You know, it’s

been a relationship that’s been very inconsistent because of my travel.

And I now share a home with my two daughters. And now, when I go away, I

miss them even more than I did before.

*AMY GOODMAN: *Cindy, headlines around the world this week. /Guardian/

of London: ‘Sheehan quits as face of US anti-war fight.’ Xinhua News

Agency, China: ‘Activist Cindy Sheehan ends her anti-war campaign.’

Alalam News Network, Iran: ‘Anti-war mom gives up campaign.’ /Melbourne

Herald Sun/, Australia: ‘Grieving mom walks away.’ /Ontario Now/,

Canada: ‘Cindy Sheehan throws in the towel.’ Your response’ And are you

concerned your decision could deflate some of those in the antiwar

movement’ What words do you have to say to them, and especially families

who have lost loved ones in Iraq, soldiers who are in Iraq, soldiers who

have come home’

*CINDY SHEEHAN: *Well, you know, I have -- in those hundreds of emails

I’ve gotten in the past couple days, there’s been many from soldiers in

Iraq, there’s been many from family members who have loved ones in Iraq

and from people all over the Muslim world, telling me, please, please

don’t give up, don’t abandon us. And I just want them to know I’m not.

I’m just -- I’m pulling back. I’m, you know, getting some rest. I’m

trying to restore my health. I want to come back stronger, but I’m not

coming back the way I was before.

We’re going to seriously reevaluate our place -- and when I say ‘our,’

I’m talking about Gold Star Families for Peace, I’m talking about the

Camp Casey Peace Institute, my skeletal staff. We’re going to -- and my

sister Dee Dee, of course. We’re going to just hunker down and find a

way that we can be more productive, that we can be more useful to

humanity. Like I said, I’ve come to a dead end in what I’m doing now.

We’ve found a chink in the armor. We exploited that chink. Now, most of

the country is on our side. I don’t think we can work with the

politicians. When we come back, we won’t work with or against

politicians, but we’ll work with humanity.

Well, since I’ve been traveling the globe, I’ve met so many people who

have been encroached upon or damaged or their families damaged by this

corporate military imperialism of the United States. We want to help

them. And we’re hoping by helping our brothers and sisters around the

world struggle against the imperialism of the US military and the US

corporations, that it will have a residual effect in helping America. We

don’t want to abandon our soldiers there in the field like the Democrats

did. You know, last night I was on Air America. Laura Flanders calls it

to sacrifice the troops, instead of support the troops. We don’t want to

leave them abandoned in the field. We don’t want to give the impression

to the people of Iraq that they have no hope.

But I just want to let you know that I was just a small cog in this

movement. It’s a large movement. And I think that this will encourage

people to step up to the plate. And I sacrificed too much for this

movement, and I’m not blaming anybody except myself. I was a willing

participant. And I would be willing to keep sacrificing, if I thought we

were making progress, if I thought my sacrifices could help. But I don’t

think that it’s helping anymore, so we’re going to pull back and figure

out how we can help. But, you know, people need to step up now. And

everybody in America is going to have to sacrifice something. We have

too much. We work too much to get things that we don’t even need, while

24,000 people a day die of starvation in the world. So everybody is

going to have to sacrifice a little bit. If everybody sacrifices a

little bit, you know, a few people wouldn’t have to sacrifice so much.

*AMY GOODMAN: *Cindy Sheehan, I asked you about messages to people here

-- of course, then there’s the Iraqi people, and people do know of your

activism there. What would you say to Iraqis’

*CINDY SHEEHAN: *You know, I would say that we are still there trying to

help you, trying to end this horrible occupation, that my new

organization that’s going to be humanitarian in nature will do

everything we can to help alleviate your suffering. And I just hope that

the people of America finally come to the realization that you are our

brothers and sisters -- we all share one beating heart of humanity --

and that we cannot allow our leaders to do what they’re doing anymore.

And, you know, it’s very important for people in America to struggle

against our system, to hold the Democrats to the same standard of

accountability that we were trying to hold the Republicans to, and to

force an end to this occupation. And that -- I’m not going to work, you

know, in this political system anymore, because I don’t have the energy

to do that anymore. But it’s very important that everybody keep up the

struggle.

*AMY GOODMAN: *And I want to read a few of the comments of our listeners

and viewers and readers around the world that came in at

democracynow.org. On electoral politics, Gordon Brown, a teacher in

Switzerland, asked, ‘Who do you believe would make the best next

president of the United States’’ Leslie Bonnet of California writes,

‘Will Cindy join the Green Party, which has steadfastly advocated for

peace and against the invasion of Iraq’ Will Cindy consider running as a

presidential or vice presidential nominee with the Green Party’’ Barbara

and Graham Dean said, ‘What can all of us in the peace and justice

movement do now to give you back your hope that we can indeed change the

dangerous course this government has forced upon this country’’ And they

ask, ‘Would you consider running for Congress’’ Paul said, ‘Given what

you’ve described as the corruption and deception that exist in both the

Republican and the Democratic political parties and how the huge

appropriations of money for defense contractors have become such a force

in the US economy, do you have any hope we will return to being a nation

that stands for right instead of being a nation that has to have

something to fight’’ And another listener/viewer, John Stauber, says,

‘What is your opinion of MoveOn and the role it played in the recent

congressional debate over war funding’’ Take your pick.

*CINDY SHEEHAN: *Well, of course, I’m not going to run for election. I

don’t -- you know, I’m very disillusioned with our political system. If

we don’t wake up in America and realize that we have to vote out of our

courage and integrity for candidates who reflect our own beatitudes, and

not the beatitudes of the war machine and the corporations, we are --

we’re doomed. And if we don’t get a viable third party -- or some people

say second party; you know, the Democrats and Republicans are so

similar, and their pockets are lined by the same people -- we are -- our

representative republic is doomed, where George Bush has assumed all the

powers to himself and Congress has given him those powers. And we really

need an opposition party in this country. But we vote out of our fear.

We go and we vote for the lesser of two evils, and we always end up

getting somebody evil. And, you know, I say ‘evil,’ not in the Christian

sense of the word. But, you know, I do believe that.

I’m not going to join any party. If I do vote again and if I do become,

you know, politically active, it will be independent. I’m not going to,

of course, run for anything, be in the system. I have been asked by the

Green Party to run for president, but, you know, that’s not anything

that I want.

And I know John Stauber. He has been struggling against MoveOn. I was

really upset with MoveOn, and plus with the corporate media, who were

characterizing MoveOn as the antiwar left in America, which was just

really, for people who are on the inside know how hilarious that is. So

I think that MoveOn has a lot of resources, and they should be trying to

represent -- truly represent the opposition to, instead of being, you

know, so tied in with the Democratic Party, to really represent the

views of the left.

*AMY GOODMAN: *Cindy Sheehan, what do you think are the greatest

successes of the peace movement so far, and then, of course, what you

want to see changed’

*CINDY SHEEHAN: *Well, you know, I think that we did an incredible job

of educating America about -- causing a debate really in this country

about the Iraq war that didn’t exist before August of ‘05. It didn’t

exist in a public way before August of ‘05. And the shift in the country

has been enormous, you know, to being against George Bush and against

the war, when it was overwhelmingly in favor of it. And we thought we

were doing something good when we elected Democrats. We thought that we

were electing them to change the way things are going, not for this, to

keep the /status quo/. And I think that we’ve been very successful in

raising awareness.

Where things have to go now -- and, you know, I’ve been saying this for

a long time -- is that we have to be willing to put our bodies on the

line for peace and justice, that, you know, we can’t work on short-term

band-aids. We need true solutions to the problem, to this corruptness,

to the stranglehold the corporations have on our government. And we

can’t just put band-aids on them. Like, ending the Vietnam War was

major, but people left the movement. It was an antiwar movement. They

didn’t stay committed to true and lasting peace. And that’s what we

really have to do.

*AMY GOODMAN: *Cindy Sheehan, we have fifteen seconds. I have the sense,

as you talk, that you’re not actually leaving, even as a public face of

the movement, but stepping back perhaps for a few months, a few weeks,

to regroup. Is that accurate’

*CINDY SHEEHAN: *Well, what I like to think about is like, we’re closing

down the factory, we’re going to retool, and we’re going to open up, and

it will be a new and improved version of it. But we are definitely going

to come at it from a totally different direction.

*AMY GOODMAN: *Cindy Sheehan, I want to thank you for being with us.

*CINDY SHEEHAN: *Thank you, Amy.

*AMY GOODMAN: *Co-founder of Gold Star Families for Peace, speaking to

us from, well, near her home. She’s in Sacramento, California.

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