Kate Anne FOR Peace, Justice and Nonviolence ~ Weblog

Munchkin has been dominating my life -- how do dog owners do it? I got to Saturday's Union Square peace vigil late, thanks to Munch and caring for my own cats and recently planted flowers. The good news is that I was able to give some subway riding Billy Graham GLY crusaders who were giggling at my peace button hat a couple copies of John Dear's prayer for our persecutors -- I also blessed them. I could say I sowed some seeds but the NYFOR info was on the bottom of the prayer and we shall see where that leads them -- perhaps back to me. AT the vigil, got to speak with Voices in the Wilderness's fasting Kathy Kelly's NY counterpart, Paul Frazier who is in NY staying at Mary House and spending time at the Isaiah Wall. We discussed teaching folks to talk to high school students about building up a conscientious objector file in anticipation of Bush's endless war bringing endless draft. We'll see what happens there, but we were both impressed by a young couple complete with sign preaching to Union Square benchsitters about current politics. I chorused in to what he was saying. Come on baby, light some fires.... Let's keep trying.

On a different topic, I gotta follow up on NY's buying voting machines which could decide our votes for us. Have to do some more research and alert folk. Check out the NYFOR and WQIDC listservs for action updates on various p&j issues. Now to walk Munchkin and get to work where Shirley Marcus is celebrating her birthday. Happy Birthday, Shoil -- and peace!!

And when will I find time to review all my email? Did Zara Fox write me? Did Catherine Cann Fox see my account of my evening with her lovely daughter? Will I find that impulsively bought lotto ticket and check it to find I won money to underwrite my peace work? Here's to communication and peacemaking and money for good purposes! After some rain it is back to getting hot -- dog days of June, indeed!!

Peace hugs,

Kate Anne

Personally, things go well. Summer is about to begin and the season has started well with a visit from my son Michael Dylan and his friends Jon Haverman and George Soltis. We played tourist together and I got talked into doing the World Trade Center's big hole but angels led me to take them to St. Paul's Chapel which miraculously survived 9/11 and served as a base for the workers/would-be rescuers. It's graveyard is the only burial place for the atoms of people who were vaporized and the energy there is phenomenal. What is better is that the church was open and it maintains a signficant tribute to the coming together of NYC, the US and the world following the tragedy and before Bush's illegal invasion of a country who had nothing to do with it. There are banners, letters and other artifacts as well as some tasteful multimedia displays. Go there if you do the site. And leave a donation for the church for being a shining example of ecumenical service.

Oh, there was John's pizza and the ESPN playsite on 34th Street and GlenGarryGlennRoss and the Rush meet-up at Loreley prior to the focal point of MDB's visit: the Marillion concert at the Bowery Ballroom -- okay, "only" three of the band -- but what a concert!! Anyway, I've since gone to Tower Records to try to find more. (Too much Fish and not enough H -- but I was able to buy the Marbles on the Road DVD -- MD had already given me the CD of Marbles.) After the concert though, Los Trios Marillos met with fans smart enough to go to the lounge. Steve Hogarth really is as charming off stage as on -- what a smile! He said I gave him energy while he was performing but in truth we all SHARED energy. See MD's blog http://audientfiles.blogspot.com for more but suffice it to say "a good time was had by all." And we met some good folk: Terry(i?), Buddy, and Lawrence in particular. And I am into Marillion big time (and thanks to the wristband that Rita Drew threw me, I've discovered "Make Poverty History" -- see http://one.org for the US site. We all ARE one so let us get our acts together.

I've got to get my act together and go walk my friend Joan's Munchkin and get to work. (Dogsitting for the next two weeks will keep me out of trouble.) But I've got to write FOR on our group's plans and work at furthering publicity and action on the Downing Street Minutes. (Dial Congress and Senators tollfree at 877-SOB-USOB for their DC switchboard.) In the meantime, Bush pushes on to build yet a 6th concentration camp at Guantanamo -- outrageous and a crime against humanity, but it gives money to Halliburton. God forgive us. (Time to re-read Fr. John Dear's prayer.)

I miss MD and Jon and George -- but I have Munchkin as well as cats Mu-ning and MacTangelo, Wilbur and Bootsie and two different NYC apartments. And I may even get to meet my English penfriend Catherine Cann Fox's daughter Zara Fox tonight. WOW! But first work -- gotta pay those bills.

Blessings and peace hugs,

Kate Anne

[See Robert C. Koehler’s column “The Last War? -- Let’s risk the mockery and say out loud that it is time to stop” at Commonwonders.com ]

Another good, strong column, Bob! Thanks. I find it interesting how we almost have to apologize, however, for daring to question the futility of war (akin to questioning the count of the last several elections, no doubt). When I wrote something along the same vein several years ago, I was "accused" of being "a tired 60's liberal." Hey, I'm glad we're still at it, determined to change the world. Anyway, you got me on a roll, exploring the topic. I started with a Kennedy quotation which your column brought to mind, googled, and found Martin Luther King, Jr. speaking similarly about a different war --

'I want to say one other challenge that we face is simply that we must find an alternative to war and bloodshed. Anyone who feels, and there are still a lot of people who feel that way, that war can solve the social problems facing mankind is sleeping through a great revolution. President Kennedy said on one occasion, "Mankind must put an end to war or war will put an end to mankind." The world must hear this. I pray to God that America will hear this before it is too late, because today we’re fighting a war.'

And I thought of Peter, Paul and Mary's "The Great Mandela" [Spell checking "mandela" and PP&M on Google led me to a lesson plan on 60s protest - see plan -- good resource to check out later] -- and that led me to another song about the earlier "war to end wars", Eric Bogle's "No Man's Land" (a/k/a "The Green Fields of France" which has a responding song -- of lesser quality -- supplied by Stephen L. Suffet, which you and I wouldn't buy.) You can find a version of Bogle's song at PeterPaulandMary.com and some other sites, but my favorite version of the song is that sung by the Fureys and Davey Arthur (proving how folk songs have lives of their own, going through changes):

The Green Fields of France

Well, how do you do, young Willie McBride
Do you mind if I sit here, down by your graveside
And rest for awhile 'neath the warm summer sun
I've been walking all day, and I'm nearly done
I see by your gravestone you are only nineteen
When you joined the great fallen in nineteen-sixteen
I hope you died well and I hope you died clean
Or, young Willie McBride, was it slow and obscene

Chorus:

Did they beat the drum slowly, did they play the fife flowly
Did they sound the Death March as they lowered you down
Did the band play The Last Post in chorus
Did the pipes play the Flowers of the Forest

Did you leave 'ere wife or a sweetheart behind
In some faithful heart is your memory enshrined
Although you died back in nineteen-sixteen
In that faithful heart are you forever nineteen
Or are you a stranger without even a name
Enclosed then forever behind a glass frame
In an old photograph, torn, battered and stained
And faded to yellow in brown leather frame

(Chorus)

The sun, now it shines on the green fields of France
There's a warm summer breeze that makes the red poppies dance
And look how the sun shines from under the clouds
There's no gas, no barbed wire, there's no gun firing now
But here in this graveyard it's still no man's land
The countless white crosses stand mute in the sand
To man's blind indifference to his fellow man
To a whole generation that were butchered and damned

(Chorus)

Ah, young Willie McBride, I can't help wonder why
Do those that lie here know why did they die
And did they believe when they answered the cause
Did they really believe that this war would end wars
Well, the sorrow, the suffering, the glory, the pain
The killing and dying was all done in vain
For, young Willie McBride, it all happened again
And again and again and again and again!

(Chorus)

© Larrikin Music. Performed by The Fureys and Davey Arthur. Written by Eric Bogle.

Anyway, thanks for spurring me onward and fighting the good fight, if there is any such thing. (I avoid war imagery -- I cannot sing Onward, Christian Soldiers.). I just read your column on Counter-Recruitment -- another keeper (yes, I file some of my favorites -- and share them with my p&j friends). Lots to do, but thanking you helped me find material for my blog. Hurrah for multi-tasking!

Peace hugs,
Kate Anne

I called Amnesty USA's New York City office and thanked them for Amnesty's courageous stand against the US gulag at Guantanamo and our other outrageous treatment of prisoners. They were happy to hear words of support and I promised to send in my renewal (talk is cheap, money is commitment). Bush and Cheney deny the torture, of course -- but then they lied about Weapons of Mass Destruction, too. Good God, forgive us our sins.

Okay, got up early today to get some stuff done around the house and ended up listening to Rachel Maddow's show on Air America Radio -- streamable over the web, but check out her blog - Maddowonline and learn about Patriot Pastors and a courageous Cleveland Heights pastor decrying their mission as "frightening, diabolical stuff for non-Christians and Christians alike" -- again, amazing what Bushites are up to. (Time to say John Dear's prayer again!)

In the meantime, the Netherlands has joined France in nixing the European Union constitution, which would create a more corporate-centered structure rather than a Europe for People. While Bush is equating Corporate America and the United States of America, Europeans aren't buying this picture for Europe. As Thom Hartmann says, our democracy must built on "we the people" and not on corporations or religions or any single ideology. The injustice of it all in America, where the middle class is becoming impoverished while tax cuts are being given to the rich. Seeing us, why would Europe follow suit? And when will America wake up?!?

There is so much to do -- in the world and at home. It is overwhelming, but we must do what we can. I'll start with doing some housework, paying some bills, and renewing my Amnesty International membership.

Peace hugs,
Kate Anne