“I don’t walk about belief – whether or not we should have started this war. Rather, I walk because we shouldn’t live our lives as if all is normal. People are suffering every moment because of this war – U.S. Soldiers and their families, Iraqi soldiers and civilians and their families – and this question of what we can do to end this suffering should be with us every day.”
a Concord (MA) area resident – in a letter to the editor regarding her own participation in a public vigil each Friday morning at the town center – ‘We Walk for All Who Suffer Because of War.’
this diary is dedicated to all who suffer because of war and other disasters
we honor courage in all its forms
cross-posted at DailyKos, Booman Tribune, European Tribune, and My Left Wing.
image and poem below the fold
Iraqis prepare to bury the body of Sheikh Faeq Abdullah Ibrahim in Kirkuk, about 250 km (150 miles) north of Baghdad March 6, 2006. Ibrahim was killed on Sunday when a roadside bomb exploded near his car in Hawija, near Kirkuk, relatives said.
REUTERS/Slahaldeen Rasheed
Iraqis comfort each other during the funeral of Sheikh Tarek Abdullah Ibrahim al-Obeidi of the powerful Obeidi tribe in the northern city of Kirkuk. Al-Obeidi was killed in a roadside bomb in the Sunni rebel bastion in Hawijah, northern Iraq. At least 13 people were killed Monday in a series of bombings and shootings across Iraq as US-led coalition forces were accused of widespread human rights abuses in the strife-torn country.
(AFP/Marwan Ibrahim)
Descriptions of Heaven and Hell
by Mark Jarman
The wave breaks
And I’m carried into it.
This is hell, I know,
Yet my father laughs,
Chest-deep, proving I’m wrong.
We’re safely rooted,
Rocked on his toes.
Nothing irked him more
Than asking, “What is there
Beyond death?”
His theory once was
That love greets you,
And the loveless
Don’t know what to say.
– – –
put a meaningful magnet on your car or metal filing cabinet
read Ilona’s important new blog – PTSD Combat
view the pbs newshour silent honor roll (with thanks to jimstaro at booman.)
take a private moment to light one candle among many (with thanks to TXSharon)
support Veterans for Peace
support the Iraqi people
support the Campaign for Innocent Victims in Conflict (CIVIC)
support CARE
support the victims of torture
remember the fallen
support Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors – TAPS
support Gold Star Families for Peace
support the fallen
support the troops
support Iraq Veterans Against the War
support Military families Speak Out
support the troops and the Iraqi people
read This is what John Kerry did today, the diary by lawnorder that prompted this series
read Riverbend’s Bagdhad Burning
read Dahr Jamail’s Iraq Dispatches
read Today in Iraq
witness every day
And the odometer still rolls along.
Click on the candle to copy the image into your own comment (you can leave it on my server), and/or rate this one – not for mojo, but to leave a small mark after taking this moment.
” I know. But I do not approve. And I am not resigned.”
from Dirge Without Music
by Edna St. Vincent Millay
I am honored that Iraq War Grief Daily Witness has been nominated for Best Series for 2005.
Thank you all,
Jerry Soucy aka RubDMC
Neocon Advocates Civil War in Iraq as “Strategic” Policy
Daniel Pipes Finds Comfort in Muslims Killing Muslims
By JOHN WALSH
This is where it’s at for us capitalists – let all those ‘others’ kill each other and save us the trouble. All the better to seize your resources, my dear.
We’ll be so happy running our machines on middle-east oil soon as they get out of the way. Won’t Africa be a lovely place to visit once all this ugly genocide is over?
Sorry, just my opinion – if each of y’all give me a dollar for it, I can go on vacation.
Suicide Car Bomber Kills 7 in Fallujah
let the women
choose the chiefs
see life honored
over death
peace honored
over war
and the end of
starvation
The point is, no matter what color one’s skin is or the type of clothing one wears, or what country one comes from, and all the rest of the qualifiers, we all mourn and cry and are sick to death of all this dying and death and killing. Enough is enough.
NOW.
I was just turned twenty-one,
And Henry Phipps, the Sunday-school superintendent,
Made a speech in Bindle’s Opera House.
“The honor of the flag must by upheld,” he said,
“Whether it be assailed by a barbarous tribe of Tagalogs
Or the greatest power in Europe.”
And we cheered and cheered the speech and the flag he waved
As he spoke.
And I went to the war in spite of my father,
And followed the flag till I saw it raised
By our camp in a rice field near Manila,
And all of us cheered and cheered it.
But there were flies and poisonous things;
And there was deadly water,
And the cruel heat,
And the sickening, putrid food;
And the smell of the trench just back of the tents
Where the soldiers went to empty themselves;
And there were the whores who followed us, full of syphilis;
And beastly acts between ourselves or alone,
With bullying, hatred, degredation among us,
And days of loathing and nights of fear
To the hour of the charge through the steaming swamp,
Following the flag,
Till I fell with a scream, shot through the guts.
Now there’s a flag over me in Spoon River!
A flag! A flag!
by Edgar Lee Masters
Peace
…I fast in solidarity with the victims of injustice across the world, especially those that suffer at the hands of the U.S. Government.
Light A Candle For
Peace, Tolerance, Understanding
and For The Children – Innocence Lost!
Dalton Trumbo, Johnny Got His Gun:
“You can always hear the people who are willing to sacrifice somebody else’s life. They’re plenty loud and they talk all the time. You can find them in churches and schools and newspapers and legislatures and congress. That’s their business. They sound wonderful. Death before dishonor. This ground sanctified by blood. These men who died so gloriously. They shall not have died in vain. Our noble dead.”
~~~~~~~~
Women’s Rights in Iraq
By Diane E. Dees
Iraqi women without headscarves are being attacked and killed.
March 7, 2006
~~~~~~~~
Michael Parenti:
“To oppose the policies of a government does not mean you are against the country or the people that the government supposedly represents. Such opposition should be called what it really is: democracy, or democratic dissent, or having a critical perspective about what your leaders are doing. Either we have the right to democratic dissent and criticism of these policies or we all lie down and let the leader, the Fuhrer, do what is best, while we follow uncritically, and obey whatever he commands. That’s just what the Germans did with Hitler, and look where it got them.”
~~~~~~~~
Civilian Deaths Rise in Iraq
By Juliana Bunim
According to Iraq Body Count, more civilians have been dying each year of the occupation.
March 9, 2006
~~~~~~~~
Edward Abbey: “A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government.”
~~~~~~~~
U.S. Will Not Demand Limits on Indian Fast Breeder Reactor, Prime Minister Says
Indian Prime Minster Manmohan Singh told the Indian parliament that the United States would not demand that New Delhi place its fast-breeder nuclear reactor under international safeguards under the terms of a nuclear technology-sharing agreement between the two countries, Electricity Daily reported today (see GSN, March 9).
~~~~~~~~
J. William Fulbright, US Senator:
“To criticize one’s country is to do it a service … Criticism, in short, is more than a right; it is an act of patriotism – a higher form of patriotism, I believe, than the familiar rituals and national adulation.”
~~~~~~~~
J. Sri Raman | Bush, Singh Unmake History
J. Sri Raman writes: A three-day visit of President Bush threatened to undo a proud history of decades, of India in the international arena. It also made a more than perceptible difference to the country’s current political history.
~~~~~~~~
Noam Chomsky:
“The point of public relations slogans like ‘Support our troops’ is that they don’t mean anything… That’s the whole point of good propaganda. You want to create a slogan that nobody’s going to be against, and everybody’s going to be for. Nobody knows what it means, because it doesn’t mean anything. Its crucial value is that it diverts your attention from a question that does mean something: Do you support our policy? That’s the one you’re not allowed to talk about.”
~~~~~~~~
Murtha to Receive Profile in Courage Award
Rep. John Murtha, a Vietnam veteran who has denounced the war in Iraq, was named a recipient of the John F. Kennedy Profile in Courage Award on Thursday.
~~~~~~~~
John Perkins, Confessions of an Economic Hit Man:
“Economic hit men (EHMs) are highly paid professionals who cheat countries around the globe out of trillions of dollars. They funnel money from the World Bank, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), and other foreign “aid” organizations into the coffers of huge corporations and the pockets of a few wealthy families who control the planet’s natural resources. Their tools include fraudulent financial reports, rigged elections, payoffs, extortion, sex, and murder. They play a game as old as empire, but one that has taken on new and terrifying dimensions during this time of globalization. I should know; I was an EHM.”
~~~~~~~~
Video Clip-Of-The-Week
Belafonte on Terror
Folks, the more one understands that terror and terrorism is a much broader problem, one can start applying it to many topics. Activist Harry Belafonte refuses to cower amidst the attempts to label him a traitor. To view the entire, video clip, visit: Belafonte on Terror If you would like to see other video clips on the Middle East, visit ETV1 & search “Middle East”.
~~~~~~~~
The American Heritage Dictionary, 1983: “fascism – A system of government that exercises a dictatorship of the extreme right, typically through the merging of state and business leadership, together with belligerent nationalism.”
~~~~~~~~
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“Never again shall one generation of veterans abandon another.”
**
“Sow Justice, Reap Peace — Strategies for Moving Beyond War” 2006 VFP Annual Convention August 10-13, Seattle, WA
Different War, Same Struggle
Veterans from both Vietnam and Iraq are organizing and speaking out against the war in increasing numbers.
David Enders
March 08 , 2006
*
“Never again shall one generation of veterans abandon another.”
*
“Sow Justice, Reap Peace — Strategies for Moving Beyond War” 2006 VFP Annual Convention August 10-13, Seattle, WA