OMNI NEWSLETTER: EVENTS, ACTIONS, COMMENT
AUGUST 6, 2005 BUILDING A CULTURE OF PEACE



AUGUST 7, SUNDAY, REMEMBERING THE VICTIMS, CELEBRATING PEACEMAKERS FULBRIGHT PEACE FOUNTAIN, UA CAMPUS. Procession starts at 6:00 at Lafayette and Arkansas, walk to and around Old Main to Fulbright Peace Fountain. Fayetteville’s new New Orleans Band leading the way. SPEAKER: MEDEA BENJAMIN, anti-war and women’s rights leader. : Medea Benjamin, as a spokeswoman for the U.S. peace movement, is traveling the country about the peace movement’s gathering momentum and real strategies for ending the occupation of Iraq, bringing the troops home. Read her new book, a vibrant collection of essays entitled Stop the Next War Now (Inner Ocean, 2005).



AUGUST 8, MEDEA BENJAMIN ALSO IN EUREKA SPRINGS, 7:30
Sponsored by: Gazebo Books (479)253-9556

Where: Unitarian Universalist Fellowship, 17 Elk St., Eureka Springs, AR



AUGUST 8-13 SHORT TAKE ON CAT CHANNEL 18

Catch Dick reading The Butter Battle Book by Dr. Seuss, 11 am, 6pm, 11pm. Do the Zooks or Yooks win? Next Monday or Tuesday go to CAT and read your favorite peace, justice, and environment book for children, or read any argument or story, or your own statement or story or poem. CAT IS THERE FOR US. Corporations have captured mainstream media, but we can speak and read and sing and dance! at CAT.


AUGUST 14, SUNDAY, 7PM, VIDEO UNDERGROUND

The powerful feature film, Hotel Rwanda. And I am happy to announce the purchase of our new (expensive) projector and the gift of a new, huge screen. We have great documentaries and feature films, we’re air conditioned, we have food, and it’s all free……..where can you beat that?!



AUGUST 15, Monday, UUFF Interweave (glbtiq), 6:30

At the UUFF Annex. Contact Rachel: SwtLykCandi@yahoo.com Join together to speak up for

diversity, equality, toleration against the growing bigotry.



AUGUST 12, Friday, FPL, 11 a.m. Rev. Lowell Grisham discussing Jim Wallis.



AUGUST 26, ANDREW RICE LECTURE ON FORGIVENESS AT OMNI, 7PM



OMNI DATA BASE

Karen Kimrey and John Ray will create an Omni Data Base. Contact Karen with ideas for contents: karenkimrey@cox.net If we are to act effectively for peace and justice and the environment, we must have effective tools.



OMNI’S SEPTEMBER FORUMS

Make and distribute flyers, write a letter to editors, phone friends. We need better publicity.

SEPTEMBER 6, Tuesday, FORUM ON WAR MADE EASY

Pentagon-White House-Media War Complex. A panel will discuss the new book, War Made Easy: How Presidents and Pundits Keep Spinning Us to Death by Norman Solomon. The Forum will take place at the home of Nancy Maier beginning at 6:30 to get acquainted and snacks and drinks, Forum beginning at 7:00. Put on your calendar. More information in next newsletter.

SEPTEMBER 15, THURSDAY, 7PM, MUSLIM WOMEN ROUNDTABLE, at OMNI

THINKING YOUR WAY AROUND THE STEREOTYPE OF THE MUSLIM WOMAN. Dr. Mohja Kahf.

GETTING OUT OF IRAQ FORUM (possible)

SEPTEMBER 21, TUESDAY, INTERNATIONAL DAY OF PEACE

September 22-Oct. 1, BANNED BOOKS WEEK (www.ala.org/ala/oif/bannedbooksweek), Celebrate the Freedom to Read. (program in preparation)



PATRIOTS FOR CIVIL LIBERTIES PANEL

I hope you saw the excellent panel on the OMNI/ACLU campaign against portions of the USA Patriot Act. Gladys Tiffany, Melanie Dietzel, Ann Heffernan, Michael Heffernan all were very well-informed and expressive. And the moderator, Maureen Mullen contributed as keenly. Watch next week for the 2nd panel, moderated by Richard Drake.



OMNI’S HOME PEACE PLACES

OMNI’s network of home peace gardens now numbers over a dozen in Fayetteville, and three more in NWA. This way of building a Culture of Peace requires no extra time beyond sending Dick the name of your garden with the word PEACE in it, the year it was begun, its location, and a description. Does this project attract you? I would be glad to turn it over to someone who will give it special attention.



OMNI NEEDS

A liaison with other peace organizations in the region—Little Rock, Springfield, Memphis, Oklahoma City. We could share ideas, methods, speakers. We could hold a get-acquainted party here. Could, could, who?



DEATH PENALTY OPPOSITION

Betsey Wright is looking for contacts that will work to repeal the death penalty in Arkansas. Contact her at betseyw@specent.com.

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR. ESSAY CONTEST COMMITTEE

OMNI’s King Committee discussed, revised, and approved the text (by Dick) and the design (by Judy Horne) of the brochure to be distributed to area high schools this September. The most significant change enlarged the scope of the contest to include high schools and home schools in Washington County. $700 will be given for six prizes for the 2006 First Annual Martin Luther King, Jr., Essay Contest. That should wake up students. The brochure now goes to OMNI’s Steering Committee for approval. Committee members: Coordinator Kelly Mulhollan, Judy Horne, Carolyn Allen, Dick Bennett. Additional members are welcome.



CONGRESS WATCH From TMN (7-31, 12A)

--Boozman and all Dems. voted for the Transportation Bill replete with the usual pork barrel. Same voted for the Energy Bill giving billions$ of subsidies to already profitable oil companies and paying little attention to energy efficiency and conservation, but the Arctic was spared. In Senate Lincoln and Pryor voted for it too (big subsidies for SUVs, etc.).

--Two tort “reform” bills passed the Senate: Lincoln and Pryor voted to cap medical liability and liability by gun manufacturers, distributors, dealers, and importers.

--On torture, Lincoln and Pryor voted to continue debate on a bill by Sen. McCain to regulate treatment of prisoners at Guantanomo and other U. S. facilities, which Bush. Admin. opposed.



BUSH WATCH

--North Korea: Nicholas Kristof, “Remember the Pueblo,” ADG (7-23)(NYT): “The Bush administration’s dismissal of serious, direct diplomacy has made Korea more dangerous.”

--Competition with China and India for Oil: George Jahn, “China, India Increasingly Vie with U. S. for Oil.” ADG (7-24). The quest for oil will continue to intensify and define our foreign security politices, including preemptive strikes and nuclear weapons rattling, esp. because China and India are wooing countries declared by this Admin. to be enemies—Iran, Sudan, Venezuela, Syria.

--Bush’s lying and media complicity: Martin Schram, “All Have Responsibility to Tell the Truth.” TMN (7-28). On White House denials that Karl Rove leaked the identity of a covert CIA agent, and media failure to report the lies.

--Nader’s Public Citizen is focusing on secrecy in the Bush Admin.: www.bushsecrecy.org


ENVIRONMENT, ANIMALS

--ExxonMobil is suing Greenpeace for exposing EM’s wrongdoings. www.greenpeace.org

--Torturing animals by industrial farming: Verlyn Klinkenborg in “The Story Behind a New York Billboard and the Interests It Serves,” NYT (7-24) defends PETA against the falsehoods and deceptions of the corporate-financed Center for Consumer Freedom.

--Protecting insects: check out http://animal.discovery.com/fansites/buggin/buggin.html; www.xerces.org (TMN 7-23).

--Rail transportation for NWA: Ozark Regional Transit is trying to raise money for a feasibility study for a light rail system from Greenland to Rogers to Bentonville to XNA to Lowell to Greenland. Give your support.

--GIS database: Washington County and Fayetteville received an award for their use of a computerized mapping/GIS database. It shows road, utility lines, watersheds, land types. This is an instrument for seeing ahead of the developers, for example knowing where all of the wetlands are and starting their defense before the developers have bought them. (TMN, 7-28). Who will do this for us?

--County zoning, “Planning and Land-Use Regulations,” TMN 7-29. Land use includes land and species protection?

--Mercury poisoning of air and water:: Rob Moritz, “Environmental Groups Lobby Senators,” TMN (7-28). Bush’s EPA would take power plants off a list of sources of hazardous mercury emissions, weakening the Clean Air Act. Support the Sierra Club, Environmental Action, and Learning Disabilities Assoc. by contacting our Senators Lincoln and Pryor to support a resolution by Sens. Leahy and Collins to prevent power plants from being removed from the lists. How much mercury does the power plant at Gravette put into our air and water?



WAL-MART WATCH and WAKE UP WAL-MART

www.wakeupwal-mart.com


RELIGIOUS PEACE FELLOWSHIPS

Not a single religious group has a chapter in Arkansas of its Peace Fellowship (Presbyterian Peacemaking, Catholic Pax Christi, Church of God Peace Fellowship, etc.). Will you head up a committee to work on this schocking absence? OMNI NEEDS.

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August 1, 2005


Pax Christi USA


SPEAK UP FOR LOW POWER RADIO

In 2000, the FCC opened up the nation's airwaves to low power community radio stations. Since then, more than 675 local stations have gone on the air in 50 states, forming the national backbone for community broadcasting.
Now, local radio (LPFM) needs your help to survive and grow. The FCC is considering critical new measures that would prevent commercial stations from pushing our community broadcasters off the dial. Before the FCC decides, they need to hear from you. Write the FCC and tell them to protect Low Power FM radio stations.



IRAQ
Declaration of the Jury of Conscience - World Tribunal on Iraq - Istanbul | Top
June 23 - 27, 2005, 27th June 2005, Istanbul
In February 2003, weeks before an illegal war was initiated against Iraq, millions of people protested in the streets of the world. That call went unheeded. No international institution had the courage or conscience to stand up to the threat of aggression of the US and UK governments. No one could stop them. It is two years later now. Iraq has been invaded, occupied, and devastated. The attack on Iraq is an attack on justice, on liberty, on our safety, on our future, on us all. We, people of conscience, decided to stand up. We formed the World Tribunal on Iraq (WTI) to demand justice and a peaceful future.
The legitimacy of the World Tribunal on Iraq is located in the collective conscience of humanity. This, the Istanbul session of the WTI, is the culmination of a series of 20 hearings held in different cities of the world focusing on the illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq. The conclusions of these sessions and/or inquiries held in Barcelona, Brussels, Copenhagen, Genoa, Hiroshima, Istanbul, Lisbon, London, Mumbai, New York, Östersund, Paris , Rome, Seoul, Stockholm, Tunis, various cities in Japan and Germany are appended to this Declaration in a separate volume.
We, the Jury of Conscience, from 10 different countries, met in Istanbul. We heard 54 testimonies from a Panel of Advocates and Witnesses who came from across the world, including from Iraq, the United States and the United Kingdom.
The World Tribunal on Iraq met in Istanbul from 24-26 June 2005. The principal objective of the WTI is to tell and disseminate the truth about the Iraq War, underscoring the accountability of those responsible and underlining the significance of justice for the Iraqi people.
To read the full Declaration of the Jury of Conscience, please visit: http://www.wagingpeace.org/articles/2005/06/27_jury-of-conscience-declaration.htm.

Last chance to sign Pax Christi USA’s statement, The War in Iraq Remains a ‘Defeat for Humanity’
To read and sign the statement, go to: http://www.paxchristiusa.org/news_eve nts_more.asp?id=921. The deadline for adding your name and having it printed in U.S. Catholic magazine is this Wednesday, August 3! Hurry and add your name, or if you've already added your name to this statement, forward the statement on to all those you know and urge them to sign on.

US GET OUT OF IRAQ

“Homeward Bound Act" Campaign Launched
This campaign to build support for H.J. Res. 55, "The Homeward Bound Act" and to build pressure on Congress for a US military exit strategy from Iraq is off to a strong start. Now it is time to take the next critical step and get the phones ringing in House member's offices. The goal is to have 100 co-sponsors before the August recess. To learn more about the bill, go to Dennis Kucinich’s, one of the original co-sponsors, web page at: http://kucinich.us/ or contact Win Without War (202-822-2075).



WAR ON TERRORISM

“The phrase ‘War on Terrorism’ is itself a propaganda message….By design, it elevates the language of conflict, suggesting that all other options (negotiation, international courts of justice, international policing) have been exhausted, when the reality is that they were never seriously considered.” From War Made Easy p. 169. A succinct distinction between the war-mongering Bush administration and the peace movement.



Genocide in Darfur
Genocide is the ultimate crime against humanity. And a government-backed genocide is unfolding in the Darfur region of the Sudan. As the horror in Darfur continues, our major television news networks are largely missing in action. During June 2005, CNN, FOXNews, NBC/MSNBC, ABC, and CBS ran 50 times as many stories about Michael Jackson and 12 times as many stories about Tom Cruise as they did about the genocide in Darfur. Whether it is coverage of the civil rights movement in the 1950s and 60s, the Ethiopian famine in the 1980s, or recent coverage of the tsunami, television news can help stop grave injustices and end human suffering. Increased television coverage of the genocide in Darfur has the power to spur the action required to stop a devastating crime against humanity. Genocide in Darfur is happening right before our eyes. Ask our networks why we can't see it...go to www.beawitness.org to take action.

ISRAEL-PALESTINE

I am thankfully on the mailing list of one of Israel’s greatest peacemakers—Gershon Baskin. If you wish to receive his newsletter: Gershon Baskin, Ph.D. and Hanna Siniora, ISRAEL/PALESTINE CENTER FOR RESEARCH & INFORMATIONP.O. Box 9321, Jerusalem 91092
Tel: 972-2-676-9460 Fax: 972-2-676-8011 Mobile: 052-381-715gershon@ipcri.org; http://www.ipcri.org; http://www.place4peace.com


UNITED NATIONS REFORM

The Challenges and Opportunities of United Nations Reform...
by Timothy E. Wirth
Washington and the world have been engaged in conversations about UN reform for some time, and as summer gives way to fall, these important conversations will lead to even more important decisions. This September, the UN is bringing together heads of state from more than 175 nations at the 2005 World Summit -- the largest gathering of world leaders in history, and a once-in-a-generation opportunity. A number of developments are unfolding in Washington that have important implications for this gathering. Read more...



INTERNATIONAL LAW VS. TORTURE

Torture Convention Tested for First Time in UK
by Andrew Fargnoli
In a case that is the first of its kind in the United Kingdom, British government officials successfully prosecuted crimes of torture committed in another country -- effectively implementing the 1987 UN convention on torture. What's interesting about this case is that the crimes for which the defendant, Afghan warlord Faryadi Sawar Zardad, 42, was prosecuted and convicted did not take place on British soil and involved no British citizens. Read More... (see FSTV below)



FREE SPEECH TV (provided by OMNI), CAT Channel 18 3 am to 9 am

Free Speech Online Network, www.freespeech.org

Programs this week include: “Kilowatt Ours” doc. on the terrible destructiveness of our present reliance on coal and the alternatives readily available to reduce the harm(efficiency and green power); a doc. on crime and punishment around the world, on the one hand China and USA with their harsh revenge punishment, on the other Finland’s rehabilitation, with Canada and Japan in between; “Baghdad Stories” about the chaos and suffering of the civilians of Baghdad following US “shock and awe”; “La Ciudad/The City” by David Riker, 4 well-acted, well-written stories about Mexicans in USA; “Positive Spin” program by the Unity Foundation in support of the UN; documentary on US “extraordinary rendition”/outsourcing torture by the CIAmainly (focuses on terrorist suspect—Mondo Hamid??--sent by CIA to Egypt for interrogation, where he was tortured); “My Messy Bedroom,” weekly program on modern sexual relations; etc.


FILM ON INVASION OF AFGHANISTAN

From John Gray: “The film that impressed me so much was "September Tapes," available at Blockbuster.

Less than a year after the attacks of September 11th, a journalist filmmaker and his crew smuggle themselves into Afganistan in search of Osama Bin Laden (after his escape from Tora Bora). All that remains of their quest is the raw footage on the eight tapes they left behind. I have simply never seen anything so frightening and so powerful in demonstrating just what we have sent our young men into.”


POLITICAL PRISONERS

Our leaders talk about political prisoners in other countries but not in our own. Subscribe to The Nuclear Resister, which gives info. about and support for imprisoned US anti-nuclear & anti-war activists. nukeresister@igc.org


NASA

What is the purpose and why the apparent popularity of this extraordinarily expensive space program? A low key article in TMN 8-4 gave several explanations. Entertainment, vicarious adventure, constant visuals for TV, scientific exploration, and pork (by design, imitating the Pentagon, NASA spread its dollars throughout the nation so that all states have a stake in it). I suspect several explanations are omitted. Nationalism is one, national pride in feeling superior. Another is the financial support from the Pentagon from the beginning. Why the military money? Research in preparation for US domination of satellites for war making.


NWACC RECOGNIZES MILITARY SERVICE

NWACC to give free tuition to Ark. Nat. Guard and Air Nat. Guard (other veterans are eligible for federal veterans’s benefits, and NWACC has about 200 such students). . For serving their country. And is this the only way citizens serve their country? And the war is illegal, forced upon us by a deceptive government. Shouldn’t NWACC give free tuition to the many civilian heroes who notably serve and sacrifice for others? Is NWACC’s selective support of military servers not one more addition to the militarism growing in the US, a part of the system of grassroots militarism? “The pioneers of a warless world are the youth that refuse military service”: Albert Einstein


OMNI SEEKS A WORLD FREE OF WAR AND THE THREAT OF WAR, A SOCIETY WITH LIBERTY AND JUSTICE FOR ALL, A COMMUNITY WHERE EVERY PERSON’S POTENTIAL MAY BE FULFILLED, AN EARTH RESTORED. WORLD PEACE, HUMAN RIGHTS, SOCIAL and ECONOMIC JUSTICE, ENVIRONMENTAL STEWARDSHIP.