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OMNI NEWSLETTER: EVENTS, ACTIONS, COMMENT
OCTOBER 18, 2005, BUILDING A CULTURE OF PEACE
Choose life not war, choose the millions living in a world of wars, violence, hunger, malnutrition, disease.
NWA CURRENT EVENTS
AETN PBS (info@aetn.org; www.aetn.org)
October 17, Monday, 8p.m. “Two Days in October” on Vietnam War; BBC World News each weeknight at 10:30
Oct. 18, Tuesday, 8p.m., Frontline, “The Torure Question” and 9:30, Independent Lens, “En Route to Baghdad,” career of UN hero, former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Sergio Vieira de Mello
Oct. 19, Wed., 7p.m., “The Hunt for Nazi Scientists”; 8 and 9 p.m. on immigrants: “The Golden Door” and “The Art of Departure”
Oct. 20, Thurs., 8p.m. Art in the 21st Century, “Memory”
Oct. 21, Friday, 7:30, “Now”
October 18, 6pm, Department of Peace Committee meets
At home of Marvin Hilton, 689 Winbaugh Lane, Fayetteville, skymar@cox-internet.com
OCT. 19, Diwan Baghdad, 3 professors discuss the war and Middle East
Student Union Servery 308, 12:30. Contact Prof. Swedenburg.
OCT 19, Wed 6:30-8 pm, Washington County Greens mtg at Fayetteville Public Library
Meetings are every 3RD Wednesday of the month.
OCTOBER 20, OMNI STEERING COMMITTEE MEETS
5:30 Potluck, 6:00 Business.
OCTOBER 20, The Association for Conflict Resolution (ACR) announces “Conflict Resolution Day.” This special day will increase public awareness about conflict resolution and its many benefits. As part of Conflict Resolution Day, ACR is helping to plan and facilitate a variety of events and programs across the country.
OCTOBER 21, UN DAY
Oct. 23 "Walk as One" march being organized by the Northwest Arkansas chapter of The National Conference for Community and Justice (NCCJ). The march lasts from 2 to 5pm and starts from Fayetteville Town Center.
OCT 23, Sat, "Big Train Ride" Ozark Headwaters Group (NWA Sierra Club) fundraiser.
Daytrip to Ozark mountains from Fayetteville to Chester (round trip). At Noon: live music on the Powerhouse Patio, 1:30: board train, 4:30: train returns. Tickets: Adults $35, student/child $25, $50 for deluxe parlor car -- all tax deductible. Contact Mike Faupel: mike.faupel@sierraclub.org
OCTOBER 23, 7:00pm Video Underground Presents: "The Miami Model"
Showing at the OMNI Center for Peace, Justice & Ecology. Free Admission
In November 2003, trade ministers from 34 countries met in Miami, Florida, to negotiate the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA). What happened there was a disturbing example of the state of free speech under a wartime president. Protestors were attacked with rubber bullets, pepper spray, electric tazer guns, and shock batons, all coordinated by the new United States Department of Homeland Security, and paid for by an $8.5 million line item within the $87 billion appropriation for the Iraq war. Show Time: 91 Minutes.
Video Underground shows political and current event videos every second and fourth Sunday of the month at 7:00pm. These videos are shown at the OMNI CENTER FOR PEACE, JUSTICE AND ECOLOGY located at 902 W. Maple in Fayetteville in the Presbyterian and Disciples Student Center by the U of A campus. To see a listing of upcoming shows, please visit our website: www.northwest-ark.com/vu
OCT 26, Wed, 7pm, OHG (NWA Sierra Club) meeting at Powerhouse Seafood Restaurant
OCTOBER 27, THURSDAY, CONVERSATIONS has been cancelled. To be rescheduled in the spring.
OCTOBER 28, 2:30, FORUM ON WOMEN at UA
The political, social, educational and economic status of women and minorities in the contemporary South in a forum moderated by former U.S. Sen. David Pryor at 2:30 p.m. Friday, Oct. 28, in the Alltel Union Ballroom at the University of Arkansas.
OCTOBER 28, FRIDAY, 6 TO 9PM: CAT FALL FUNDRAISER
The CAT Telethon 2005, The Monster Twist party, at 101 W. Rock Street, one block south
of the Downtown Fayetteville Square across from the Police Station and will be live on CAT channel 18. There will be carnival games, a bake sale and Magi Matt the Magician will perform. All ages are invited to attend and all the proceeds go to keep Community Access Television "alive and kicking" in Fayetteville. For more information about CAT's Fall Fundraiser call Sky at 444-3433.
NOVEMBER 1, SUPPORT THE FASTING GUANTANAMO PRISONERS
http://www.demaction.org/dia/organizations/ccr/campaign.jsp?campaign_KEY=1341
MARCH 20, 2006, PREPARING TO REMEMBER THE US 2003 INVASION OF IRAQ
OMNI is forming a committee to plan our special protest of the US war and occupation on the anniversary of the invasion March 20, 2006 (or a close date). Contact Chris (omniprotest@yahoo.com), Kelly and Donna (still@stillonthehill.com).
FAYETTEVILLE, NWA, ARKANSAS
PROTESTING THE WAR (see below on Getting Out)
We will be making some changes in our street protest of our successive government’s addiction to wars. For the next two weekends (Oct. 22nd and 29th ) we will continue at College and Dickson in Fayetteville. For those of you who have your own signs, come 9:30 to 11:30; signs available at 10:00. If you believe these recent invasions are wrong (and part of a history of illegal US invasions) and you wish to end them and to warn against future illegal invasions, then search your heart about why you have not been standing with us since June.
Beginning in November we will protest once a month, 11 to 12 a.m., on first Saturdays at Joyce and Mall at McDonald’s. I hope to see you Nov. 5.
Contact Chris to help with publicity (omniprotest@yahoo.com).
LAND FOR MEMORIAL FOR CIVILIANS KILLED IN WARS
The 20th century witnessed the gradual alteration of wars from killing mainly combatants to killing mainly civilians, especially by air war. Do you have a plot of land you would give to OMNI or would sell to OMNI for a memorial to this horrific slaughter of civilians?
CENSORSHIP of CAT
The book censors in Fayetteville are quiet for moment, but censors have always complained against CAT in the past and continue unabated in the present. Perhaps you saw the Roundtable chaired by Richard Drake shown on CAT last week, with Mrs. Hannah’s alarming desire to close down and shut up CAT. A Mr. Dutton has pursued a one-man campaign against CAT for many years. Recently he wrote a letter to the Mayor and City Council denouncing Free Speech TV, shown 3 to 9 a.m. (and paid for by OMNI). I have replied to his letter to the Council, and one more person has written, but many more letters should be sent. Sky Blaylock can send you his letter (sky_blaylock@catfayetteville.com). I can send you a sample list of FSTV programs, but I urge you to watch FSTV to see for yourself how erroneous his criticisms are. Also write to the NAT and to TMN. The attack on the FHS library was turned back by the large number of letters and attendance at meetings; the same will be necessary in defense of CAT.
UNITED CAMPUS MINISTRY’S FOUNTAIN
UCM is a “peace ministry,” and although its reactivated fountain is not officially named a “peace fountain,” we think of it as such. It offers a most attractive welcome to UCM and to OMNI.
GIVING TO OMNI and the PEACE AND JUSTICE MOVEMENT
Why you do and should contribute financially to OMNI: The issues dealt with by the peace movement are universally recognized to be highly significant, yet few people give for an effective advocacy of world peace, social and economic justice, human rights, and species and earth stewardship. Most people who contribute to good causes give to the United Way, Habitat for Humanity, research for diseases, and so on; those charity causes will be supported by the public. So those who would change the power and profit structures of our world, who have an international vision, who recognize world hunger, nuclear war, the gap of rich and poor, and environmental destruction as the truly momentous problems, should give to resist them, since so few do.
ECONOMIC JUSTICE:
Waiters and waitresses are paid about $2.50 / hr. in many restaurants. Customers make up the rest with their 10% to 20% tips. A meal advertised at $10 is really $12. But besides this deception by restaraunteurs, the real harm is that a good waitress/waiter in a cheap restaurant and a good one in an expensive restaurant receive quite different pay. Any remedy?
ECOLOGY: DEVELOPMENTS ON LAKES AND STREAMS
High rise condos have been proposed for the shores of Beaver Lake. But these are only the more dramatic of the wild sprawl occurring in NWA. Resistance is rising, for the people know there are hidden costs for which the public must pay but which the developers never mention: water pollution, increased need for social services, highways, and much more. What NWA needs are Carrying Capacity Studies, since endless growth is a recipe for disaster.
SUBURBS, CARS, FUEL, AND NUTRITION
We can save money and fuel and resist industrialized farming by growing our own food, shopping at Farmer's Markets, and eating locally. Eat mostly fruits and vegetables that are in season in your area. Most Americans are far removed from the source of their food and from the people who grow it; our food travels an average of 1300 miles to reach our tables: another kind of sprawl that is causing the fossil fuel crisis.
ANSWERING R-W MYTHS (from Coralie, livanlern2002@yahoo.com)
What the world needs is a booklet called "50 RightWing Myths and Muddles" (or 47, or 72). We have been bumping into those myths and muddles for some time in letters to the editor, the political blog, and debates, and we all have some answers ready, as well as lists of sources and links. I visualize it as 50-75 pages, written as clearly
and simply as possible, sold by mail for around $2.00 or $3.00 plus postage, thus affordable for almost everybody. Send Coralie your favorite r-w myths and replies.
WRITE FOR A BOOK
"The Cost of Freedom" is a book project about activists in the peace movement. The publisher is Howling Dog Press. We have been collecting stories of people and groups around the United States who have been working to fight Bush these past few years.
We are still seeking short submissions for our "One Hundred Words More or Less" or less section. We want: a sentence or paragraph (100 words or less!) about how you, your campaign, your group, or groups you have collaborated with have been working to maintain our freedoms. Could be a short history, an anecdote, obstacles you face, a mission statement, a recipe for "Peace Pie" -- it's up to you. (We also welcome photo submissions.) The deadline for submissions is November 1st.
We are also still seeking longer stores (1000-2000) profiling local actions and groups, as well as observations and comments on the peace movement in general. The deadline for these stories is negotiable. Whitney Trettien Co-editor, Cost of Freedom project whitney@moonslush.com
NATION, WORLD
DEPARTMENT OF PEACE
Contact your member of Congress now and tell them to support H.R. 3760 in the House and S. 1756 in the Senate. Click here to send a message
New Campaign Information Cards. Order now!.
GETTING OUT, GET OUT
BUSH FAMILY PROFITS AND OIL
On FSTV a video on how money gets power for the Bush family and power gets money especially in oil, included the invasion of Iraq for oil. “Bush Family Fortunes” based on the book The Best Democracy Money Can Buy by Greg Palast.
PRESIDENT BUSH RATIONALIZATIONS
In two sentences spoken at the VFW convention in Utah recently, Bush told two lies or delusions that are very influential in popular support for the war/occupation: After acknowledging the death of more than 2000 troops in Afghanistan and Iraq, the President said: “Each of these heroes left a legacy that will allow generations of their fellow Americans to enjoy the blessings of liberty.” (The invasion and occupation not only have nothing to do with our freedom [unless to control Iraq’s oil] but in fact have decreased our security.) “We’ll honor their sacrifice by staying on the offensive against the terrorists.”? (We must continue to fight the war in Iraq to honor the soldiers already killed fighting the war in Iraq!)
FALLUJAH
FSTV Video “Images from Fallujah,” another place we had to destroy to save it. In Nov. 2004 two-thirds of the buildings were damage; 250,000 refugees created. Film refers to U. S. terrorism, Fallujah a “monument to brutality and overkill.” Fallujah is the equivalent of Grozny, which the Russians flattened. The people of Fallujah are calling for an international inquiry into the killing of civilians there. We should get out because we are causing more harm than good, and not increasing U.S. security, but in fact inspiring more terrorists (or freedom-fighters from their point of view). Video produced by Deep Dish TV and Code Pink.
“Resistance against the War Is the Mainstream” (approx. title). Interview of Media Benjamin by David Barsamian. US majority public thinks the war wrong . An AP poll last week found that only 28% of respondents believed the government to be headed in the right direction. Yet they are silent. Why? They are “anaesthetized and cynical.” What more than what we are now doing (see past newsletters) must we do to arouse the public?
ANTI-WAR VIDEO
Check out what may be the strongest anti-war flashvideo I've ever
seen: http://theunitedamerican.blogs.com/Movies/2000A/2000.html music by Pink Floyd
CONGRESSPEOPLE FOR GETTING OUT: ASK CONG. BOOZMAN TO JOIN THEM.
Click on this web site for list of the 'Out of Iraq' Caucus Membership in the US House of Representatives (as of
August 31, 2005) according to http://democracyrising.us/content/view/288/165/ -Chris Delacruz
Co-founders Barbara Lee John Lewis Charlie Rangel Lynn Woolsey Jan Schakowsky Maxine Waters John Conyers William Delahunt.
U.S. MILITARISM
The New American Militarism: How Americans Are Seduced by War by Andrew Bacevich. Oxford, 2005. From a review: “As Andrew Bacevich points out in one of the most acute analyses of America to have appeared in recent years, the United States itself is in many ways a militaristic country, and becoming more so.” Speak out against militarism.
PRESIDENTIAL POWER
OMNI has held two forums lately about two new books that alert people to the growing danger --especially in combination with the military-industrial complex--of increasing presidential power and decreasing congressional oversight: Losing American: Confronting a Reckless and Arrogant Presidency by Senator Robert Byrd and War Made Easy: How Presidents and Pundits Keep Spinning Us to Death by Norman Solomon. Both books are available at area bookstores. Earlier, in book after book and speech after speech, Senator J. William Fulbright sounded a similar alarm. Write and call your senators and congressman.
US TORTURE
An attempt by 3 Senate Republicans (Ted Stevens (AK), Thad Cochran (MS) and Kit Bond
(MO)) to amend McCain's Anti-Torture amendment to the defense (war) bill in the committee that reconciles House and Senate bills so that McCain's Anti-Torture amendment would exempt the CIA from the torture ban. If you click on the following web address, you will see an explanation and the website provides an automated way to email our Congressional representatives and our local newspaper's editiorial department about this and other current bills and issues. http://www.nocrony.com/no_torture.htm (from Chris D)
BUSH ADMINISTRATION SECRECY EXPANDING
“The government is withholding more information than ever from the public and expanding ways of shrouding data….the government spent $7.2 billion in 2004 stamping 15.6 million documents ‘top secret’, ‘secret’ or ‘confidential.’ That’s almost double the 8.6 million new documents classifed as recently as 2001.” From ADG (9-4). And these figures do not include the CIA, because their classif. totals are secret! “The report also noted the growing use of secret searches, court secrecy, closed meetings by government advisory groups, and patents kept from public view.” See: www.openthegovernment.org
ECOLOGY: EXAMPLE OF FLORIDA, and 2 Heroes
From FSTV: Local governments have a very poor record of protecting the earth and the species here before humans arrived. Private developers think the purpose of government is to help developers and growth. The result? Decreasing acquifers, destroyed wetland, reduced farmland and habitat. If we are to prevent what has happened to Florida from happening to NWA, we should widely show the film “Changing Lanes,” which indicts Florida officials from governors on down to the mayors for promoting the lie that growth means progress and improvement and allowing the population growth, the highways, the subdivision sprawl that are ruining Florida. Two Florida environmentalists who could teach us: Elton Gissendanner, Juanita Green(e?).
HEROINE ACTIVIST AGAINST POLLUTION
On FSTV’s “Democracy Now” Amy Goodman interviewed Diane Wilson, who has taken on Dow Chem and other giants. Diane was a Texan shrimp fisherwoman , but she’s not afraid of criminals even at the apex of corporate or government officialdom.
FACTORY PIG FARMS
On FSTV a video by The Nature of Things, “Part I: Corporate Agriculture: The Hollow Men,” on harms of pig factories in US and Canada: water pollution, animal cruelty, elimination of small farmers, damage to democracy by further reduction of small farmers by consolidation of wealth able to buy politicians. Robert Kennedy, Jr., founder of Waterkeepers Alliance, a hero in the video (for one thing he is suing hog factories to build sewage disposal plants). The enemy: greed of industrial agricultural capitalists regardless of harm to nature and humans. “Part II: Food for Life” on alternative agriculture.
TAKE ACTION
Check out http://www.congress.org . Congress.org is a service of Capitol Advantage, a private, non-partisan company facilitating civic participation. Congress.org allows users to: -Identify and contact leaders in Congress, the White House, and state legislatures.- Post letters online in Letters to Leaders and read what other Americans are saying to elected officials.- Create and post Soapbox action alerts to enlist others on your issue.- Have letters printed and hand-delivered to Congress.- Find and contact local and national media by ZIP code or by state with Media Guide.- Have your representative's votes sent to you weekly via e-mail with MegaVote.- Search alerts and take action in the Issues and Action area Go to http://www.capitoladvantage.com/capwiz/contact.html to get your organization's alerts on Congress.org, Yahoo!, MSN, AOL and more sites).
--Senator Blanche Lincoln: Web Site: www.lincoln.senate.gov
Washington Office:355 Dirksen Senate Office BuildingWashington, D.C. 20510-0404
Phone: (202) 224-4843 Fax: (202) 228-1371. Fayetteville office: 251-1380;.
--Senator Mark Pryor: Web Site: pryor.senate.gov
Washington Office:217 Russell Senate Office BuildingWashington, D.C. 20510-0403
Phone: (202) 224-2353 Fax: (202) 228-0908
Main District Office:700 W. Capitol, Rm. 2527 Little Rock, AR 72201
Phone: (501) 324-6336 Fax: (501) 324-5320
--Congressman John Boozman, District 3, 12 counties from Benton to Washington
Fayetteville office: 442-5258; 207 W. Center, 72701.
Ft. Smith office: 479-782-7787; 30 Soutt 6th St. Rm 240, Ft. Smith 72901.
Harrison office: 870-741-6900; 402 N. Walnut, Suite 210, Harrison 72601.
DC address: 1708 Longworth House Office Bldng., Washington, DC 20515; 202-225-4301.
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 PROTECTING SPECIES AND THE EARTH.
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