1. Recruiters lie. According the New York Times, nearly one of five United States Army recruiters was under investigation in 2004 for offenses varying from "threats and coercion to false promises that applicants would not be sent to Iraq." One veteran recruiter told a reporter for the Albany Times Union, "I've been recruiting for years, and I don't know one recruiter who wasn't dishonest about it. I did it myself."
2. The military contract guarantees nothing. The Department of Defense's own enlistment/re-enlistment document states, "Laws and regulations that govern military personnel may change without notice to me. Such changes may affect my status, pay allowances, benefits and responsibilities as a member of the Armed Forces REGARDLESS of the provisions of this enlistment/re-enlistment document" (DD Form4/1, 1998, Sec.9.5b).
3. Advertised signing bonuses are bogus. Bonuses are often thought of as gifts, but they're not. They're like loans: If an enlistee leaves the military before his or her agreed term of service, he or she will be forced to repay the bonus. Besides, Army data shows that the top bonus of $20,000 was given to only 6 percent of the 47,7272 enlistees who signed up for active duty.
4. The military won't make you financially secure. Military members are no strangers to financial strain: 48 percent report having financial difficulty, approximately 33 percent of homeless men in the United States are veterans, and nearly 200,000 veterans are homeless on any given night.
5. Money for college ($71,424 in the bank?). If you expect the military to pay for college, better read the fine print. Among recruits who sign up for the Montgomery GI Bill, 65 percent receive no money for college, and only 15 percent ever receive a college degree. The maximum Montgomery GI Bill benefit is $37,224, and even this 37K is hard to get: To join, you must first put in a nonrefundable $1,200 deposit that has to be paid to the military during the first year of service. To receive the $37K, you must also be an active-duty member who has completed at least a three-year service agreement and is attending a four-year college full time. Benefits are significantly lower if you are going to school part-time or attending a two-year college. If you receive a less than honorable discharge (as one in four do), leave the military early (as one in three do), or later decide not to go to college, the military will keep your deposit and give you nothing. Note: The $71,424 advertised by the Army and $86,000 by the Navy includes benefits from the Amy or Navy College Fund, respectively. Fewer than 10 percent of all recruits earn money from the Army College Fund, which is specifically designed to lure recruits into hard-to-fill positions.
6. Job training. Vice President Dick Cheney once said, "The military is not a social welfare agency; it's not a jobs program." If you enlist, the military does not have to place you in your chosen career field or give you the specific training requested. Even if enlistees do receive training, it is often to develop skills that will not transfer to the civilian job market. (There aren't many jobs for M240 machine-gunners stateside.)
7. War, combat, and your contract. First off, if it's your first time enlisting, you're signing up for eight years. On top of that, the military can, without your consent, extend active-duty obligations during times of conflict, "national emergency," or when directed by the president. This means that even if an enlistee has two weeks left on his/ her contract (yes, even Guard/Reserve) or has already served in combat, she/he can still be sent to war. More than a dozen U.S. soldiers have challenged "stop-loss" measures like these in court so far, but people continue to be shipped off involuntarily. The military has called thousands up from Inactive Ready Reserve -- soldiers who have served, some for as long as a decade, and been discharged. The numbers: twice as many troops are fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan per year as during the Vietnam War. One-third of the troops who have gone to Iraq have gone more than once. The highest rate of first- time deployments belongs to the Marine Corps Reserve: almost 90 percent have fought.
Beating, confinement, chaining, emotional distress - the evidence of elephant suffering in circuses is overwhelming...
"It's kind of like a conductor leading an orchestra"
- AZA Elephant Group Head Mike Keele, on using a bullhook
So why is the Association of Zoos and Aquariums' (AZA) elephant group leader defending the treatment of elephants by Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus?
Tell the AZA to sever all ties with circus elephant cruelty
September 16, 2009
AZA'S COZY RELATIONSHIP WITH CIRCUSES
Despite the overwhelming amount of evidence of cruelty to elephants and other animals, the Association of Zoos and Aquariums (AZA) maintains close ties with circuses. In doing so, zoos give credibility to the circus and help perpetuate the abuse and suffering inherent to the use of elephants in entertainment.
IDA CONFRONTS THE AZA
While the AZA holds its annual conference in Portland this week, IDA is there to pressure this trade association to sever all ties with the circus industry. Our activities include running a hard-hitting ad
in USA Today, holding a press conference and organizing leafleting outside the convention center where AZA members are gathering.
IDA is also seeking censure of Oregon Zoo acting director Mike Keele, head of the AZA's Elephant Taxon Advisory Group (TAG) and acting director of the Oregon Zoo. In a complaint to the AZA Ethics Committee, IDA detailed Keele's self-serving and disturbingly close relationship with the Ringling Bros. Barnum and Bailey Circus.
KEELE TESTIFIES AS EXPERT FOR RINGLING CIRCUS
In March 2009, Keele testified as a $125-per-hour expert witness for Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus at a trial in the U.S. District Court in Washington, DC. That complaint accused the circus of violating the Endangered Species Act by harming endangered Asian elephants through routine and abusive elephant handling practices. By appearing as an expert for the circus, Keele gave a tacit seal of approval to Ringling's unconscionable practices that were documented through mountains of evidence presented at trial. These include:
Chaining elephants at the Ringling Center for Elephant Conservation for 16 to 22 hours per day;
Using chains and ropes to tear babies away from their mothers at age two or younger (before they are weaned) to begin their training for the circus;
Training baby elephants by breaking their spirits through maternal separation, prolonged restraint (tying up their legs), isolation from other elephants and hitting with bullhooks. (One 2-year-old baby elephant, Aria, was chained nonstop for four months and only let off chains for 40 minutes a day to be trained);
Striking the elephants with bullhooks, the steel-tipped rods used to hit, stab and hook elephants into compliance. Ringling head Kenneth Feld, CEO of Feld Entertainment International admitted under oath that all his handlers strike elephants with bullhooks.
Adding to the incontrovertible evidence of elephant abuse and suffering in the Ringling circus is undercover video
of Ringling handlers repeatedly beating and whipping elephants and tigers. The video was taken while the Ringling trial was underway and Keele was testifying on behalf of this egregious abuser of elephants and other animals.
Keele was well-compensated for his association with the Ringling circus, both in terms of the money he was paid as an expert witness and by advancing his goal of cementing closer cooperation between Ringling and AZA zoos for breeding purposes. In return, the circus received credibility from Keele, whose credentials as a zoo and AZA official were made clear at the trial.
Keele's behavior brings shame to the AZA, harms those within the industry who truly care about protecting elephants and makes a mockery of the group's stated commitment to promote "respect for the dignity of the animals in our care."
TIME FOR AZA TO CONDEMN THE CIRCUS
Several AZA specialist groups, including those that deal with Great Apes and monkeys, have officially condemned the use of these species in entertainment. It's past time for AZA's elephant group to follow suit.
Tell the zoos to sever ties with the cruel circus industry. If zoos want to educate the public about elephants, the place to start is by taking a stand against the use and abuse of these magnificent animals for entertainment.
Contact:
Jim Maddy, President and CEO Association of Zoos & Aquariums 8403 Colesville Road, Suite 710 Silver Spring, MD 20910-3314 (P) 301-562-0777 X222 (F) 301-562-0888 (E) jmaddy@aza.org
Also write to the zoo in your community and request that it adopt a policy condemning the use of elephants in circuses and other entertainment venues. Find zoo contact information here
.
In Defense of Animals, located in San Rafael, Calif., is an international animal protection organization with more than 85,000 members and supporters dedicated to ending the abuse and exploitation of animals by protecting their rights and welfare. IDA's efforts include educational events, cruelty investigations, boycotts, grassroots activism, and hands-on rescue through our sanctuaries in Mississippi, Mumbai, India, and Cameroon, Africa.
In Defense of Animals is a registered 501(c)3 non-profit organization. We welcome your feedback and appreciate your donations. Please join today! All donations to IDA are tax-deductible.
In Defense of Animals 3010 Kerner, San Rafael, CA 94901 Tel. (415) 448-0048 Fax (415) 454-1031 idainfo@idausa.org
"Well over half of nearly 1,400 Palestinians killed in Israel's Gaza war were civilians, including 252 children younger than 16, a leading Israeli human rights groups said Wednesday, challenging Israel's claim that most of the dead were militants..............".
Please click below for more, plus when you go there I added a list of media contacts found on Fair.org down in the comments section. Please contact them and push to get this out to people.
An animal rights group publicized a video Tuesday showing unwanted chicks being tossed alive into a grinder
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This was posted by Lars, I'm passiong it on because it needs to get out to as many people as possible because most people don't know anything about what happens before they get their food.
When you go to the news item you will see links (copy and paste them) in the comments, please be vocal.
Here are a few of the links:
On the Web:
Mercy for Animals video: http://www.mercyforanimals.org/hatchery
Hy-Line International: http://www.hyline.com/
Here is the page with the contact form for hyline:
Before anything else, we owe a couple dozen of you a bit of an apology. We underestimated the demand for the new "Single Payer Health Care" caps and got caught short by a couple dozen with the shipment that went out yesterday. But we will be taking delivery on another big batch before the end of the coming week, and they are all going out first class, so if you don't get yours this week, you will shortly after that, and we thank you for your patience. And if you get a request in this week it will go out then as well. In the meantime, all the "Convict Dick & W" caps have gone out.
Not Even Obama Will Give Up The Illegal War Powers Seized By Bush Unless Congress Makes Him Do It
Even in appointing a special counsel last week to look into torture, Eric Holder essentially directed him to IGNORE whether a crime was committed in ordering torture in the first place. The only mandate lifelong Republican prosecutor John Durham has been given is about whether department personnel EXCEEDED the instructions they were given. The "just following orders defense" rejected at Nuremberg has been resurrected by our new Attorney General.
With Holder doing such a weak job of enforcing the law on his own, it is all the more important to get Congress to reassert itself in all these matters, in particular the abuse of war powers under which all the torture happened in the first place. And HR 104, To establish a national commission on presidential war powers and civil liberties, appears to be a good step in this direction. We should not preemptively exclude congressional commissions or investigations as a route to real justice, for that is what Watergate was all about. Congress must act NOW to constrain ALL future presidents, including Obama, lest we end up with worse than Bush before we know it.
How all those Nazi war criminals would have wished for a standard like that set by Eric Holder. Legal opinions no matter how corruptly or self-servingly drafted become get out of prison free cards. Never might that there were many valiant, patriotic people in the CIA and the FBI, the vast majority, who STRENUOUSLY objected to the adoption of torture as accepted U.S. policy. The fact is that NO member of any one of these agencies could have believed in good faith that the torture techniques condemned when used by every other totalitarian regime were suddenly squeaky clean in their hands.
That is what is so disingenuous about Holder's posture, a refusal to actually confront the real issue. Either we are a nation of laws or else we are not. And if the Justice Department was issuing opinions that were patently bogus in defense of torture, it is corruption in HIS OWN department that must be rooted out, and all involved in such outrages must be held fully responsible.
Instead, Holder's suggestion is essentially that a couple so-called "bad apples" should be scapegoated, just as the contractors directing the torture at Abu Grahib, under orders that came direct from the White House, were allowed to skate away, while the lowest level grunts were given 10 years of hard time. At this point, the best way to pressure Holder to actually do his job is to pressure Congress to do theirs, and execute their own investigation into the abuse of war powers.
And yes, we will continue to hear lies about how splendidly well torture worked, even though it did not, to try to seduce the American people into endorsing the abominable. Cheney was all over the TV over the last couple months asserting that the recently released CIA report would absolve him, by showing how torture led to all kinds of great intelligence breakthroughs. There was nothing like that in there. Instead, there were detailed specific instructions on executing torture, adopted from and imitating the worst dictatorships in history, in clinical detail like something out of World War II Nazi bureaucracy.
The Washington Post is in up to their hips with this disinformation campaign, running a story over the weekend with a headline suggesting that waterboarding and sleep deprivation were a boon to intelligence. And yet when you actually read it you find that WHILE Khalid Sheik Mohammed was being waterboarded 183 times he was giving false intelligence that was harmfully counterproductive. It is only AFTER the criminal mistreatment stopped, and much later, that he actually started to cooperate.
So let us make no mistake, the people who did these things in our name were a handful of true sickos, getting in their own sadistic jollies to the disgrace of the good name of the United States of America. And not just those few who willingly went along with it without objection, those who authorized, justified it, and ordered it must also be held responsible, right back to the desk of former Vice President Dick Cheney, and his go along patsy, George Bush. If Holder is so anxious to relieve CIA employees of responsibility, let them testify against the real criminal kingpins in the White House, as the price of their immunity.
So again, if want a "Convict Dick & W" cap we'll be shipping more of those this week, we'll have more of the "Single Payer Health Care" caps at the same time. And you can request either of these or any other of our progressive advocacy gifts from the return page of the action page above, or directly from this link.
And yes, you can also respond to this action through the new Twitter gateway. Just send the following Twitter reply, and add any personal comment you like.
@cxs #p1001
And if you want a step by step explanation of how to set up the Twitter thing here is the link for that.
I think this below is a good thing to add to what we are all doing to get the facts out to the average person about the torturing done with our money and in our name (and against our laws).
Please check this out.
Thanks and Peace NotSilent
Dear Friend,
Want accountability for torturers? Tired of the "few bad apples" line?
The Center for Constitutional Rights has partnered with CREDO Action to distribute Torture Team trading cards to start the conversation about responsibility for torture at the highest levels. Each card features a single high-level official and has information about the way in which he or she paved the way for torture.
You can get one pack of ten cards for free. Click here to check it out and get the Torture Team cards before they run out.
Also, there are several news items, and other information on here (Care2.com ) where you can find where to write, email, call and fax to demand full accountability.
There are sev eral news items on here (Care2.com) and sites where ypou can go and sign petitions and send letters and make phone calls to DEMAND FULL accountability of those that ordered torture and those that carried it out. Please search for what you can do.
Not only is it wrong to torture, but if you are the type that agrees with it just take a minute and think about the repercussions. we are making more people hate us every day. So even if it is only for your own safety, please be informed and speak out against torture and demand full accountability.
Here are a few things followed by an email from IndictBushNow.org You can get on their mailing list.
**Please circulate widely to friends and on social-networking sites**
It is Bush and Cheney who gave the orders and it is they who must be held responsible
“The real culprits in this sordid story are those higher-ups, starting with former president George W. Bush and former vice president Richard B. Cheney, who led America down the degrading path of state-sanctioned torture and left the next administration to cope with the fallout.”
Dear Every member of IndictBushNow should feel proud. The announcement that a Special Prosecutor has been appointed to investigate Bush-era crimes was the direct result of the massive, grassroots movement from below. It was the action taken by you and people all around the country that made this possible.
The investigation must and will lead back to the high officials who ordered their subordinates to carry out the most heinous crimes. Now we must keep up the pressure. In fact we must increase it a hundred fold with newspaper ads, street demonstrations, media outreach and more.
As it was stated by the Washington Post lead editorial today:
“The real culprits in this sordid story are those higher-ups, starting with former president George W. Bush and former vice president Richard B. Cheney, who led America down the degrading path of state-sanctioned torture and left the next administration to cope with the fallout.”
What does the report that Attorney General Eric Holder released yesterday reveal? That Cheney, Bush and Rumsfeld’s torture tactics included:
Mock executions
Repeatedly choking detainees carotid artery until unconsciousness
Threatening sexual attacks against the children and parents of detainees
Detaining the children of detainees and threatening to kill the children
“Hard takedowns” meaning repeatedly smashing prisoners into the floor
Head smashing inmates into walls
Water dousing, pouring freezing water on naked inmates strapped to plastic sheets followed by holding the still naked inmates in bitterly cold cells for days
Sleep deprivation lasting for 11 days
Violent shaking of prisoners
Waterboarding (mock drowning) 183 times in the case of one detainee
Hanging prisoners form their wrists for up to three days
“Scrubbing” the bodies of detainees with metal brushes
More than one hundred prisoners may have died in these torture centers according to Col. Lawrence Wilkerson who served as Colin Powell’s chief of staff during the Bush Administration.
The IndictBushNow movement is now in high gear for the next phase of this critical struggle to save the Constitution. Every elected official and the mass media must know that the people will not accept finding a few low-level scapegoats to punish.
Members of Congress are echoing this call and we can create an avalanche of public support for the indictment of Cheney, Bush and Rumsfeld.
Jerome Nadler, the House Judiciary Constitution Subcommittee Chairman said yesterday: “The gruesome acts described in today's report did not happen in a vacuum ... it is vital that this special counsel be given a broad mandate to investigate these abuses, to follow the evidence where it leads, and to prosecute where warranted.”
Now that the investigation has begun all efforts to limit it will fail. Each step of the investigation will inevitably point to those who gave the orders in the chain of command. It is Bush and Cheney who gave the orders and it is they who must be held responsible.
August 21, 2009
Organic Bytes #187 Dangerous Flu Vaccines, USDA Stupidity and More....
Health, Justice and Sustainability News from the Organic Consumers Association
In This Issue
Quote of the Week: Jim Hightower: "USDA: Irresponsible, Dangerous, and Stupid"
Bad News of the Week: USDA Wants Genetic Engineering Allowed in Organic
Good News of the Week: Vacation with the OCA and Savor Mexico's Growing Organic Movement
Alert of the Week: Factory Pig Farms & Big Pharma Vaccines - Protect Your Family & Know Your Rights
Video of the Week: Vaccine Nation
Alert Update of the Week: Whole Foods CEO Ignites Boycott
Quote of the Week
"Irresponsible, Dangerous, and Stupid" Is the Unofficial Slogan of the USDA
"Let's bring into our country a genetically-engineered, non-native tree that is known to be wildly invasive, explosively flammable, and insatiably thirsty for ground water. ... Yes, this would be irresponsible, dangerous, and stupid - but apparently 'Irresponsible, Dangerous, and Stupid' is the unofficial slogan of the U.S. Department Agriculture."
Bad News of the Week
USDA Wants Genetic Engineering Allowed in Organic
"In reality, the divide between organics and biotechnology is an artificial construction maintained by ideology rather than science. A governmental decision to change organic regulations to permit the use of biotechnology could have far-reaching policy implications for global agriculture. Allowing producers to gain organic certification for biotech crops could encourage the development of a new type of environmentally sustainable agricultural production with greater benefits for the consumer." - USDA Foreign Agricultural Service, "The Unexplored Potential of Organic-Biotech Production," May 26, 2009
Good News of the Week
OCA's Via Organica EcoTours to Mexico
August 2-9, 2009, Via Organica (the "Organic Way"), OCA's sister organization in Mexico, organized our first Agro-EcoTour to Mexico, bringing US organic consumers down to the beautiful San Miguel de Allende region of Guanajuato, for a first-hand look at the budding organic Movement south of the border. Tour leaders included Ronnie Cummins, OCA Director, Alexis Baden-Mayer, head of OCA's Washington, DC office, Luc Monzies, organic farming expert, and Ana Maria Quispe, Via Organica's staff dietician and translator.
Trip highlights included an all-day Organic Agriculture workshop at the Via Organica farm and conference center, attended by 250 small farmers from the area who are working with our staff to make the transition to organic agriculture; visits to regional organic farms and permaculture sites; a rural community organizing center; as well as organic retail stores, restaurants, and farmers markets.
Alert of the Week
Factory Pig Farms & Big Pharma Vaccines - Protect Your Family & Know Your Rights
The propaganda machine of the U.S. government and Big Pharma are busy force-feeding Americans a dubious, in fact dangerous message: don't worry about filthy, disease-ridden factory farms and drugged-out farm animals incubating infectious diseases like the Swine Flu, because Big Pharma will protect us, starting with quasi-mandatory mass vaccinations of schoolchildren this fall. Not only is the Obama Administration ignoring warnings by the world's scientists that factory farms are the source and direct cause of the Swine Flu and Bird Flu epidemics, but they are preparing to allow greedy drug companies to inject you and your children with basically ineffective Swine Flu vaccines that contain hazardous viruses and chemicals. As organic consumers know, there are practical alternatives to factory farms (organic farms and ranches). And as millions of alternative medical consumers and practitioners understand, there are clear alternatives to hazardous Swine Flu vaccines: strengthening our body and immune systems with healthy organic diets, medicinal herbs, and homeopathy.
OCA needs your help and support. If we are to stop Monsanto's GMOs and shut down factory farms; if we are to head off dangerous vaccines and promote holistic health; if we are to make organic food and farming and green living the norm--rather than just the alternative--we need your donations today. Any size donation is welcome, but for those who can afford it, give OCA a donation of $1000 or more and we'll treat you to a royal organic vacation and tour at the Mexican organic farm and EcoTourism center of our sister organization Via Organica.
Investigative film director Dr. Gary Null challenges the basic health claims by government health agencies and pharmaceutical firms that vaccines are perfectly safe.
, arguing against health care reform and the so-called "public option." Mackey contends that the United States can fix our healthcare crisis not by reining in insurance companies and improving access to comprehensive healthcare and affordable organic food, but by patronizing his overpriced WFM and further deregulating the insurance industry. In fact, Mackey believes that healthcare is not a human right, but a commodity that only the wealthy should have. Tens of thousands of organic consumers and health care advocates have responded by calling for a boycott of Whole Foods Markets.
Over fifteen thousand OCA members have contacted WFM in recent months, urging the nation's largest retailer of organic products to increase organic food access, implement comprehensive testing for GMOs in their private label products and eliminate dangerous chemicals from their body care products. WFM responded by bowing to OCA pressure and has promised to sell significantly more organics in 2010. We having an impact!
These are uncertain times. The economic crisis has reminded us of our vulnerabilities. Debt. Foreclosure. Evaporating Savings. Rising Costs. Job Insecurity. We can face these changes alone - or come together. Common Security Clubs bring people together to explore ways to increase our economic security through mutual aid and shared action. Learn more
Poor farmers in Mexico are experimenting with a sustainable way of growing food crops that their ancestors used. It could provide them with better protection against the extremes of climate change, reduce deforestation, improve food security and even promise a better diet. Learn more
The sustainable-food movement needs to step up and start grappling with big questions: 1) Soil Fertility-How are we to build soil fertility on a larger scale? 2) Labor-Who's going to work our farm fields, and at what wages? and 3) Access-How can we make sustainably grown food accessible to everyone? Learn more
In collusion with the Rockefeller and Bill and Melinda Gates foundations, Taylor is once again the go-between man for Monsanto and the U.S. government, this time with the goal to open up African markets for genetically-modified (GM) seed and agrochemicals. Learn more
Water wasteful chemical agriculture has depleted ground water, mined soil fertility and contributed to climate change. The solutions for the climate crisis, the food crisis, and the water crisis, under which India is reeling, are biodiversity based organic farming systems. Learn more
LOCAL OH NEWS OF THE WEEK
OH--Get Involved Locally
Learn more about OCA related action alerts and other news in OH here
is one of the few national organic food producers who goes beyond the USDA Organic Standards. Although Eden Foods is USDA certified, their products do not bear the USDA seal, because they say the USDA standard really represents a "minimum standard" that Eden Foods goes far beyond.
As a subscriber to Organic Bytes, you can enjoy a 15% discount rate on any Eden Foods products by going here
Please forward this publication to family and friends, place it on web sites, print it, duplicate it and post it freely. Knowledge is power!
Organic Bytes is a publication of Organic Consumers Association
This week, when President Obama met with Egypt's President Mubarak to discuss the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and possible paths toward peace, the public was unaware of their duplicity: Both nations are aiding Israel's strangulation of the people . . .
Below is a letter from Leonard to us all and also a link to a petitopon for you to write to the parole board (hearing is set for 7/28/09) to support his release.
Take action now!
Click here to send a letter to the United States Parole Commission to express your support for parole for Leonard Peltier. Justice is long overdue!
Statement from Leonard Peltier, June 27, 2009
Greetings my friends and relatives,
I want to start off this statement or speech or whatever you want to call it by saying again as I’ve said before thank you thank you thank you from the bottom of my heart for supporting me and for standing up for right wherever you are. I can’t express to you in words how extremely grateful I am not just to the people of America but to the people all over the world who have supported the cause of Indian people and myself.
I know a lot of you have given up a lot to help so many in my predicament. Daily I am made aware of political prisoners around the world. Many who have been killed or tortured or who knows what for trying to right the wrongs in their area, country or nation. I have been asked to make statements in support of other movement people around the world from time to time, South America, Europe and other places. People who love freedom, people who love the earth, people who love their family, people who love the freedom to make their own choice with their own resources, and all indigenous people—we share a common bond. The bond of brother and sister hood, the bond of believing there is a greater power than ourselves. And I don’t mean some government power; I mean the greatest power in all the universe the Creator Himself.
We also as human beings upon this earth have to recognize that there have always been those who suffer from an illness called greed. They have an appetite for gaining material wealth that is never satisfied. They have an appetite for land that is never satisfied. And the most common symptom of their illness is indifference to the suffering they cause with their quest. These people are the ones that have identified themselves as our common enemy. It is so terrible that under the guise of religion and shouting freedom they pit one people against another. This isn’t something new. All down through history it has taken place. All down through history there have been men, spiritual men, holy men, great thinkers and philosophers who have tried to unite us against this common enemy.
Today my brothers and sisters I want you to know that if nothing else if we don’t unite against the destruction against the Mother Earth we will have a common future that is void of clean air, clean water, and basic freedoms. We must reach our hands out to embrace others to the cause of life. We must do our best from where ever we are with whatever tools available to enhance and further our quality of life. We must find a way to break down the barriers that divide one people from another. We must find the things we have in common and find ways to solve our differences as basic humanity. We must evolve to a higher level of thinking or to as you might say a traditional level of thinking which obviously is superior to what they call progress today. Our traditional values taught us to live in harmony with Earth the greatest manifestation of the Creator that we have to relate to. Our traditions taught us to respect our bodies the greatest gift we have or possess as an individual. Our traditions taught us to preserve the environment for our children and all our future generations. As a member of the American Indian Movement these values are what we were about. Poverty isn’t solved by money, poverty is solved by attitude. The problems we have today among all our people are caused by attitude. They are caused by an attitude that was given to us in boarding schools and on reservations that were nothing more than concentration camps in the past. They are attitudes by people who came to us talking to us about God and wanting us to embrace their version of religion and as one brother said once, “They told us to bow our heads, and when we looked up our land was gone, our culture was gone, our children were gone, our way of life was gone.” And now the air itself is dwindling.
I have been in this cage for some 34 years and though I have been caged I have sought the spirit in prayer of our brother the eagle, I have sought to have an overview of things for as anyone can see I don’t have the freedom to examine life from a close perspective. And from this distant view, abstract view, this detached view, at times I get to see the destruction and divisiveness that these political powers that have scattered us for so long have involved themselves in promoting among our people. I don’t know if it is because I am older now or because my future is so uncertain or if through some spiritual inspiration I deeply want to say so much. I deeply want to move you to do something to save our earth and our children and our children’s future. I didn’t get to raise my children; I haven’t got to really know them or my children’s children. I may never get to, but I love them all just the same. And I love life as much as anyone on the outside. And I don’t know how long I will walk this cage. Some days I feel quite healthy and energized and some days I feel like the 64-year-old man that I am. I’m always hopeful that I will be free at some point, perhaps in the latter part of July after my parole hearing, and perhaps I won’t. The people that hold me, the FBI and the conglomerate corporations that have for so long controlled the resources of this country and others and for so long have done their best to stifle, to denigrate, and to vilify the voice of the oppressed are some of the most formidable well-funded political people on Earth. I was told that the FBI themselves are some 10,000 strong.
I am but a common man, I am not a speaker but I have spoken. I am not all that tall but I have stood up. I am not a philosopher or poet or a singer or any of those things that particularly inspire people but the one thing that I am is the evidence that this country lied when they said there was justice for all. I am the evidence that they lied when they extradited me from Canada. I am the evidence that they can lie at your trial, they can manufacture evidence at your trial, they can intimidate witnesses at your trial, they can have back room conversations and agreements with the judge at your trial. I am the evidence that the attitude, the powers that be still hold us in a grip. They hold us in an emotional grip. They hold us in a poverty grip. They hold us in a cultural deprivation grip. I could go on and on about the things that go on that weigh so heavily against our people but the bottom line in my case is well documented by court after court after court, by hearing after hearing after hearing, by statement after statement after statement. And we as a people are the evidence that this country fails to keep its treaties, this country fails to keep its word. This country has failed to follow its own Constitution—the treaty between the people and the government. We are that evidence. I am nothing more than evidence. That is why people all over the world and here at home have supported the cause of justice in my case. In my particular situation I can’t say that there will ever be any level of justice.
They cannot give back the 34 years of life that have been taken from me. They can not give back the life of Joe Stuntz that they took June 26th 1975. They cannot give back the lives of the 60 something people that they directly or indirectly caused the death of. They cannot give back the thousands upon thousands of Indian people that were killed and abused since the inception of this government. But the one thing we can do, we must do, is find a way to change their attitude. My brother Leonard Crow Dog once said, “If you want to change the white man you have to change his religion.” And religion is a word that means how you do something on a regular basis; most generally it is associated with your spirituality. Perhaps with global warming as it is and the changes in the weather patterns and the questionable future that faces the earth, they will start to listen. Maybe they will reach back and embrace the words of our people foretold again and again. We must live the way that the Earth will renew itself every spring. We must help them reach back. We must speak to them at every opportunity. We must make an effort to reach back ourselves to our own cultural values. And in doing so we can start to solve the many destructive challenges we face. We must more than ever before find a way to heal the wounds of our children and prevent the social illnesses that are so prevalent across our reservations and communities. We have the tools, we have the teachings, we have the philosophies, we have the culture, we have the artists, we have the singers, we have the philosophers, I could go on and on but in essence what I am trying to say is it is imperative that we bring together all our resources to enhance the future for our children in a way that they themselves can further the healthy teachings of our culture and way of life; and in doing so I have no doubt that we can change the world.
If I am freed next month or if I die in prison remember my words and remember we are evidence that the Creator made a beautiful people a people that respected the Earth and nature and each other. We are evidence on every level of goodness that when the Creator made us He meant for us to be free. All our traditions have taught us this way. And even this very form of government that exists today was copied from our people. Our people with our foods, our medicines, belief in freedom and right to choose have influenced the world. It's too bad they didn’t adopt a healthy attitude that we had toward the Earth or an attitude of respect for us the first keepers of this portion of the Earth. If there is something about me that this government can point at and say is wrong or any person say is wrong I will by my own choice, if it proves to be fact, seek to fix it myself. But I also want to remind them the policies that have been in place for so long have made us what we are today. The policies that have been in place for so long, have created another reservation called Iraq and another reservation called Afghanistan, and the list goes on and on, you see what’s happening over there is what happened here and all down through North and South America.
I am just a common man and I am evidence that the powers that put me here would like to sweep under the carpet. The same way they did all of our past leaders, warriors and people they massacred. Just as at Wounded Knee the Fifth Cavalry sought its revenge for Custer’s loss and massacred some 300 Indian men women and children then gave out 23 Medals of Honor and swept the evidence of their wrongdoing aside. Perhaps this statement is somewhat more lengthy than the others I’ve made; perhaps it is some things I should have said before and perhaps more, if so I hope you will forgive me. I recently was thought to be having a heart attack because of pain in my chest. After having been beaten and kicked and stomped in the last year, I am not quite sure what was causing the pain. I had never been beaten, kicked and stomped like that before. And also I have never been 64 years old before. The one thing all this did for me is it really brought home my sense of mortality. I don’t want to spend the rest of my life in this prison. And I don’t want you to spend the rest of your life in some prison of the mind, heart or attitude. I want you to enjoy your life.
If nothing else give somebody a hug for me and say, “This is from Leonard.”
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