Here is an email I received from a conservative attorney who is normally not associated with demonstrations or involvement in activist events.
To Our Friends and Family,
We apologize for this unsolicited intrusion. But today, after the latest distressing pronouncements from the Azores, we have concluded that silence on an issue of grave concern to our country and our family and friends is no longer an option. You are the audience that is immediately available.
It may be, after so much ink has been spilled and opinions broadcast, there is nothing truly original to add. Yet we feel that we must say something.
The American juggernaut toward war with Iraq is in full gear. Despite all opposition. Despite the litany of powerful reasons why an immediate attack, without U.N. support is, at the very least, a path of disruption and, at worst, a crapshoot of potentially devastating consequences.
Doubtless the current Iraqi regime is worthy of the world's disdain. It must be contained and ultimately disarmed. Yet through our imperious diplomacy we have handed Saddam Hussein an unwarranted victory. By pursuing its otherwise laudable goals on an arbitrary timetable for military action, in the face of worldwide doubt and opposition, the Bush Administration has lost the legitimacy of U.N. support and has jeopardized a wide range of vital alliances developed and nurtured through more than sixty years of hot and cold war. The regimes even of our staunchest allies are teetering as the direct result of their deeply unpopular support for the current U.S. war policy.
In barely a year of Iraq warmongering we have also squandered the near unanimous sympathy of the world after 9-11.
And yet we continue our relentless march toward war. With tomorrow as a last chance -- for what?
Many pundits proclaim that war is inevitable. They say we can now only watch and wait to see whether our President's riverboat gambler's bet on a quick and relatively painless war -- has there ever really been one? -- leads to victory or disaster.
The stakes are too high to question in silence such a reckless and dubious bet.
We do not condone Saddam Hussein. We support the U.N. in seeking to disarm Iraq. But we still believe that the world community can coalesce around a sensible and resolute plan for achieving that goal. Nothing President Bush has said in so many attempts to articulate a persuasive rationale for his impatient policies has, for us, come close to demonstrating the unavoidable need for immediate war in the face of worldwide opposition.
Developing support for the use of force, should that ultimately become necessary, will take more time. It will probably require spending some billions more to maintain an effective troop presence in the region during an additional period of a coercive United Nations led inspections and disarmament. But would that not be time and money well spent?
If cards need to be shown, as in a Texas poker game, rather than bullying the Security Council with impossible deadlines why not permit reluctant Council members put up or shut up. Not tomorrow, which is nothing less than an unworkable ultimatum and prelude to imminent hostilities, but in a reasonable period of months or perhaps even a year. If the plan preferred by a majority of the Council for continued and stepped up inspections has by that time demonstrably failed to achieve clearly defined and agreed benchmarks for disarmament, then military action could be commenced. After such a deliberate process there is a far greater likelihood of unified support in contrast to the present moment of worldwide disunity and tumultuous opposition.
Our diplomacy and arm twisting has evidently failed to secure even a bare majority of support on what had been a unanimous Security Counsel. Who is the United States to say -- essentially unilaterally -- that the rest of the world is wrong and we are right?
9-11 is one key excuse that has been given. We suffered the attack and only we can understand and therefore act. If that is so, then why is this country also being torn asunder by doubt and dissent over the President's policies? And why have some one hundred city councils -- including New York City where the 9-11 attacks occurred -- expressed their disagreement with the Administration's precipitous march to war?
In fact, the 9-11 excuse makes no sense. The clear lesson of 9-11 is the crucial value of a worldwide coalition unified in support of the war against terrorism. Its lesson is hardly to single out the United States for the focus of all terrorist rage in a world divided and indeed infuriated by our peremptory, unilateral actions.
Has this country ever stood on the brink of a major foreign war more divided? And what does that degree of dissent portend for the Administration's goals? Our war plans for Iraq are exceedingly ambitious. They can succeed, if at all, only with a significant degree of domestic and international support after the immediate hostilities have ended.
We hope you, your like-minded friends and families, and their friends and families around the country will show the Administration that thoughtful and patriotic Americans are simply not prepared at this time to risk so much for such a poorly articulated and conceived, potentially avoidable military adventure. We and the world do feel threatened -- but sad to say right now it is far more by the warmongering of our own leaders than by a regime in Iraq that is currently being contained by the world's attention and pressure to disarm, however maddening Saddam's recalcitrant arms gamesmanship may be.
What can you do? If you support our position, forward this email to your friends and families. Or write you own email. The Internet is a powerful tool. Could there be any more appropriate moment in history for harnessing its power in the cause of preventing war?
Email the President. Can this possibly make a difference at one minute before the Administration's declared midnight? We do not know. But if millions of emails suddenly flooded the White House could the Administration really continue to treat democracy and informed dissent as simply a meaningless "focus group?" President Bush was elected (if at all) by a minority vote. It is surely worth reminding him that he cannot be reelected if his policies are being decisively rejected by a vocal majority of the American people.
Email your representatives in Congress. Where are they? Where do they stand? Won't the loyal opposition please stand up? Let's at least also remind our elected officials of what many of them surely know but unfortunately are too political timid to say. Writing a blank check for war last Fall was a terrible idea. Let's demand that Congress stop payment on that check. How about another resolution in Congress and a renewed debate on the Administration's questionable policies? It's time to remind our officials that their terms in office may also be in jeopardy if they do not represent the vital and fervently felt interests of their constituents.
We recognize that the demonstrations to date have failed to stop the juggernaut. It is now time for all those who question the President's current course to stand up and be counted before the bombs begin to fall. Ask your family, your friends and your neighbors to join in opposition to the President's call for immediate military action in the absence of U.N. approval. To that end we are inviting you and all who reject this precipitous military adventure to step out onto the street in your community at 3:45 PM today (Monday, March 17) -- peacefully and nonviolently. This action is timed to come after school and before rush hour to minimize physical disruption but to maximize persuasive impact and to let the Administration know where we stand.
Carry a sign, wear a button, honk your car horns, tell passersby that you are opposed to the war in Iraq. And if you simply cannot step out at 3:45PM why not at least send out your emails at that time in opposition to the President's call for immediate war?
Imagine what it would be like if millions of American citizens were to succeed in mounting this kind of peaceful demonstration? A pipe dream? Perhaps. But less so by one if you act.
submitted by Art Bechhoefer |
