The writer is an organizer with the ANSWER Coalition (Act Now to Stop War and End Racism) in L.A. and editor of PSLweb.org. He delivered this talk at the Oct. 27 rally in Los Angeles. There was a mass Die-In directly afterward. More than 10,000 people lay down in the street to the sound of simulated air-raid sirens and bombs dropping, illustrating the effects of war on Iraqis and U.S. troops.
The war is a tragedy: for Iraqi people, the people of the Middle East and
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You don’t have to look far to see the effects of war at home. From the government’s racist response to Katrina to the catastrophe of the California fires. The fires are another terrible example of how the U.S. war machine refuses to deal with human lives. Much-needed resources to fight the fires—both equipment and people—are being used to occupy Iraq.
These too are war crimes. They don’t reach the magnitude of the 1 million Iraqis that have been killed by the occupation since 2003, but they are crimes.
And what about the U.S. soldiers—working class people, Black, Latino, Asian and white—who are victims of the economic draft and are sent to kill and be killed for corporate profits. All are victims of the war. Not only the 3,900 who have died in Iraq, but the 70,000 injured and the tens of thousands more suffering traumatic brain injuries.
So, how do we stop the war? There has been a lot written about this recently, mostly by corporate media outlets saying that the anti-war movement is weak. But, sisters and brothers, we are not weak here today.
This country’s ruling elite would like us to be demoralized. They would like us to stop organizing on the streets and,
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“Be quiet and live with the system,” they say—”vote for who will oppress you for the next four years; who will keep your wages low, slash welfare and attack immigrants. Vote for the next war criminal.”
Both the Republicans and the Democrats are backing the continuation of the criminal occupation for years and decades to come, and now they’re rattling their sabers at Iran.
We just found out that the U.S. wars on Iraq and Afghanistan could cost $2.4 trillion over the next decade. All the money directed toward killing people should fund jobs, education, healthcare, Social Security and housing for everyone, not foreclosures. Not one more person should die in this war based on lies.
It will not be in the White House, the Supreme Court or the halls of Congress where the people will succeed. It will be in the streets.
From the labor movement to the women’s and LGBT rights movements, from the civil rights to the Black liberation movements and, of course, the movement against the Vietnam War, mass movements of people independent of the political establishment have been the real engines of change.
Everyone here today should become an organizer. Let’s turn the anti-war majority into the biggest people’s movement the world has ever seen. Instead of buying into the system, let’s change it. We don’t want another decade of war and occupation. Join the ANSWER Coalition. Only the people can stop the war!
