Peace movement at a crossroads (my hometown)

[whimsicaldeb]

This is happening where I live, and is deeply, deeply personal. I don't talk about it much because I get too emotional; one of those crosses is for someone very dear. I mean they're all dear ... (you know what I mean). There have been many articles so far about it in our local papers and others, but this new one by Salon so far is the best. It really says it all.

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2007/ ... e_crosses/



Peace movement at a crossroads

Three years ago, it was called "un-American." But now this moving antiwar protest in small-town America has been embraced by the community.

By Katharine Mieszkowski
Photo by Katharine Mieszkowski

Jan. 20, 2007 | LAFAYETTE, Calif. -- On a brisk, clear Sunday morning, Paul Cavanaugh, a paralegal, and his 10-year-old son, Kevin, work on a steep green suburban hillside, dotted with more than 1,200 white wooden crosses. Armed with staple guns, father and son busily affix laminated pieces of paper to the crosses. Each slip of paper bears the name of an American serviceman or woman killed in Iraq. Other volunteers use shovels to dig holes in the ground and install new crosses. By mid-afternoon, there will be 1,400 crosses on the hill, and yet that's still less than half the number of American soldiers killed so far in Iraq.

The crosses were first erected by a local building contractor, Jeff Heaton, as a daily reminder to commuters of the tragic toll of the Iraq war. Cavanaugh and his wife, a lawyer, run a family law firm in nearby Concord. He says he supported the war in Afghanistan and adds, tartly, "That was a rat's nest we needed to clean out." But the recent escalation of the war spurred him and his son to get their hands dirty. "When Bush made the announcement that we're going to commit our reserves, 20,000 troops we don't have, we decided to get involved," Cavanaugh says. "After the election we just had, which was a referendum on the war, it's just outrageous."

Where's the outrage about putting tens of thousands of additional troops in harm's way in this dead-end war? It's here in a bedroom community in Northern California. Located 15 miles from Berkeley, Lafayette is made up mostly of low-slung ranch homes nestled in oak-covered foothills. Its population of 24,000 people is a mix of retired oldsters and a newer generation of wealthier professionals, who've migrated to the sprawling suburbs east of the San Francisco Bay to raise their families. Louise Clark, 81, who owns the private property where the crosses sit, has lived in Lafayette for 55 years. She describes it as "a suburban community that's not at the forefront of political action. It's a town that's concerned with potholes in the pavement."

When the crosses first started appearing last November, they prompted a contentious City Council meeting and stirred local debate. But as the memorial has grown, it's become a national symbol of opposition to the war, making news everywhere from National Public Radio's "All Things Considered" to the New York Times. Resistance has come to Middle America. According to a recent Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll, more than three-fifths of Americans now believe the war is not worth fighting. And 60 percent of Americans, like Cavanaugh, don't support the president's plans to escalate the war by sending in another 21,500 troops.

Heaton, who started the memorial, is a soft-spoken, 53-year-old general contractor who has lived in Lafayette his whole life. In a black fleece vest, the bespectacled Heaton, trim and clean-shaven, looks like he'd be at home on Lafayette's hiking trails. In his younger days, the self-described pacifist marched against the Vietnam War, only to be chased by police mounted on horseback, wielding billy clubs. A conscientious objector, whose draft number never came up for Vietnam, Heaton has protested every war since then. Inspired by a visit to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C., he decided three years ago to oppose the Iraq war by erecting 20 crosses on this hillside. Vandals promptly tore them down. "Anyone who tried to do something like this three years ago was called un-American, unpatriotic, but now it's completely changed," he says.

The current memorial took shape after the November '06 election. The first few hundred crosses were planted by Heaton and volunteers from groups like Mt. Diablo Peace and Justice Center, Grandmothers for Peace, and Lamorinda Peace Group. But now the effort has expanded to include local neighbors like Cavanaugh. At weekly Sunday work sessions, the memorial is branching out at the rate of about 200 new crosses per week. The goal is to erect one cross for every American soldier lost.

A field of white crosses now covers a swath of the five-acre hillside. They are easily visible from both the BART commuter train platform across the road, and nearby state Route 24, a major artery that takes commuters on their weekday trek from suburban enclaves like Concord, Walnut Creek and Lafayette to San Francisco.

Many crosses have red ribbons tied around them in bows. Others boast flowers or American flags planted at their bases. One cross has a wooden Star of David affixed to it, while another bears a crescent moon, a symbol of Islam, a third a Chinese prayer wheel. Several are festooned with wreaths. All of the crosses fan out from a large sign that reads: "In memory of 3019 U.S. troops killed in Iraq." An American flag flanks the sign. The number on the sign changes as the death toll continues to grow.

While Heaton sees the memorial as a way to protest the war, he has taken pains to keep it from becoming overtly partisan. When someone planted a sign amid the crosses that read, "Bush Lied. Troops Died," he removed it. He sees the installation as having a different kind of impact than attending a march or a rally. "You can go out and hold a sign and get arrested, and get five seconds on the evening news, but this is something that is here every day that hundreds of thousands of people who commute to work see," he says.

On the hillside, one first-time volunteer, who gives her name only as Sandra, breaks down in tears at the sight, while Heaton places a hand on her back to comfort her. A retired Head Start teacher who lives in neighboring Concord, she says the son of a friend is about to be sent back to Iraq to serve for the fourth time. She admits that she was initially for the invasion, but only because she had been misled to believe that Saddam Hussein was harboring weapons of mass destruction. "I feel very strongly that our troops should come home," she says. "It's a civil war over there now."

Baika Pratt, 46, a hospice worker who drives past the site every weekday on her commute from Martinez to Oakland, says she was drawn to it by her grief and disillusionment about the war. "So many young people are dying and it's for nothing," she says. Now, in addition to attending the Sunday work groups, she stops by almost every day, checking in on her way to or from work, to pick up trash or to straighten crosses that may have been knocked down in the wind, or just to sit and look.

Candlelight vigils were held at the crosses on New Year's Eve and after Bush announced the commitment of 21,500 more troops. On Christmas Eve, the red ribbons on many of the crosses shimmered in the night, turning them into so many solemn Christmas presents. Heaton later heard that the ribbons were put up by some local high school grads. It's the informal, grass-roots nature of the project that the instigator says gives it its appeal. "People come by, and they don't have to belong to a certain group," he says. "They can participate and let it represent something for them. That's why I'm trying to keep it from becoming too politicized. It is a demonstration against the war, but I want to make sure it really stays a memorial."

Not everyone who lives in Lafayette is in favor of the highly visible display of the cost of the war. There's still a trace of black tar on top of the sign announcing the number of the dead. It's left over from the time a vandal painted over the whole sign to obscure the message. On another occasion, a furious motorist got out of her car to kick the large sign down. One Islamic crescent moon mysteriously disappeared in the night. And while the memorial is located on private property, the local City Council has taken up the issue of its legality, since the sign announcing the death toll is too large by city standards. Even now, as the volunteers, in their jeans and tennis shoes, work to expand the memorial, a driver in a white pickup passes by, honks his horn and yells out his window: "Thanks a lot for trashing our neighborhood!"

Louise Clark and her husband, Johnson Clark, 85, bought the land where the crosses sit decades ago in hopes of developing it into senior housing, given that it's so close to public transit. Heaton is the son of friends the Clarks have known for 50 years.

Clark says she's received about 100 phone calls about the memorial on her land, and so far only one has been from a person opposing it. She hopes the memorial will remind Americans that the real costs of the war are hidden from most of them. "Back in World War II, we had gas rationing, we had meat rationing, we had special taxes on just about any luxury, and that's not happening today," she says. "Today's war is on the shoulders of just the service people and their families. It's too big a sacrifice to ask of such a small segment of our large country. I want young people to realize that the country is at war, and there are people who are giving their lives for the rest of us."

That said, Clark would like to see the troops withdrawn right away. "I want the world to know that we support our service people and we want to bring them home, and we don't want them dying for reasons that are not obvious to most people in this country. They're not fighting a war against terrorism. That's in Afghanistan. Right now they're fighting a civil war for the Iraqi people, and we have no right to be there."

[bohonato]

I think that protests against the war like this are the best. Unfortunately, the only time my hometown did anything like this, it was the Catholic church protesting abortion. I really wanted to put crosses up across the road for the war. I'm glad someone else has done it.

Last year, two friends and I painted the local rock (oh, high school traditions that never die) for the third anniversary of the war in Iraq.



Surprisingly it lasted about a week. Then it was back to the high schoolers "Happy 16th!" rubbish. Living in a smaller community in North Detroit, it caused quite the commotion. It was the first time that anyone had done a public display against the war there. And like you, as both a cousin and my sister have served overseas, the issue is very personal for me. My sister is back up for redeployment this spring, and after the president's announcement, I have no doubt she'll be leaving again.

[whimsicaldeb]

Your sister; my friend's son (for the 3rd time), one of our friends whose 56 years old no less for the 4th time!; and we’ll know soon about one of my nephews for the second time and another for the first time.

I remember the tradition of painting rocks. Never did it myself but always wanted to. It's still being done here as well. A rite of passage.

I thin our types of non-violent forms of protests gets the message across the best. It allows people to take in the knowledge and experience their feelings in their own way. It's interesting that the most violent reactions to the cross protests in our area have been performed by those in support of the war – but then again, violence begets violence. I also wonder if these reactions aren’t dis-associated guilt and pain reactions from those who don't know how to face or handle grief, loss well.

Whatever is touching them; they clearly are focusing on the protest part and overlooking that first and foremost - this is a memorial; a memorial that is representing many thing to many different people: to those who lives have been lost; the family and friends who know and loved them; the loss of peace, integrity in our country; 9/11 – you name it – we’re in mourning.

Daily, people drive by, or take BART on their way to work or where-ever with their lives uneffected from all that's happening elsewhere. These crosses on the hillside remove the mindlessness ... you can't go by, see these crosses, without it touching you in someway.

For some, that touching of them makes them yell out in anger - or get so pissed off they put tar on the signs; for most though ... it's a quiet (silent even) heartfelt connecting from within.

…

I'm watching what Pelosi and Murtha will be able to do, or not do, regarding the funding and other things for sending these extra troops. My hope is that they will succeed and then your sister and others we know and love wouldn't have to go back again (or for the first time).

[stilltrucking]

...
going to be a busy day today 20 more crosses to erect as of yesterday It is a good thing we don't have to put any up for the Iraqi's We don't have enough real estate for that Quote: Three years ago, it was called "un-American." But now this moving antiwar protest in small-town America has been embraced by the community. It has always been un-American to oppose wars. Where is the HUAC when we need them. He is running out of places to give speeches. Quote: At Fort Benning, a Quiet Response to a Presidential Visit By Peter Baker Washington Post Staff Writer Friday, January 12, 2007; Page A12 FORT BENNING, Ga., Jan. 11 -- The pictures were just what the White House wanted: A teary-eyed President Bush presenting the Medal of Honor posthumously to a slain war hero in the East Room, then flying here to join the chow line with camouflage-clad soldiers as some of them prepare to return to Iraq. There are few places the president could go for an unreservedly enthusiastic reception the day after unveiling his decision to order 21,500 more troops to Iraq. A military base has usually been a reliable backdrop for the White House, and so Bush aides chose this venerable Army installation in western Georgia to promote his revised strategy to the nation while his Cabinet secretaries tried to sell it on Capitol Hill.http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/co ... 00389.html You know I really don't have anything to say. The only news cast that has a moment of silence for the fallen is Jim Lerher's news hour. Sometimes that silence goes on for ever. We lower the flag for Gerald Ford, but it will be back up flying high next week. Down here in Texas the war is pretty much out of sight out of mind. At one of the bowl games here a couple weeks ago they had a half time show, a tribute to the Army recruits. No mention of the dead, no moment of silence. You too young to remember the Korean war, what got me was how they held a peace conference and spent weeks aruguing about the shape of the table, circular or rectangular. They did the same at the end of the Viet Nam war too. While men died our leaders quibbled about furniture. Cause you know we did not want to lose face. Bush will not end the war, he does not want to lose face. His mind is on his presidential library and his legacy. I hope he lives a long long time, at least until his nineties. Because I don't believe in hell, I want him to face history. Put a portrait of Dorian Gray in his library. sorry for ramble

[whimsicaldeb]

going to be a busy day today
20 more crosses to erect as of yesterday

It is a good thing we don't have to put any up for the Iraqi's
We don't have enough real estate for that

<>

The only news cast that has a moment of silence for the fallen is Jim Lerher's news hour. Sometimes that silence goes on for ever.

Well - in point of fact there is a site that does the Iraqi count, as well as the US.

Here's the website:
http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2006/0 ... 269021.php

Here's the Current TV Video - which is currently playing on-air btw:
16 Shadows
It's called 16 Shadows because even using the US "approved" rate of Iraqi dead (which is a much lower number than what most people know to be true) - it's still 16:1 (Iraqi/US)



BTW: Current TV also has memorials for the soliders every day:
In Memoriam

Current TV have and air some very moving videos, like this one:
Memories

All this new stuff, it's not all for or just about the young.

And to take a moment from another thread; this is the good use of technology. (imo) (Umm... maybe I should post about current TV in Laurie's thread.)

So - what I'm saying/showing (again) - what you're looking for, or wishing you'd see more of - IS out there; just not in the places you're expecting it to be; the places you're used to looking. They're in new places, in new forms of presentation, using new technologies.

when one door closes, another opens, but we spend so much time looking at the closed door ...

[stilltrucking]

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I ain't looking for nothing deb Did I say that? I am grateful for the newshour, it keeps me mindful and it would be nice if the network news shows did it too. But that might be bad for morale. I don't know anyone here who is surfing the net for news about the war. They going to need about 650,000 crosses for the Iraqi's according to a study by Johns Hopkins University. You know what? it is a drop in the bloody bucket. What difference does it make. Stay the course

[whimsicaldeb]

I ain't looking for nothing deb
Did I say that? I am grateful for the newshour, it keeps me mindful and it would be nice if the network news shows did it too. But that might be bad for morale.

I ain't looking for nothing deb

Aren't you?

That's why I posted what I did the way I did; because even though you didn't say it 'out loud' via typing in out in your post - I still heard your wish of ..." it would be nice if the network news shows did it too." How do you know they don't - if you weren't looking?

They don't, but Current TV does, along with PBS. And I bet you didn't know about Current TV and that they do - until now because I just told/showed you. And I also bet that you didn’t know about the woman and her moving memorial of both Iraqi and US losses as well - until now because I just showed/told you.

That’s why I posted and also why I didn't wait until I “was asked.”
I'm "uppity" that way.

...

BTW – You haven't asked me about this either but ...

You can view 16 Shadows and other things on your TV by going to
http://www.current.tv/ – then to TV NETWORK – then to CHANNEL LOOKUP where you'll find your local channel where all these pods are being shown.

You can even make one of your own and submit it …

[stilltrucking]

...
Listen deb you live on a different planet than I do what i am saying is that it should be more in the face of americans, it should be on all three networks every time a soldier is killed and the name is released it should be right there in our faces, not for people with the internet, you would be suprised how many people don't surf the net. I am talking about the people I meet every day. If pbs does it why cant nbc or cbs abc fox. call me stupid I know why you do to stay the course

[e_dog]

they shouls have a reality show baghdad autopsies. extreme.

[stilltrucking]

exactly

[whimsicaldeb]

Listen deb
you live on a different planet than I do

You wish.


...Look

I'm posting about the way things are - the way it is - now. These are things happening in and around my own life. I'm not posting about the way I wish it was, or the way I think it should all be etc., etc., (such as you and e-dog) ...I'm posting the way it IS. Now. As I see it.

I'm sorry that bothers you so much, but - GET OVER IT ALREADY!

If you don't like how the main networks don't show things you expect/want them too - START YOUR OWN DAMN THREAD AND SAY SO - and in the process --- STOP PISSING ON MINE!

[stilltrucking]

...

[stilltrucking]

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for me it is like men are from mars and women are from alpha centauri.

[whimsicaldeb]

Get off my thread Jack. Hi-jack someone elses.

[mnaz]

This may sound a bit harsh, but why only crosses for fallen U.S. troops? Where is the symbolic representation for Iraqi war dead?... Standard line: "We regret the losses, and the Iraqis are better off now, and it was necessary and unavoidable".

As if "necessity" makes it right. And was it necessary? Is it still necessary? I've a hard time linking government-issue necessity to "justifiable" collateral killings, but suppose for a moment that I play along. I said from day one that the US/UK invasion of Iraq was unjustified, and I stand by those statements, given the situation in 2003 and where I thought our national security priorities should be. In retrospect the case to remove Saddam may have been slightly more viable than I allowed in 2003. Maybe. Probably not. Who cares? Why is the United States military still occupying a country that wants it gone by a fairly healthy majority? Why is D.C. unwilling to consider options other than a central Iraqi government on a tether to the White House? Because resolution, peace, and "Iraqi Freedom" are not of primary concern to D.C., in favor of hegemonic influence in the Middle East. And this I hear justified continually by various pundits as having something to do with the inherent evilness of theocracy in general... like that had anything really to do with the initial Iraq invasion to begin with. Please.

I checked the polls: 61 percent disapprove/26 percent approve/13 percent drunk... I checked the latest election results: an inexplicable shift to the long-vilified "defeat-o-crats"... The message seems pretty clear to me, but why grant the likes of Dick Effin' Cheney power to begin with? Too late, people. I'll probably take a lot of shit for this, but at some point the strong, upstanding families who comprise our all-volunteer armed forces might read a little more late 20th Century history, and read it more vigorously, and (dare I say) more critically. It is only through the vitality and love and dedication of its people that government policy is fleshed out on the ground. In light of the last few decades, and the last four years in particular, I would hope the all-volunteer military might take a closer look.