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From Kings Bay Plowshares

MARCH, 2019 LETTER FROM MARK COLVILLE FROM THE GLYNN CO. JAIL

Dear Friends,

Greetings and hugs all around! With a grateful heart I commend all who continue to make the sacrifices necessary to keep our doors at the Amistad Catholic Worker open, the kitchen warm, and the table set, especially during these harsh months and under the added strain of my extended absence. For some time now, I’ve hesitated to check in from here in Georgia before being able to offer a bit of clarity with regard to the legal situation of the Kings Bay Plowshares in Brunswick Federal Court. But with delays encroaching now into Spring, and still no action being taken by the magistrate judge on our pretrial motions, a brief update has become increasingly overdue.

Actually, what has been most on my heart these past three months is a deep sense of responsibility to speak about this jail where I’ve been warehoused now for the better part of a year. It is labeled a detention center,” so-called because the people being kept here have been arrested but have not yet had their cases adjudicated. Considered a temporary holding facility, its conditions and amenities are suited to accommodate the accused for a few weeks or a month at most, irrespective of the reality that – for reasons I’ll explain in a moment – half a year or more is closer to the average length of stay. This means that all the detained, most of who are suspected of low-level or nonviolent offenses, are held in maximum security conditions for months, and in some cases, years on end. We are locked down on crowded cellblocks, essentially for 24 hours a day. The diet is heavy on starch, sugar, and sodium, which rapidly foster obesity, high blood pressure, diabetes and heart disease when combined with a sedentary lifestyle. (I’ve witnessed three people having strokes, and one man I knew died of heart failure in his cell late last summer). There is no access to the outdoors nor to physical recreation of any kind; no exercise permitted outside of one’s cell; no visits with loved ones except by video monitor; no use of a library, computer or internet. It also seems to be common knowledge that we are sitting on top of a toxic waste dump, but I have neither the means nor the fortitude to investigate that particular report.

As for the 400 to 500 detainees here, most are in the same predicament as Liz, Steve and I, being held indefinitely with their cases pending. Several systemic factors conspire to make this so. Bail is generally set extremely high, unaffordably so for many, although this can sometimes be remedied at a bail reduction hearing after at least six weeks have passed. The bigger issue, though, is what’s referred to as the “probation hold.” In Glynn County, persons arrested for any reason while on probation can be jailed for renewable terms of up to 60 days, and simply forced to wait until a probation violation hearing is scheduled. As anyone who’s had the experience knows, virtually any encounter with a police officer on probation can result in an arrest, regardless of probable cause or the likelihood of an infraction being provable in court. Merely being on probation is reason enough.

Practically speaking, lengthy probation terms usually have little to do with supervision, rehabilitation or public safety. They have plenty to do with funneling people back through the criminal justice industrial complex, which seems to be a significant source of revenue and employment in municipalities like this one. Convictions in the Brunswick court, 90 percent of which are obtained by plea bargain, commonly bring sentences which include probation terms of between 3 and 20 years! The prisoners here call it being “on paper.” Once they are on a probation hold, an investigation of the newly-alleged crime can proceed, or not, at the leisure of the D.A.’s office, Of course, whether or not they find evidence, the living conditions at the detention center will usually provide ample coercive power to secure another conviction. Obviously, after 60 or 120 or 180 days of 24-hour lockdown, almost anyone is well-disposed to accept whatever plea will result in an immediate release, even if it means being on paper for another decade. This, there is ensured an endless supply of indefinite detainees at the Glynn County Detention Center, and their demographic won’t surprise anyone; at present, I am one of three white people in a cell block of thirty-four.

From the inside, I find the real horror of all this in its utter normalcy. Sometimes it takes a rigorous act of the will to maintain a personal relationship with reality. I’m living in a place where hundreds of people accused of low-level and/or nonviolent crimes are being held indefinitely, under maximum security conditions, having neither been granted due process nor convicted nor sentenced. The presumption of innocence is, quite literally, a punchline. The totalitarian culture of coercion that dictates every aspect of life in a maximum security jail has essentially chewed up and swallowed the “justice system” here, such that it is not honestly possible to even use that term without the disclaimer of quotation marks. Broken families bear a terrible burden, some driven from poverty into destitution. The racial bias could hardly be more obvious. Yet it all seems to function well beyond significant public notice, much less any questions of morality, necessity or service to the public good.

Of late, I’ve grown convinced that it couldn’t be more fitting for the Kings Bay Plowshares to have been swept up and tossed into a human dumpster such as this. The racket they run here gives real substance, on the neighborhood level, to what U.S. nuclear policy – our national religion – has been preaching to every child born on the planet for the last seventy-five years: No Lives Matter. However long it might draw out, I hope that my incarceration here will in some way speak this truth. The idols we named at Kings Bay are not sleeping. They demand sacrifice. The god of the national security state feasts on the blood of the poor.

“The ultimate logic of racism is genocide.” – Martin Luther King, Jr., March 1968

Yes, indeed.

– Mark Colville

[As of this writing, the Kings Bay Plowshares have been waiting many months for a ruling from Magistrate Judge Benjamin Cheesbro on a pre-trial argument they have placed before the court. The essence of their position is that a jury should be allowed to hear and consider the principles of faith and conscience that informed their action at Kings Bay, and that the government has acted improperly by filing criminal charges against them. For a transcript of Mark’s testimony at the pre-trial hearing https://static1.squarespace.com/…/9.26.18+Colville+RFRA+Dec… The seven were arrested on April 5, 2018.]

#blacklivesmatter

#swordsintoplowshares

#kingsbayplowshares

#abolishprisons

#abolishnuclearweapons

https://www.kingsbayplowshares7.org/

No To NATO events in DC in April

This came from Facebook, from the World Beyond War group. Protest will be on April 4, 2019.

War on Iraq Reflection

And all the suffering and dying done by US troops was to make sure that evil people like Cheney made a shitload of money. And, of course, the price paid by US troops was nearly non-exisitant compared to the price paid by the Iraqi people.

This war was a massive, massive evil done by massively evil people and promoted by our massive evil corporate media. May they all rot in Hell. This came form a Facebook post.

Our Biggest Polluter, Part 2

Not only does the US military burn more oil than any other single entity, the are also the world's biggest polluters. They are an environmental disaster.

Our Biggest Polluter On The Planet

This came from Facebook. The US military is the single biggest burner of fossil fuels on our planet. They burn more fuel than about 160  countries! And they are totally exempt from an carbon agreements (as are the military in other countries). And not only does the US government plan on drilling for oil in the Arctic after the ice melts, they also have plans for our military to conduct more wars for oil in the Arctic. I think we might be mostly gone before that drilling in the Arctic or wars in the Arctic actually happens. At least, I hope so.

Another quote from Scott Peck

“How could a whole people have gone to war not knowing why? The answer is simple. As a people we were too lazy to learn and too arrogant to think we needed to learn. We felt that whatever way we happened to perceive things was the right way without any further study. And that whatever we did was the right thing to do without reflection. We were so wrong because we never seriously considered that we might not be right. With our laziness and narcissism feeding each other, we marched off to impose our will on the Vietnamese people by bloodshed with practically no idea ow what was involved. Only when we - the mightiest nation on earth - consistently suffered defeat at the hands of the Vietnamese did we in significant numbers begin to take the trouble to learn what we have done.” - M. Scott Peck, from the book "The People of the Lie"

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I would argue that (for the most part) we never did take the trouble to learn what we have done in Vietnam. We never faced up to it, and therefore we (meaning the American people) see no reason to make reparations or feel much regret for what happened to the people who lived and currently live in Vietnam. And that is true for many aspects of our history both recent and past.

Quote from Scott Peck

“As an example of group evil MyLai was not an inexplicable ‘accident’ or unpredictable aberration. It occurred in the context of a war, which is itself an evil context. The atrocities were committed by the side that was the aggressor and that, in its aggression, had already fallen into evil. The evil of the small group - Task Force Barker - was clearly a reflection of the evil of the whole American military presence in Vietnam. And our military presence in Vietnam was directed by a deceitful, narcissistic government that had lost its bearings and that was mandated by a nation that had fallen into torpor and arrogance. The entire atmosphere was rotten. The massacre at MyLai was an event waiting to happen” - M. Scott Peck, from the book "The People of the Lie"

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All wars start with lies, and usually anyone joining in a war is lying also. And lies lead to evil. Unfortunately in the USA, the majority of the population is full of lies that came from our lying corporate media. And unfortunately, the majority of the population is too narcissistic and lazy to figure out what the truth of our nation's actions were in the past or the present. And this is why we have killed about 20 million people since the end of World War II and why hardly anyone knows about it and and hardly anyone cares. 

In honor of the White Rose Society

Sophie Scholl was killed on this date in 1943. She is an inspiration to me.

A Reflection On Our Politicians and Pundits

This came from Facebook.

Stop the US-Led Coup Against Venezuela!

Petitions and Condemnations Are Not Enough

The US Peace Movement Must Act Decisively!

U.S. Peace Council — January 26, 2019

Once again, the bloody hand of US imperialism is reaching out into Venezuela to complete the failed job of regime change that it started in 2002 against President Hugo Chavez. There is no doubt that another US-led coup is underway to topple the democratically elected government of President Maduro in the hope of putting an end to the Bolivarian Revolution in Venezuela.

The illegal act by the US Government to recognize Juan Guaido as the “President of Venezuela” is not only in violation of the International Law and the United Nations Charter, but constitutes a direct attack on Venezuelan people’s right to national sovereignty and self-determination. We do not forget that the same tactic of creating a US-fabricated “alternative government” was also used by the Obama Administration, and especially by Hillary Clinton as the US Secretary of State, in an attempt to overthrow the legitimate government of President Assad in Syria.

The forced regime change operation in Venezuela is just another instance of the ongoing policy adopted by U.S. imperialism against the governments that have been resisting US domination since the dismantling of the USSR — Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria, Yemen, Iran, Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua, North Korea — which is now being intensified by the exclusively corporate/military controlled Trump Administration. In addition, recent efforts by NATO to recruit Latin American countries, such as Colombia and Brazil, further threaten countries like Venezuela who dare to assert their autonomy. 

This criminal decades-long regime change policy is driven by both economic and strategic objectives. Venezuela has been in the US crosshairs, along with Iraq, Libya, and Iran, for its large oil reserves. Venezuela is also the primary exporter of oil to the United States. US control of these rapidly depleting oil reserves is key to the US imperialism’s domination of the global economy in the 21st Century, especially in the face of emerging powerful challenges from countries like China and Russia.

But an even more urgent motivation for US imperialism to force a regime change in Venezuela is putting an end to the anti-imperialist role Venezuela’s Bolivarian Revolution has played in Latin America. Since the ascendance of President Chavez to power in 1999, the Bolivarian Government of Venezuela has played a critical role in promoting self-determination, democracy and mass-empowerment in Latin America. It has been Cuba’s main supporter during the emergency period that it faced after the disintegration of the Socialist Camp. Venezuela provided subsidized oil to numerous countries in the Caribbean, e.g., Cuba, Haiti, Jamaica, Belize, Nicaragua, that allowed those countries to finance education, reduce poverty and pay down debt. Venezuela also provided deeply discounted heating oil to impoverished families in 25 states throughout the US.

It is for all these reasons that the success of US-led coup in Venezuela would result in a disaster, not only for the people of Venezuela, but for all of the Latin America and even the people of United States. It can easily lead to a long civil war and possibly another US military intervention, this time in Venezuela, especially since Trump and Bolton and Pompeo have consistently said that this option is on the table. It would lead to displacement of hundreds of thousands, or even millions, of people, creating a huge wave of refugees throughout Latin America, which would affect the United States as well. Given Trump’s policy of anti-refugee, and an anti-immigrant border wall, one can imagine the dimensions of the humanitarian disaster that could arise.

The U.S. Peace Council strongly opposes US imperialism’s criminal interference in the internal affairs of Venezuela and demands full respect for the will of the majority of the Venezuelan people who have freely elected Nicolas Maduro as their President.

We call upon the US peace movement to not limit itself to just signing petitions and issuing statements of condemnation, as important as they are. While these methods are necessary and helpful in applying pressure on the US Congress and the government, the history of US imperialism has demonstrated that such appeals alone have not been effective enough to stop the crimes that are being committed by our government abroad in our name.

We need to organize broad mass protests in every corner of the country, against war, against foreign intervention, and against violations of UN Charter by the US ruling class.

Many organizations in the US and around the world have already issued calls for mass protests against the ongoing US coup attempt in Venezuela (for a partial list of actions CLICK HERE).

We urge our members and supporters, and all peace-loving people, to join these actions or organize similar protests in their own area.

Let us remember how we stopped the Vietnam War. Let us join hands again to demonstrate the immense power of the people who want peace and an end to imperialist interventions.

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Local action: February 17 at 1 PM at Pritchard Park

U.S. Hands Off Venezuela Rally!

Hosted by Party for Socialism and Liberation - PSL and Party for Socialism and Liberation - Asheville

Location is Pritchard Park and time is 1 to 2:30 PM. This came from a facebook invite.

The U.S government is aggressively pushing forward its attempts to promote and facilitate a right-wing coup in Venezuela. President Trump recognized the opposition leader Juan Guaidó, who has never even run against the democratically-elected Nicolas Maduro. The U.S’s interference in another country's election is the height of hypocrisy given the uproar around the so-called Russian meddling in U.S elections. 

Once again we are witnessing the U.S.’s illegal interference in a sovereign nation of South America. 

Join the Party for Socialism and Liberation this Sunday in saying no to U.S imperialism! We will begin the rally at 1pm at Pritchard Park and then march to the Federal Building on Patton. 

NO COUP! 

NO WAR! 

NO SANCTIONS!

"Hold Out Your Hand" by Brandi Carlile

No More War!

This graphic came from the US Peace Council.

The only 'freedom and democracy' that the US brings to other countries is the freedom of the grave and the democracy of death. We must stop them.

Slavery in the USA

From The U.S. Peace Council

PLEASE CIRCULATE WIDELY! SIGN THE STATEMENT HERE -----> nowaronvenezuela.org Desplácese hacia abajo para leer la versión en español. No U.S. War on Venezuela! Support National actions on Saturday, February 23 - the one month anniversary of U.S. attempted coup.   We cannot be silent in the face of the latest U.S. aggression against the Venezuelan people. Nicolás Maduro is the president of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, chosen twice by the people as part of an internationally observed electoral process. Since the 1998 election of Hugo Chávez, the United States has been relentless in its pursuit of regime change in Venezuela. With Donald Trump in the White House, these efforts have escalated to threats of all-out military violence, the plundering of billions of dollars in wealth from the Venezuelan people and pushing a multitude of outrageous lies in the global media.  For hundreds of years, the U.S. has waged war against the people of the world through coups, invasions and economic warfare. Juan Guaidó is a U.S. puppet. He is not a representative of the Venezuelan masses. The idea that a person can swear themselves in as president at a rally in the interest of “defending democracy” is laughable. The right wing in Venezuela claim the Bolivarian elections are rigged because they refuse to participate in them. Instead they engage in voter intimidation using violence reminiscent of Jim Crow terrorism against African-Americans in the Deep U.S. South. U.S.-led sanctions and currency manipulation are responsible for the suffering in Venezuela. Marco Rubio and right-wing media guide the Venezuelan opposition from Miami. The U.S. cannot stand for any country on the planet to enjoy its natural wealth or the fruits of its labor independent of Wall Street and the Pentagon. Venezuela has the largest proven oil reserves in the world and is rich in gold and other mineral wealth. Iraq war architect John Bolton said that regime change in Venezuela would be a tremendous opportunity to gain more profits for Wall Street. We believe him. Since the Bolivarian Revolution in 1998, massive strides have been taken to uplift the working class, Afro-Venezuelans and Indigenous populations in Venezuela. The working poor have made tremendous gains because the government implemented policies and passed laws to fight racism, sexism, homophobia and economic inequality. Despite sanctions and sabotage, Venezuela has maintained a transparent and democratic system through many elections. Venezuela provides aid to struggling people worldwide through subsidized fuel and by leading the way with progressive labor laws. Their gains are part of the global struggle waged by workers and the oppressed against the wealthiest and most powerful capitalists on the planet. Therefore, we demand: ● The U.S. immediately cease all hostile actions against the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela — lift all sanctions, stop backing a coup, cease efforts to destroy the Venezuelan economy and respect the right of the Venezuelan people to self-determination. ● All countries involved in the plunder of Venezuelan wealth immediately return what they have stolen to the democratically elected government of Venezuela and its people. ● Wall Street must immediately pay reparations to the Venezuelan people for their suffering under genocidal sanctions and currency manipulation. In the internationalist and liberatory spirit of Simón Bolívar, we pledge to mobilize and fight on the side of Venezuela’s right to sovereignty, understanding that the gains won under the Bolivarian Revolution are gains for all the world’s workers and oppressed.

If you ever doubt yourself.....

The above came from a Facebook comment.

Veterans Call To Resist U.S. Coup in Venezuela

Veterans For Peace is outraged at the unfolding coup d’etat in Venezuela, which is clearly being orchestrated by the U.S. government. Two hundred years of blatant U.S. intervention in Latin America must come to an end.  Veterans For Peace was founded in 1985, in part prompted by the U.S.-backed “contra” war in Nicaragua, and U.S. support for the rightwing government in the bloody civil war in neighboring El Salvador.  We did not want to see another Vietnam War in Central America. 

Years of increasingly crippling U.S. sanctions have succeeded in destabilizing the Venezuelan economy and created great unrest, division and migration.  The U.S. government encouraged Venezuelan opposition parties to boycott last year’s election. Now they are calling the election fraudulent, and attempting to install a little-known politician more to their liking.  This is part of a dangerous game that the U.S. continues to play throughout Latin America. 

President Trump’s National Security Advisor John Bolton has called Venezuela, Nicaragua and Cuba the “Troika of Tyranny,” and boasted that they have now “met their match.”  Right-wing Cuban American Senator Marco Rubio of Florida, said to be deeply involved in orchestrating this coup, has implied that U.S. military intervention may be next. Responding to questions about possible military intervention, President Trump says that “all options are on the table.”  Trump and Vice President Mike Pence have openly encouraged the Venezuelan military to stage a coup and U.S. officials have even met with potential coup leaders.  Right-wing governments in Colombia and Brazil could also possibly be involved in U.S.-coordinated military action against the democratically elected government of Venezuela.

In our Statement of Purpose, Veterans For Peace promises to “restrain our governments from intervening, overtly and covertly, in the internal affairs of other nations.”  We call on our members in over 100 U.S. cities and internationally, to make their voices heard.  We must do all we can to prevent a bloody civil war from taking a huge toll on the Venezuelan people, and the peace-loving people of the hemisphere.

Call your political representatives, write letters to the editors, protest in the streets, resist yet another blow against democracy and human rights in this hemisphere and the world.

For more historical context details about the current situation in Venezuela, please read this Open Letter signed by 70 academics, Latin America experts and activists, including Veterans For Peace Advisory Board members, Medea Benjamin and Phyllis Bennis.

A Call To Action

A Call for National Mobilization to Oppose NATO, War, and Racism

April 4, 2019, will mark the 51st anniversary of the assassination of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., the internationally revered leader in struggles against racism, poverty and war.

And yet, in a grotesque desecration of Rev. King’s lifelong dedication to peace, this is the date that the military leaders of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) have chosen to celebrate NATO’s 70th anniversary by holding its annual summit meeting in Washington, D.C. This is a deliberate insult to Rev. King and a clear message that Black lives and the lives of non-European humanity, and indeed the lives of the vast majority, really do not matter.

Since its founding, the U.S.-led NATO has been the world's deadliest military alliance, causing untold suffering and devastation throughout Northern Africa, the Middle East and beyond. Hundreds of thousands have died in U.S./NATO wars in Iraq, Libya, Somalia and Yugoslavia. Millions of refugees are now risking their lives trying to escape the carnage that these wars have brought to their homelands, while workers in the 29 NATO member-countries are told they must abandon hard-won social programs in order to meet U.S. demands for even more military spending.

Dr. King's words linking the three evils of American society: Militarism, Racism and Poverty, and his deeply profound remark that every bomb that falls on other countries is a bomb dropped on our inner cities, reveal the deep-rooted relationship between militarism and the social, racial, economic and environmental injustices that now impoverish whole cities and rural communities and have plagued our society and the world for a long time. It was exactly one year before he was murdered that Rev. King gave his famous speech opposing the U.S. war in Vietnam, calling the U.S. government “the greatest purveyor of violence in the world” and declaring that he could not be silent.

We cannot be silent either. As Rev. King taught us, "Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.”

Every year NATO has held its summits, people around the world have organized massive protests against it: in Chicago (2012), Wales (2014), Warsaw (2016), Brussels (2017 & 2018) — and 2019 will be no exception.

We are calling for a peaceful mass mobilization against this year’s NATO Summit in Washington, D.C., on Saturday, March 30. Additional actions will take place at the opening of the NATO meeting on April 4. We ask you to make every effort to join with us in Washington DC, or, if not possible, organize a rally or demonstration in your area. We need to show, in the strongest possible way, our opposition to NATO’s destructive wars and its racist military policies around the world.

We also invite you to add your, and/or your organization’s name to the list of supports of the anti-NATO, Anti-War and Anti-Racism mass actions in Washington DC. Please go to the web site at http://no2nato2019.org to add your organizational or individual endorsement of the action or to make a donation to build the action. 

You can also contact us by email: Contact@No2NATO2019.org.

Thank You. 

Steering Committee for the March 30th Anti-NATO Mobilization:

• Bahman Azad, Coalition Against U.S. Foreign Military Bases • Ajamu Baraka, Black Alliance for Peace • Leah Bolger, World Beyond War • Alison Bodine, Mobilization Against War and Occupation • Gerry Condon, Veterans For Peace • Miguel Figueroa, Canadian Peace Congress • Sara Flounders, International Action Center • Margaret Flowers, Popular Resistance • Rev. Graylan Scott Hagler, Plymouth Congregational United Church of Christ • Madelyn Hoffman, U.S. Peace Council • Tarak Kauff, Coalition Against U.S. Foreign Military Bases, Veterans For Peace • Marilyn Levin, UNAC • Joe Lombardo, UNAC • Tamara Lorincz, Canadian Voice of Women for Peace • Jeff Mackler, West Coast UNAC • Alfred L. Marder, U.S. Peace Council • Sarah Martin, Women Against Military Madness • Nancy Price, WILPF-US Section • Paul Pumphrey, Friends of the Congo • Cindy Sheehan, Gold Star Families for Peace • Paki Wieland, CODEPINK • Phil Wilayto, Virginia Defenders • Ann Wright, Veterans For Peace, CODEPINK • Kevin Zeese, Popular Resistance

Welcome 2019

Guantanamo

It is shameful that we have an off-shore gulag, complete with torture, for over 17 years.