[Peace-discuss] July 4th Parade ?

[C. G. Estabrook]

On the theme “Celebrate America,” AWARE members could carry posters celebrating Americans’ historic reluctance to go to war. (President John Adams, writing in 1813 about the French revolutionary wars: "The middle third [of the US population] composed principally of the Yeomanry the soundest part of the Nation and always averse to War, were rather luke warm both to England and France.”) 

Every American war since (and including) the 'War of Independence’ has been opposed by a majority of Americans, who had to be manipulated into war by government leaders. Not just Washington, Lincoln, Wilson, Roosevelt, Truman, and Kennedy - but also current leaders: the greatest anti-war demonstrations in human history occurred before the invasion of Iraq; and Obama got himself elected (twice) by co-opting the anti-war movement. 

See the excellent recent collection in the Library of America series, "War No More"; on the ‘hard case’ - the Second World War - see the devastating account by Nicholson Baker, “Human Smoke”; and for the horrors of the current US policy - Obama’s drone program is "the most extreme terrorist campaign of modern times” - see Andrew Cockburn, "Kill Chain.” (Maybe we should think about another AWARE reading group on books like these.)

[1] "War No More: Three Centuries of American Antiwar and Peace Writing” (2016) ed. Lawrence Rosenwald: <https://loa.org/books/511-war-no-more-three-centuries-of-american-antiwar-and-peace-writing>;

[2] "Human Smoke: The Beginnings of World War II, the End of Civilization” (2008) by Nicholson Baker: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_Smoke>; and

[3] "Kill Chain: The Rise of the High-Tech Assassins" (2015) by Andrew Cockburn: <http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/03/06/remember-kill-chain/> <http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/03/26/how-the-us-government-and-us-military-became-murder-inc/>.

Since the Clinton campaign is smearing Americans’ opposition to war as “isolationism,” we should provide some counter to their propaganda for the July 4 march.

—CGE


> On Jun 3, 2016, at 10:02 AM, Karen Aram <karenaram at hotmail.com> wrote:
> 
> I certainly support a coming together and unification of like minded groups who support the battle against,  war, injustice and racism. That might therefore exclude some, just as some groups might object to us. I hope you guys who have done an excellent job in the past, can bring it together in the spirit of cooperation, as you envision. 

> From: Stuart Levy <salevy at Illinois.edu>
> Sent: Friday, June 3, 2016 8:08:41 AM
> To: David Johnson; C. G. Estabrook; David Green; Karen Aram; Karen Medina; Stuart Levy
> Cc: salevy at Illinois.edu
> Subject: RE: July 4th Parade ?
>  
> AWARE hasn't even talked about the parade this year.  We should! 
> 
> We have organized/participated with other groups more recently.   For example two(?) years ago we were part of a Progressive Coalition that included Aware, the PDA and a few other people.  But most other potentially interested groups marched on their own.
> 
> Application deadline: June 26th.   Theme this year: "Celebrate America".
> 
> Dave, I think this would be a wonderful thing to do!
> 
> Karen and I are out of town until the 16th and can't help much until after then.
> 
> 
> 
> -------- Original message --------
> From: David Johnson <davidjohnson1451 at comcast.net> 
> Date: 06/02/2016 14:43 (GMT-06:00) 
> To: cge at shout.net,davegreen84 at yahoo.com,karenaram at hotmail.com,kmedina67 at gmail.com,stuartnlevy at gmail.com,salevy at illinois.edu 
> Subject: July 4th Parade ? 
> 
> 
> Does AWARE have any plans to have a presence in the 4th of July parade this year ?
>  
> What does everyone think of having a large Left presence in the parade of all of the various organizations in C-U.
>  
> We did this back in 2000, 6-months after the WTO Seattle protests and it was the largest procession in the parade which stretched over one block long.
>  
> Let me know what all of you think and if so, I will help organize it.
>  
> David J.