[Peace] Fwd:[ANSWER]: MARCH 15: Emergency Anti-War Convergence on th

[jencart]

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Date: Thu, 20 Feb 2003 00:39:32 -0500
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MARCH 15:
Emergency Anti-War Convergence on the White House

MARCH 1:
Locally-Coordinated Actions

The A.N.S.W.E.R. Coalition and other organizations are 
calling for an Emergency National Anti-War Convergence to  TAKE IT TO THE WHITE HOUSE on Saturday, March 15. There  will be parallel activities on the West Coast.

The Emergency Convergence had originally been set for  March 1 because we wanted to continue to mobilize 
pro-actively to prevent war before it started. It appeared  that the Bush administration would seize upon negative or  ambiguous language presented in the UN weapons inspectors  February 14 report and use it as a pretext for a quick 
launching of the war.

We propose now that March 1 be a day for local organizing  and that the Emergency Convergence at the White House be  on March 15. Now the Bush war timetable has been pushed  back because of the political developments that took the  administration by surprise in the last week.

1) The report by the inspectors to the Security Council on  February 14 and the subsequent discussion inside the UN  was a significant set back for the Bush administration's  plans. Included in his report, Hans Blix debunked some of  the dramatic presentation points made by Secretary of 
State Powell in his February 5 speech at the UN indicting  Iraq. The presentation by International Atomic Energy 
Agency Director General Mohammed ElBaradei revealed that  the inspectors had seen no indication that Iraq was 
working on a nuclear weapons program. It was clear from  the response of various UN delegates that the Bush 
administration had been momentarily pushed into a 
defensive posture, its arguments and rationale for a rush  to war exposed.

2) While the events of Friday at the UN were significant,  the real factor is the massive street protests of the past  few months that have forced some governments to at least  temporarily pull back from a rush to war. This weekend  brought tens of millions of people around the globe into 
simultaneous action against the war. The social and 
political relevance of the reemergence of a global mass 
movement is altering the political equation. It has been 
the basic premise of the A.N.S.W.E.R. Coalition that the 
only thing that could prevent this aggression against Iraq  was for the people themselves to become a major force  though mass action. Every government in the world and all  the mass media are recognizing this central fact.

The New York Times agrees with the Bush agenda for the  overthrow of the Iraqi government and it supports a war to  accomplish that end. Thus, it is worth including a few 
words from a front page article from the Times which 
summarizes the importance of the mass movement:

"The fracturing of the Western alliance over Iraq and the  huge antiwar demonstrations around the world this weekend  are reminders that there may still be two superpowers on  the planet: the United States and world public opinion.

"In his campaign to disarm Iraq, by war if necessary, 
President Bush appears to be eyeball to eyeball with a 
tenacious new adversary: millions of people who flooded  the streets of New York and dozens of other world cities  to say they are against war based on the evidence at 
hand." (New York Times, Monday, February 17, A1, "A New  Power in the Streets")

Because of the intervention of the people, the Bush 
administration has again been at least momentarily 
frustrated in its rush to war. Since this is a dynamic 
struggle between the "two superpowers" (a