[Peace] Fwd: FILIBUSTER AT UIUC

[Wendy Edwards]

Interesting, but hasn't this already been done by Preacher Dan?

On Mon, May 16, 2005 at 05:51:15PM -0700, Laura Haber wrote:
> see below for an interesting protest idea.
>  
> -Laura
> 
> hannah son <hhson at uiuc.edu> wrote:
> Date: Mon, 16 May 2005 17:49:11 -0500
> From: hannah son <hhson at uiuc.edu>
> Subject: Fwd: FILIBUSTER AT UIUC
> To: esarery at uiuc.edu, hamidito at uiuc.edu, chrejsa at uiuc.edu, badr at uiuc.edu,
> lazare at uiuc.edu, amyrios at uiuc.edu, jennyho at uiuc.edu, vcarreon at uiuc.edu,
> slaughter at uiuc.edu, rbarua at uiuc.edu, msimon at uiuc.edu,
> finucane at uiuc.edu, lhaber at uiuc.edu, lmccoy at uiuc.edu, laska at uiuc.edu,
> devenpor at uiuc.edu, jduax at uiuc.edu, frias at uiuc.edu, rscott2 at uiuc.edu
> 
> hey guys, (read below) 
> ..
> 
> 
> 
> .....
> 
> .
> 
> 
> ....
> who's in?
> (i'm thinking in front of the union or maybe under a tree on 
> the quad. your thoughts? if you know of more ppl who'd be 
> interested please forward.. or quality listserves...)
> 
> we could start at noon wednesday then go til 5 or midnight
> (but we'll have a signup sheet incase ppl passing by want to 
> sign up) 
> 
> you could freestyle about filibustering, read camus, talk 
> about your lack of direction in life, or about the dream you 
> had last night. or something overtly political.
> 
> this sounds fun and smart. 
> _____________________________________________________
> swarm this part around, yeah? signup addon ifyes
> WED MAY 18
> 12:00 hannah
> 12:30
> 1:00
> 1:30
> 2:00
> 2:30
> 3:00
> 3:30
> 4:00
> 4:30
> 5:00
> 
> 
> 
> 
> To: hhson at uiuc.edu
> From: teresa leonardo <teresal at Princeton.EDU>
> Subject: FILIBUSTER AT UIUC
> Date: Mon, 16 May 2005 15:14:36 -0400
> 
> Dear Hannah,
> 
> My name is Teresa Leonardo and I am one of the organizers of the Frist 
> Filibuster event at Princeton University (www.FilibusterFrist.com).  I 
> got your name from an article in the Daily Illini about the 
> anti-nuclear option protest held a couple weeks ago.
> 
> Here at Princeton we maintained a filibuster in support of the Senate 
> filibuster for 16 days continuously and brought the protest to DC where 
> we were joined by Congressmen and Senators.  We?ve been covered by the 
> Washington Post, New York Times, Time Magazine, CNN, MSNBC, CSPAN, and 
> the PBS news hour with Jim Lehrer; we?ve been in the news in England, 
> Holland, and Ireland (and likely other countries). 
>  
> Right now we are looking for organizers to start filibusters in all 50 
> states (ideally by this Wednesday.) A filibuster protest at your 
> school would be an incredibly powerful statement, especially as part of 
> a nation-wide protest.  We need your help.  It really is easy; all you 
> need is five students and a couple of books outside.  We will support 
> you with all the other details and, with our media contacts, we can 
> rapidly spread word of your filibuster.
> 
> Please let me know if you would be able to help organize this and/or if 
> you know of other people who might be interested.
> Below follows more detailed background and logistical information.
> 
> Hope to hear from you soon.
> best,
> Teresa
> 
> 
> This letter explains our plans to start filibusters on campuses all 
> over the country; it details the ease with which this can be done; it 
> lists the things we can do to get you media attention.  Please read it 
> with an enthusiastic sense of possibility. 
>  
> As you likely know, Senator Frist has promised to bring two of the 
> controversial judicial nominees to the floor on Wednesday.  He expects 
> the Senators uncomfortable with these nominees to begin a filibuster, 
> at which point he plans to implement the nuclear option.  When I began 
> working with the other students on my campus, I did so because I 
> thought that it was important to protect the Senate institution of the 
> filibuster.  I don?t believe I understood then, however, how important 
> it really is.  After three weeks, it has sunk in, and I realize it on 
> an emotional level: the nuclear option would devastate our political 
> system, in institutional and cultural terms.  It would fatally 
> compromise the ideological independence of the judiciary, the branch of 
> government most crucial to shelter from ideological pressures; it would 
> be nothing less than a constitutional coup.  It would also likely 
> destroy beyond the possibility of repair the ability of members of both 
> parties to work tog ether.  Partisanship is divisive now; imagine the 
> consequences if the nuclear option is implemented. 
>  
> But you understand the urgency of the situation.  The question I am 
> writing to help you answer is: What can you do to disable the nuclear 
> option?  In fact, a lot.  The Princeton students, and the students from 
> other campuses who have filibustered, have managed to alter public 
> discourse on the filibuster.  We managed this not by the arguments we 
> made per se, but by making ourselves into a symbol of concerned and 
> disinterested citizens, idealistic and enthusiastic students, the 
> generation who will have to deal with the consequences, etc.  You know 
> the story about students.   The mock filibuster is a simple and 
> eloquent visual symbol.  And, having created that symbol, we got people 
> to pay attention to it.    This affects national perception of the 
> filibuster controversy.  The loud articulation of student support for 
> the institution, coming from a body of citizens entirely uninvolved in 
> professional politics, is a counterfoil, a contrast to those Senators, 
> who want to implement the nuclear option.  The contrast creates in 
> itself the perception that those Senators are acting in radical and 
> unprincipled self-interest; a corollary is that it paints the senators, 
> who want to protect the filibuster, as simple defenders of American 
> government.  We have done some real and substantial work already 
> setting the debate in these terms.  But we can do more; we can really 
> control the way this country talks about the filibuster. 
>  
> Our plan is to start filibusters on as many campuses as possible.  Each 
> filibuster should start, at the latest, on Tuesday morning.  It should 
> continue through to Wednesday, at least until noon; but we should be 
> prepared to go to 5 pm.  The goal is to be filibustering when the 
> Republican leadership opens the debate on the controversial nominees.  
> Imagine what the story will be on Wednesday morning, the day of the 
> debate, if 50, 100 schools all across the country have risen up in 
> parallel protest.  This will be huge, and the thing is, we can do it ? 
> we can do it easily.  All it takes is 50 to 100 individual decisions to 
> filibuster. 
>  
> Some of you are still in session.  Others (like us) are in exam 
> period.  Others have finished for the year.  It will be easiest for the 
> first group but ? and I want to stress this ? eminently doable for the 
> others.  The first and only thing you have to understand about starting 
> a filibuster is that it?s really easy. 
>  
> ?           You don?t need to worry about logistics, about planning in 
> advance.  You don?t need a microphone or a podium.  All you need is a 
> student ready to read or speak for an hour, a student to follow her, 
> and a student to follow her, etc.. 
> ?           It is easy to find the small number you need to start it.  
> You will find that the event generates its own momentum very quickly.  
> You will have students eager to sign up and participate.  (Okay, you 
> will need someone, not speaking, at the site with a sign-up sheet.)   
> That?s all you need to do.  If you plan to go from Tuesday morning at, 
> say, 10:00 to Wednesday, noon, you only have to get 26 students.  We 
> have been assigning half-hour slots because the demand to participate 
> is so high; we were generally booked 60 or so hours in advance. 
> ? The filibuster can run for any length of time. Overnight 
> filibusters are great, but you could also do a more simple filibuster 
> from, say, 12-5pm.
> ?           Choose a well-traveled place on campus, so that people know 
> what you are doing. 
> ?           Allow people to read or say whatever they would like.  
> Don?t worry about that. 
>  
> That?s all.  If you want a more elaborate event, you can look at some 
> tips at http://www.campusprogress.org/tools.  You can also get 
> information about the history of and issues surrounding the Senate 
> filibuster.  But you really don?t have to go there.  Just do the 
> above. 
>  
> The effectiveness of this strategy doesn?t lie in the quality, as it 
> were, of each particular filibuster event ? I don?t even know what 
> ?quality? would mean in this context.  It lies in the simple fact of 
> students having a filibuster.  That fact speaks for itself and, if each 
> of you start a filibuster, it will speak very loudly indeed. 
>  
> Once you have decided to start a filibuster, we can help you with the 
> rest.  We have received significant media attention and, in so doing, 
> have established significant contacts.  We can make sure that people 
> across the country know about your particular filibuster. 
>  
> PUBLICITY
>  
> ?           our website is the most visited site in the world for 
> people who want to know about the filibuster.  We will announce your 
> filibuster on it and post a statement from you about your reasons for 
> holding it.  That statement will be posted alongside statements from 
> constitutional luminaries like Larry Tribe of Harvard Law.  
> ?           Though it is not necessary, you are welcome to start your 
> own website and start or (easier) borrow a blog to discuss the event 
> and the issues.  We will link to both on our website. 
> ?           We will help you craft a press release to be sent out on 
> Monday announcing your event.
> ?           We will use our own very extensive list of media contacts 
> to issue the release and we have already developed the credibility that 
> will make sure people listen. 
> ?           We can advise you on how best to contact local media and 
> get attention from political blogs.  These were the two seeds of our 
> publicity success. 
> ?           We can provide you with talking-points papers to speak with 
> media and strategy memos on the way to represent yourself most 
> effectively.  (You will never again be impressed ? if you ever have 
> been ? by talking heads on TV.) 
> ?           We can put you in touch with local political action groups, 
> who can help you organize your event and get you in touch with media. 
>  
> It?s easy and it will be effective.  Simple as that. 
>  
> Once you have decided to start a filibuster, get in contact with us by 
> email.  We?ve set up a dedicated account for you: pctbust at hotmail.com.  
> Please email us at that account, putting your state?s abbreviation in 
> the title.  Email should include a simple announcement of your 
> intention to start a filibuster, and when; three names, each with a 
> cell phone number so we can talk strategy in person; the url of any 
> website you start or blog on which you are documenting the event.
>  
> You are welcome to stop reading here, because you know all that you 
> need to know.  But there are a few other supplementary pieces of advice 
> that I have to give.
>  
> ?           In organizing your filibuster, get in touch with other 
> progressive groups on campus ? College Democrats, Abortion-rights 
> groups, Environmental groups, etc.  The network thus created would be 
> able to sustain a filibuster for 5 days even without other students 
> signing up. 
> ?           Recruit faculty to speak.  The media love this.  The media 
> covering the filibuster at Princeton got much more excited by a 
> Nobel-prize winning physicist (doing nothing more than reading, kind of 
> monotonously, from a physics textbook) than all of the Congressmen who 
> came to speak.  This, in fact, prompted our first jump to a new level 
> in press coverage.  Faculty speakers also engage students on campus.  
> Faculty can say something substantial in their own words or read from 
> whatever text they choose. 
> ?           Set up a stand to the side of your filibuster where 
> students can call Senators who have not declared how they intend to 
> vote on the nuclear option.  Use the text and numbers I provide at the 
> bottom of this email. 
> ?           Prepare a short statement that participants can read at the 
> beginning or end of their turn, explaining why you are filibustering.  
> You can use ours:
>  
> We are here today filibustering in support of the filibuster.  Senate 
> Majority Leader Bill Frist?the Frist whose family funded the building 
> behind me?is pressing what he calls the ?nuclear option,? a rule change 
> that would ban filibusters of judicial nominations.  Throughout U.S. 
> history, the Senate filibuster has served as an important element of 
> the checks and balances system, preventing a partisan majority from 
> ruling through tyranny while promoting bipartisan compromise and 
> moderation.  We are here because we are dismayed at the plan to 
> dismantle one of the only protections for the minority party, weaken 
> the Senate?s constitutionally recognized duties of advice and consent, 
> and rubber-stamp the President?s far-right nominees for the federal 
> courts.  The courts belong to all Americans, not just the party in 
> power.  And federal judges are appointed to their positions for life, 
> which means that unlike the President, who will leave office in four 
> years, the judges appointed
> today will have an impact on YOU for the next forty years.  So?say YES 
> to the Frist filibuster, and NO to Sen. Frist?s attack on the 
> filibuster.
>  
> So that?s it.  I?m sorry its not more complicated, more of an effort.  
> I promise you, however, that it is personally satisfying and 
> politically effective nonetheless. 
>  
> I want to say, in conclusion, that the people who started the 
> filibuster at Princeton hoped that they could go for one half of one 
> day.  We didn?t expect it to go on for more than two weeks; we didn?t 
> expect to be on the front page of nytimes.com.  But in hindsight, we 
> see how all that happened and we realize how simple it all was. 
>  
> I look forward to hearing from you. 
>  
> Best regards,
>  
> Teresa
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