“I do believe that,
despite the general defeated atmosphere this country is mired in, and despite
all the impoverished and despairing developments in the world, that there is
also such raw potential at this time for something absolutely unprecedented to
occur. And I want to be a part of it)
that one of the greatest challenges facing this movement, and something that is
so crucial to its development and maturation into a force that can really have
an impact, is whether or not we can inspire and motivate individuals and
communities for whom politics is an abstraction, something that is witnessed,
on the television and in the newspapers, but never actually experienced or
lived out in our day to day lives. We
have grown used to being the spectators. I’d say we are taught to be
spectators in almost every aspect of our lives…
Somehow
it has to be brought home to them that this is their world we’re talking about,
and that no amount of silence or patience will keep away the future that is
steadily approaching them. Somehow an
atmosphere has to be created that brings home the immediacy and the urgency of
the situation, an atmosphere in which the old diffusing safety valves no longer
can keep them from taking charge of the situation and empowering themselves and
each other to act) ”
from a World Can’t Wait activist, Austin TX
Let’s URGENTLY
make this a World Can’t Wait ( Drive Out the Bush Regime summer, leading up to
Thursday October 5, a day of mass repudiation, across the country. People are angry and disgusted with the whole
Regime but wondering what if anything can be done to change it. It’s up to us,
the people who have started this audacious movement, to reach out to newer and
greater numbers of people and discuss the options. We need to make the connections to this whole
fascistic program that people don’t immediately see, and get people to face up
to what this society will be like if we don’t stop and reverse the direction
the Bush Regime is taking. Events are
bearing the truth of our analysis of the situation and the importance that
people who see where this country is headed are actually in a position to turn
it ( if,
as attorney Michael Ratner said when he opened the inquiry into whether
the Bush administration is guilty of crimes against humanity, “we dare to
be as radical as the times we live in.”
This Bush Regime is in trouble, with acute problems
everywhere. Bush’s own poll numbers are
the third lowest in history: now 31%.
This year’s spring commencements are threatening to become a season of
Bush Regime embarrassments. Boston College
is in an uproar over Rice being the commencement speaker. Bush is coming to
West Point to speak, and protests by military families and West
Point graduates are being arranged. The New
School protested John McCain’s
commencement speech in connection with his speech at Jerry Falwell’s Liberty University. Then Donald Rumsfeld was disrupted and
dumbfounded by The World Can’t Wait & Ray McGovern in Atlanta earlier this month. New albums this month by The Dixie Chicks,
Pearl Jam, Pink, Paul Simon, Bruce Springsteen, and Neil Young all take on the
terrible direction the country is being dragged in, and represent the broad and
deep sentiments many people share in rejecting this course.
The overwhelming public opinion that this Regime is more
hated than ever is not deterring them from pressing ahead and hammering their
agenda into place. There is widespread
outrage this week over the vastness of the NSA warrant-less spy program that tracks
tens of millions of domestic phone calls.
Bush appointed the very general in charge of the program to be the new
chief of the CIA, extending military domination over intelligence gathering. The characters at the helm of military
intelligence include Stephen Cambone, who argued in support of Rumsfeld’s
justification for torture and General Jerry Boykin, a religious fundamentalist
lunatic infamous for claiming that George Bush was not elected by a majority
but was “appointed by God”.
Can we wait passively for Bush to be replaced in 2008,
hoping things won’t get any worse?
NO! If we don’t stop this
direction by mass upsurge of millions, whoever replaces Bush from the
Republican Party will have to be approved by the same group of Christian
fascists and neo-cons who determine what the Bush Regime does now. Why else is
John McCain speaking at Liberty University and Rudy Giuliani now openly
campaigning for Ralph Reed, darling of the Christian Coalition, saying “”You
can count me as a friend and supporter, someone who will do anything I can to
get you elected”?
The divide between what people want and what “official
politics” is offering is deeper than ever.
The Democratic Party leadership is behind the squashing of a motion for
impeachment in the CA state legislature; Nancy Pelosi & other Democratic
leaders are saying that if the Democrats gain a majority in the house, they are
not interested in impeachment. They
accept this general direction with an election platform which reads
“fascist-lite”, designed not even
to mobilize their base around sentiments against the war.
World Can’t Wait’s
time is now! If the sentiment
against Bush is galvanized into massive opposition, immense potential is there
to not just drive this regime from office in disgrace, but to repudiate and
beat back the whole direction this regime has been taking the country in. If it is not, and the official “elect-able”
politics of the mid term elections set the tone and political parameters for
debate, the political direction will continue to drift dangerously to the
right. Imagine what it would mean to people in Iraq and the rest of the world if
people here took the example of the immigrants who marched in the millions and
this October marked a new level of resistance, taking off work and school,
stopping politics and business as usual to demand DRIVE OUT THE BUSH
REGIME. What do you think would change
in the political climate in this country if The Call to drive out the Bush
Regime became the political terms the media had to respond to?
We recently received a letter that represents the mood and
potential among people and especially youth to take up The Call to change the
course of history. The whole letter is attached and we would suggest getting
together in WCW committees and with your friends and neighbors to discuss this.
How to Make October 5th the Major Event We Are Calling
For:
*Get out There
and Talk to People About The Call. Get
World Can’t Wait out to millions more. Get it in the headlines.
Print the call as a poster and hang it in store windows, in
coffee shops, and bus stops.
Run it in your newsletter or zine and get it printed in
local newspapers
Get your organization to sponsor it as an ad.
Attend the conference of your professional association or go
to one you’d like to know more about, the Librarians, scientists , teachers,
unions and religious groups are all
holding important conferences and conventions this summer. Attend, organize a
workshop, speak at a Plenary Session and help draft and get resolutions supporting
The Call and WCW passed.
Go door to door and set up tables in front of stores or
parks and have people sign The Call.
Over the summer we must collect a million signatures. Collect signers contact information and
e-mail with their signature and fundraise with their help to build the funds to
further publicize The Call.
Find out what people
are thinking about the political situation in this country. If you need help starting the conversation
ask questions like these:
1. Do you think any or all of the
‘Your Government is’ are true? If so,
how is this situation tolerable?2. Do you think the statement in
The Call ‘That which you will not resist and mobilize to stop, you will learn (
or be forced ( to accept” is true?3. Do you think that the official
politics as usual can stop this direction?4. What do you think the
political situation in this country would look like if people did what the
immigrants did this spring, flooded into the streets, and took it upon
themselves to demand that this regime be driven from office?
To promote WCW and The Call we need 3 new versions of The
Call:
A poster of The Call
A large high-quality glossy poster of The Call to match the
first (the Iran
poster) in a poster series (posters on abortion & contraception, theocracy,
Katrina, etc. will be released all summer – with matching t shirts)A glossy beautiful postcard of The Call that people can keep
and pin up
*Active investigation
into peoples’ thinking to learn more about the political mood, and how it’s changing. What is compelling people to act? Many of them are taking up political activity
for the first time in their lives but what is still holding people back? What do they fear and what do they hope for?
What do they think of this movement and what can we learn from their insights
and questions? What do we learn from both the broad sentiments as well as the
thinking and feelings of a few people who are ahead of the pack? What might that indicate about what is percolating
and taking shape at a deeper level or at a level that isn’t as immediately
apparent?
This is something we have to systematically and
scientifically learn from, sum up for the movement and in a timely way because
when things really take off all this can be changing and developing very
quickly.
*Raising money for this movement is perhaps the most
decisive thing to be done. There will be no
removing a regime without raising funds commensurate to that challenge. The Bush regime and politics as usual have
the full force of the media behind them.
We cannot let it be said that people failed to stop this slide into
theocracy and permanent war for want of money, in this, the wealthiest country
in the world.
Donating and raising money matters. It concentrates a commitment. Huge funds will make it possible to reach,
inspire, and organize the millions across the country who are aching for a way
to oppose this regime. Fund raising for WCW will be approached both as a mass
movement of small donations and through significant fund raising by those with
significant resources.
*Giving a bold focal point to the summer, the Drive Out the Bush Regime Bus Tours that go straight to the hot
points, vividly drawing a line of demarcation.
The tours will attract media attention and friend and foe alike, and
will be a major way that momentum and interest is built over the summer. It’s part of bringing alive the Call, and
concretely organizing people.
Don’t wait to start a tour of your own right away. Take the Memorial Day weekend to get in a van or
car caravan and take WCW on the road.
(On the East Coast we are thinking of taking WCW to Pennsylvania to track and follow the craven
pandering to the hypocritical and amoral social and moral values of the Bush
agenda by the likes of Bob Casey, the “pro-life” Democrat opponent of
Senator Santorum.) Take WCW with you
when you go on vacation and get the call to someone new. Get your friends together for a road trip
with boxes of calls, posters, T-shirts and buttons. Organize a trip to the
border or a red state or and exurb or a progressive community in the country. Contact people ahead and have them ready for
your arrival with a forum or community meeting or a living room chat. Leave behind the movement and have the first
step be a collective picture in front of their city hall with the Drive Out The
Bush Regime banner. We’d like to start putting together a picture site of
people in cities and towns across the country holding Drive Out the Bush Regime
signs, in a tapestry borrowing from the AIDS quilt project of the 1980’s which
gave everyone a way to represent their sentiments.
Nationally, we are
organizing a bus tour starting in New Orleans
and ending in South Dakota,
stopping to protest symbols of the Bush Regime’s base and supporters, holding
speak-outs and film showings, teach-ins and community meetings, the tour will
be a lightning rod for the discontent in the country. Youth, military families, veterans, new
activists and organizational representatives will take part in the tour, joined
by well-known signers of the Call at key events. The tour will meet people at
libraries, theaters, bookstores, coffee shops, gay bars, abortion clinics,
youth hang-outs, mosques, churches, temples, military installations, and
connect with those under attack (abortion providers, LGBT community,
librarians, professors). It may
intersect with World Can’t Wait’s presence at concerts. An advance & press team will project the
tour to the media, and a film and blogging crew will document it along the
way. The tour will be connected to the
WCW National Office via a Tour Coordinator.
Projected calendar: June 28-July 20.
*Make the next
big focal point the July 4th
weekend. Organize a well-publicized block party and get a permit to block
off a couple of city blocks. Look at all the creative energy that is pulsing
and bring bands and entertainment out to reach ‘critical mass’. Make sure that all the immigrants, their
culture and languages are included, in opposition to the chauvinist and jingoistic
displays that will be held that day,
There is a place and community for people who feel THE WORLD CAN’T
WAIT. If you can’t block off a street,
do a picnic in your local park and put up a big banner WCW – Drive Out the Bush
Regime! and raise money . Set a goal for calls distributed that day and make
sure to get out to the official fireworks displays and parades.
*Concert Tours: World Can’t Wait plans to be part of
major tours over the summer. Van’s
Warped Tour goes to 40+ cities from June 15–August 11, and WCW team will
travel the whole tour, but more help is needed to join them in each city. Also Lollapalooza, Bonaroo, and other
nationally important local festivals need to be stamped with “Drive Out
the Bush Regime”.
*Start
conceptualizing and further envisioning the character, spirit and scope of what Oct 5 should be. Talk to people
about this as part of doing active investigation and write up your thoughts for
the national organization. Let’s start wrangling with this now and come
together in conferences later this summer to finalize plans.
*Idea: Book clubs! The books written by major signers of the Call
are a great place to start. Discussions
can happen anywhere people have access to the website. Needed: book editor for the site; and more
suggested titles with short reviews & sample questions.
*Last but not least –
and in fact it’s a beginning kick off to the summer ( announcing an exciting
session of political education and field work happening in NYC next month. Off
this people can organize similar sessions, especially for students coming back
into town at the end of the summer. June
2-11 in NYC will include lectures and evening programs that can be attended by
anyone interested, and daytime field work ( heading to an immigrant neighborhood
one day, Harlem the next, out to the suburbs, to the Darwin exhibit and to
plays that are speaking to the present extremes. A sampling of the speakers:
Cristina Page: author of “How the Pro-Choice
Movement Saved America: Freedom, Politics, and the War on Sex” will
discuss the Christian fundamentalist attack on contraception and sex educationDr. Scott Gilbert, evolutionary biologist, and Dr.
David Kohn, editor of the Darwin Manuscripts, on evolution and the importance of critical
thoughtEsther Kaplan, author of
“With God on Their Side: How Christian Fundamentalists Trampled Science,
Policy, and Democracy in George W. Bush’s White House”
*Needed! Volunteers
for the national office! Each
project needs co-ordinators.
The National Office Manager who has helped lead the whole
organization for the last 6 months is undertaking a new role as Development
Director, and we need her replacement as soon as possible. There are many roles and jobs to be filled.
*************
More excerpts of a letter sent after the writer heard
Sunsara Taylor on a speaking tour:
Everywhere I go, I hear the issues being brought up and
discussed. I’m often surrounded by young people, and I’m shocked at how often
the conversation turns to the Bush administration. There’s a common language
developing among the youth in this country. And even with the more conservative
of youth, I hear a common tone between them and their more progressive-minded
peers when it comes to the government in general, and to authority in general,
actually. Whether they’re bitching about the police cracking down on pot or the
economy or corporate control or the army committing atrocities overseas,
there’s a common tone, and it’s one of disgust and defiance.
But here’s the thing: even when there does seem to be an
atmosphere of outrage, there is always a reluctance on their part to actually
do something. And I think that, while consumerism and a culture of passive
spectacle-watching are a big part of it, a great part of it has to do with the
nature of political movements in general over the years.
I think there has developed a strong lack of spontaneity, of
immediacy, of even joyful activity in political movements over the past few
decades. I know what a lot of people think of when they hear the word
“protest.” They think of a bunch of people gathering signs and
marching from point A to point B, with the permission and under the careful
guidance of some authority, usually the local police force, at which point they
are all subjected to speech after speech, filled with the same fiery rhetoric
they’ve heard a thousand times over, before being told to disperse peacefully
once more. Are they any more empowered, after these rallies, to take that
collective energy and spirit and apply it to their day to day lives?
I certainly am for mass demonstrations. Any movement with
the stated intention of World Can’t Wait is going to need, obviously, the
participation of millions of individuals from all walks of life, and often in
nationally co-ordinated actions that will really lend to the atmosphere we need.
But I think that the old forms of demonstrations have grown meaningless for a
lot of people, and the general activist spirit has stagnated significantly. And
this isn’t leading to some simple-minded call for violent action (though I do
believe in some very specific circumstances violent force can be justified).
I’m not someone from the Black Block here.
But I think that if we round up a bunch of people and ask
them all to be spectators once more, this time watching a bunch of organizers
and endorsing intellectuals speak at their rallies, then they will never be
evoked or empowered or equipped to bring about substantial societal change. And
the taking on of not just a president and his administration, but of their
entire program, is a huge shift. You’re asking people to do something that is
truly terrifying, and something the majority of them have probably never
imagined themselves capable of doing.
I really think that new possibilities for what a movement of
people could look like have to be considered. I think that if all the energy of
the organization is focused on intermittent mass demonstrations then it just
won’t draw as many people out of their doorsteps as is needed. Or, worse, it
may draw people out in mass numbers we could never have imagined, only to have
those people find themselves participating in the same politics they’ve seen
before.
If we’re really talking about creating this intended
environment, I really think that we have to push ourselves to continually
exploring new tactics, new ways in which people can contribute, both
collectively and as individuals. How many artists and musicians are out there,
for example, with amazing resources and local connections who could really give
something of value? Are there, alongside solemn or defiant demonstrations,
street parties that could be had? Not just acts against this administration,
but acts for our communities, acts that create community in a deep and
long-lasting yet immediately felt way? What could we do that called for, not
just the creativity and organizing skills of a few individuals, but for what
everyone has to contribute? Librarians, grandmothers, prisoners, nurses,
students, businessmen and women, the homeless?
It’s a borrowed phrase, but what could we do to make
resistance irresistible?
The actions and demonstrations that so impacted this country
during the 60s and 70s were varied and diverse. Some were legal, others were
not. Some were planned and organized. Others were more spontaneous and
unregulated. There seemed to be room for rage and joy, solemnity and laughter.
The whole breadth of human experience and expression.”