The World Can’t Wait, Won’t Wait, Isn’t Waiting

Presentation to the Kuala Lumpur Peace Conference

By Cynthia McKinney, Feb. 5, 2007

Everyone in this room and every participant in this Conference is here because we want peace.  Peace and justice.

And
these principles of peace and dignity, justice and self-determination
were embodied in the policies pursued by our host, The Honorable Tun
Mahathir, while he was Prime Minister of Malaysia.  In fact, it was Tun
Mahathir who put Malaysia
on the map for me when he stood up to the world’s economic powers and
refused to cash their check of dependency.  Instead, Tun Mahathir
returned their check and said out loud for the entire world to hear
that Malaysia would chart its own course.  As a result of that singular
act of pride, self-determination, confidence, and independence,
Malaysia boasts a strong economy and a legacy of uncommon independence.


But,
Tun Mahathir has also learned that such independent thinking, and
confidence in the people comes at a personal price.  For while his
message ricocheted around the world and struck me, an African American
woman steeped in the Old Confederate South of the United States,
the people we fight for are rarely in a position to reward such acts of
courage.  Yet the powers that be always seem to be able to exact their
punishment.  So oftentimes, where there is courage, truth, compassion,
belief in the people, and a solid sense of right and wrong, there is
also aloneness, vulnerability, or deep disappointment.

But
instead of abandoning the struggle, we come together at this important
Conference to commune with each other, learn from each other, give love
and support to each other, recharge our batteries, and continue our
work on behalf of what is right in a world currently filled with so
much wrong.

Not too long ago, I was asked by Debra Sweet to
endorse the activities of the American peace-seeking organization named
World Can’t Wait.  They advocate the impeachment of George Bush and
other Members of his Administration because in their view, the World
Can’t Wait.

I agree with them.

And after having been
defeated for the second time by an unsupportive Democratic Party and
Republican voters who crossed over and voted in the Democratic Primary
for my opponent, and knowing that George Bush had earned impeachment, I
decided that I would do it if no one else would.  So, on my last day in
Congress, after 12 years of service to my people and my country, I
offered Articles of Impeachment against President Bush, Vice President
Cheney, and Secretary of State Rice. 

Impeachment is America’s
roadmap back to dignity.  Impeachment is the Constitutional way to
handle an Administration that has, from the outset, violated so many
tenets of the U.S. Constitution.  It is also a way of saying “No, we do
not condone what has been done in our name, and we are not complicit.” 


The first time I felt the sting of Republican retribution and
Democratic Party indifference was in 2002 when I questioned the
Administration’s explanation of what happened on September 11th, 2001. 
I am the Member of Congress who asked the simple question, “What did
the Bush Administration know and when did it know it, about the tragic
events of September 11th.”  After I was defeated in 2002, I traveled
all over my country supporting the anti-war movement and informing the
American people of the lies of the Bush Administration.

The
film “American Blackout” tells the whole story of how Republicans stole
two Presidential elections and of how Republicans stole two elections
from me.

Well, as it turns out, The World Didn’t Wait.  And
activists in the rest of the world are the people now practicing the
art of effective resistance.

I guess it started in 1959 with Cuba.  However, Cuba is no longer alone in its attempt to chart its own course.

In
1998, Venezuelans elected Hugo Chavez who has used oil profits to set
up healthcare for all, arts programs for the children, and subsidized
education, including free universities.

In 2001, the people of
Cote d’Ivoire rejected dictatorship and up to today, continue to try
and chart an independent course despite huge big power interference due
to offshore oil reputed to be of the quality of Nigeria’s.

In 2002, Brazilians sent shockwaves throughout the Americas by electing the Workers’ Party Lula to become their head of state.

In
2003 Argentina elected Kirchner, 2004, Spain elected Zapatero, and
India rejected the BJP politics of division.  In 2005, Bolivia elected
Morales; 2006, Bachelet in Chile, Correa in Ecuador, Ortega in
Nicaragua were all elected, with one agenda-to provide prosperity,
independence, justice, and peace-to the people that they represent.

And let us not forget the valiant people of Haiti
who twice have had their elected President, Aristide, removed from
office by means of U.S. intrigue.  But the Haitian people took to the
streets and demanded that their votes be counted and that the election
not be stolen as the U.S. opposed the election of Aristide’s friend and
ally, Rene Preval.

Today, Preval is the President of Haiti
because the Haitian people took every step within their means to ensure
that their votes were counted and that their democracy was respected.

Against
tremendous odds, people who have far less than most Americans have-in
terms at least of material goods-stood up and took their fates in their
hands.  They did what Mario Savio asked Americans to do in the 1960s. 
They put their bodies against the levers and the gears and the wheels
of the machine and they said to the owners if you don’t stop it, we
will.  And stop it, they did.  The people of these countries stopped
the machine.  And I know that Americans can do it, too.

On
the
day before he was murdered, in his less-celebrated “I’ve Been to the
Mountaintop” speech, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. said that he is happy
to be living in the second half of the 20th Century because something
is happening in our world.  He said, “The masses of people are rising
up.  And wherever they are assembled . . . whether in Johannesburg,
Nairobi, Accra, or New York City, the cry is always the same:  “We want
to be free.”

Well,
I can stand here nearly 40 years later and say that at the dawn of the
21st Century, “something is happening in our world!”  The world’s
marginalized, exploited, and dispossessed are taking center stage
because they have decided to defy imperial domination.  They are saying
that resource wars that hurt the masses and benefit the few are
illegal, immoral, and just plain wrong.

If Dr. Martin Luther
King, Jr. were with us today, I think he would be proud of the people
around the world who are standing up for themselves.  But would he be
proud of American resistance?
 
I’m sure Dr. King would wonder
why the American people have failed to change their own government when
it’s so very possible to do, notwithstanding the stolen elections.

What
is clear is that the world isn’t waiting for the people of the United
States to act.  But what the world is showing us, is that if we, in the
United States, fail to act, we will be the ones left far behind.
 
Republicans stole the 2000 Presidential election.

Then,
on September 11th a grave tragedy befell our country.  We, the American
people, were promised a white paper by Colin Powell stating what
happened, how it happened, and who did it.  We have yet to receive such
a white paper, Osama bin Laden is on the FBI website, but not for
September 11th!  And yet, the American people continue to rely on the
truthfulness of the Administration for explanations.

Hot
on the heels of September 11th, however, the Administration pushed
through a series of draconian laws that usurp the United States
Constitution and the civil liberties embodied in the Bill of Rights
that make us “free,” the ostensible cause of the September 11th attacks
in the first place, according to the Administration story.

Then,
the Administration seized the September 11th tragedy to invade and
occupy Iraq while lying to the American people and the global community
about why this action was necessary.

A
campaign of terror ensued at home with the U.S. government targeting
the Muslim community and actually rounding up innocent, law-abiding
residents for interrogations.  Those of all faiths, races, and
ethnicities who dissented from the Administration’s policies found
themselves targeted for surveillance and worse.  Medical records, bank
records, telephone conversations, e-mails, regular mail, and more, all
became subject to government seizure.  Even church sermons,
environmentalists, and peace groups were monitored.  The Administration
spied on the American people, breaking U.S. law, and lied to them about
it.

The
Administration stole the 2004 Presidential election, and
immediately set the stage for attacks on other countries it didn’t
like.  It told us to expect war for the next generation and targeted 60
countries around the world.  It has now initiated gunboat diplomacy
against Iran, is saber rattling against Syria, taunting North Korea,
and has actually dropped bombs on the poor, defenseless people of
Somalia.  Ethiopia,
a country with a proud heritage of never having succumbed to any
colonial power is now firmly a Bush vassal, part of the
Administration’s war machine against fellow Africans.

Interestingly, none of what I’ve said is a secret in the U.S. 

When
Bobby Kennedy was asked about a U.S. military strike on Cuba during the
Cuban Missile Crisis, his response was that it was unseemly for a
country the size of the United States to use military force against a
small country like Cuba.

Bobby Kennedy, would have been President of the United States
had he not been murdered by assassin’s bullets.  And I’m told that
Bobby Kennedy was considering Dr. King to be his Vice President, but
the assassins got Dr. King, too.

Who could explain today’s
U.S. behavior to Bobby Kennedy or Dr. King?  How do we maintain any
dignity or pride or responsibility to our children and to the world’s
children when we fail to exercise every tool available to us to stop
the Bush Administration and for that matter, any future Administration
that would do this in our name?

I am pleased to announce that
I have signed the online petition pledging not to vote for any
candidate who has voted in the past or who will vote this year to fund
the war.

The petition can be found at www.petitiononline.com/Abstain/petition.html.

The
work being done here in Malaysia is necessary and we must conduct our
lives in such a way as to mean it when we say “No War!”

Each
one of us, individually, has no choice but to become the leader we are
looking for.  Otherwise, we will continue to get what we’ve always been
given:  handpicked leaders who don’t represent us.

One way for
the American people to demand accountability from their leaders and a
return to respectability is to impeach the Bush Administration. 
However, the complicity of both major U.S. parties in this intensifying
debacle is clear now that the Democrats have taken impeachment “off the
table.”  And if the Democratic Congress, that owes its majority status
to antiwar voters, votes to fund the war, then our mission will become
very clear.

We will have to change the structure of U.S. politics because changing the people, clearly, isn’t enough.
This is quite possible with the right set of circumstances.  And
the current elected leadership is helping to create those
circumstances.

When the Presidential election was stolen in Mexico, defenders of democracy shut Mexico City
down for weeks until the unrightful, new Mexican President was sworn
in.  After that, they formed a “parallel” government.  And if Mexican
defenders of democracy can do it, certainly American defenders of
democracy can do it, too.

For us, nothing less than the soul
of our country is at stake.  But for the world, nothing less than the
fate of mankind is at stake. 

Because
of the work of the Perdana Global Peace Organisation, Kuala Lumpur has
become the “peace capital” of the world.  And because of this
Conference that should be taken to every Continent Kuala Lumpur will
shine the light of peace on the world by showing us the horrors of war.



Thank
you, Tun Mahathir, for hosting this Conference for peace.  Thank you
Tun Mahathir, for giving us the courage to go forth, especially in the
United States, and build an uncompromised movement for dignity and
justice, based on peace and love.

Thank you.


You can learn more about Cynthia McKinney at www.cynthiaforcongress.com and coming soon at

 www.allthingscynthiamckinney.com.