03 Mar 2014
Events, Families of Veterans, Veterans For Peace Permalink

Fundraiser for Veterans For Peace at Squashed Grapes

March 3, 2014

squashed_grapes_logoPlease Join Us at Squashed Grapes
http://www.facebook.com/SquashedGrapes
2351 East Main St, Ventura
Sunday, March 16, 2014
1pm – 4pm

To listen to good music by the band popularly known as Home Made Jam. They have volunteered their musical talent  to raise funds for Veterans For Peace. Funds will be utilized for scholarships and our work towards peace and social justice.

At this event you’ll enjoy good food at reasonable prices and the company of each other who are  believers in the pursuit of peace and human harmony at home and abroad.
For more information please contact: Anthony Whitaker (805) 813-1463

Program 

1:00 pm – Welcome by VFP Chapter 112 President – Sr. Acevedo

1:20 pm – Music Time featuring “Home Made Jam”

2:30 pm – Intermission – Poetry  Reading:
Los Pintos de Gitmo
Prisoners of Guantanamo Bay
Presented by: VFP Member Gabriel Serrano
…in the spirit of their liberation

2: 45 pm – Music Time featuring “Home Made Jam” until your feet get tired of Rockin N Rollin

4:00 pm – Thank you very much for your attendance and contribution

Co-Sponsors: In the spirit PUMA “Pintos Unidos Mexicanos Americanos

 

17 Feb 2014
News, Politics, Veterans Issues No Comments Permalink

Proposition 41 – support request

February 17, 2014 No Comments

As you are aware, last year all veterans’ organizations I represent, including yours, supported AB 639 by Speaker John Pérez from Los Angeles.

This bill required that $600 million of existing CalVet bonding authority be used to build multifamily permanent supportive housing for disabled veterans to be built near existing VA facilities or California State Veterans Homes.

This measure does not interfere with or change the current CalVet Home Loan program for single family homes or farms.  It adds to the existing program.

This program is now on the June ballot as Proposition 41.  The sponsors are asking all veterans groups that supported AB 639 to sign the attached form allowing your organization to be listed in support.

FYI – it is 100% legal for non-profit veterans groups to sign on in support of propositions on the ballot.

You will recall your organization supported Proposition 36 in 2012.  Prop. 36 was to allow military personnel to continue to get long-term auto insurance discount when they were deployed overseas. Unfortunately it failed.

Please review the enclosed form and have the Commander and/or the Adjutant sign the form.
View Campaign Prospectus

Time is short; the election is in four months. 

In the interest of full disclosure, I have been appointed as a member to the Coalition for Veterans Executive Board as an unpaid volunteer.

 

Pete Conaty
www.peteconaty.com

 

17 Feb 2014
News, Politics No Comments Permalink

Cindy Sheehan Running For Governor

February 17, 2014 No Comments

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February 20th is the deadline for “Signatures in Lieu” of filing fee to get Cindy Sheehan on the ballot for Governor here in California. 

The campaign has been working since January 1st to collect the signatures, and we really do not have a clear idea of how many have been collected, but we believe it is far short of the 10k needed.

That means that we will have to pay 35 cents per signature NOT collected, and we also do not have the money on hand in our campaign chest to do that.

Please make a DONATION, or PLEDGE today. http://cindyforcalgov2014.nationbuilder.com/donate

In these days of crumbling empire, crumbling economy, and crumbling infrastructure, a NEW DAY and NEW WAY for California are needed.

——

Jerry Brown says: “California is Back” We say: “For the 1%. We want it back for all.”

Jerry Brown supports fracking and other forms of oil extraction.

We support expanded, accessible, clean public transportation and using the subsidies and tax breaks given to Big Oil to invest in clean and renewable forms of energy.

Jerry Brown supports nuclear power, we say, “Decommission all nuclear power plants.”

Jerry Brown is in the pockets of the Prison Industrial Complex, we say, “Free all non-violent offenders and invest that money in our children and education.”

Jerry Brown wants to run unreasonable surpluses, we say, “give that money back to the people by restoring needed public and social services.”

Jerry Brown is unconstitutionally going forward with the “Tunnel Project,” we say: STOP! The people of California have already said, “No.”

There are many ways that we oppose the government of the 1% and feel that we need to wrest OUR STATE out of their hands by this people’s movement.

 

 

17 Feb 2014
Costs of War, News No Comments Permalink

What’s Troubling American Troops

February 17, 2014 No Comments

It’s about “combat experiences,” not length of deployment.

By Mark Thompson
@MarkThompson_DC
Feb. 04, 2014

This Army graph makes crystal clear what many U.S. troops, and their loved ones, have long suspected: the more combat events they experience, the more mental-health problems they will suffer. In fact, according to this illustration from a new Army report, there is a direct linear relationship between combat exposure and resulting mental maladies.

http://swampland.time.com/2014/02/04/military-troops-iraq-afghanistan-ptsd-combat/#ixzz2smKxMCsM

16 Feb 2014
Costs of War, News No Comments Permalink

Santa Barbara: March 15-2014 Global Network Space Organizing Conference

February 16, 2014 No Comments

March 14-16, 2014
Vandenbergs Role in US Global Domination

Implications of US Pivot into the Asia-Pacific
22nd Annual Space Organizing Conference

La Casa de Maria Retreat and Conference Center
Santa Barbara, California

More Information: http://www.space4peace.org/actions/gnconf_2014.htm

The 2014 Global Network space organizing conference will be held near Vandenberg AFB, California on March 14-16.  We will meet at the La Casa de Maria Retreat and Conference Center in Santa Barbara.  On Friday, March 14 well organize a 4:00 pm vigil at the front gate of Vandenberg and on the evening of March 15 we will hold a public event at Trinity Episcopal Church in Santa Barbara.

Conference Program

Friday, March 14
2:00 pm Hospitality lounge & Conference registration at La Casa de Maria Retreat Center (800 El Bosque Rd, Santa Barbara). All guests should check in at the registration office, and then proceed to Casa San Ysidro.

3:30 pm Leave for Vandenberg AFB

4:00 – 5:30  Vigil at Vandenberg AFB

6:00 – 7:30  Dinner at Casa San Ysidro house

–         Welcome by Dennis Apel (Guadalupe Catholic Worker House)

–         Music by Holly Gwinn Graham (Olympia, Washington)

 

8:00 – 9:30 Showing of Ghosts of Jeju documentary film

 

Saturday, March 15
7:30 am  Breakfast at Casa San Ysidro house

9:00 – 11:00 Introductions and local updates

11:15 – 12:00 Presentation by Bard Wormdal (Norwegian journalist) on his book The Satellite War

12:00 – 1:30  Lunch and awards

3:00 – 4:00 Presentation by Tamara Lorincz (Canadian activist) on Conversion & Demilitarisation

5:15 – 6:15 pm  Dinner

6:30 pm Move to Trinity Episcopal Church (1500 State Street)

7:00 – 9:00 Community program at Trinity Episcopal Church (free and open to public)

–         Welcome by David Krieger (Nuclear Age Peace Foundation)

–         Dennis Apel (Guadalupe Catholic Worker House)

–         Dave Webb (GN Chairperson, Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, Leeds, UK)

–         Andrew Lichterman (Western States Legal Foundation)

–         Christine Hong (Korea Policy Institute and US Santa Cruz)

–         Mary Beth Sullivan (Social worker & peace conversion activist, Bath, Maine)

–         Music by Tom Neilson & Holly Gwinn Graham

 

Sunday, March 16
7:30 am Breakfast

9:00 am – 12:00  Global Network annual membership meeting (Election of board, coordinator’s report, budget review, strategy & planning discussion, next meeting decisions, 2014 Keep Space for Peace Week theme)

12:00 Lunch

1:00 Check out of retreat center 

—-

 

Global Network Against Weapons & Nuclear Power in Space
(207) 443-9502

globalnet@mindspring.com

http://www.space4peace.org/

http://space4peace.blogspot.com/  (blog)

 

05 Feb 2014
News No Comments Permalink

Countless Dead, Poverty, Corruption – and the Taliban Rising What We Did to Afghanistan

February 5, 2014 No Comments

by PATRICK COCKBURN

A few years ago in Kabul, I was listening to a spokesman for an Afghan government organisation who was giving me a long, upbeat and not very convincing account of the achievements of the institution for which he worked. To relieve the tedium, and without much expectation of getting an interesting reply, I asked him – with a guarantee of non-attribution – what benefits the Afghan government had brought to its people. Without hesitation the spokesman replied that these benefits were likely to be very limited “so long as our country is run by gangsters and warlords”.

Scroll down on this page to read article

 

05 Feb 2014
Events, Families of Veterans, News, Veterans Issues No Comments Permalink

GI Coffee House Sunday February 16 in Oxnard

February 5, 2014 No Comments

CoffeeHouseImage2

Representations of Three G.I. ‘Coffee Houses’ will tell the story of their vital work to support service members, veterans and military families while challenging war and militarism from inside the military community.

They come from Under the Hood at Fort Hood in Killeen Texas, Coffee Strong at Joint base Lewis- McChord near Seattle, Washington And The Clearing Barrel at the U.S. Army Garrison (USAG) in Kaiserslautern, Germany.

It is more important than ever that G.I.s know their rights within the military. They must have access to information about all their options. They need counseling on how to avoid being deployed to war and how to seek a discharge from the military as a Conscientious Objector or on medical or other grounds. Service members need support from the military and veteran communities where they are based.

Please join us for this important discussion at:

Café on ‘A’ 
438 S. A Street  Oxnard, CA

_____________________________________________

FLYER:

GI_CoffeeHouseFlyer_Feb16

 

24 Jan 2014
Publications No Comments Permalink

Latest Edition of Space Alert

January 24, 2014 No Comments

Screen shot 2014-01-24 at 11.22.43 AMDear Friends, Our latest edition of our Global Network newsletter, Space Alert, is now finished and is at the printers.  There is extensive reporting in this issue about the US “pivot” into the Asia-Pacific and anti-drone campaigning.

You can see the full color version online at:   http://www.space4peace.org/newsletter/Space%20Alert%2029.pdf 

We are looking for folks who will help us distribute copies of the printed newsletter in their local community.  We will provide newsletters to you for free and only ask reimbursement for the cost of postage to you.  So if you can help pass them around please let us know how many copies we should send you.

Best wishes to all and thanks for your help.

Bruce K. Gagnon
Coordinator
Global Network Against Weapons & Nuclear Power in Space

http://www.space4peace.org/

http://space4peace.blogspot.com/  (blog)

24 Jan 2014
Fukushima, Health, News No Comments Permalink

Toll Mounts Among U.S. Sailors Devastated by Fukushima Radiation

January 24, 2014 No Comments

By Harvey Wasserman

The roll call of U.S. sailors who say their health was devastated when they were irradiated while delivering humanitarian help near the stricken Fukushima nuke is continuing to soar.

So many have come forward that the progress of their federal class action lawsuit has been delayed.

READ ARTICLE: http://www.nationofchange.org/toll-mounts-among-us-sailors-devastated-fukushima-radiation-1389540068

24 Jan 2014
Commentary No Comments Permalink

Where are the great legislative protectors of our armed forces when you need them?

January 24, 2014 No Comments

Fr:  Buzz Davis, member, Veterans for Peace

Oh, where are the great legislative protectors of our armed forces when you need them?

All those talkative senators and reps don’t want to talk about what happened after the earthquake in Japan near the nuclear power plants.  That would remind people of all our US nuclear power plants sitting on lakes, river and oceans in the US.

And now we have hundreds or thousands of sick military personnel who were ordered by commanders to move in and help the stricken people of Fukushima.

Truman bombed the two Japanese cities at the end of WWII after many top military commanders thought the Japanese were already defeated.  The atomic bombing of those cities was unnecessary.  The US effort to produce atomic weapons, which may destroy civilization on this planet yet, has unleashed upon us potential destructive forces we have shown we are not smart enough to handle.

Long ago I was training to be an infantry officer during the Vietnam war and we have a field exercise on nuclear weapons.  I asked how can we protect our people if such bombs go off.  The sergeant said have your men hide under their rain ponchos.  We all laughed we thought he was kidding.  He was serious.  I thought we are all dead meat.

The poncho will protect the bare skin from flash burns but nothing else.

Read the story below and you will be shocked.

I bet a dollar that trained officers and enlisted men and women said “we shouldn’t send our ships in to help or all will be contaminated.”  But in the ships went.  What would you have ordered if you were the ship commander or President Obama?

Peace

Buzz