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Dear Peacemakers,
When the calendar flipped over into 2008 last New Year's Eve our sense of dread was palpable. It is no longer about just ending imperialist wars and occupations. It is nothing short of hanging on for dear life as the Perfect Storm of crippling debt, energy depletion, radical religion, and environmental catastrophe converge to present us a challenge that will demand the resourcefulness of a thousand generations.
The Northwoods Peace Initiative started in 2003 as an on line organizing tool that helped bring over 1000 people from Wisconsin to Washington DC for a march to preempt the preemptive war against Iraq. We never got a count on how many people were actually there but the bus drivers, many of whom drove hundreds of thousands out to DC during the peak of resistance to the Vietnam war, say they have never seen anything like it. When there is absolutely nowhere to eat breakfast in Breezewood, Pennsylvania after an all night bus ride you know that something is happening here.
Since then, the NPI newsletter has been devoted to providing a calendar of peace and justice events for the northern Midwest (Minnesota,Wisconsin, Michigan), scouring the news wires for information to clarify our thought and actions, and mobilizing the masses when taking to the streets became the priority of the moment. Close to 1000 names are on our mailing list and there is no telling how many people are reached by the forwards that all of you send out. A poll we took last fall garnered a response of almost 20% of the mailing list which, I am told, is a good response for this kind of outreach newsletter.
As we enter the year that historians will likely look back on as the turning point of the rest of our lives, the format will be mostly the same as it has been. A little more emphasis will be placed on tracking down information that will try to help us all sort out the cacophony of over stimulation that is both the benefit and the bane of life on the "entire web". For every story that gets sent to you, perhaps 100 articles are read. Kind of crazy but I know I hate receiving random forwards and I know everyone out there is too busy to sort through even the best intentioned drivel.
So let's get on with it. The big new this issue is that Sami Rasouli, director of the Muslim Peacemaker Teams, is going to be back in the area from March to May for his annual report in from occupied Iraq. For those of you who have heard Sami speak, you know that he is THE unique voice coming out of Mesopotamia. He is 100% Iraqi and 100% American. He speaks both languages, gets both cultures, and interprets the conflict through the prism of nonviolent intervention. Get back to me right away if you want to schedule Sami for a visit to your area.
There are a few calendar items out there that can wait until next time. I'm going to try to keep this newsletter as brief as I can. If it is too tedious you're just going to hit the delete button anyway. The news I want to focus on this issue is mostly economic. The American Century is coming to a close. The important question that remains is how gracefully will we depart from dominating the world stage. The only resources the US has left to offer the global community is counterfeit money and things that explode. That is going to make the upcoming year pretty extraordinary to say the least. As my favorite pessimist James Howard Kunstler puts it --"Better superglue yourselves to the floorboards and pray for God's mercy."
Happy New Year.
Mike and Barb
Northwoods Peace Initiative Here are a smattering of articles that have been helpful to me. I find the ones from the markets themselves to be the most interesting.
"Hedge funds have helped create a counterfeit economy that some experts say could lead to another full-blown economic depression."
The Crash of 1929: Are We on the Verge of a Repeat? By Scott Thill, AlterNet. Posted July 26, 2007.
"In order to reap the promises of supercapitalism, we've all made Faustian bargains. But these agreements have a moral as well as economic bottom line. Eventually you must pay the "devil" his due. The first hint came in 2000-2002, with the post-90s recession. We didn't learn that lesson. Now, with the subprime-credit meltdown rapidly metastasizing, we have another chance to get it right during the 2008-2011 recession. But don't hold your breath. Why? Because the grand drama painted in "Supercapitalism" and "Richistan" is not really as new as Reich and Frank want you to believe. It's timeless."
By Paul B. Farrell, MarketWatch Last update: 7:00 p.m. EST Jan. 21, 2008 "The credit storm that began in the United States with subprime mortgages has spread to markets across the globe. In fact, the train has already crashed. What we're seeing now is the boxcars piling up on top of each other."
"A Generalized Meltdown of Financial Institutions" Take a Look at Professor Roubini's Crystal Ball By Mike Whitney 11/24/07 "ICH"
"But if you dig a little deeper, it is easy to see that the U.S. never really got out of the recession of 2000-2002 which followed the bursting of the dot.com bubble at the end of the Bill Clinton presidency. This event was marked by the stock market crash starting in December 2000 that cost Americans over a trillion dollars in retirement savings and other forms of paper “wealth” over a period of a few months.The U.S. producing economy never really came back from that debacle. Instead, the Federal Reserve, under “Maestro” Alan Greenspan, facilitated the blowing of three financial bubbles, upon which the Bush/Cheney ship-of-state has sailed along merrily until recent weeks."
by Richard C. Cook Global Research, January 20, 2008
Why are the big dogs telling us that they will fight preemptive nuclear war if they need to preserve their security? Why are they saying this now? This should make us all a little nervous
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