Hire Your Own Cop!

Hire Your Own Cop!
By Steve Clemens. June 2008

For the past twelve years, AlliantACTION has vigiled in front of Alliant Techsystems, Minnesota’s largest arms merchant. After being spun off from Honeywell who grew tired of the protests from the Honeywell Project, Alliant Techsystems, or ATK as it is known by their company logo and in the stock market, first located in an old Honeywell facility in Hopkins, MN.

The weekly vigil by local activists started in 1996, focusing on ATK’s manufacture and sale of anti-personnel landmines. After a significant victory in court in 1997 when 79 people were acquitted of trespassing charges under a defense claiming International Law, the Wednesday morning vigil continued to grow in size.

When the weapons manufacturer moved its headquarters a mile or two down the road to Edina, the weekly vigil followed. After a few years there, we noticed a difference in the police presence. At first, the city of Edina assigned a police Sergeant as the primary liaison between the vigilers and the arms corporation. AlliantACTION didn’t request any law enforcement presence even though it felt that some international laws should be enforced against this company. Apparently local police don’t specialize in enforcing International Law.

Because members of the group occasionally attempted to carry their concerns directly to the front doors of the corporation – attempting to deliver documents highlighting the illegality of the weapons they made to corporate officers – they recognized that the local police might haul some of them off under charges of trespassing. The Edina Police Sergeant courteously explained to the group that his presence during our vigil was to be sure our First Amendment rights were honored as much as to “protect” the property of this manufacturer of cluster bombs and depleted uranium weapons. He even insisted on sitting through an entire trial after he was called to testify about the arrest of some of the group for trespass. He told some of the defendants, “Since I arrested you, the least I can do is remain in the courtroom to hear your testimony about why you did it.” After hearing testimony from one defendant about ATK’s research and development of a gun that could “shoot around corners”, then hearing the defendant add that “we know that any such weapon made for our own soldiers will likely be found a few years later on our own streets and used against our own cops by criminals”, the Edina policeman wanted to know more about the research on this weapon uncovered by the defendants.

The vigil group noticed a change after that Sergeant was replaced after a few years. Now, younger, more verbally abrasive officers were present on the Wednesday mornings. Members of the group suspected (and were later told) that these police were “hired” by ATK. It wasn’t until ATK recently moved again, this time to Eden Prairie, that the AlliantACTION group began to question this practice. The group’s new police liaison with Eden Prairie, Lt. Tracy Luke, informed the group that the two officers now present at each weekly vigil were off-duty Eden Prairie Police who were “hired” by Alliant Techsystems. The crucial difference was that AlliantACTION decided to change part of their vigil in to a walking picket that now crossed the driveway into ATK’s parking lot and office complex. So now, police hired by the company being picketed decide when to stop the flow of pickets in order to allow ATK workers up their driveway.

When questioned about the obvious conflict of interest present, Lt. Luke responded, “Well, you know, you can hire your own cops as well. It is $60. per hour”. The private-duty cops are dressed in their Eden Prairie Police uniforms and arrive for this “private-duty” work in an Eden Prairie squad car. While they are charged by their own department to fairly uphold the law, wouldn’t their judgment be skewed in favor of who is paying for this job? What if AlliantACTION hired its “own cops”? Would it depend on the rank or seniority of the “dueling police officers” in judgment calls about when to give priority to the pedestrian “rights” of picketers over the “rights” of motorists?

Have you noticed the uniformed police officers at your local Target store or grocery store? How does one tell if a police officer is a “hired gun” for a corporation rather than a public safety officer for the community? If citizens are free to “hire our own cop” to ensure our First Amendment rights, should Black citizens hire their own officer of color if you are afraid of being stopped for “driving while Black”? If you are Latino, you might want to hire your own Hispanic-heritage-looking cop so you aren’t stopped and asked to see if you are in this country “illegally”. Maybe Native Americans can hire their own cops and ask them to help enforce some of the many Treaties that have been unenforced by the “majority” political powers. However, at $60. an hour, not too many of us can afford our own “law enforcement”.

Maybe, we could decide as a society to pay our public safety officers enough so they wouldn’t have to “moonlight” as shills for the corporate powers. It makes one wonder when, this September, we meet cops “protecting” who(?) during the Republican convention – who are they working for when “private-duty” cops wear the same uniform as public safety officers. Maybe they could wear armbands that disclose their “sponsor” for the day.

A Review of JFK and The Unspeakable

Reintroducing JFK: Seeing Our Slain President Through a New Lens by Steve Clemens. June 2008

Review of James W. Douglass, JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why It Matters. (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books. 2008)

I had just turned 13 the month before the startling news was broadcast into my 8th grade classroom: President John F. Kennedy was shot in Dallas and had been rushed to the hospital. It was followed by the bulletin that the President was dead. Lorenzo, my fellow classmate, an Italian Catholic, burst into tears. I sat quietly thinking: at least we got that Papist out of the White House! The anti-Catholic indoctrination I received from my church and parents never allowed me to see JFK as a person, only a symbol of a false religion to reject. Oh, and he was a Democrat as well!

Had I known the JFK that Jim Douglass reveals in his new book, I would have had more reasons to dismiss him: a President engaging in peacemaking activities with the Premier of the godless Communists, Nikita Khrushchev, passing letters back and forth that even members of his Cabinet were unaware! A US President secretly arranging for face-to-face consultations with Fidel Castro to resume normal diplomatic relations with a communist Cuba! The man who issued the secret National Security Action Memorandum 263 ordering the removal of 1,000 US Military advisors from Vietnam by the end of 1963 and ALL US Troops by the end of 1965. Under the guise of “peacemaking” President John F. Kennedy was urging “capitulation” to the Soviets in the Cold War – at least from my junior high school analysis.

Jim Douglass describes JFK’s “turning” – his movement toward peace rather than “victory” after the almost catastrophic “Cuban Missile Crisis” the year before in 1962. While the world was on the brink of nuclear devastation, I had practiced the “duck and cover” technique at school in the event the Ruskies dropped “the big one”. My own personal “turning” toward peace began five years later when I had to register for the military draft when I turned 18 in the fall of 1968. Fortunately I was no longer dependent on getting political perspective from US News and World Report (The Commies are killing our missionaries in Vietnam!) nor my theology from my evangelical/fundamentalist church (Jesus’ call to “Love your enemies” was trumped by St. Paul’s admonition to the Christians in Rome: “Let every soul obey the governing authorities”).

Having been issued a uniform and rifle for the compulsory ROTC class when I registered for my college freshman year, I had an epiphany on the rifle range when I realized that even though the targets were circular, they were, in reality, the bodies of the “Viet Cong”. Under no reading of Jesus’ teaching could I justify pulling the trigger so I registered as a conscientious objector. I had begun my own turning. Little did I know that one year later, I would be marching on the local Wheaton, IL draft board arm-in-arm with a Catholic priest! Another year later would find me taking some courses with that priest at the nearby Catholic Maryknoll Seminary. Soon I would discover Jim Douglass’ The Non-Violent Cross after I had left behind my anti-Catholic upbringing and was open to hearing the “Gospel” through a new lens. My own turning toward peace.

Why would a legendary peace theologian get caught up in conspiracy theory? That was my first question when I received an invitation to attend a Pax Christi retreat 5 or 6 years ago led by Jim Douglass. I’d read virtually all his excellent books, followed his campaign against the Trident and the White Train delivering nuclear weapons to those submarines, and had met him at several conferences on peacemaking. When he and his wife Shelly moved to Birmingham to form a Catholic Worker House, I anticipated seeing more of him because I was only four or five hours away in southwest Georgia. However, soon after they arrived, our family moved to Minnesota. Now here was a chance to re-connect with this insightful theologian-activist. But his retreat topic was on the connections between the assassinations of the Kennedy brothers, Martin King and Malcolm X! He talked about how American deals with its prophets – in similar fashion to the way the Romans dealt with the notorious Galilean troublemaker during the administration of Pilate and Felix. At the time, Jim was only beginning the long research project that has led to this first of what promises to be a trilogy of books on the killings of prophets and peacemakers in the 60s in America.

Research indeed! JFK and the Unspeakable has close to 100 pages of small-print footnotes to document and explain his sources about the JFK most of us did not know. However, a small but powerful force within the government, namely the CIA, the FBI, the Joint Chiefs of the military, and even some of his own Cabinet and advisors, came to feel the need to remove him as a danger to an American strategy of global domination. Kennedy, recognizing that the use of nuclear weapons against the Soviets would leave an estimated 140 million dead, decided you could not “win” the Cold War. The others in that military-industrial-intelligence complex felt that with “only” a few million Americans killed if America struck with a first-strike, we could “win”. The window for such an advantage in the nuclear arsenal and delivery systems would narrow and begin to close after 1964, leading some to conclude that the obstacle that the President embodied would have to be removed before the end of 1963.

The “unspeakable” in the title comes from Trappist monk/peacemaker Thomas Merton’s book, Raids on the Unspeakable. It is a term he used to describe the confluence of evil within systems like governments, corporations, and other power centers. Walter Wink uses the term “the Domination System”. St. Paul referred to “the Principalities and Powers”. President Eisenhower coined the phrase “the Military Industrial Complex”. Catholic Worker Dorothy Day talked about “this filthy, rotten system. The “unspeakable” that conspired (breathed together) against JFK (and later his brother as well) was the manifestation of the national security state that insisted on total allegiance to both its ideology and methodology. Kennedy ran for office as a Cold Warrior. Only his glimpse into the abyss that was the Cuban Missile Crisis allowed him to see how close that system pushed toward a nuclear holocaust.

Kennedy was truly saved by his enemy – Nikita Khrushchev. The irony this book discloses that all three antagonists, Castro, Kennedy, and Khrushchev, all had struggled for peaceful co-existence in opposition to their own advisors. Each leader was trapped within national systems that had a vested interest in keeping the conflict going rather than risking a negotiated resolution.

Through extensive interviews and research, Douglass paints a compelling portrait of the supposed assassin/”patsy”, Lee Harvey Oswald. While the Warren Commission (conveniently controlled by ex-CIA Chief, Allen Dulles) failed to interview numerous witnesses that might challenge the “lone gunman” theory, Douglass sought out the stories that convincingly (to me) argued for at least one or more “Oswald” doubles. Douglass argues that the CIA hoped to pin blame for the assassination of the US President on both Cuba and the Soviets, urging the new President, Lyndon Johnson to “retaliate” with their desired preemptive nuclear strike.

It was the successful cover-up orchestrated by the Warren Commission Report that led to the subsequent assassinations of Malcolm X, Martin Luther King, followed by Kennedy’s brother, Bobby is the argument Douglass puts forth. JFK and the Unspeakable is the first of a trilogy of books attempting to unmask or at least begin to demystify this force of evil that has so captivated our national soul.

Besides attempting to portray John Kennedy’s courage in his “turning”, Douglass also wants to steel his readers who are committed to peacemaking to be realistic about the challenges we face. If the “unspeakable” is willing to kill a sitting President, what should we expect if we attempt to follow Jesus down that same road? The Kennedy that Douglass portrays is less overtly religious than Martin King in his last days (“I only want to do God’s will.”). JFK “looked into the abyss” and chose his path of change or turning when he decided that the fate of the world’s children were at stake if these nukes were ever used again. Kennedy realized that even just the atmospheric testing of these weapons imperiled the health of all humanity with the radioactive fallout.

But Kennedy’s religious tradition also spoke to him clearly – especially through the powerful words of the initiator of Vatican II, Pope John XXIII with his final masterpiece, Pacem in Terris. The impact of this work so moved Nikita Khrushchev that he is reported to have kept a medallion given to him by this beloved pontiff on his desk in the Kremlin as a way to irritate some of his own Politburo advisors.

Kennedy’s own commencement speech given at American University five months before his death certainly owed some of its power and insight to the recently deceased pope who died two weeks prior to that June 1963 address. In that speech which ironically was carried more widely over the radio to Soviet citizens (and ignored by most US media), Kennedy cautioned Americans not to demonize the other side. His words, “… not to see only a distorted and desperate view of the other side, not to see conflict as inevitable, accommodation as impossible, and communication as nothing more than an exchange of threats. No government or social system is so evil that its people must be considered as lacking in virtue.”, could (and should) be readily applied today to Ahmadinejad’s Iran.

The book also raises a very disturbing portrait of how this National Security State imperils our democracy. The idea of a group of secretive men (although there are probably some women in the mix today) deciding who can be or remain President exposes the figure-head nature of the power of that office. The collusion of un-elected agents, military officers, wealthy business elites, “diplomats” and others plotting behind the scenes to replace the elected head-of-state is not just something that happens in Third World nations. Was what happened in November 1963 in Dallas really a coup-d’etat?

Back in the mid-70s, William Stringfellow raised questions about the compatibility between democracy and the apparatus of a National Security State. Stringfellow, drawing on the insights of Biblical prophets and the writings of Jewish theologian Abraham Joshua Heschel, called the allegiance demanded of citizens by this obsession with “security” during the Cold War by its Biblical name: idolatry. With the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of the Soviet empire, cold warriors searched about for new adversaries so they could continue to justify our dependence on and subservience to the military industrial complex out of fear. Terrorism conveniently became the new whipping boy and the anticipated “peace dividend” disappeared.

While Douglass’ JFK story harkens back to the Cold War, the idolatry of the National Security State is as strong as ever – and its practitioners stand ready to remove or marginalize any who stand in its way. How else could one explain the almost universal condemnation of former-President Jimmy Carter’s sit-down with the leadership of Hamas and Syria this Spring? Or the annual rite of genuflecting before the power of AIPAC by both Democrats and Republicans – each vying to out-do the other in pandering to the Israeli state, ignoring and neglecting the cries for justice emanating from behind the 26’ tall “security barrier”, the new Berlin Wall that Carter has identified as apartheid?

This book is sobering, disturbing –but ultimately hopeful as well. If even such a stout Cold Warrior as John Fitzgerald Kennedy could decide to “turn toward peace” –albeit at a terrible price – can we too break the shackles of fear and greed and begin that same turning ourselves? As Jim Douglass reminded a friend of mine: who is the real “hero”, the prime mover of this story? It is God - God working through JFK, Khrushchev, and others who had the courage to take risks for peace. “After all,” Douglass reminded him, “the nuclear holocaust didn’t happen!”

We must open ourselves to recognize the common humanity we share, as “we all inhabit this small planet. We all breathe the same air. We all cherish our children’s futures. And we are all mortal.” When we recognize and act on this, we join hands with the Creator and work together to build a world of peace. One place to start is exposing, unmasking, naming the truth behind this system. Exposing it to the light. It might put us in its target but only by escaping its clutches can we truly be free and healed of that primal urge to dominate.

The Problem with Appeasement.

The Problem with Appeasement
Steve Clemens. May 21, 2008

It has become the all-too-common political slur de jour: any indication that one is willing to sit down and talk with an adversary is painted with the slanderous epithet used to describe British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain acquiescing to the diabolical ambitions of Adolph Hitler – appeasement. Technically, “offering concessions in order to secure peace” is the definition but modern abuse of the term to slander another seems to involve even recognizing the humanity of the other.

When efforts at diplomacy are categorically dismissed as being “weak”, “un-Presidential” or might be construed as too “effeminate”, then the only “weapons” political leaders are left with are the deadly, military ones. Bombast and bluster become backed by bomb blasts and cluster bombs. Today’s political climate doesn’t even allow for the Manifest Destiny swagger of Teddy Roosevelt: “Speak softly but carry a big stick.” Somehow, even speaking softly to one’s adversary is suspect today. Don’t speak to your adversary – only speak at him.

Barack Obama is denounced by President Bush in a speech to the Israeli Parliament as an appeaser for offering to sit down and talk with President Ahmadinejad of Iran. Even Hillary Clinton has to rush out and threaten to “obliterate” Iran rather than to appear weak or effeminate on the campaign trail. Most Americans have finally come to reject Bush’s “shoot first” policy that has resulted in a quagmire in Iraq. But now the demonization that once belonged to Saddam Hussein has now been transferred to the elected Iranian leader and the mainstream (read “corporate”) media and the American public uncritically follow suit. One wonders what the “media” in Iran reports about us.

Although the verbal demonization of the enemy (or “axis of evil”, “rogue state”, or other connotation of sub-humanity applied) is directed primarily at one as the epitome of evil, the militarized response is seldom as restricted. But what’s a little “collateral damage”?

In his powerfully disturbing new book, JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why it Matters (Orbis, 2008), Catholic theologian and peace activist Jim Douglass argues that President Kennedy was targeted for assassination by the military-industrial-intelligence complex because he was willing to explore dialog with Khrushchev and Castro rather than risking the extinction of humankind by unleashing our nuclear arsenal. Although we now have clear evidence that Castro had interest in negotiation (Douglass’ book is carefully footnoted), the killing of the President in 1963 has given us 45 years of on-going failed policy with Cuba. What might have happened if dialog was pursued instead of military and economic threat?

This isn’t a uniquely American problem. Douglass also records the assessment of Khrushchev’s son of his father’s need to keep the secret correspondence between the US President and the Soviet Premier from the prying eyes of the Politburo. Khrushchev ran into the same problem as Kennedy – elements within his own government who thought they had more to lose with peace than war. The chief question arises: who profits from increasing world tensions rather than trying to sit down and resolve differences?

President Eisenhower warned three days before he left office about the undue influence in the corridors of power of “the military industrial complex”. While prescient in recognizing it’s power, he was less knowledgeable of the growing subversive power of the CIA as well as the rise of corporate media and the distortions of the 24 hour news cycle where certain sound bites are drum-beaten over and over into our collective consciousness without any real contextual analysis or historical context.

Psychologists tell us that we’re often unaware of our “shadow” self, the dark side that our adversary sees to which we are often blind. We need the adversary to mirror back to us the image we project. During the Cold War, Americans were quite aware of the (negative) role the Soviets or “red” China played. Now, as we better re-learn our own national history, we can see more clearly some of the brutal, oppressive governments we supported or created to combat the others’ “evil”.

The problem with appeasement is that concessions are needed on both sides of a conflict for there to be peace. When only one side or perspective dominates, the result may appear “peaceful” but it is the enforced “peace” of the Pax Romana or Pax Americana rather than a negotiated settlement. The model which is more helpful in this regard is that of conflict or dispute resolution that is growing as a substitute for older models in the criminal justice field. It is possible that the proper terms should be arbitration instead of appeasement, mediation rather than “missile diplomacy”, dispute resolution rather than “defense” [sic] appropriations, negotiation rather than the nuclear option.

Arbitration, mediation, or conflict resolution takes the first step in recognizing that there is a problem. The “problem” doesn’t have to be between “equals” (one side is often perceived as more powerful than the other) but for there to be a genuine solution, there must be “buy in” from both sides. Politicians who like to slander their opponents with epithets like appeasement aren’t often looking for solutions that result in peace but rather stirring the pot and keeping the conflict going. That is why it is so important to look beyond the conflict to see Who Profits?

The present political system in the U.S. is broken. Scoring points against the opposition has become more important than solving seemingly intractable problems. As long as “We, the people” allow or encourage these dysfunctional partisan attacks to dominate, we will continue the downward spiral of a superpower/empire in decline. While the decline of our “super” status will likely be a good thing for the rest of the world, there is still much good that can be shared with our fellow world citizens if we are willing to also learn and receive from others as equals rather than ones to dominate.

Someone needs to be talking to Iran rather than just threatening. There are genuine differences that must be addressed and hopefully resolved. Like alcoholics on the road to recovery, we need to take the first step and admit we have a problem. The problem with appeasement is the one-sided concession the public has given the politicians who would rather inflame and aggravate than do the hard work of genuine peacemaking. President Carter sitting down with Hamas is a much more helpful model than scapegoating Ahmadinejad.

If we want real peace, all those with a vested interest in the outcome must be invited to the table. The model of restorative justice suggests that all those who are impacted by harms done (or threatened) must be part of the decision-making. All those who might be impacted by potential agreements need to be included. The path to peace means a lot of difficult work. Maybe the real “appeaser” is the politician who panders to the public with sound bites but isn’t willing to invest the time and resources for genuine dialog which could lead to a peaceful resolution.

Disarm The Troops - Bring Them Home

Disarm the Troops! Bring them Home!
by Steve Clemens. January 2008

Jim Steinhagen, a leader of the local chapter of Veterans for Peace told his story about his participation in the Korean War at the recent annual gathering of the Minnesota Alliance of Peacemakers. When he discussed his own personal naivety in enlisting in the Marines with his high school buddy at age 17, it struck me that those of us seeking alternatives to war continue to send the wrong (or at least confusing) messages to our young people about military “service”.

When conscientious people opposing the present war put up signs “Support the Troops – Bring Them Home,” it sends a mixed message. How does one “support” those, who, for a variety of reasons, chose to be trained to kill others on the basis of orders from a “superior” officer or the “Commander-in-Chief”? Clearly the primary responsibility for the war must lay with those who planned it, ordered it, and voted to pay for it with our tax dollars (or, more accurately, with debt to be placed on future generations).

But remember those provocative and attractive posters from the Vietnam era: “What if they gave a war and nobody came?” If no one “volunteered” for our “Volunteer Army,” how could our politicians choose to go to war on false and manufactured evidence? Our politicians know that if we continue to permit many to go uncounted as we claim “full employment” and continue to allow the minimum wage to be set significantly below a “livable wage,” and allow college costs to skyrocket while loans and grants to students expire, there will always be some driven by an economic conscription to “enlist”.

There will always be young people who are motivated by a narrow view of patriotism who think they are serving their country by “protecting” it and thus they sign up to put on the uniform and pick up a gun. Yet another group exists, those with an over-flowing of testosterone who see the uniform and gun as an extension of their “manhood.” There are some who enlist seeking “discipline,” and others who are promised that they can avoid prosecution or incarceration by enlisting. All of the above groups will fill out the ranks of the military.

I truly believe there are some in the military who actually see their commitment as “service” but it is more accurate to identify those in uniform as “military forces” rather than “military service” when one takes a hard look at the ways our military is used around the world to protect corporate greed and domination, rather than the professed task of genuine national “defense.” The very nature of basic training for the various military branches is designed to break down normal, human defense mechanisms in order to rebuild a new identity as one who is ready and willing to kill-on-command.

The 1980s PBS TV series, War, based on the book by the same title by Gwynne Dyer, a veteran from several nations’ militaries, includes an episode called ”Anybody’s Son Will Do” which was filmed at Parris Island, NC, a Marine Corps basic training facility. To visualize the dehumanization which passes for molding “a few good men” is sobering.
( http://chat.wcc.cc.il.us/~kwestman/Anybodys_Son.htm ).

Yet it is also hopeful – there is something within the human spirit which must be destroyed before one is able to kill when ordered to do so. I believe there is a healthy, God-given resistance to killing instilled in us that must be broken and then rebuilt if we are to be of any use as one who kills without question.

In 1980 when President Carter ordered the reinstatement of Selective Service registration for a future draft as a warning shot over the bow of the Soviet Union ship of state, he is reputed to have said that our nation needed to reach young men before they got to age 22 or so in order to influence them before they had made up their own minds. Now scientific research is replete with research showing that the teenage brain is still growing and developing and society can’t expect fully-developed reasoning in some areas until the early 20s. It is no wonder that military recruiters want to be active in our high schools when decision-making is more impulsive and subject to manipulation.

Let me be clear: I don’t “blame” the troops. One only has to look at the PTSD, suicide rates, broken marriages, the number of vets who end up homeless and on the streets to see that they are victims as well. There is something about teaching another human being to kill – without questioning orders - that scars the soul and psyche of even the most macho among us. Many of the survivors of combat return home with what is referred to as “the thousand yard stare.” Chris Hedges, former New York Times war correspondent and author of the excellent book, War is a Force that Gives Us Meaning, describes the “addiction” that war often engenders in its participants and continues to keep hold of them.

I think the American public in general feels somewhat embarrassed about its unwillingness to directly fight and sacrifice for war – or at least this war. People know, at least subconsciously, that those burdens are placed disproportionately on the poor, the less educated, and those with fewer options so, out of that guilt, we profess special “honor” and “respect” for those who are “willing to die for our country”. But doesn’t this make many of our troops mercenaries? It is hard to separate out how much of the incentive to enlist is out of patriotism and how much is economic desperation; what part is the macho urge to dominate others versus the attitude of wanting to serve one's country?

I don’t blame the “grunts”- it is the politicians who determine the policy; soldiers are merely functionaries - yet they also must be held accountable - but to a lesser degree than “the Masters of War”. We can’t expect those with questionable educational backgrounds to have the savvy to do political and social analysis about the nature of American geopolitical strategy before deciding to enlist; but when those troops engage in activities ordered by Washington bureaucrats to conduct “enhanced interrogations” which may or may not breach the strictures of the Geneva Conventions, can we still “support” those troops? The lessons of the Nuremberg Tribunals after World War II make it clear that “following orders” is no excuse.

What about the troops that drop cluster bombs and fire rounds and shells comprised of depleted uranium? Is the typical soldier supposed to study the Laws of War to discern the legitimacy of using such controversial weapons? Yet if the typical soldier refuses, especially in the theater of battle, there is often a terrible price to pay.

I think that many of the average soldiers go in to the military with honorable intentions. Rather than see their mission as projecting and expanding the edges of American Empire, they envision themselves as protectors and defenders of “our way of life.” Little analysis is spent on investigating whether that “way of life” is sustainable in a globe of limited resources. But is that really the responsibility of the troops?

Are those who serve as pawns in the hegemonic games of the political and military strategists, the corporate robber-barons, and the economic and academic elitists to be held responsible for “following orders” whose ends they don’t really comprehend? Whose responsibility is it to “educate” our young people to those realities before they enlist? Those of us who do recognize the “Domination System” for what it is have an obligation to warn those unsuspecting collaborators. To do so, we have to ask some hard questions of ourselves about how we benefit from that system before challenging others to take that “road less traveled”.

But while we do that necessary work to educate ourselves and others, lets at least stop parroting the phrase “support the troops” and be honest with young people about what “service”[sic] in the military is all about: being used by the Domination System to protect empire. Even a true patriot should see that it is not in the world’s best interest for that to continue. Our churches, synagogues, mosques, and other faith communities must withdraw their chaplains which bless and excuse this killing and its preparation. We must actively “counter-recruit” and create life-affirming alternative opportunities for those presently targeted by military recruiters. Maybe we can tape over the first word of those signs and replace it with “Disarm the Troops - Bring them Home!”

My Story with the Draft

My Story with The Draft
By Steve Clemens

I turned 18 in the fall of 1968 while enrolled as a freshman at Wheaton College, an evangelical school located in the western suburbs of Chicago. At that time there was an active military draft and all males were required to register with the Selective Service System within 30 days of their 18th birthday.

En route to Wheaton, IL from my home in eastern Pennsylvania, my parents and I stopped in Fort Wayne, IN to visit some relatives. We attended the Mennonite Church they were members of since we arrived on the weekend. In the Sunday School class I attended, there was a discussion about a Christian response to the war and I discovered my cousin, Jon Brandenburger, was declaring himself to be a “CO”. I had heard of Conscientious Objectors and knew that many Mennonites refused to fight and chose to do alternative service instead. Because most of my relatives had left the Mennonite tradition, it was not an issue I had faced before. While there were still a few members of Calvary Church, my home congregation, who were committed to the Mennonite understanding of a commitment to nonviolence, most members seemed to feel that was another legalistic area they could leave behind in seeking a new identity as evangelical Christians rather than Anabaptists. I had been “sheltered” from the realities of the Vietnam War and the draft by attending a private college-prep high school where everyone graduating was headed to college. In most public high schools, graduation often meant “the draft” for many classmates.

Just two days after this Sunday school discussion, I was handed an M-1 rifle and a uniform as part of my enrollment as a Wheaton freshman! Wheaton College had mandated two years of compulsory military training for all male students through its ROTC program. [ROTC stands for Reserved Officer Training Corps and, at Wheaton, was connected with the U.S. Army. If one completed all four years offered, one would be commissioned as a Second Lieutenant in the Army upon graduation.]Twice a week we were scheduled to rise before breakfast and to drill in our uniforms with our weapons. (The firing pins had been removed and were stored in a locked area in the ROTC offices.)

My first pangs of dis-ease or conscience arose as I found myself encouraged to chant with the student troops phrases to cadences which were very demeaning to women and most people in general. I was not even slightly aware of the burgeoning feminist movement on the horizon. I just felt that “Wheaton’s kind of student” wouldn’t casually demean others because of our faith commitment. It seemed that the uniform had a way of making one’s faith commitment a secondary issue when competing with the Army’s mentality. Along with drill, we had several classes each week in military history and strategy taught by Army Officers who were granted teaching status at the college. We also went to the firing range several times to practice our weapon skills.

I had gone hunting with my dad and brothers numerous times before I went off to high school at Stony Brook. We hunted squirrels, rabbits, ducks, pheasants, and deer. Whenever we practiced shooting our shotguns or rifles, my dad [a veteran of WWII as an Army infantryman who saw action in France and Germany] would tell us, “Never, ever, point your gun at another human being. Never, ever, point your gun at something you don’t wish to kill.” He was very emphatic that we practice safety whenever we were carrying a gun, to unload it while in vehicles, how to safely cross a fence, and so on. Whenever we sighted in a gun before deer season, we fired at circular targets and we realized that those targets were representative of the area of the deer we were to aim at- usually the area where the heart and other vital organs were located.

It didn’t take long on those Wheaton firing ranges to subconsciously realize that something was very wrong. These circular target were no longer representative of deer but were now used to represent the “Viet Cong”! This “hunting” practice was no longer fun. In the classroom, we discussed military strategy and history but never the morality of whatever war we studied. The assumption seemed to be that we accepted the notion of the “Just War Theory” but never dealt with the details of how these conflicts measured up to those standards. I started to wonder how to reconcile Jesus’ command to “love our enemies” with what we were being taught by our professed Christian army officers. But I kept these questions to myself since I didn’t hear anyone else asking them either.

I turned 18 on October 16th. This was a significant event for a male in 1968 because it meant I had to register with the Selective Service System for “the Draft”. This was a mechanism set up by the government to select which male citizens it would compel to serve in the nations Armed Forces. It was a strategy to channel some men into certain job areas by offering exemptions and deferments. It also served as a channeling device to encourage young males to continue in higher education, allowing them to postpone the date by which they would have to report for a physical exam to see if they were fit to be compelled to join the Armed Forces. By 1968, many people were noticing how the draft had a way of selecting what seemed to be a disproportional number of youth from the inner cities and/or people of color to go to serve. Many white males found ways to avoid the draft or enlisted to get a choice of military branch or assignment. Because of the high casualty rate in Vietnam, many tried to find ways to avoid being assigned to the Army infantry. Students enrolled in accredited colleges were granted deferments from the draft as long as they maintained a passing grade-point average. Some young men went to great lengths to avoid being drafted: stories abounded about kids who shot or cut off a toe, feigned mental illness or homosexual tendencies, fled the country or went into hiding, or sought to become ministers or teachers.

Fortunately for me, the Resident Assistant (RA) for my residence hall dorm wing was Dan Sharp, a quiet senior who also grew up in a Mennonite background. He asked me if I wanted to talk with him about the decision I faced with the draft. We read the Bible together and prayed and I felt that because of my Christian convictions and my understanding of Jesus’ teaching and example, I could not serve in the military. So, my next choice was “what kind of CO would I be”? At that time, when one registered for the draft, you could choose three options: Classification 1-A meant that you were available for military service. Classification 1-AO meant that you were available for military service as a non-combatant. Classification 1-O designated you as a Conscientious Objector. In order to be classified thusly, one had to fill out a lengthy form answering questions about your religious training and beliefs. One had to assert that you were opposed to all wars – if you were selective about some wars being “just” and others as “unjust”, Selective Service regulations stated that you did not qualify as a Conscientious Objector. You also had to decide whether your conscience allowed you to serve in the military as a non-combatant like a medic, a cook, or truck driver.

Despite the life-saving qualities that a medic would have, after more investigation it was made clear to me that the primary function of the medic in the military was to “fix up the wounded” in order that they could continue to fight. Serving as a truck driver or cook just freed up others to fight so I felt that I couldn’t serve in that capacity either. I did feel that I “owed” “service” to my country; and, as a Conscientious Objector, if drafted, I would be required to perform “Alternative Service”. Many COs who were drafted were assigned to work in mental hospitals, conservation or national park service, or even as subjects of medical experiments. Just like with the draft, one could “enlist” before being drafted which might allow more choice in one’s assignment. The local Draft Board was given the authority to determine ones appropriate classification and approve the “service” assignment.

At the time of my draft registration, if you were a full-time student, you could choose to “register” at either your home draft board or the draft board where your college was located. Other students told me that the Wheaton, Illinois Draft Board prided itself in never having granted an application for Conscientious Objection. [Draft Boards were comprised of local “volunteers” who were often military veterans and usually staffed by strong supporters of the present U.S. foreign policy.] My home draft board was located in Norristown, PA and had many young men from Quaker, Brethren, or Mennonite backgrounds who chose to register as Conscientious Objectors so my application would not be unusual. Since I had been baptized at age 12 at “Calvary Mennonite Church” [before the church dropped Mennonite from its identity four years later], I was almost certain my CO application would be granted. I wrote out my application for a 1-O classification and mailed it to my home draft board.

However, because I was already enrolled in ROTC, the college had automatically applied for a student deferment for me. The classification of 2-S would allow me to avoid being drafted as long as I was enrolled full-time in college and maintained a passing grade. Other deferment s were granted for those studying to be ministers, sometimes for inner-city school teachers, and for certain other occupations. Exemptions from the draft were given to ordained ministers and some other occupations. If one failed the physical exam or were declared “unfit” for other reasons (“moral” reasons like admitted homosexuality or a criminal record, or “psychological” reasons like schizophrenia) you received a classification of 4-F. The draft board kept a “pool” of those classified as 1-A, 1-AO, and 1-O and would summon a group for their induction physicals when more troops were needed.

I maintained my 2-S deferment until December 1969, when, for political reasons and because of growing opposition to the War in Vietnam, President Nixon announced there would be a national “lottery” and each birth date would be assigned a number and those with lower numbers would be drafted first and fewer deferments and exemptions would be offered. I clearly remember sitting in the college dorm watching the TV screen as the numbers were drawn and assigned to each of the 366 birthdates in a year. I was very relieved to note that the number assigned to October 16th was 254 – I could be assured that I could finish my college degree and even consider graduate school without the fear of “Uncle Sam” calling. Commentators on the TV were saying that anyone with a number lower than 100 would definitely be called, those between 100 and 200 were possible draftees, and those of us with numbers greater than 200 were likely to be “safe” or less likely to be conscripted.

After a year of grad school in Social Work, I chose to do my own “voluntary service” for my country and signed up with Mennonite Central Committee to work in rural Mississippi for a summer followed by a year in the Mennonite Peace Section Office on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC for a year. After that, I continued my voluntary service for another 16 years, working primarily to build affordable housing in southwest Georgia with an organization that became the birthplace of Habitat for Humanity.

At the time of my draft registration, I was not active politically. I grew up in a home that had voted Republican and only knew a handful of people who identified themselves as Democrats. My choice to be a Conscientious Objector was not a political decision against the Vietnam War. I remember “winning” an in-class debate in 9th grade on why the U.S. should be in Vietnam – well before President Johnson’s escalation in ’67 and ’68. For me, being a CO was a personal and moral choice, not a political act. It wasn’t until a year later, after spending a summer working in the inner-city of Philadelphia, that I started to publicly demonstrate against the war. Even then, although I had heard stories of “protesters” burning draft files or their own draft cards, I didn’t know anyone personally who was that “radical”. It wasn’t until after President Nixon expanded the war by invading Cambodia that I began to re-evaluate my own position.

After one of Nixon’s TV speeches defending the war in 1971, I went in to the bathroom and burned my draft card. I scooped up the ashes and placed them in an envelope and addressed it to my local draft board without my return address. As I said, at this time I personally did not know any “resisters” and had no support group to rely on if I made my resistance to the draft system public. After several months, I was courageous enough to write on an unopened letter I received from Selective Service: “Return to sender –obscene material” and from that point on, my resistance to the draft was public. However, by then many of the jails and prisons were full of resisters and many areas of the country were choosing not to prosecute men who were publicly refusing to carry their draft cards or who had burned them. The government’s hands were full in attempting to track down military deserters or those who publicly refused induction rather than to track down other non-cooperators.

I chose to supplement my resistance by being trained as a Draft Counselor and learn the rules and regulations of the draft laws to better aid those caught up in that pernicious system. I was only able to counsel a few men before the political pressure to end the war metamorphosed into Nixon’s “Vietnamization” Program which substituted U.S. troops for more money to pay South Vietnamese to fight on our (their) behalf. My anti-war sediment continued to expand and grow as well as my commitment to nonviolence and ultimately led to my first arrest for civil disobedience in the last major demonstration against the war in March 1975, a month before Saigon “fell” and the war was over. By the end of the war, I was advocating a position of refusal to register if one had the conviction, support, and fortitude to pay the consequences of such a decision – the likelihood of a 2-4 year prison sentence.

I have mixed feelings about the draft. On one hand, I think it is essential that every citizen make up their mind about participating in a war rather than leaving the fighting primarily to those who can’t find other “jobs” in the economy or can’t afford college costs and enlist in the military to get money for education. If everyone had to personally commit, it would be harder for our politicians to “choose” to go to war. On the other hand, I believe that there are many better ways to “serve one’s country” than to be trained to kill others. By having a draft, it sends a signal to our political leaders that war is always an option. I feel that “option” must be taken off the table if our world is not only to survive but also thrive.

Zacchaeus the Tax Collector

Zacchaeus the Tax Collector . CSM Shared Word by Steve Clemens . Nov. 4, 2007

Luke 19:1-10 (New International Version)
1 Jesus entered Jericho and was passing through. 2 A man was there by the name of Zacchaeus; he was a chief tax collector and was wealthy. 3 He wanted to see who Jesus was, but being a short man he could not, because of the crowd. 4 So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore-fig tree to see him, since Jesus was coming that way.
5 When Jesus reached the spot, he looked up and said to him, "Zacchaeus, come down immediately. I must stay at your house today." 6 So he came down at once and welcomed him gladly.
7 All the people saw this and began to mutter, "He has gone to be the guest of a 'sinner.' "
8 But Zacchaeus stood up and said to the Lord, "Look, Lord! Here and now I give half of my possessions to the poor, and if I have cheated anybody out of anything, I will pay back four times the amount."
9 Jesus said to him, "Today salvation has come to this house, because this man, too, is a son of Abraham. 10 For the Son of Man came to seek and to save what was lost."

Actually this text is scheduled in the lectionary as an alternate one because it falls on the Sunday closest to All Saints Day, when we often switch texts to remember the Saints who have gone before and whose spirits are with us now. We often use the “Cloud of Witnesses” text from Hebrews and probably leave ol’ Zacchaeus out of the list of those who’ve gone before – in favor of Abraham and Sarah, Priscilla and Aquilla, Oscar Romero and Tom Fox. So, instead, I want to give Zacchaeus his “15 minutes” of fame this week.

Some of you who are my age or older who were raised in the church might recall the Sunday School ditty about this story. We had the flannel-graph figure of Zacchaeus, placed it up in the tree so he could see Jesus coming in the distance, and then he hops down and takes Jesus to his house.
(song from childhood:)
"Zacchaeus was a wee little man,
a wee little man was he.
He climbed up in a sycamore tree,
the Lord he wanted to see.
And as the Savior passed that way,
He looked up in that tree.
And He said,
"Zacchaeus, you come down!
For I'm going to your house today."

You might not know it from this cute little Sunday School song that this story should be considered by most of us as one of the infamous “Texts of Terror”. The kind of sick feeling you get in your stomach- kind of what I felt this past June when I got a letter in the mail addressed to Christine and me from the MN Dept. of Revenue informing us that “We have selected your taxpayer account for examination under the authority provided by MN Statute 270C.31. Please provide the following documentation: [and then provided a list of six things we were to send in within the next 30 days relating to our Federal 1040 Forms for 2004, 2005, and 2006. …] Additional information may be requested if necessary.” Signed by Zacchaeus-oops!, I mean by Greg Ozmun, Revenue Tax Specialist.

Is this a “Text of Terror” because of how some of us feel about the IRS? Jesus might have had something to fear about this man since the Gospel stories indicate one of the charges leveled against him at his trial was that “He refuses to pay taxes to the Emperor!” What if Zacchaeus about to “audit” Jesus’ tax return?

Humm, “no where to lay your head, eh?” Better not have taken the mortgage interest deduction.
“Feeding crowds of 5,000? Where’d you get the bling to pay for that?” Did you get a receipt for the 5 loaves and 2 fish?

“Healing. Without a license. Have you paid your dues to the AMA?

“Have you listed the pharmaceutical samples you got as income?

No, the “Text of Terror” comes about when we realize that WE are the focus of this story. WE are the Zacchaeus figure. We’ve heard about this “Jesus” character and we want to see what all the fuss is about but we don’t expect to be singled out for our own audit!

Now, Zacchaeus didn’t become “Chief Tax Collector” for the area without some serious collaboration with the Coalition Provisional Authority - I mean, the hated Roman Occupying Army and maybe the Temple political structure.

But, look at the text again. When Jesus announces that he is coming over to Zach’s house TODAY – and he’s gonna “stay with him”, ol’ Zach knows the jig is up. I’m sure he’s heard about the other previous encounters Jesus has had with “rich folk”. Luke has written several stories about these encounters before we get to the Zacchaeus story in his Gospel. I’m sure word has gotten out what Jesus said to The Rich Young Ruler. “Sell what you have, give it to the poor, and come, follow me!” He also knew that there probably weren’t too many “formerly-rich” folk in Jesus’ entourage that day. Oh, I’m sure that at their annual “Motivational Speakers banquet” a year-or-two ago, there was that talk about the strange behavior of Brother Matthew – and how he went “off the deep end”, quit his IRS job, to follow this mystic teacher and preacher. He quit his job and now just hangs around with this “gang”.

I wonder if it was a long walk from the Sycamore Tree back to Zach’s pad? What was Zach thinking as he ran back to “straighten up the place”? Whatever it was, Luke tells us he didn’t wait for Jesus to clear his throat and give him a hard stare and start confronting him about his vocation and lifestyle. No, Zacchaeus stood up, looked Jesus in the eye and said, “Not only do I have too much, but I need to look at paying reparations for how I got this rich.” Now, tax collectors in those days got their money anyway they could. There were probably a couple of “busted kneecaps” in the area where Zach did his strong-armed collecting.

Zach says, “Here and now I’m giving half of my possessions to the poor.” Zach was ready to follow. He was ready for the invitation to be offered. Chances are, he personally knew “the poor”. But what about we “rich folk”? Do we know the poor? If we were to give half of our possessions to “the poor”, who would we give it to? How insolated or isolated are we from “the poor”? IF I defrauded anyone, … 4 x restitution. Does our lifestyle “defraud” others when close to half the world’s population lives on less than what I spent on a can of Pringles? How “Deserving” are the poor? What if I give them money and they don’t “spend it correctly?

Here is what I’d like each of you to do. On the back of the piece of paper that has today’s text, I want you to write the name of 1 or 2 people or groups that you have a personal relation with who is poor (or works with the poor) that you would give part of your own money to.

Then, I want you to get into small groups of not more than 6 people each, none from the same household together, and share what you’ve written and why with that group. Each group will have $100. to “give away to the poor” BUT you will all have to be in agreement/consensus with how/where it is to go. Each of you could designate part of it to go to 5 separate individuals or, as your group meets, maybe you’ll come to consensus about pooling your money together to give it to one entity to make it go further. Think about what you are going to say to that person or organization when you give them the money. If you can’t come to consensus after 5 minutes, you’ll need to return the money to me.

We won’t take the time to have each group report back to the whole body but after worship, I’d like someone from each group to write down to whom their money is going so all of us can see it.

The amazing thing about this story is that Zacchaeus didn’t say, “Oh crap! Now I’m screwed! What shall I do?”

“Can’t I just avoid Jesus? Why’d he have to pick me out?

No, he joyfully decided to cast his lot with Brother Matthew and other followers and radically change his life.

And Jesus says, Today Salvation has come to this household. The economics of the entire household are connected with what it means for Jesus to be “saved”.

Is it a Text of Terror? Or a Text of Liberation and Salvation? We can choose how to respond to Jesus.
_____________________________
Where the $ went:
Group 1: $60. to Peace House on Franklin Ave. (for homeless)
$40. to Christian Peacemaker Team in Columbia.
Group 2: $100. to El Salvador student scholarship fund (Kaydee Kirk connection)
Group 3: $10. Kinship mentoring program
$10. CPT
$20. local foodshelf
$30. fund for people being deported
$20. Open Arms (meals to those with HIV/Aids)
$10. (uncertain who this went to)
Group 4: $60. Genesis House (for recovering prostitutes in Chicago)
$40. student emergency fund for Anoka Ramsey College. (Erik Weiger recommendation)
Group 5: $100. MN Health Worker Volunteer fund for Ugandans recovering from HIV/Aids to purchase cows and pigs for food and economic recovery. (Johan Cavert recommendation)
Group 6: $20. Oxfam
$20. Homefulness (housing program in St. Paul)
$20. Evan. Lutheran Church in Jordan and Palestine
$20. Twin Cities RISE!
$20. One Acre Foundation (subsistence farming in Africa- recommended by Eric Berger)
Group 7: $20. to Rojas family in Northfield (home destroyed in recent fire)
$20. for 7th grade boy in Northfield
$20. Heartside (shelter? in Grand Rapids, MI)
$20. United for a Fair Economy (Tom Witt recommendation)
$20. Mennonite Central Committee work in Cambodia.

This Is What Democracy Looks Like?

This Is What Democracy Looks Like?
By Steve Clemens. October 27, 2007

The chants rang out: “Who is a terrorist?” with the reply echoing, “Bush is a terrorist!” “This is what democracy looks like” – with the reply “Bush is what hypocrisy looks like!” Bless their hearts; people are angry and fed up with war and occupation. The need to vent their anger at the geo-political realities certainly seems necessary as the war for oil and domination continues in its fifth year - with signs that it might not abate until our military is completely broken or our political “leaders” grow some spine and stand up to the Administration.

I remember hearing Dick Gregory, the great humanitarian, civil rights activist, and comedian say during the protests against the Vietnam War, “If democracy is as good as we claim it is, we won’t have to shove it down others throats with the barrel of a gun. If it is so good, people will steal it!” The notion of going to war to establish “democracy” in the Middle East is preposterous. But chanting epithets on a street corner in south Minneapolis at noon on a sunny October day didn’t make me proud that “this is what democracy looks like” when it is coupled with angry personal taunts at the President or his policies.

Don’t get me wrong – I think those policies are not only misguided, wrong, and ultimately evil – and, yes, invading a nation which posed no threat to us and littering its countryside and cities with cluster bombs, depleted uranium munitions, and more “conventional” bombs dropped from thousands of feet above so the pilot cannot witness the human carnage below is an act of terrorism. But our political task is not to engage in self-righteous bombast but to find ways to invite our fellow country-folk (who voted in large numbers to keep Bush in power in 2004) to re-imagine what it could mean to renounce empire and rejoin the community of nations. Self-righteous anger can only get one so far – and we have an enormous job ahead of us to turn around the ship of state and convert it from a battleship to a hospital ship, cruise liner, or pleasure craft.

Do our signs and banners encourage dialog and conversion or do they serve as a bludgeon against our adversaries? Is our presence on the street corner friendly and inviting to those who might be ready to start on a new journey toward peacemaking?

I envision an open circle, welcoming for others to join in, holding candles lit up instead of cursing the darkness. Talking with each other, confessionally; what is it in my own lifestyle that encourages our political leaders to think that we want to maintain our comforts at the expense of others – thus requiring a military force to prevent others from getting what we have (to paraphrase LBJ before he invaded the Dominican Republic in the mid-60s.) Only when we are vulnerable to each other and open can we allow “the other” (be they our neighbors or even our “enemies”) to engage our common humanity and together seek a way out of our spiral of violence.

I stood silently with my rainbow-colored PEACE flag alongside my friends and fellow activists somewhat embarrassed at the projecting of evil solely on the other – the President and an ineffective Congress. Calling others “evil-doers” and labeling an “axis of evil” hasn’t worked out so well (in the long run) for President Bush. Why should we think it will work any better for us? Competent military leaders know you must “win the hearts and minds” of the nation you occupy to ultimately be successful. Maybe the peace community needs to recognize the same goal applies within our own nation which is presently “occupied” by the military-industrial complex.

Shouting and sloganeering rarely opens my heart to really listen to others. Can we find some other ways to offer our principled opposition to the war while inviting others into our (hopefully, expanding) circles?