Post-election actions for the "first 100 days"

We, the people, must influence the "first 100 days." We know you get lots of emails on these topics, but we highlight three days of action, and ongoing initiatives for you.

JANUARY 11: SHUT DOWN GUANTANAMO: Alliance Council supports day of action--participate in a national call-in day to Congress. Thursday, January 11 marks the 5th anniversary of the first prisoners taken to the US prison at Guantánamo, Cuba. Since then, more than one thousand men and boys have been imprisoned there. Accounts of cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment have been condemned by the United Nations, Human Rights Watch and other reputable bodies. Yet, not one prisoner has been charged, tried or convicted of any crime. Many have been released because no evidence has been found against them, but more than 430 men remain in indefinite detention. The United States has abandoned law and justice.

A coalition of groups, organized by Witness Against Torture, will mark the anniversary by an International Day of Action to Shut Down Guantánamo. The Alliance for Democracy has endorsed this day of action. Events in Washington include a march, press conference, and non-violent direct action. Other vigils, forums, and other events are scheduled world-wide. Wherever you are, you can call your members of Congress and urge them to take positive action. For background information and a list of events, visit www.witnesstorture.org

The day of action calls on the US government to repeal the Military Commissions Act and restore Habeas Corpus; charge and try or release all detainees; withhold funds for the proposed $125 million construction of new military courts at Guantánamo; clearly and unequivocally forbid torture and all other forms of cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment, by the military, the CIA, prison guards, civilian contractors, or anyone else; pay reparations to current and former detainees and their families for violations of their human rights; and shut down Guantánamo, Abu Ghraib, Bagram and all other U.S. prisons overseas, including secret CIA detention facilities.

January 27: March on Washington for Peace and Bring the Troops Home Now. Organized by United for Peace and Justice: Go to www.unitedforpeace.org for information on transportation, housing, and logistics.

Call your Senator and Representative (calls are better than e-mail) and say you support Rep. Jim McGovern’s bill, H.R. 4232, to cut-off funds for the Iraq war. Ask them to sign-on as sponsor when this bill is refiled. Watch the video that highlights this bill.

January 29: Lobby Day organized by Progressive Democrats of America (PDA). For information on making appointments to meet with your members of Congress to demand “Bring the Troops Home Now” and "Impeach Bush and Cheney” see the PDA website and read column on right “Join March and Lobby Day” for information.

Here at Home: The Cost of War: On Friday, January 5, Jan Edwards interviewed Mike Ferner, free-lance writer and author of Inside the Red Zone: A Veteran For Peace Reports from Iraq on the AfD radio program “Corporations & Democracy” in Mendocino County, CA-KZYX. Ferner emphasized that if you compared deaths and destruction in Iraq to the population of the U.S. everyone in 10 major cities would be killed, every person in 12 states wounded and 216,000 doctors would have left the country.
His text on this comparison to use for an Op-Ed or Letter to the Editor is posted on the Alliance website under Action Alerts, or you can go directly to his website. Learn more at Occupation Project, sponsored by the Voices for Creative Nonviolence.

Ask your representative to investigate, investigate, investigate. At www.afterdowningstreet.org/investigations read the list of Congressional committee heads and the war-related issues they should be investigating: corporate profiteering, misuse of intelligence and war crimes. This page links to comments and one-page guide to calling Congress members to support investigations.

Put impeachment "On the Table" now: Join your voice with those in your community and across the country who say “YES” to impeachment. Tell Speaker Pelosi and Sen. Reid that Impeachment is “On the Table.” Remember, in December 2005, Rep. John Conyers, D-MI, introduced House Resolution 635 calling on Congress to Impeach Bush. There are now some 30 co-sponsors and growing. Nixon was impeached only after popular pressure influenced Congress. To keep the heat on, pass an “Impeachment Resolution in your community. Across the country, dozens of cities and statewide and local political committees have passed pro-impeachment measures. For a model resolution to take to your city or county council and for map of where resolutions have passed to date, click here.

Get a text of Rep. Cynthia McKinneys’ speech on her last day in office and outline of impeachable offenses. And download and share the 10 Reason to Impeach George W. Bush and Dick Cheney.

Call your Senator and Representative and ask them to support impeachment hearings, now, and read these two important books, then pass them on to friends: Impeach the President: The Case Against Bush and Cheney, by Dennis Loo and Peter Philips. Howard Zinn calls it, “a gripping call for action from the leading political analysts of our time...[it will] be welcomed by anyone concerned for peace, justice, and a truly democratic nation." And United States v. George W. Bush et al, by Elizabeth de la Vega, an experienced former Federal Prosecutor, in which she lays out the case for conspiracy to defraud as it would be presented before a grand jury. She makes a clear distinction between the political vs. the legal question and evidence for impeachment. As she says, the legal question is not whether the President lied, but whether he and his team defraud the country through the universal techniques of fraudsters -- deliberate concealment, misrepresentations, false pretenses, and half-truths.