Resisting Bush's War
by Rep. Dennis Kucinich
Resisting Bush's War
Rep. Dennis Kucinich
February 25, 2002
[Editor's Note: The following is a speech that Dennis Kucinich, U.S. Congressman from Cleveland, Ohio, gave this past weekend at the University
of Southern California. Rep. Kucinich is the leader of the Progressive
Caucus and a longtime defender of free speech, civil liberties and
international peace. This speech makes him the first member of the
United States Congress to openly repudiate President Bush's war rationale.]
"I offer these brief remarks today as a prayer for
our country, with
love
of
democracy, as a celebration of our country. With
love for our
country.
With
hope for our country. With a belief that the light
of freedom cannot
be
extinguished as long as it is inside of us.
With a belief that freedom rings resoundingly in a
democracy each
time we
speak freely. With the understanding that freedom
stirs the human
heart
and
fear stills it. With the belief that a free people
cannot walk in
fear and
faith at the same time.
With the understanding that there is a deeper truth
expressed in the
unity
of the United States. That implicit in the union of
our country is
the
union of all people. That all people are essentially
one. That the
world
is
interconnected not only on the material level of
economics, trade,
communication, and transportation, but
innerconnected through human
consciousness, through the human heart, through the
heart of the
world,
through the simply expressed impulse and yearning to
be and to
breathe
free.
Let us pray that our nation will remember that the
unfolding of the
promise
of democracy in our nation paralleled the striving
for civil rights.
That
is
why we must challenge the rationale of the Patriot
Act.
We must ask, why should America put aside guarantees
of
constitutional
justice? How can we justify in effect canceling the
First Amendment
and
the
right of free speech, the right to peaceably
assemble?
How can we justify in effect canceling the Fourth
Amendment, probable
cause,
the prohibitions against unreasonable search and
seizure?
How can we justify in effect canceling the Fifth
Amendment,
nullifying
due
process, and allowing for indefinite incarceration
without a trial?
How can we justify in effect canceling the Sixth
Amendment, the right
to
prompt and public trial?
How can we justify in effect canceling the Eighth
Amendment which
protects
against cruel and unusual punishment?
We cannot justify widespread wiretaps and internet
surveillance
without
judicial supervision, let alone with it. We cannot
justify secret
searches
without a warrant. We cannot justify giving the
Attorney General the
ability
to designate domestic terror groups. We cannot
justify giving the FBI
total
access to any type of data which may exist in any
system anywhere
such as
medical records and financial records.
We cannot justify giving the CIA the ability to
target people in
this
country for intelligence surveillance. We cannot
justify a government
which
takes from the people our right to privacy and then
assumes for its
own
operations a right to total secrecy. The Attorney
General recently
covered
up a statue of Lady Justice showing her bosom as if
to underscore
there
is
no danger of justice exposing herself at this time,
before this
administration.
Let us pray that our nation's leaders will not be
overcome with
fear.
Because today there is great fear in our great
Capitol. And this must
be
understood before we can ask about the shortcomings
of Congress in
the
current environment. The great fear began when we
had to evacuate
the
Capitol on September 11. It continued when we had to
leave the
Capitol
again
when a bomb scare occurred as members were pressing
the CIA during a
secret
briefing. It continued when we abandoned Washington
when anthrax,
possibly
from a government lab, arrived in the mail. It
continued when the
Attorney
General declared a nationwide terror alert and then
the
Administration
brought the destructive Patriot Bill to the floor of
the House.
It continued in the release of the Bin Laden tapes
at the same time
the
President was announcing the withdrawal from the ABM
treaty. It
remains
present in the cordoning off of the Capitol. It is
present in the
camouflaged armed national guardsmen who greet members of Congress
each day we enter
the Capitol campus. It is present in the labyrinth of
concrete barriers
through
which we must pass each time we go to vote. The
trappings of a state
of siege trap us in a state of fear, ill equipped to
deal with the
Patriot
Games, the Mind Games, the War Games of an unelected
President and
his
unelected Vice President.
Let us pray that our country will stop this war. "To
promote the
common
defense" is one of the formational principles of
America. Our
Congress
gave the President the ability to respond to the tragedy
of September the
Eleventh. We licensed a response to those who helped
bring the terror
of
September the Eleventh. But we the people and our
elected
representatives
must reserve the right to measure the response, to
proportion the
response,
to challenge the response, and to correct the
response.
Because we did not authorize the invasion of Iraq.
We did not authorize the invasion of Iran.
We did not authorize the invasion of North Korea.
We did not authorize the bombing of civilians in Afghanistan.
We did not authorize permanent detainees in
Guantanamo Bay.
We did not authorize the withdrawal from the Geneva
Convention.
We did not authorize military tribunals suspending
due process and
habeas
corpus.
We did not authorize assassination squads.
We did not authorize the resurrection of
COINTELPRO.
We did not authorize the repeal of the Bill of
Rights.
We did not authorize the revocation of the
Constitution.
We did not authorize national identity cards.
We did not authorize the eye of Big Brother to peer
from cameras
throughout
our cities.
We did not authorize an eye for an eye. Nor did we
ask that the
blood of
innocent people, who perished on September 11, be
avenged with the
blood
of
innocent villagers in Afghanistan.
We did not authorize the administration to wage war
anytime,
anywhere,
anyhow it pleases.
We did not authorize war without end.
We did not authorize a permanent war economy.
Yet we are upon the threshold of a permanent war
economy. The
President
has
requested a $45.6 billion increase in military
spending. All
defense-related programs will cost close to $400
billion. Consider
that
the
Department of Defense has never passed an
independent audit.
Consider
that
the Inspector General has notified Congress that
the Pentagon cannot
properly account for $1.2 trillion in transactions.
Consider that in
recent
years the Dept. of Defense could not match $22
billion worth of
expenditures
to the items it purchased, wrote off, as lost,
billions of dollars
worth
of
in-transit inventory and stored nearly $30 billion
worth of spare
parts
it
did not need.
Yet the defense budget grows with more money for
weapons systems to
fight
a
cold war which ended, weapon systems in search of
new enemies to
create
new
wars. This has nothing to do with fighting terror.
This has
everything to
do
with fueling a military industrial machine with the
treasure of our
nation,
risking the future of our nation, risking democracy
itself with the
militarization of thought which follows the
militarization of the
budget.
Let us pray for our children. Our children deserve a
world without
end.
Not
a war without end. Our children deserve a world
free of the terror
of
hunger, free of the terror of poor health care, free
of the terror of
homelessness, free of the terror of ignorance, free
of the terror of
hopelessness, free of the terror of policies which
are committed to
a
world view which is not appropriate for the
survival of a free
people,
not
appropriate for the survival of democratic values,
not appropriate
for the
survival of our nation, and not appropriate for the
survival of the
world.
Let us pray that we have the courage and the will
as a people and as
a
nation to shore ourselves up, to reclaim from the
ruins of September
the
Eleventh our democratic traditions. Let us declare
our love for
democracy.
Let us declare our intent for peace. Let us work to
make nonviolence
an
organizing principle in our own society. Let us
recommit ourselves
to the
slow and painstaking work of statecraft, which sees
peace, not war
as
being
inevitable. Let us work for a world where someday
war becomes
archaic.
That
is the vision which the proposal to create a
Department of Peace
envisions.
Forty-three members of congress are now cosponsoring
the legislation.
Let
us
work for a world where nuclear disarmament is an
imperative. That is
why
we
must begin by insisting on the commitments of the
ABM treaty. That
is why
we
must be steadfast for nonproliferation.
Let us work for a world where America can lead the
way in banning
weapons
of
mass destruction not only from our land and sea and
sky but from
outer
space
itself. That is the vision of HR 3616: A universe
free of fear.
Where we
can
look up at God's creation in the stars and imagine
infinite wisdom,
infinite
peace, infinite possibilities, not infinite war.
Let us pray that we have the courage to replace the
images of death
which
haunt us, the layers of images of September the
Eleventh, faded into
images
of patriotism, spliced into images of military
mobilization, jump
cut
into
images of our secular celebrations of the World
Series, New Year's
Eve,
the
Superbowl, the Olympics, the strobic flashes which
touch our deepest
fears,
let us replace those images with the work of human
relations,
reaching out
to people, helping our own citizens here at home,
lifting the plight
of
the
poor everywhere. That is the America which has the
ability to rally
the
support of the world. That is the America which
stands not in
pursuit of
an
axis of evil, but which is itself at the axis of
hope and faith and
peace
and freedom.
Let us pray for our country. Let us love our
country. Let us defend
our
country not only from the threats without but from
the threats
within...".
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