August 18, 2010
Dear Representative Woolsey,
Things are changing fast for this world, but many of these things are headed in the wrong direction. You are in a unique position — at least in regard to most of the world’s population — to put some very important things on a positive track. And these are things that will reverberate around the planet.
To do so, however, you might need to disabuse yourself and your colleagues of some pervasive and destructive notions. The first of these is that Americans are more valuable than other people in the world.
I’m sure there would be loud protestations of denial on the floor of the House if this assertion were stated aloud and as a fact. However, once alone—away from the C-SPAN cameras and din of the Capitol—the more honest of you would admit that this notion is behind many of the decisions made in the U.S. Congress.
This all-too-common belief is false. As Americans, we are no more valuable, no more important than any other human being, creature, or living thing on the planet. We just think we are, and this thinking has led to the wars we are engaged in, the sense of entitlement we have that any resource should be ours for the taking no matter the consequences, and that our way of life is the one and only correct one. This has caused nothing but harm to other countries, and—the honest of you will have to admit—it has caused long-term harm to the majority of Americans.
Every decision made in the U.S. Congress affects everyone else in the world. Rather than giving you and your colleagues a feeling of power, realizing this should humble you and make each piece of legislation you sponsor or fight, each law you enact or vote down, or each progressive proposal you support or block a klaxon’s blare, reminding you that your actions have repercussions.
Whether you want to envision the butterfly effect, a cascade of falling dominoes, or a nuclear chain reaction doesn’t matter. What matters is that you become mindful of your influence, and that the most immoral action you could take would be to betray the world with a vote that benefited a few over many, legislation that promulgated American interests over the future of the planet, or enacted a law that denied the rights of any one person, just to appease the trumped-up fears of the loudest voices.
You are responsible to more than your district, no matter what you tell yourself. We all are. Not one of us can live without others, and we cannot choose the “others” that will keep us alive—not in this world. One man’s fears and self-loathing resulted in the annihilation upwards of 42 million people on his continent. And one man’s decision—in part to assert U.S. hegemony—caused the deaths of at least 225,000 people in a tiny country from dropping two bombs.
The next thing you and your colleagues must dispose of is the mistaken doctrine that free-market capitalism is a good. Again, honest and quiet deliberation will make you admit that the flaws of this system—and of allowing it continued domination and free rein—benefit very few people and harm billions more. Like valuing Americans over other people, the free market has despoiled the land, water, and air; enslaved millions—either literally or figuratively—through poverty; and resulted in untold numbers of deaths from starvation or gluttony and from acts of violence or neglect.
Free-market capitalism—hand in hand with the fallacy of American entitlement—has left millions of Americans unemployed, debt ridden, and hopeless. They are also bewildered, because they, too, thought things were supposed to be different for Americans.
You can help all of us in this country learn that unless we view every atom on this earth as interconnected with every other atom, we will continue in a downward spiral until we have nothing more to eat, no clean water to drink, and only poisoned air to breathe. That is, for those of us who have not already died as a result of psychotic retaliations against U.S. aggression or the catastrophic destruction from our hubris-driven quest for energy from deep-water oil wells or nuclear generation.
Here is what you must do:
1.End the wars and occupations. Now, and with no exceptions. Whatever excuses you give yourselves in the open Congress or in committee sessions, admit privately and then openly that there is no benefit for the American people in perpetuating this militaristic path we have been on for too long.
2.Create jobs — real ones that actually accomplish something. Rebuild our infrastructure, teach our children to think critically, support the creation of life-affirming art, and develop energies that will not kill our planet as they heat and light our homes. Take the money you’ve been allotting for wars and spend it on the people who live here.
3.Take care of all of the people in this country with medical care that is as much their right as breathing clean air—no matter where they came from or how. Again, you can do this instead of paying a few companies and countless crooked politicians to facilitate the wars and occupations.
4.Protect the American people — not from perceived or imagined threats from outside of our borders but from the real dangers they face from poverty, homelessness, disease, and despair. We have two remarkable systems rightly called social safety nets: Social Security and Medicare. Not only must you make sure they remain intact, you should work tirelessly to strengthen them. They need to be here for our aged and vulnerable people, whose numbers are increasing by the day and whose ranks we could someday join. You should not fear these programs and decry them for costing us money; you should celebrate and cherish them, affording them the regard they deserve as emblems of the best in American society.
If you follow through with these four actions, the result will be the safe, prosperous, democratic, and free country everyone in the Congress claims to work for and revere. This will be a country full of people who have learned to care about one another, because they do not have to live in fear. And by caring first about their neighbors, then their communities, and then the people of their country, they will understand that everyone in the world has the same value — infinite.
Do not devalue your constituents or the American people by pursuing the same destructive course of action that has become the government’s business as usual. Pursue instead the course of peace, of respect for our planet, and of esteem for all life by bucking the tide and using the power you hold as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives.
You nominally represent the people who elected you (and didn’t!), but you actually represent everyone whose voice is lost in the din of the status quo and the entitled elite, whose babble drowns out the voices of compassion and reason, because they can afford to make it loud and dominant. You represent the people who are counting on you to make decisions that will make their lives intrinsically better. By doing so, the dominoes will fall in a pattern of beauty rather than chaos and fear.
1.THANK YOU for joining Rep. John Conyers’ Out of Afghanistan Caucus.
2.THANK YOU for co-sponsoring Rep. Barbara Lee’s HR 6045: Responsible End to the War in Afghanistan Act.
3.If you have not already done so, please support Rep. Barney Frank’s call to reduce military spending by 25 percent, to fund our communities. (If you have done so, THANK YOU again!).
4.THANK YOU for your pledge to protect Social Security.
5.AND THANK YOU for voting NO on the recent Supplemental for Afghanistan.
These are important first steps that many other Representatives have yet to take. Thank you for consistently supporting such efforts aimed at countering the folly of our current Defense situation. However, we strongly urge you to publicly commit to voting “No” on any bills that fund wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, or Yemen, and to publicly urge your colleagues and the House leadership to make the same commitment.
This is no time for quibbles about procedure and minutia. Time is running out. Fulfill your oath of office and act for The People.
In urgency,
Progressive Democrats Sonoma County
PDA Chapter
Ed. Note – formal headings, contact info removed for this posting.
For more information about PDA (Progressive Democrats of America) & the Brown Bag Lunch Vigils, please visit www.pdamerica.org
