Rolla Peace News
August 11, 2009

Dear Friends:

          In this newsletter is:

1. THURSDAY NOON VIGIL FOR PEACE
2. THE POLITICS OF FEAR
3. ITS A CRIME TO BE POOR
4. LET'S APOLOGIZE TO RALPH NADER

          ==================

1. THURSDAY NOON VIGIL FOR PEACE

Our weekly noon vigils are now on Thursdays. We vigil for peace in front of the Rolla Post Office THIS THURSDAY, August 13, (and all subsequent Thursdays until peace is established) from Noon to 1:00 PM. Please try to join us. The temperature is predicted to be in the low 80s under sunny skies. If you do not feel comfortable standing with us in front of the Post Office, please consider driving by and showing your support for our message by honking your horn and flashing a peace sign.

2. THE POLITICS OF FEAR

Ira Chernus explores the politics of fear in relation to recent homophobic murders in Tel Aviv, (click here). Chernus concludes that trying to control through fear leads to a world increasingly out of control. (Think about the changes in our own society since Sept. 11, 2001.)

3. ITS A CRIME TO BE POOR

Barbara Ehrenreich (author of "Blood Rites," "Nickel and Dimed," "Bait and Switch," etc.) explores the growing criminalization of poverty in the US, as more and more people are pushed into poverty by a corporate dominated society totally out of control, (click here). We now spend over $50 Billion putting and keeping 2.3 million people behind bars, making us Number 1 in prison population, while 45 to 50 million live in poverty. Ehrenreich notes: "If poverty tends to criminalize people, it is also true that criminalization inexorably impoverishes them."

4. LET'S APOLOGIZE TO RALPH NADER

Whenever the subject of the Wall Street meltdown comes up, I like to remind my Republocratic friends that if we had elected Ralph Nader, we would not be in recession now. In this article by Chris Hedges, (click here), Ralph Nader notes: "This is the third television generation. They have grown up watching screens. ... They have no idea of any public protest or activity." How true! Every one of the regulars at our weekly peace vigils is over 60. Nader also notes that if we fail "to step outside the two-party system, ... we will continue to undergo a corporate coup d’etat in slow motion that will end in feudalism."

          ==================

Rolla Peace News is distributed by email once a week on Tuesday evenings (except on rare occasions) and is posted on the web at http://tomsager.org (links below my photo on upper left of home page).

If you don't wish to get notices of peace events in the Rolla area, let me know and I'll take you off this list.

If you want to be added to this list, let me know: .

Wage peace,

Yusha
tom (at) tomsager.org

###