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For Immediate Release
March, 19 2015, 12:15pm EDT
Contact:
Barry Ladendorf, Veterans For Peace, President, 619-997-2772; Michael T. McPhearson, Veterans For Peace Executive Director, 314-725-600
Veterans to Call for End to Endless War
Demilitarize U.S. Foreign Policy
WASHINGTON
U.S. military veterans of several wars, from Vietnam to Iraq to Afghanistan, will call for the demilitarization of U.S. foreign policy, as they mark the 12th anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq.
VETERANS MAKE CASE FOR PEACE
on FRIDAY, MARCH 20
at the University of the District of Columbia, David A. Clarke School of Law
4340 Connecticut Ave., NW, Room 454, Washington, DC 20008
(at Van Ness / UDC metro stop on red line).
11:00 am - 12:30 pm: Ukraine to ISIS to Drones: Why We Must Demilitarize US Foreign Policy Speakers: Marjorie Cohn, Ray McGovern and Matthew Hoh,
Marjorie Cohn is a law professor at the Thomas Jefferson School of Law in San Diego where she teaches criminal law and procedure, evidence and international human rights law. Cohn lectures throughout the world on human rights and U.S. foreign policy. She has authored and edited several books, including most recently "Drones and Targeted Killing: Legal, Moral, and Geopolitical Issues" (2015)
Ray McGovern is a retired CIA officer turned peace/political activist. McGovern was a CIA analyst from 1963-1990, in the 1980s chaired the National Intelligence Estimates and prepared the President's Daily Brief. McGovern is an army veteran and serves on the Advisory Board of Veterans For Peace.
Matthew Hoh is a Senior Fellow at the Center for International Policy, A former State Department official, Hoh resigned in protest from his post in Afghanistan over U.S. strategic policy and goals in Afghanistan in September 2009. Prior to his assignment in Afghanistan, Hoh served in Iraq; first in 2004-5 in Salah ad Din Province with a State Department reconstruction and governance team and then in 2006-7 in Anbar Province as a Marine Corps company commander. He writes on issues of war, peace and post-traumatic stress disorder recovery at MatthewHoh.com.
"The Bush administration detained and tortured suspected terrorists; the Obama administration assassinates them. Assassination, or targeted killing, off the battlefield not only causes more resentment against the United States, it is also illegal." - Marjorie Cohn, "Drones and Targeted Killing: Legal, Moral, and Geopolitical Issues" (2015)
VETERANS AND MILITARY FAMILIES MARK 12th ANNIVERSARY OF US INVASION OF IRAQ WITH CALLS FOR A PEACEFUL FOREING POLICY
3:00 pm - 4:30 pm: End these Endless Wars: Voices of Veterans and Military Family Members
Speakers: Kevin Lucey, Maggie Martin and Michael McPhearson
Kevin Lucey is the father of Cpl. Jeffrey Michael Lucey, an USMC reservist who returned from Iraq in July, 2003 mortally wounded by Hidden Wounds ie moral injury, PTSD, etc. After trying to get help from the VA, Jeff committed suicide on June 22, 2004. Kevin has a M.Ed. He is a retired Chief Probation Officer and presently is a therapist. He is a member of Military Family Speak Out, Gold Star Families Speak Out and an associate member of Veterans For Peace.
Maggie Martin is Co-Director of Iraq Veterans Against the War. She served in the Army from 2001-2006, deploying three times. She holds an M.A. in Social Justice and has been working since 2007 with fellow IVAW members to oppose expanding US Militarism, to fight for the "Right to Heal", and to build a healing community for those impacted by war.
Michael T. McPhearson is the Executive Director of Veterans Fort Peace and co-chair of the Don't Shoot Coalition in Saint Louis, MO that formed in the wake of the killing of Michael Brown Jr. McPhearson joined the Army Reserve as an enlisted soldier and attended basic training the summer between his junior and senior high school years. He is a ROTC graduate and served as a field artillery officer in the 24th Mechanized Infantry Division during Desert Shield /Desert Storm, also known as Gulf War I. He separated from active duty in 1992 as a Captain. Michael's son joined the Army in January 2004 and served one tour in Iraq in 2005-2006. He separated from the military in 2007.
5 pm -6:30 pm: World Beyond War: An Alternative Global Security System
Speakers: David Swanson, Matthew Hoh, and Robert Fantina
David Swanson is an author, activist, journalist, and radio host. Swanson co-founded the website After Downing Street (now War Is a Crime.org) and is the director of WorldBeyondWar.org and campaign coordinator for RootsAction.org. Swanson's books include, War is a Lie (2010), When the World Outlawed War (2011) and War No More: The Case for Abolition (2013). Swanson blogs through various political sites, including his own co-founded site, WarIsACrime.org
Robert Fantina is an author and journalist whose main interest is in human rights. He has written extensively on the oppression of the Palestinian people by Israel. He also writes on the political situation in the United States. He is the author of 'Desertion and the American Soldier: 1776 - 2006', a detailed history of desertion from the U.S .military; Look Not Unto the Morrow' a Vietnam era, anti-war novel, and Empire, Racism and Genocide: A History of U.S. Foreign Policy.
Matthew Hoh (Bio above. See 11:00 am panel info.)
Spring Rising Schedule VETERANS FOR PEACE
www.cindysheehanssoapbox.com/schedule-of-events.htm www.veteransforpeace.org
Veterans For Peace is a global organization of Military Veterans and allies whose collective efforts are to build a culture of peace by using our experiences and lifting our voices. We inform the public of the true causes of war and the enormous costs of wars, with an obligation to heal the wounds of wars. Our network is comprised of over 140 chapters worldwide whose work includes: educating the public, advocating for a dismantling of the war economy, providing services that assist veterans and victims of war, and most significantly, working to end all wars.
(314) 725-6005LATEST NEWS
'Financial Murder': Dems Slam Trump Team Falsely Declaring Thousands Dead in Social Security File
"This inhumane, illegal, and unconstitutional action will inflict—and already has inflicted—irreparable harm on these individuals," senators wrote of the effort to make thousands of immigrants "self-deport."
May 08, 2025
Just a day after Senate Republicans confirmed U.S. President Donald Trump's Social Security Administration commissioner, Frank Bisignano, the chamber's Democrats on Wednesday announced a series of letters about outstanding questions and concerns regarding the federal agency—including one that demands an investigation into what they call attempted "financial murder."
Two of the letters unveiled Wednesday were dated April 30. Both were led by Senate Finance Committee Ranking Member Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) and signed by a dozen members of the Democratic Caucus: one was to Leland Dudek, then acting commissioner of the SSA, and another was to Michelle Anderson, assistant inspector general for audit at the agency.
The latter asks the SSA Office of the Inspector General to probe reports that the administration "is taking steps to place certain categories of immigrants who have lawfully obtained Social Security numbers (SSNs) in its Death Master File (DMF)," which contains data on more than 141 million people whose deaths were reported to the agency, in an effort to make them "self-deport."
The letter to Dudek declares that "this inhumane, illegal, and unconstitutional action will inflict—and already has inflicted—irreparable harm on these individuals, undermines trust in and accuracy of the Social Security programs, and sets a dangerous precedent in allowing the government to take away Americans' access to their earned Social Security benefits."
"If living number-holders are improperly transferred to the DMF, they lose their ability to legally work in the United States, as well as access to any earned Social Security benefits, healthcare, banking and credit cards, and access to virtually every other exchange with a third-party that is verified by a valid SSN," the letter explains. "The result is, as former SSA Commissioner Martin O'Malley put it, 'tantamount to financial murder.'"
"Changing the name of the database to the 'Ineligible Master File' as a clumsy attempt to evade public criticism or legal exposure does not mitigate these consequences to these individuals, as has already been reported," the letter asserts, urging Dudek "to immediately cease this practice and remove all individuals placed on the DMF through this initiative."
In addition to Wyden, the letters were signed by Sens. Cory Booker (D-N.J.), Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nev.), Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.), Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii), Angus King (I-Maine), Ben Ray Luján (D-N.M.), Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), Patty Murray (D-Wash.), Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), and Peter Welch (D-Vt.).
Warren and Wyden also partnered with the chamber's New York Democrats, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, for a Wednesday letter to Bisignano, who was confirmed Tuesday with a 53-47 vote along party lines.
"Since President Trump took office, we have—prompted by the administration’s attacks on Social Security—sent 17 letters to the Social Security Administration," they wrote. "These letters have sought answers for why the Trump administration and the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) appear to be dismantling the SSA, potentially depriving Americans of their hard-earned benefits."
As the letter details:
We have not received responses to the vast majority of our questions. In fact, acting Commissioner Leland Dudek has reportedly instructed staff to not respond to public or congressional inquiries. The limited answers we have received have been unsatisfactory," they continued.
We have also requested information from you directly. Through direct inquires, your hearing before the Senate Committee on Finance, and post-hearing questions for the record, we have sought to determine whether you intend to continue DOGE's disastrous efforts to hollow out the SSA. In response, you repeatedly claimed that, because you were not yet working at SSA, you did not have sufficient information to answer. You made these claims despite the fact that a former SSA employee whistleblower has reported that you have been participating extensively in high-level operational, management, and personnel decisions at SSA.
Now that Bisignano has been confirmed, the senators are demanding answers to their nearly 200 questions.
"We are extraordinarily concerned about the future of the SSA under the Trump administration, and Americans deserve information about the fate of their benefits under your watch," the senators wrote. "We therefore ask that you provide full and complete answers to all of our questions no later than May 21, 2025."
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'US Mail Is Not For Sale': Americans Across Political Spectrum Oppose Postal Service Privatization
"Postal customers should trust their gut when it comes to schemes to sell off or transfer the USPS," said the head of the American Postal Workers Union.
May 08, 2025
As the Trump administration signaled a potential step toward privatizing the U.S. Postal Service with the reported selection of a FedEx board member to serve as postmaster general, new polling on Thursday showed just how strongly the American public would oppose such a move.
The survey by Hart Research Associates and North Star Opinion Research, which was commissioned by the American Postal Workers Union, found that 60% of respondents were opposed to privatizing the postal service, while just 26% were in favor.
The opposition cut across ideological, geographic, and demographic divides, with people in all regions of the country saying they wanted to maintain the USPS as a public service by a margin of at least 29 points—and as many as 40 points in western states.
While rural voters supported President Donald Trump by a 23-point margin in the 2024 election, the research firms posited that the heavy reliance people in far-flung areas have on the USPS helped push rural respondents to say they oppose privatization, with 58% saying they were against it.
As Common Dreams reported last month, an analysis by the Institute for Policy Studies found that private mail carriers like FedEx and UPS already charge "remote surcharges" to 8% of all U.S. ZIP Codes—home to nearly 4 million people—because they are in mountain communities and other remote areas. While USPS has a universal service obligation, people in rural areas pay up to $15.50 for deliveries from private companies.
Fifty-six percent of Americans said privatization would result in higher prices for mailing packages and letters, while 17% said prices were likely to improve.
Without competition from USPS, private companies could impose additional charges for weekend deliveries, fuel, residential deliveries, and more.
"Postal customers should trust their gut when it comes to schemes to sell off or transfer the USPS," said APWU president Mark Dimondstein. "Plans to privatize the Post Office are about enriching Wall Street and not serving Main Street. Evidence shows that selling off the USPS would lead to higher prices for postal services as well as higher prices for shipping packages at FedEx and UPS."
On the House floor recently, U.S. Rep. Sarah McBride (D-Del.) warned that "corporations won't serve what isn't profitable."
"This isn't about efficiency," she said. "This is about dismantling public services so they can prove government doesn't work."
The poll was released two months after Wells Fargo presented a five-step plan for privatizing USPS to Wall Street investors, including raising USPS prices by as much as 140%, selling postal real estate to commercial bidders, and imposing mass layoffs on the service's 600,000 employees.
The bank said privatization would lead to the "harvesting," or closing, of neighborhood post offices across the country—something 72% of respondents opposed in Thursday's poll.
Trump ally Elon Musk also said in March that Amtrak and USPS were top targets for the so-called Department of Government Efficiency, which the president selected him to lead and which has pushed to dismantle numerous government agencies and laid off nearly 300,000 federal employees.
"I think logically we should privatize anything that can reasonably be privatized," Musk said. Trump has also expressed support for privatization.
Respondents to Thursday's poll expressed support for a number of steps that could strengthen the U.S. Postal Service's finances, including 77% who backed making office supplies available for purchase in post offices, 72% who supported the selling of hunting and fishing licenses, and 60% who supported making magazines and newspapers available for purchase.
"The survey results indicate that the outlook is good in our ongoing fight against privatizers trying to sell off our public Postal Service for profit," said the APWU. "We should remain steady in our message—the U.S. Mail Is Not for Sale!"
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'We Have No More Food,' Says World Central Kitchen Amid Israeli Attacks and Deadly Starvation
"Our trucks—loaded with food and supplies—are waiting in Egypt, Jordan, and Israel, ready to enter Gaza," said WCK founder José Andrés. "But they cannot move without permission."
May 08, 2025
After serving more than 130 million meals and distributing 26 million loaves of bread to Gazans over the past 18 months, even after repeated—and critics say deliberate—Israeli massacres of its staff, World Central Kitchen said Wednesday that it has no more food left to prepare as Israel continues to block lifesaving aid from entering the embattled enclave and more Palestinians starve to death.
"World Central Kitchen no longer has the supplies to cook meals or bake bread in Gaza," the Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit said in a statement. "We have no more food to prepare."
"We have now reached the limits of what is possible."
"Since Israel closed border crossings in early March, WCK has been unable to replenish the stocks of food that we use to feed hundreds of thousands of Gazans daily," the group continued, referring to Israel's tightening of the 579-day "complete siege" imposed on the Palestinian territory after the Hamas-led attack of October 7, 2023.
"In recent weeks, our teams stretched every remaining ingredient and fuel source using creativity and determination," WCK said. "We turned to alternative fuels like wood pallets and olive husk pellets and pivoted away from rice recipes that require more fuel in favor of stews with bread."
"By constantly adapting over the past weeks, we were cooking 133,000 meals daily at our two remaining WCK field kitchens and baking 80,000 loaves of bread each day," the charity added. "But we have now reached the limits of what is possible."
WCK kept serving Gaza even after Israeli airstrikes killed 11 of its staff members.
In April 2024, seven members of a WCK aid team were killed when their clearly marked convoy was bombed in Deir al-Balah, despite receiving travel clearance from the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), which knew exactly where the vehicles were. Renowned Spanish-American chef José Andrés, who founded WCK in 2010—and was a vocal defender of Israel—called the attack "deliberate" as some Israelis took to social media to mock the slain humanitarians.
Seven months later, Israel bombed a WCK vehicle traveling in Khan Younis, killing three of the group's staffers. A "double-tap" follow-up strike killed two bystanders who attempted to help the initial victims.
In March 2025, a WCK volunteer was killed by an Israeli airstrike near one of the charity's Gaza facilities.
The slain WCK staffers are among the more than 400 humanitarian workers killed by Israeli bombs or bullets in Gaza, where more than 52,600 Palestinians—most of them women and children—have been slaughteredd and over 118,700 others wounded since October 2023, according to the Gaza Health Ministry.
Upward of 14,000 Gazans are also missing and presumed dead and buried beneath the rubble of hundreds of thousands of bombed buildings. Nearly all of Gaza's more than 2 million people have been forcibly displaced, often multiple times, while starvation and sickness ravage the besieged strip.
Deadly malnutrition—which has claimed the lives of at least dozens of Gazans, mostly children—has increased markedly since Israel's March 2 lockdown. Local officials say that at least 57 Palestinians have died from malnutrition combined with lack of adequate medical care. One of the most recent victims was 4-month-old Jenan Saleh al-Skafi, who died of severe malnutrition in al-Rantisi Hospital in Gaza City on May 2.
According to the Gaza Health Ministry, at least 65,000 children in Gaza require urgent treatment for severe malnutrition.
Israel—which is facing an ongoing genocide case at the International Court of Justice—stands accused of using starvation as a weapon of war in Gaza. Israeli leaders including National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir have endorsed bombing Gaza's food stores and other humanitarian aid. Ben-Gvir claimed Republican leaders in the United States, which provides Israel with diplomatic cover and tens of billions of dollars in armed aid, agree with his stance.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is a fugitive from the International Criminal Court, where he is wanted for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity including extermination and forced starvation, has backed his ministers' calls to starve Gaza.
Despite the growing starvation in Gaza, Israel is making it harder for foreign-based nongovernmental organizations to register and operate in Palestine by imposing what European lawmakers this week called "purposely vague" and "highly discretionary" new rules.
Although it is out of food, WCK said it is still able to distribute desperately needed potable water to Palestinians in Gaza.
"Our pots may be empty, our cooking fires snuffed out—but World Central Kitchen will keep serving," said Andrés. "Our trucks—loaded with food and supplies—are waiting in Egypt, Jordan, and Israel, ready to enter Gaza. But they cannot move without permission. Humanitarian aid must be allowed to flow."
WCK Gaza response director Wadhah Hubaishi asserted that "the borders need to open for World Central Kitchen to be able to feed people in need."
"If given full access to our infrastructure, partnerships, and incoming supplies," he added, "we are capable of providing hungry families in Gaza with 500,000 meals a day."
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