One of the martyrs in the SOA cause is Dorothy Kazel, a Cleveland nun who was raped and killed Dec. 2, 1980, by El Salvador National Guardsmen.
"I know the Kazel family very well," said Kucinich, a former Cleveland mayor.
His relationship with the Kazels goes back to high school. He knew the family well enough to attend Kazel's going away party before she left for her mission work in El Salvador.
Kazel was known as "Madre Dorthea" in the Central American community where she worked to help refugees of the Salvador Civil War obtain food, shelter and medical supplies. She was one of four women killed that day. Kucinich also knew Jean Donovan, a layperson who was also one of the victims.
When Kucinich takes the Fort Benning Road stage shortly after 9 a.m. Sunday, he will do what he has been doing since he was elected to Congress in 1997 -- call for the closure of the U.S. Army school. This will be the first time he's attended the protest and the first time the protest has had a presidential candidate address a crowd that is expected to be more than 20,000 people.
"I am looking forward to joining thousands of Americans from all around the country in standing for human rights and for a new direction in U.S. international policy," Kucinich said in a telephone interview this week. "This is a question of justice being done. The School of the Americas has trained people to kill innocent civilians. It's a matter of simple justice that requires it to be shut down, and for America to stop supporting regimes that violate human rights."
While Kucinich stands for that new direction, he wants to make one thing clear -- it's not about the soldiers.
"I will also talk about the soldiers and how we can't separate ourselves from the soldiers and their families," Kucinich said. "This is a debate about policy that is set by the commander in chief and by decades of unchallenged international direction."
Eric LeCompte, one of the SOA Watch organizers, said having Kucinich take part in the vigil sends a positive message.
"What it illustrates is this is a national issue," LeCompte said. "Not only do people across the country care about this, but it's reaching the presidential campaign. The presidential debate will allow us another venue to seek the closure of the school."
Kucinich said because this country is at war, it's important that people's voices are heard this weekend.
"We don't give up our rights when we are at war," he said. "We need to stand by our rights. That is when it's most important to do it. This administration has taken this country in a direction that is anti-democratic."
Kucinich worked with the late Congressman Joe Moakley and his successor, Rep. Jim McGovern, D-Mass., to try and pass legislation that will cut federal funding to the school, which trains military and police for Central American and Latin American countries. So far, those legislative actions have been unsuccessful.
He did fight for an amendment to legislation that funded the school. Interestingly enough, this amendment had over a 100 sponsors and has since the 108th Congress. The bill prohibiting funding has yet to make it out of the House yet.
But I am not letting Clinton, Obama, Dodd, and Biden or Edwards especially off easy for ignoring this issue. They should have been at this protest today. Despite the fact that if you look up their votes, you can see that they voted or chose to register a "no vote" on legislation that appropriated further funds for WHINSEC, it does not matter. They are running to lead this country and must be adamantly against this School of the Americas.
Pick up and read Truth, Torture, and the American Waytoday, a book written by a woman whose husband Everardo, a Mayan comandante in the mountains of Guatemala, was disappeared. She risked her life and protested outside the National Palace in Guatemala fasting for over thirty days.
She also has fasted and protested in Washington, D.C. hoping to get the attention of our government who must shut down this school.
She has worked closely with Sister Dianna Ortiz whose story is an atrocity one would have only thought Nazis allowed. Yet, America allowed soldiers it trained to allow or participate in the harm of this nun.
by
Kevin Gosztola (231 articles, 127 quicklinks, 72 diaries, 895 comments)
on Monday, November 19, 2007 at 8:32:25 AM
While most of the other phony candidates claiming to be 'fighting for the American people' spent their Sunday spinning and pontificating on the Sunday shows, Dennis Kucinich actively participated and spoke at an anti-war protest against the School of the Americas, which trains Latin American dictators (sorry Musharraf, you can't apply) to torture and oppress their people.
Kucinich took time out, and had the courage, to actually demonstrate in an anti-war protest at the Army’s terror school for dictators SOA.
Obama didn’t even have the guts or time to leave the campaign of lies to vote against the Kyl-Lieberman resolution for starting the next war in Iran.
Of course, to be fair to Obama, it should be noted that at least he wasn’t as bad as uber-war-hawk Hillary, who left the campaign to actually vote for the Lieberman IRAN WAR PLAN!!
In our country where the vast majority of average people want the war ended NOW, this clearly explains why the MSM applauds Hillary as the front-runner, Obama as the most serious contender, and Kucinich as not even worth covering.
This clearly shows, beyond a shadow of doubt, that theMSM is totally against the democratic will of the American anti-war people — and totally in the hands of the ruling-elite corporatist war-Empire.
[As i posted on NYT blog]
by
Alan MacDonald (10 articles, 0 quicklinks, 1 diaries, 67 comments)
on Monday, November 19, 2007 at 9:42:21 AM
When asked about the School of the Americas at a fundraiser.
...here in Santa Fe, Dennis Kucinich said, with no hesitation, that if he were elected President, he would *shut down* that abomination. I'm paraphrasing, but the strong emotion was there!
by
Judy Barrett (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 11 comments)
on Monday, November 19, 2007 at 7:40:26 PM
Excellent article! // There are 2 huge themes underlying
your story here -- and very much to your credit, I see that you're on to both of them.
But just to put these themes into explicit focus -- one concerns the extent of militarization of US society -- not just in education, but in all basic aspects of the economy, the political system, & the culture. The other lies in the question, what is the real relationship of the Democratic Party to this militarization?
The more one examines it, the clearer it becomes that militarization has largely taken over American society, & this process has been in high gear ever since WWII. When Eisenhower warned the public of the danger posed by the "military industrial complex" (MIC), in his 1961 farewell address, he was talking about something he already saw as a monster -- and the monster has only become larger & more powerful since then.
Any attempt to "remove" the MIC from the economy, or to simply limit its control over the political process, or to somehow cut it down to size -- is unfortunately something we can only dream about. Politicians don't even talk about such things anymore -- the issue is "not on the table" for discussion. The monster is just too deeply embedded -- it would be more accurate to think of this immense military machine as what America has become, than to imagine that it's something that "We, the people" have any control over.
As you noted, none of the other Democrats showed up at the SOA protest. This is no accident. The MIC came into being during the Truman administration, & the economy has been on a permanent "war footing" ever since. And both parties have supported this, every step of the way. They developed a code language for speaking about it. Everyone knows that politicians always call for a "strong America" in their speeches -- but what the phrase really means is the intention to spend unlimited taxpayer funds on the Pentagon, & on technologies that may prove to be useful in some military sense.
The Dem Party likes to posture as the more "dovish" of the 2 parties, but the truth is entirely different. Ever since WWII, the Dems have supported the growth of the MIC, the use of US military power & the CIA, & the dirty torture tactics of those we trained at the SOA -- every bit as much as Republicans. And of course, the problem is not the SOA itself, which has become (like Guantanamo) a kind of symbol of something much larger. (In other words, once you get something so unpopular as the SOA or Gitmo, it becomes possible for some Democrats to posture as "antiwar" by calling for a shut-down of the symbol -- without at all opposing the larger militarized system that creates such symbols.)
To say it briefly, the Dems and the Republicans are full partners in the ongoing militarization of American society -- and always have been. The only difference between the parties, in this area, is that the D's posture as "doves," while the R's are pretty out-front about their intentions to bully other countries with military force. But when it comes to actual support of the MIC as demonstrated by policy & by congressional votes -- both parties are completely obedient to, & supportive of, the MIC. In a sense, the MIC runs the country; in many ways, it practically is the country -- except for much of the population (whose voice counts for very little in all this).
by
Richard Mynick (2 articles, 3 quicklinks, 1 diaries, 1213 comments)
on Monday, November 19, 2007 at 12:05:13 PM
U.S. interrogation techniques are NOT torture, period. Those who are saying differently are incompetent or asserting propaganda for political benefit at the cost of American citizens. No, matter your political party affiliation, and setting aside your thoughts on issues.We all need to remember what it is to be an American Citizen.We need to make sure our elected representatives obey their Oath of Office and keep their Oath of Allegiance.See http://tinyurl.com/2znnvl Know whom you are voting for.
by
DrColes (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 23 comments)
on Monday, November 19, 2007 at 2:54:19 PM
Perhaps you should undergo some waterboarding, and then
some of the sex-humilation techniques practised regularly at Gitmo and Abu Ghraib, and then some exposure to vicious snarling dogs, as we all saw in the photographs. Then we'd "rendition" you to Syria or Egypt for some more "humane persuasion."
Then you could come back and tell us if you thought it was torture or not.
by
Richard Mynick (2 articles, 3 quicklinks, 1 diaries, 1213 comments)
on Monday, November 19, 2007 at 3:15:27 PM
This response seems a bit schizophrenic. You want our elected officials to keep their oaths of office, but waterboarding and its cousins are *not* torture?
Down in this rabbit hole with you, let me say that today's American "democracy" is not democratic, it's elections are *not* elections, but selections, instead.
Yes, be careful for whom you vote. They might restore the Constitution, Habeus Corpus, the Bill of Rights -- not to mention America's standing as a decent and compassionate player among nations.
by
Judy Barrett (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 11 comments)
on Monday, November 19, 2007 at 7:37:46 PM
I am the Public Affairs Officer (Spokesman) for the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation, and I continue to be amazed at the wilful ignorance that permeates the dialogue about the institute. Start with Father Roy's comment, "Who are the insurgents?" Guess what, insurgents are people with guns and bombs, trying to overthrow their governments. And guess again, all the governments in this hemisphere are civilian elected governments (except Cuba, and we don't work with them). Most of them send students to our courses because those courses are worthwhile to them. Not only are the courses worthwhile, but maybe even more important is the opportunity to sit down with people from neighboring countries and develop relationships that lead to understanding. No use me going on about this--what every person who sincerely seeks the truth should do is his/her own research. Come to the institute, sit in classes, talk with students and faculty, review instructional materials. Students, reporters, other citizens do so daily--nothing hidden, nothing avoided.
by
Lee Rials (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 5 comments)
on Tuesday, November 20, 2007 at 8:22:35 AM
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