Rest in peace, Tim. My heart goes out to your family.

NBC covverage of Tim's death at their studio at 58.

Daniel Drezner's odd post (with a comment from me).

In her most recent book, "War in the Empty Air: Victims, Perpetrators, and Postwar Germans" (2005), Barnouw examined Germans' failure to acknowledge and mourn their war dead and the devastation German citizens suffered in Allied air raids.

After the war, ordinary Germans were viewed collectively as perpetrators of the Holocaust and responsible for World War II. Silenced by this presumed guilt, even German war remembrances maintained an exclusive focus on Jewish victims of the Nazi regime, to the detriment of historical reality, she wrote.

I'm fascinated to learn of an intellectual who wrote passionately about the need to understand post-WWII in totality, rather than only through the lens of the Holocaust. It is a real shame that so many Americans, especially Jewish Americans, are indoctrinated to believe that Jewish suffering is somehow worse than the suffering that occurs throughout the world on a daily basis. That genocide was over 60 years ago and many genocides have occurred and are being perpetuated since then. Yet, somehow the refrain "never forget" is allowed to continue as an excuse for apartheid in Israel and starvation in Palestine.

Let me be clear: the Holocaust was a tragedy of incredible proportions. I have no doubt that we lost untold generations of brilliant people. I acknowledge that it was the most significant event for the Jewish people in the 20th century. However nothing - not the Holocaust or the pogroms of Russia that forced my family to flee to the U.S. or any other aspect of Jewish history - makes me or my people the world's most suffering ethnicity. Indeed, I believe this past suffering has been used to justify a horrific amount of racism and discrimination and colonial exploitation in Israel and Palestine.

I do not understand how my religion, which has so many threads of peaceful nonviolent resistance in its history, and my people, who have been on the forefront of the movements for social change, have become so entrenched in bigotry and discrimination. I fear that writing these words makes me a larger target for political reprisal. My friends joke that they don't want to stand too close to me walking down a street - fearing an assassin will be off-target and shoot them instead. (I actually found this to be the strangest aspect of my trip to NYC; my friends who do not participate in social activism seem to believe my influence and notoriety is any larger than the few people who occasionally read this blog.)

But this post was not supposed to be about me, rather about Dagmar Barnouw, whose books I must search out and read.

Read about her life from USC, including her enduring marriage to a man who fell in love with her at first sight.

I hope to have the courage to speak and write as passionately as Dagmar, even if it makes many people uncomfortable.

Women's International League for Peace and Freedom, US Section Acting Executive Director Laura Roskos is working with our web consultant and web hosting service to resolve the problem. Priority is being given to getting our website back online and investigations will continue to pinpoint the cause of the problem.

WILPF is the oldest women's peace organization, dedicated to women's participation in all political decision-making processes, a cessation of violence, and the creation of a just and peaceful world. Two of our foremothers are the only American women (so far) to win Nobel Peace Prizes: Jane Addams and Emily Greene Balch.

You may have heard of our Great Day slogan: "It will be a great day when our schools get all the money they need and the Air Force has to hold a bake sale to buy a bomber."

Support WILPF - Purchase Great Day Products from Northern Sun. WILPF copyrighted that sentence in 1978 and receives royalties for all products sold featuring our slogan and children in a playground image.

Read about our work to expand the reach of UN Security Council Resolution 1325 on women, peace, and security at our Peace Women Project website.

Learn about Creating a Critical Mass of Political Will for Nuclear Disarmament at our Reaching Critical Will website.

The above two projects are coordinated by WILPF international and reside on a more secure server.

Nicholas Kristof has a powerful Op-Ed in today's NYT, "Our Racist, Sexist Selves," that reminds us of the power of genitals. I speak plainly because this truth is so often denied in both the mainstream media and popular culture: Women Are Not Equal. The Women's Movement Cannot Be Dead. There Is Much That Still Needs to Be Done to Create Gender Equality. Los Derechos de Las Mujeres Son Los Derechos de Humanidad.

Until we start talking about the real ethnic differences that divide us, and the common humanity that unites us;

Until free-trade capitalism's reliance on extreme economic disparity is confronted;

Until democratic dialog inspires as much participation as American Idol voting,

the Movements for Change must continue.

According to the NYT, most people my age and younger are chatting on Facebook, MySpace, and their blogs about presidential YouTube clips. There's a free PDF about online political advocacy at e-politics. The Feminist Peace Network reminds me that there are lots of people who see that peace cannot be created without gender justice.

I'm not sure how to break through the clutter, have my voice heard, and influence public opinion. I do know I want to spend more time keeping up with Daniel Drezner (who lives the life I sometimes wish I had) and less time on conference calls.

So now, if you lose your home in the mortgage meltdown, and maybe the bank repo's your car because you lost your job, it'll be even harder for you to find work to pull yourself out of the economic hell that is the US "middle class."

Intellectuals wonder why Americans focus so much on celebrity gossip and have such a poor grasp on foreign affairs. Perhaps they can't be bothered with politics because they're struggling to make ends meet and they focus on the lives of the rich and famous because that fantasy is the closest most Americans will ever come to the American dream.

"Is a Lean Economy Turning Mean?" by Peter Goodman

Here's the Obama video:

And here's my man from the 04 race, General Wesley Clark for Hillary:

She got a more home-made endorsement from Anne Rice, the author of the famous Vampire Chronicles and more recently known for her Christianity:

I'm not posting the "Making of the Band" spoof that attempts to show the kids that Hillary is their kind of candidate. If you're looking for prophetic inspiration, Obama is probably your choice. If you think experience matters, Hillary is the one to vote for. Personally, I'm still waffling.

So, why should I put a lot of energy into discerning the difference between two candidates beholden to a broken system? Well, I am a member of the Democratic party, so I should at least be making an informed decision on Tuesday. The truth is, Obama is a much more inspiring speaker than Clinton. He's charismatic, charming, and yes, even reminds me of John F. Kennedy. But is that enough? After all, while Kennedy performed well during the Cuban Missile Crisis, it was proceeded by his disastrous leadership in the Bay of Pigs invasion.

In my mind, a presidential candidate's foreign policy is always the most important thing to judge him/her on, regardless of whether or not there's a "war on terrorism" happening. This is because everything domestic the president does is guided by the laws enacted by Congress, whereas the executive branch truly leads the nation in its international interaction. We have no choice but to accept that we live in a global economy with a global community, and I want a president with experience to be the chief ambassador of this country. I have more faith in Clinton's knowledge of foreign affairs than I do in Obama's.

Of course, there's also the historic moment bit of the contest. My father constantly points out that I should strongly support Hillary because we share an alma mater. And of course, there's plenty of second generation feminists who will tell you that young women who don't support Clinton don't appreciate the sacrifice and hard work of the women's movement and the need for women to support women candidates. It's a tired, patronizing drone that I don't think any young woman should take seriously. Because the truth is, gender and ethnic discrimination cannot be separated. On the scale of history, electing either a black man or a white woman would be an important milestone for this country. Young women recognize this and probably take gender out of the equation when choosing between the candidates, because we've grown up understanding the intersections of racial and gender bias.

Nevertheless, I've watched several of the Democratic debates over the last few months and Clinton has consistently seemed the stronger candidate in my mind. Of course, this says nothing about her electability since in the last two elections, the American people chose the dumbest candidate on the stage for their president.

Or did we?

The other reason I'm not obsessed with the presidential race is because I know it is inherently undemocratic. The electoral college system is a vestige of a time when men didn't trust the people and thought States were more important than individual citizens. Until the day that my vote in Los Angeles counts for exactly the same amount as a voter in Des Moines, I will continue to believe the presidential election process is inherently undemocratic. There is absolutely nothing about rural voters that make them needy of a stronger voice in the democratic process than any other minority in this country. In fact, I'd argue that the disproportionate value of rural voters has led to some of the worst legislation in this country's history: Farm Bills that feed the coffers of agribusiness and leave US school children with unhealthy meals, "alternative energy" policy that is completely fuel inefficient and has increased the poverty and hunger of our Mexican neighbors by raising the price of corn, and so forth.

So yeah, I'll probably be voting for Clinton on Tuesday. But it wont be the most interesting political act I do in the coming week. I consider my WILPF work more important to the future of society than any ballot I cast. Nevertheless, it is my civic duty to vote, and I will.

Over the weekend, Gazans were able to break through the Rafah border with Egypt and streamed into that country to do heinous things...like buying groceries and petrol.

Egypt is now sealing that border and residents of the Egyptian town of Rafah have been quoted as worried that Egyptians will starve because the Palestinians are buying all of their food.

In the meantime, the Israeli and US governments continue to justify this collective punishment - illegal under international law - by reminding people of militant rocket fire into the Israeli city Sderot.

For an Israeli historian's perspective on "the genocide" of Gaza, see "The Israeli Recipe For 2008: Genocide in Gaza, Ethnic Cleansing in the West Bank," by Ilan Pappe in the Indypendent of NY

Israeli humanitarian organizations tried to get aid into Gaza and were stopped by the Israeli government. Read about their interaction with their Palestinian neighbors on Al Jazeera.

The Chinese news service Xinhua reports that Egypt is sealing its border with Gaza.

AP reports that SecState Rice wants the border closed and Palestinian police should help maintain the territory's isolation.

UN Relief and Works Agency, the UN agency tasked with helping Palestine

UN News Centre, a roundup of official UN body discussions related to the Middle East

To be clear: I do not support violence. There is no justification for rocket attacks on Sderot. Just as importantly, the racist attitudes of the US and Israeli governments has justified inhumane and illegal treatment of the Palestinian people. Palestinians are not subhumans bent on killing every Jew. Palestinians are human beings who deserve the ability to make their own democratic choices and deserve freedom of movement, freedom from collective punishment, and freedom from the land and water grabs of their Israeli neighbors.

The mainstream media has been focused on the 08 presidential race horse race since at least January 07. More air time was spent on Sunday morning talk shows discussing candidates' relative viability in Iowa and New Hampshire than was spent discussing the substantial policy positions that differentiate them. Scariest statistic learned from this over-flow of information: only 5.7% of eligible voters participate in the 2004 Iowa caucuses. Tell me again why Angelenos live in too big of a city to have our votes count equally with those in rural states.

Elections haven't been going well around the world - among corruption charges, Kenya's elections are bloodier than normal (yes, sadly, violence is a regular aspect of national elections there). They aren't going well in Pakistan either, where Benazir Bhutto lost her life attempting to bring democracy back to a country plagued by military dictatorship buttressed by US foreign aid. Many in the US think democracy is duking it out with socialism in Venezuela, but personally I think the story is more complicated than that.

I'm looking forward to a New Year when people's movements for change encourage more people to get involved in social change. I look forward to more people believing they can make a difference - when more people delve deeply into the issues that intertwine us all, make their voices heard, and start building the nonviolent movements for change that will create the social upheaval needed to build a more just, peaceful world.

I believe we will be the change we wish to see in 2008. I believe together we will change the world. I believe 2008 will be more peaceful and just. I look forward to the New Year.

Want to support women's advocacy for peace & justice both in the US and throughout the world? Then give a tax deductible contribution to the Jane Addams Peace Association.

To join the world's oldest women's peace organization, click here.

I don't pretend to have all the answers. My belief in the Women's International League and its members is based on my observations of the peace, justice, and women's movements in historical perspective. It is difficult for me to hold firmly to that long-term view while dealing with the immediate realities of grief and mourning.

I hope as we move forward in our struggles for peace & justice we remember our individual and institutional fallibility. Though we are not perfect, we are all striving towards the same basic goal: a world at peace where all human needs are met equitably. I hope we will continue to work together to achieve those goals, by constructively supporting each other's work. I fear that our institutional progress may be undermined by our current financial crisis and eagerness to lay blame on particular individuals.

I look forward to helping the WILPF increase its presence within the movements for peace & justice and expanding its membership. I apologize if my last post seemed unnecessarily negative - sometimes, I deal with my frustrations publicly. Usually, I try to maintain a veil between my personal angst and public persona. I hope my sister WILPFers can forgive my transgression and we can work together to create the WILPF needed to create peace & justice in the world.

I have chosen not to write about the internal mechanisms of WILPF on this extremely public blog. While I will continue to refrain from delving into intra-personal conflict details that are best resolved through other fora, I feel it's time to address some of my WILPF work in a public forum.

Being a Member of the National Board
I've been accused of being power hungry and squandering the organization's resources on petty junkets to gab with my sister board members. The board, through a strategic planning process, is planning to restructure the composition of the next board. We have engaged stakeholders in the planning process, though they do not have equal decision-making authority. We are rolling out the vision through a series of conference calls this week with our national membership. This process has been demoralizing and fatiguing. While many people (include my local branch board) are supportive of the process, others choose to criticize and berate us for the format through which we are making changes. Rather than ask for background on the work of the board and the reasons the current board is considering a restructuring, members have decided that the position titles they prefer should be added to the next term. In the next breath, we are denounced for focusing solely on the structural needs of the organization and not spending enough time discussing the political underpinnings of the organization. Furthermore, our organization's financial precariousness is apparently caused solely by the lack of vigorous fundraising at the board level.

I have to admit that this whole discussion makes me question my unwavering support for the oldest women's peace organization. Unlike many US members, I became involved in WILPF because of my intellectual appreciation for the institution. As a peace & justice studies scholar, I learned the importance of strong civil institutions to hold governments and corporations in check. Without a strong institution, the best political rhetoric and most intriguing banners and actions wont make lasting change in this world. I think many of my sister WILPFers have more in common with the anarchists I've met in the blogosphere, than they do with the founding mothers of WILPF. Their disparaging comments on serious review of national structure is flabbergasting to me. Apparently, great program alone is the way to making our organization thrive.

As the National Program Chair, I know part of the criticism thrust at me is that I spend too much time trying to herd cats rather than do action. I'm never quite clear what action I'm supposed to be doing - as a trained organizer, I'm trying to give people the tools to lead our multi-issue organization, rather than be the leader of a fiefdom. Alas, volunteer efforts ebb and flow as the other areas of life creep in and snatch away time (illness and family obligations are the two major culprits in removing activists from our midst). And sometimes, I'll be honest, I disagree with the paths chosen by my sister activists. I believe writing this blog on a regular basis would be a better contribution to the social upheaval needed to create peace & justice in this world than wasting time writing letters to the editors of mainstream newspapers. Similarly, I don't want to spend my time organizing marches or rallies. But I respect the people who choose those paths of activism. I choose to deeply engage in issues and to write and speak about the hypocrisy and injustice in the world, rather than marching or holding honk for peace signs.

For the last several years, I've spent the majority of my time trying to create a structure that better supports the activism within WILPF and the greater peace & justice movement. Every time I read about rape as a war crime and how the international community consistently turns a blind eye, I remember why I'm involved in a women's peace organization. Every time I see misogyny on t.v. - be it the dozens of "models" on Deal or No Deal or the inability for a female contestant to win the audience's votes on Dancing with the Stars - I am reminded why even in this country, it is vitally important for women to stand together for peace & justice.

But I am tired. I'm serving my second three-year term on this board. During my first term, I watched my mentors quit - as they realized deep involvement with the org was not aligned with their personal commitments to peace & justice, because the org refused to change its parochial, upper middle class, older white women's closed society ways. During my second term, I watched the younger members of the board leave to focus more on their work (leaving me to wonder why I spent my 20s focused on WILPF rather than my paid work), and my best friend move onto involvement at the international level. I am very grateful that there are term limits and I cannot stand for another term on the board (unless I ran for President). I am tired of spending my life on this organization. Don't get me wrong - I'm a life member, and I'm not going away. Next June, I'll step down as Program Chair, but I'll still be the co-convener of the International Communications Committee and I'll still be involved in the Los Angeles branch. Hopefully, this break from involvement at the national level will allow me the room to breathe. To not wake up every day thinking about WILPF - to allow myself to create the semblance of a social life. I am hopeful that the next wave of board members will have the strength to continue implementing the strategic vision this board began.

To learn more about the US Section of WILPF, check out our website.

To learn more about Women's International League for Peace and Freedom, check out our international site.

Peace Women is an international WILPF project that monitors the implementation of UN Security Council Resolution 1325, which mandates women's equal participation in conflict and post-conflict resolution.

Reaching Critical Will is an international WILPF project that believes it will take a critical mass of political will for nuclear disarmament.

The Jane Addams Peace Association is educational affiliate of WILPF. Named for our famous, Nobel Peace Prizing winning, founding member, tax deductible donations to WILPF's peace work can be made through JAPA.

For more information on the Los Angeles branch, please email wilpfla AT yahoo DOT com.

In related crazy-people-control-politics news, the LA MTA has a new plan for the subway to the sea. Instead of acknowledging Wilshire as the overwhelmingly most popular bus route in the city, there's a proposal to route it on Santa Monica where more young people live who would embrace faux city living. Apparently, the masses of poor people who desperately need better public trans in this city are secondary to the desire by city boosters to create yuppie paradise.

"Chicago's transit budget at a crossroads: Emergency funds are granted as state lawmakers debate a sales-tax increase." in today's LAT

"L.A. subway plans take a radical shift," by Rong Gong Lin II in today's LAT

But that's okay, because the surge is making Iraqis safer. The Public Editor of the NYT makes the case that maybe there's been a decrease in the number of civilian casualties since the surge began. Then again, he ends the column by reminding us that it is still unsafe to live in Baghdad, according to an article written by 15 NYT reporters (never mind what's happening elsewhere in Iraq - it's too unsafe for US writers to venture beyond Baghdad).

Let's not get bogged down in details. It's important to remember the frame through which the occupation of foreign countries became acceptable to the US public: by creating a culture of fear that blames the ills of the world on so-called "Islamofascists." Nevermind that the word is meaningless. Pay no attention to reality: fascism is alive and well in the Western world. Even university courses on political science in the US have a difficult time defining fascism. Perhaps because the core of fascism is simple: the military & corporations taking control of the levers of political power. Instead of allowing this simple definition of fascism to be understood, Western leaders propel a a blurry, fearful understanding of a combination of racism and authoritarianism as the only "true" definition of fascism. Furthermore, instead of debating people who recognize the full scope of power held by the military industrial complex, Western political and intellectual "leaders" dismiss us as crazy left-wing nut cases.

Military force must always be the last resort of states and the international community. As Albert Camus said:

Mistaken ideas always end in bloodshed, but in every case it is someone else’s blood. That is why some of our thinkers feel free to say just about anything.

The safety of the world relies on more individuals becoming engaged in the political process, supporting international institutions, creating dialog with people in other countries, and demanding that the international political and economic structures be based on human security and human needs rather than on corporate greed.

Camus quote from this Op-Ed piece in today's NYT.