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"We won't take it any more."
October 27, 2007
City & County Building, Salt Lake City, Utah
Address by Mayor Ross C. "Rocky" Anderson
11/15/07 "ICH" -- - Today, as we come together once again in
this great city, we raise our voices in unison to say to
President Bush, to Vice President Cheney, to other members of
the Bush Administration (past and present), to a majority of
Congress, including Utah's entire congressional delegation, and
to much of the mainstream media: "You have failed us miserably
and we won't take it any more."
While we had every reason to expect far more of you, you have
been pompous, greedy, cruel, and incompetent as you have led
this great nation to a moral, military, and national security
abyss." "You have breached trust with the American people in the
most egregious ways. you have utterly failed in the performance
of your jobs. You have undermined our Constitution, permitted
the violation of the most fundamental treaty obligations, and
betrayed the rule of law.
You have engaged in, or permitted, heinous human rights abuses
of the sort never before countenanced in our nation's history as
a matter of official policy. You have sent American men and
women to kill and be killed on the basis of lies, on the basis
of shifting justifications, without competent leadership, and
without even a coherent plan for this monumental blunder.
We are here to tell you: We won't take it any more!
You have acted in direct contravention of values that we, as
Americans who love our country, hold dear. You have deceived us
in the most cynical, outrageous ways. You have undermined, or
allowed the undermining of, our constitutional system of checks
and balances among the three presumed co-equal branches of
government. You have helped lead our nation to the brink of
fascism, of a dictatorship contemptuous of our nation's treaty
obligations, federal statutory law, our Constitution, and the
rule of law.
Because of you, and because of your jingoistic false
'patriotism,' our world is far more dangerous, our nation is far
more despised, and the threat of terrorism is far greater than
ever before. It has been absolutely astounding how you have
committed the most horrendous acts, causing such needless
tragedy in the lives of millions of people, yet you wear your
so-called religion on your sleeves, asserting your
God-is-on-my-side nonsense - when what you have done flies in
the face of any religious or humanitarian tradition. Your
hypocrisy is mind-boggling - and disgraceful.
What part of "Thou shalt not kill" do you not understand? What
part of the "Golden rule" do you not understand? What part of
"be honest," "be responsible," and "be accountable" don't you
understand? What part of "Blessed are the peacekeepers" do you
not understand?
Because of you, hundreds of thousands of people have been
killed, many thousands of people have suffered horrendous
lifetime injuries, and millions have been run off from their
homes. For the sake of our nation, for the sake of our children,
and for the sake of our brothers and sisters around the world,
we are morally compelled to say, as loudly as we can, 'We won't
take it any more!' "
As United States agents kidnap, disappear, and torture human
beings around the world, you justify, you deceive, and you cover
up. We find what you have done to men, women and children, and
to the good name and reputation of the United States, so
appalling, so unconscionable, and so outrageous as to compel us
to call upon you to step aside and allow other men and women who
are competent, true to our nation's values, and with high moral
principles to stand in your places - for the good of our nation,
for the good of our children, and for the good of our world.
In the case of the President and Vice President, this means
impeachment and removal from office, without any further delay
from a complacent, complicit Congress, the Democratic majority
of which cares more about political gain in 2008 than it does
about the vindication of our Constitution, the rule of law, and
democratic accountability.It means the election of people as
President and Vice President who, unlike most of the
presidential candidates from both major parties, have not aided
and abetted in the perpetration of the illegal, tragic,
devastating invasion and occupation of Iraq. And it means the
election of people as President and Vice President who will
commit to return our nation to the moral and strategic
imperative of refraining from torturing human beings.
In the case of the majority of Congress, it means electing
people who are diligent enough to learn the facts, including
reading available National Intelligence Estimates, before voting
to go to war. It means electing to Congress men and women who
will jealously guard Congress's sole prerogative to declare war.
It means electing to Congress men and women who will not submit
like vapid lap dogs to presidential requests for blank checks to
engage in so-called preemptive wars, for legislation permitting
warrantless wiretapping of communications involving US citizens,
and for dangerous, irresponsible, saber-rattling legislation
like the recent Kyl- Lieberman amendment.
We must avoid the trap of focusing the blame solely upon
President Bush and Vice-President Cheney. This is not just about
a few people who have wronged our country - and the world. They
were enabled by members of both parties in Congress, they were
enabled by the pathetic mainstream news media, and, ultimately,
they have been enabled by the American people - 40% of whom are
so ill-informed they still think Iraq was behind the 9/11
attacks - a people who know and care more about baseball
statistics and which drunken starlets are
wearing underwear than they know and care about the atrocities
being committed every single day in our name by a government for
which we need to take responsibility.
As loyal Americans, without regard to political partisanship --
as
veterans, as teachers, as religious leaders, as working men and
women, as students, as professionals, as businesspeople, as
public servants, as retirees, as people of all ages, races,
ethnic origins, sexual orientations, and faiths -- we are here
to say to the Bush administration, to the majority of Congress,
and to the mainstream media: "You have violated your solemn
responsibilities. You have undermined our democracy, spat upon
our Constitution, and engaged in outrageous, despicable acts.
You have brought our nation to a point of immorality,
inhumanity, and illegality of immense, tragic, unprecedented
proportions."
But we will live up to our responsibilities as citizens, as
brothers and sisters of those who have suffered as a result of
the imperial bullying of the United States government, and as
moral actors who must take a stand: And we will, and must, mean
it when we say 'We won't take it any more.
If we want principled, courageous elected officials, we need to
be principled, courageous, and tenacious ourselves. History has
demonstrated that our elected officials are not the leaders -
the leadership has to come from us. If we don't insist, if we
don't persist, then we are not living up to our responsibilities
as citizens in a democracy - and our responsibilities as moral
human beings. If we remain silent, we signal to Congress and the
Bush administration - and to candidates running for office - and
to the world - that we support the status quo.
Silence is complicity. Only by standing up for what's right and
never letting down can we say we are doing our part. Our
government, on the basis of a campaign we now know was entirely
fraudulent, attacked and militarily occupied a nation that posed
no danger to the United States. Our government, acting in our
name, has caused immense, unjustified death and destruction.
It all started five years ago, yet where have we, the American
people, been? At this point, we are responsible. We get together
once in a while at demonstrations and complain about Bush and
Cheney, about Congress, and about the pathetic news media. We
point fingers and yell a lot. Then most people politely go away
until another demonstration a few months later.
How many people can honestly say they have spent as much time
learning about and opposing the outrages of the Bush
administration as they have spent watching sports or mindless
television programs during the past five years? Escapist,
time-sapping sports and insipid entertainment have indeed become
the opiate of the masses. Why is this country so sound asleep?
Why do we abide what is happening to our nation, to our
Constitution, to the cause of peace and international law and
order? Why are we not doing all in our power to put an end to
this madness?
We should be in the streets regularly and students should be
raising hell on our campuses. We should be making it clear in
every way possible that apologies or convoluted, disingenuous
explanations just don't cut it when presidential candidates and
so many others voted to authorize George Bush and his neo-con
buddies to send American men and women to attack and occupy
Iraq.
Let's awaken, and wake up the country by committing here and now
to do all each of us can to take our nation back. Let them hear
us across the country, as we ask others to join us: "We won't
take it any more!"
I implore you: Draw a line. Figure out exactly where your own
moral breaking point is. How much will you put up with before
you say "No more" and mean it?
I have drawn my line as a matter of simple personal morality: I
cannot, and will not, support any candidate who has voted to
fund the atrocities in Iraq. I cannot, and will not, support any
candidate who will not commit to remove all US troops, as soon
as possible, from Iraq. I cannot, and will not, support any
candidate who has supported legislation that takes us one step
closer to attacking Iran. I cannot, and will not, support any
candidate who has not fought to stop the kidnapping,
disappearances, and torture being carried on in our name.
If we expect our nation's elected officials to take us
seriously, let us send a powerful message they cannot
misunderstand. Let them know we really do have our moral
breaking point. Let them know we have rawn a bright line. Let
them know they cannot take our support for granted - that,
regardless of their party and regardless of other political
considerations, they will not have our support if they cannot
provide, and have not provided, principled leadership.
The people of this nation may have been far too quiet for five
years, but let us pledge that we won't let it go on one more day
- that we will do all we can to put an end to the illegalities,
the moral degradation, and the disintegration of our nation's
reputation in the world.
Let us be unified in drawing the line - in declaring that we do
have a moral breaking point. Let us insist, together, in
supporting our troops and in gratitude for the freedoms for
which our veterans gave so much, that we bring our troops home
from Iraq, that we return our government to a constitutional
democracy, and that we commit to honoring the fundamental
principles of human rights.
In defense of our country, in defense of our Constitution, in
defense of our shared values as Americans - and as moral human
beings - we declare today that we will fight in every way
possible to stop the insanity, stop the continued military
occupation of Iraq, and stop the moral depravity reflected by
the kidnapping, disappearing, and torture of people around the
world.
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