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On experiencing arrest as a "mild inconvenience"...

Submitted by Lyssa Strada on Wed, 09/13/2006 - 8:11pm.

“If every member of the house and senate had received 100 letters from people back home saying we have to do something about Rwanda, when the crisis was first developing, then I think the response would have been different” - Former US Senator Paul Simon

"The only way that we here, in the US, can assert our own humanity is to stand up to genocide, even a distant one.” - New York Times columnist Nicholas D. Kristof

"Our mild inconvenience [in being arrested] does not compare to the suffering of the people in Darfur. But until that suffering comes to an end, it is critical that people all over the world continue to demand that their leaders push for security and justice for the people of Darfur." - Reid Rector [an activist with Save Darfur] So wrote Rector in his blog entry about his frustration in trying to get enough people to pay enough attention to this story -- just click on his links.

What can you or I do? First, read this. Then, decide how much you can do. Writing a letter or several, which perhaps requires less of one's time and resources than any of the other actions-- certainly less than Reid Rector required of himself-- might actually be one of the most powerful actions one can take, especially if one writes from the heart. Read again what Sen. Simon wrote [above] about the power of letters to Congress.

Lyssa Strada will also post your letters here. Please use the email connection.

 

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Just to get us started, here is what I wrote...

Submitted by Admin on Wed, 09/13/2006 - 9:47pm.

to Senators Specter and Santorum:

Read what President Clinton said about Rwanda...

"It didn't happen under my administration. It happened under me." [in Fortune Magazine]

And then try to imagine our current president saying the same thing about Darfur. [I know... I can't picture it either.] No two ways about it, though. President Clinton is perfectly clear that if he had it to do over again, he would act more promptly to stop the genocide in Rwanda.

Polls show that the American people think we should be doing something to stop the slaughter, but as with so many other issues, our elected representatives are stuck inside a ring of hell known as inside-the-beltway politics.

Please try to break this insidious cycle and do something about this crisis that is neither a Republican, nor a Democratic, issue, but a simple, humanitarian issue. A humanitarian issue that will come back to haunt us all, if we do nothing.

To begin with... how about sending Bolton packing, and insisting that George Bush send a more worthy nominee for the UN? Then, how about allocating some money, to help defray the costs for those who will be called upon to contribute troops, since we won't be able to...

Now that would be some legislation that could still be passed this session-- given the political will-- and about which both political parties could be proud.

Sincerely yours,

LS

[I used the form on this page.]

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