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Musings from Central America

By Lane Anderson

We do live in interesting times...and challenging times!

Here in Latin America there is a certain gratitude among those on the left that the US is bogged down in Iraq. Remember that Mexico was invaded several times by the US, and Guatemala, where I am headed next, was the first successful coup of the CIA. They have long memories down here. They know that if the US military were not so overextended in Iraq and Afghanistan, that they might well be in Venezuela, Bolivia and Nicaragua ...all of which have elected leftist leadership recently, and the first two of which are nationalizing resources which US corporations used to profit from...usually a precursor to intervention.

So the resources (and the profits they represent) have been the basis for nearly every war we have fought, I think. Perhaps the Korean war and Vietnam war were not so overtly about the resources, but about ownership of them....would they be publicly owned (communism) or privately owned (capitalism)? This is the debate that Latin American countries are now having, and without the kind of intervention that they once would have expected.

And what exactly can we do about globalization and corporatization of economy and resources? We are not in the category of Bolivia, Venezuela or Mexico...we are not producers, but we are consumers of those resources...and it is our military that is used to go after those resources...our sons and daughters who die!

With a broken democracy, a corrupt system of corporate plutocracy, and the specter of global warming, peak oil, and endless future conflicts to secure the resources that the corporations require, we must look to the only place we are still in control...total control...that of consumption. The US citizenry may not be able to elect the kind of candidate they want, and they may not be able to get their representatives to stand up for peace and justice, but they CAN change the way they consume the resources... that is in our power.

As they have in the past, veterans who have served their country in time of war can lead the way to this needed change. Last summer Brian Willson led a Veterans Ride to the Veterans For Peace convention in Seattle while the VVAW had a convention in Chicago. This year the two conventions are close enough for a vets ride between the two....the VVAW 40th August 4th and 5th in Chicago and VFP in St. Louis August 16th. The ride will require 40 miles a day, something we learned we could do last summer. We will be hosted by churches, peace and justice groups and conservation groups along the way (as we were last summer).

I invite my comrades in VVAW to join in this effort to do 40 miles a day for oil independence and a new American Way Of Life (AWOL).

To join up and be included in the planning, email andersonlane47@yahoo.com

CIS delegation to Rutilio Grande and Romero events...the bearded man in the middle is Father Orlando, Rutilio Grandes nephew and the location is the church in El Paisnal, where Father Rutilio Grande lived and spoke. Six of the men are veterans, including two Vietnam vets. Lane Anderson is in the VVAW shirt, National VFP Boardmember Wayne Wittman is in the VFP shirt.