WORLD CAN'T WAIT - DRIVE OUT THE BUSH REGIME!

Why YOU are needed in Berkeley this summer beginning July 15:

The anger and frustration that millions of people all throughout the country have been feeling during Bush's second term has mostly remained at a low simmer, beneath the surface, held in check by feelings of impotence and the illusion of a Democratic savior.  This reservoir bubbled up and overflowed this spring in Berkeley. Hundreds of youth took to the streets to demand: military recruiters out of our schools and out of our communities!  Hundreds of people of conscience - lawyers, psychologists, law students, torture survivors - have been part of a growing movement to dismiss, disbar, and prosecute "torture professor" John Yoo.

The battles to shut down the Marine recruiting station in Berkeley and to fire UC Berkeley professor John Yoo have become major fault lines which have reverberated across the country and put Berkeley in the national spotlight as an epicenter of resistance to the Bush program of unending war and torture.  All summer long we will be mobilizing youth to spark a movement that can transform the national landscape.

No more sitting passively on the sidelines waiting for some politician to put an end to the dangerous direction this country is heading.  It's not going to happen!  If the Democrats really wanted to stop the war, they wouldn't keep funding it.  They just gave Bush another $162 billion!

We are the ones we've been waiting for.  Will we go down in history as the apathetic self-absorbed generation who spent the summer playing video games while our government tortured people and got ready to bomb Iran?  Or will join the resistance movement in Berkeley, changing ourselves and the world in the process? 

SPECIFIC PLANS: Volunteers will begin arriving in Berkeley July 15.  August 20 we'll be heading to Denver to put out a radical pole of opposition at the Democratic National Convention (Aug. 25-28).  Here are some of the things we will be doing before we head out there:

• "Shut Down the Recruiters" tour: Build for a Bay Area-wide tour that becomes a major political event.  People can "hook up with" the tour.  This would be a one week tour of recruiting stations and military bases around the Bay Area.  Each day we would go to two different spots, including off-the-beaten-track places like malls.  This would culminate in a large civil resistance at the Marine recruiters in Berkeley.  
• Street canvassing in Berkeley, including fundraising.  We will take out a petition calling for shutting down the Marine recruiting station.  We will also build support for the John Yoo tribunal in the Fall.  And we will find people who want to come on the "Shut Down the Recruiters" tour and to the DNC.
• Mass flyering at concerts and events all summer long.
• A musical benefit show to raise money for the DNC trip and get people onboard. 
• Youth mural project against military recruiting.
• Thursday youth gatherings.  Young people can hook up with us Thursday evenings for movies, discussion, brainstorming, and planning.  4-6pm starting July 17 at Spud's Pizza (Alcatraz and Adeline in Berkeley)
• Organize buses/vans/car caravans to the DNC.  Some youth will go early and make stops at military bases, including the notoriously right wing Christian fascist Air Force base in Colorado Springs.
  

What you can do to help make this happen:

Come to Berkeley!  If you live in the Bay Area, get involved in these exciting plans!

Intern with World Can't Wait: get school credit for fighting the power and changing the world.

Berkeley residents: house World Can't Wait volunteers from around the country.  Email us back and let us know how many people you can house and what the arrangements would be.

DONATE!  DONATE!  DONATE!  All this is going to take money.  What could be more important than helping a youth volunteer get to Berkeley and making it possible for them to be part of this summer of resistance?   Adopt an Actvist !

Several youth are ready to go make history. Your generous contribution today will make it happen!

Contact us at:

youth_students@
worldcantwait.org

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World Can't Wait on Facebook

 SPECIAL WCW MEETING FOCUS:
No Attacks on Iran!

With special guest Aaron Newman showing his new documentary film:

IRAN (is not the problem)

6:30 PM, Friday evening, June 6
The Persian Center, 2029 Durant Ave., Berkeley, CA
Map & Directions to the Persian Center 

 This important special meeting will focus on the dangerous situation with possible US attacks against Iran looming. This is a chapter meeting, open to all concerned friends and the community, to discuss urgent plans that everyone can take part in.

We'll be joined by filmmaker Aaron Newman who will screen for us his excellent new documentary "IRAN (is not the problem).” Although his film had a recent premiere screening in San Francisco, it hasn't yet been released widely. We are encouraging everyone to see it, spread it, take it to classrooms and communities and house meetings.

Ron Kovic:
"I am sending my complete support and admiration to all those now involved in the courageous struggle to stop military recruitment in Berkeley and across the country."

Ron Kovic -- the paralyzed Vietnam veteran whose autobiography was made into the Oscar-winning 1989 feature film by Oliver Stone: "Born on the Fourth of July," starring Tom Cruise -- sends his complete support to the effort to stop the recruiters in Berkeley and across the country.

We are encouraging all of our friends and supporters to read his powerful statement, posted today on "Common Dreams," forward it widely, and yes . . . go out and rent/borrow/buy "Born on the Fourth of July." And make sure you bring a couple of friends to the debate Thursday!

Here is Ron's statement:
Stopping the War Machine: Military Recruiters Must Be Confronted

Cindy Sheehan, Gold Star Mother
vs.
Recruiting Officer for the U.S. Armed Forces

Audience Questions and Answers to follow
All Ages Welcome
(A special invititation to Youth, Students,
and Their Families and Loved Ones!)

A storm of controversy has erupted over recent protests against the Marines Recruiting Station in downtown Berkeley. With no end in sight to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and a new war against Iran looming -- all the major presidential candidates agree on a significant expansion of U.S. military forces. What do you know about these questions? What do you think? Come hear a two-sided debate between one of the country's most well-known anti-war leaders and the military recruiters themselves. Bring your friends, your family, your opinions, and your questions.

Date: Thursday May 29
Time: 7:00 PM-9:00 PM
Place: St. Mark's Episcopal Church
2300 Bancroft (at Ellsworth)
Berkeley, CA 94704

Donation $5-10 sliding scale, $3 Youth/Students
(No one turned away for lack of funds)

This debate presented by The World Can't Wait - Drive Out the Bush Regime!,
SF Bay Area Chapter and will be taped by KPFA 94.1 FM for later broadcast.

Wheelchair accessible

For more info, or to reserve seats, call: (415) 864-5153 or email: sf@worldcantwait.org

You’re invited to be in the hall for this important national World Can’t Wait organizers’ conference! It’s set for the May 3'd - 4th weekend, on the UC Berkeley campus.

WCW organizers and leaders from all over the country will spend two days delving deeply into the challenges facing our movement, sharing experiences and setting the direction for the coming months of 2008. Everyone who’s been part of and/or supporting the World Can’t Wait movement is urged to come take part! We’ll be making bold plans to repudiate the program still firmly in place under George Bush. We will discuss factors that may yet make it possible to drive Bush and Cheney from office, and the need for people to act independently of the politics defined and allowed by the coming election (witness the fact that no campaign is making the obvious moral call for impeachment based on lying to Congress or war crimes). We’ll tackle assessing the Bush program – the disparity between the hopes people have in the presidential candidates, and the candidates’ actual political programs – the possibility of a Bush attack on Iran. We’ll dig into World Can’t Wait’s work against military recruiting and torture, and make concrete plans through the fall for spreading the movement among youth and students.

Most importantly, we’ll discuss our responsibility as people living in this country, to bring a halt those actions most associated with the crimes of the Bush regime: the illegitimate war and occupation of the Middle East, the torture state assembled at the highest White House level and the “fascist remaking” of the society for generations to come.

Mid-way in the conference on Saturday evening we’ll be in North Berkeley for a program (open to the public) of video excerpts from the March Winter Soldier Investigation into the US military in Iraq & Afghanistan, with commentary from Elaine Brower whose son was deployed in both countries.

Can the world wait? Our movement will discuss the demands placed by history on those who have identified the Bush regime as a danger to the world which can and must be isolated, its program defeated and the basis laid for a movement on a scale that can really make a huge change in this country and in the world. Join us!

Watch here for more info about the conference agenda and registration. But please go now to the national WCW website – and as you browse the new articles, action reports and commentaries there, think about what a difference it has already made that the World Can’t Wait movement has been out here for these past three Bush Regime years! Calling war crimes and war criminals out for what they truly are . . . Demanding impeachment . . . Taking on the Christian Right . . . and the military recruiters . . . and Fox News . . . and the architects of torture . . . Inspiring a new wave of youth and students to take heart and take to the streets. Have you been part of bringing all this forward, in these past 3 years? Do you want to be part of it now and in the months ahead? Then come to this conference and jump in.

AND WE NEED VOLUNTEERS! As the host chapter, we need everyone to help with setting up the conference site, organizing housing, providing food and many other details both large and small. If you can help personally or with suggestions on any of these, please call these coordinators:

General Help:   Office;     415-864-5153
Housing:        MaryAnn;    510-502-8947
Food (meals):   Sabrina;    510-827-8372
Logistics:      Mike;       650-619-9273
Logistics:      Noel        415-864-5153

SF Bay Area WCW Chapter office
415-864-5153

Download & distribute a  2-sided flyer for feb. 11-15

EMERGENCY 24-HOUR VIGIL
Support the Berkeley City Council Stand! calling on USMC Recruiters to leave Berkeley. Bring tents, sleeping bags, food, your family & friends, your signs, music. (A coordinating meeting was held on 2-10-08 including World Can't Wait, CODEPINK, The ANSWER Coalition and Veterans For Peace)
Monday  2-11-08
     7PM CODEPINK organized encampment with World Can't Wait
Tuesday 2-12-08
     5AM World Can't Wait & CODEPINK counter-protest right-wing press event
     12noon protest coalition press conference/rally led by CODEPINK
     5PM City Council Meeting demonstration. This is a national media event.
City Hall lawn, 2134 MLK Jr. Way, Berkeley (2 blocks from Downtown Berkeley BART).


SHUT DOWN THE BERKELEY MARINE RECRUITING STATION!
Join World Can’t Wait, Code Pink, high school and college students, anti-war veterans and many others. Nonviolent Civil Resistance all day beginning at 7AM. Public debate.
Friday  2-15-08
     7AM - 7PM demonstration & action led by WORLD CAN'T WAIT and joined by others
     3PM Rally and Convergence. Waterboarding re-enactment.
64 Shattuck Sq. at University Ave, Berkeley (2 blocks from downtown Berkeley BART).

The city council members and Mayor Tom Bates need to hear from you now in support of their resolution declaring the Marine Corps Recruiting Center to be "unwelcome" in Berkeley. Email or call them your support. Please CC us so we can publish your support (names and emails deleted for publishing): sf@worldcantwait.org
Mayor Tom Bates                   510-981-7100   mayor@ci.berkeley.ca.us
District 1   Linda Maio             510-981-7110   lmaio@ci.berkeley.ca.us
District 2   Darryl Moore          510-981-7120   dmoore@ci.berkeley.ca.us
District 3   Maxwell Anderson  510-981-7130   manderson@ci.berkeley.ca.us
District 4   Dona Spring           510-981-7140   spring@ci.berkeley.ca.us
District 5   Laurie Capitelli       510-981-7150   lcapitelli@ci.berkeley.ca.us
District 6   Betty Olds             510-981-7160   olds@ci.berkeley.ca.us
District 7   Kriss Worthington   510-981-7170   kworthington@ci.berkeley.ca.us
District 8   Gordon Wozniak     510-981-7180   GWozniak@ci.berkeley.ca.us

Thousands of support letters sampling: webpage PDF for printing

• the story on the recruiters "Unwelcome" in Berkeley city resolutions
• San Francisco Chronicle story
• New York Times story
• City of Arcata, CA has just begun ballot initiative for banning recruiters
  

2-1-08 Shut Down: chained to door, blocking, arrest
Photo gallery | Press | Report
Video: Shutting down the Berkeley USMC Recruitment Center 2-1-08


1-31-08 Shut Down and Water-boarding re-enactment
Photo gallery | Press | Report
Video: Berkeley Can't Wait for Recruiters to Leave!

These compelling, ORANGE 6 foot banners are available at the office.

You may sign them out, and get them sponsored and displayed immediately.

Click on these thumbnail photos to view the full-size image.

The Susan Wicklund book-signing event was a great way to end a weekend of resistance for women's rights and freedom.

go here for the complete set of images of this event
higher resolution available

An extremely important anti-torture event on the way to to the January 31 national day of "civil resistance"


go here for the complete set of images of this event
higher resolution available

YOUR GOVERNMENT, on the basis of outrageous lies, is waging a murderous and utterly illegitimate war in Iraq, with other countries in their sights.

YOUR GOVERNMENT is openly torturing people, and justifying it.

YOUR GOVERNMENT puts people in jail on the merest suspicion, refusing them lawyers, and either holding them indefinitely or deporting them in the dead of night.

YOUR GOVERNMENT is moving each day closer to a theocracy, where a narrow and hateful brand of Christian fundamentalism will rule.

YOUR GOVERNMENT suppresses the science that doesn't fit its religious, political and economic agenda, forcing present and future generations to pay a terrible price.

YOUR GOVERNMENT is moving to deny women here, and all over the world, the right to birth control and abortion.

YOUR GOVERNMENT enforces a culture of greed, bigotry, intolerance and ignorance.

People look at all this and think of Hitler - and they are right to do so. The Bush regime is setting out to radically remake society very quickly, in a fascist way, and for generations to come. We must act now; the future is in the balance.