Berkeley Summer of Resistance: Rock the BOAT!

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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