wfn.org | War, domestic concerns dominate legislative briefing

["NewsDesk" <NewsDesk@UMCOM.ORG>]

March 6, 2003	    News media contact: Joretta Purdue7(202)
546-87227Washington	10-21-71BP{125}

NOTE: Photographs are available with this story.

By Joretta Purdue*

WASHINGTON (UMNS) - Politicians and social justice advocates held out hope
during a legislative briefing that people across the United States could
still make a difference where it counts: in the budget and on issues of war
and peace.

More than 250 United Methodists attended a March 2-5 legislative briefing on
"Gospel Demands Public Witness," sponsored by the denomination's Board of
Church and Society. Speakers, including two senior senators, called for
alternatives to a military strike against Iraq and urged President George
Bush to give more attention to domestic issues.

Sen. Edward "Ted" Kennedy (D-Mass.), a Catholic, and Sen. Daniel Inouye
(D-Hawaii), a United Methodist, both elected to Congress in 1962, spoke about
the costs of war. Marian Wright Edelman, founder of the Children's Defense
Fund, lamented the Bush administration's proposed budget and the high price
she said it will exact from children and the poor.

Kennedy praised Bush "for the way he rallied America and the entire
international community after the appalling terrorist attack of Sept. 11,"
and for "impressive leadership" during the war in the Afghanistan.

"But few can also deny that after that, President Bush squandered too much of
the good will of the world community because of his single-minded rush to war
with Iraq even if he has a few - or even no - allies to go to war with him,
and even when there are other ways to contain the threat posed by Saddam's
Iraq," Kennedy said. His address was broadcast live on C-Span.

He said everyone agrees that Saddam is a despicable dictator, but he asserted
that war with Iraq would make the world more dangerous rather than less. He
warned against shattering "the very coalition that we need in order to combat
the greater and more imminent threat we face from al-Qaida and its
terrorists." This is the same coalition that led to the arrest the preceding
weekend of the man believed to have planned the Sept. 11 attack on the United
States, Kennedy added.

"On top of these actions, the Bush administration quietly and stealthily
changed a half a century of American defense policy from one that used our
nuclear arsenal for defense to one in which nuclear weapons may be used
pre-emptively," Kennedy said. That is a major change that affects prospects
for peace on the planet, and Americans are owed a debate on that, he said.

"We cannot be a bully in the world schoolyard and expect cooperation,
friendship and support from the rest of the world," he cautioned. War cannot
be successfully waged if it lacks the strong support of the people. "The
reason for that lack of support today is clear. The administration has not
made a convincing argument for war against Iraq or its costs or its
consequences."

He urged strengthening domestic defenses and an honest discussion of the
financial costs of war. "Across the country, the Bush administration is
leaving local governments high and dry in the face of continuing threats at
home." 

"I'm here because I've seen too many wars," Inouye said. One of his sleeves
hangs empty because he lost an arm in military service during World War II. 

He was a naive 18-year-old when he left Hawaii, he recalled, a young man who
sang in the choir, attended worship and participated in Sunday school. After
a little training, he went to the front. He will never forget shooting his
first German soldier. He was praised by his buddies, and "I felt proud," he
confessed softly.

"Killing becomes commonplace," he said. The training and military experience
changes people, he reported. "It does terrible things to the human soul."

"It would take a minor miracle to change the path we're on (to war with
Iraq)," he commented. Though he's the senior member of the Senate
Appropriations Committee, he said he has been given no idea how long such a
war will take, how long an occupation the administration expects and what
will happen after Saddam Hussein is gone. And even after Saddam, potential
will exist for much bloodshed among the various ethnic and religious groups
within Iraq, he said.

U.S. Rep. Lane Evans (D-Ill.), a former Marine whose speech is slurred by
Parkinson's Disease, complained that the men and women of the armed forces
have been sent to countries that most Americans could not locate. Meanwhile,
he said, this nation will not be able to devote resources to finding a cure
for diseases like Alzheimer's.

"We need another debate before we rush to war," said Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee
(D-Texas). Since the passage last year of a bill authorizing the president to
use military force against Iraq, "the world is a different place. We have an
extremely dire situation in North Korea, and Iraq is complying with the U.N.
weapons inspections." 

"War always produces uncontemplated, difficult-to-handle effects," said U.S.
Rep. Jim Leach (R-Iowa), one of the few Republicans who voted against the war
authorization bill. He particularly warned against letting a war with Iraq
become a war between cultures. To avoid promoting this perception, he advised
careful use of language, particularly words such as "evil" - a moral precept
that can be applied to actions and individuals but not countries - and "axis"
- a term for an alliance. 

"As long as democracy means anything, war is not inevitable," said Tom
Andrews, national spokesperson for the Win Without War coalition, which
includes the National Council of Churches. There is "a chance to expose this
great mistake we are about to make." But he also warned against appearing to
favor appeasement. "The first priority problem from my point of view is the
terrorists and the conditions that cause terrorism to thrive."

Several speakers, such as U.S. Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio), expressed
concern for domestic issues. 

"This country ought to stand for a national health care plan - a quality
health care plan," Kucinich said. "Preserve Social Security and resist any
efforts to privatize," he urged, saying Social Security is rock solid through
2041 as it is. He supports "full employment with a living wage" and an
America at peace with the world "without aggressive unilateralism."

Eleanor Holmes Norton, delegate to the House of Representatives from the
District of Columbia, said of the current administration and Congress: "They
need to get back to the business of the United States of America." She
praised churches for providing leadership and speaking out on the issues of
the day.

"It's time for all people of conscience to wake up and stop the Bush
administration's war on poor children," said Edelman. "This budget (recently
proposed for the coming year) says the poor should subsidize the rich."

The Bush administration's budget dismantles Head Start, housing, foster care
and Medicaid under the guise of state flexibility, she warned. She accused
the administration of "playing a shell game," putting a few more dollars in
some children's programs and taking away millions from others.

As an example, she said the budget would force children, persons with
disabilities and the elderly to compete for diminishing amounts of money,
while allowing states facing some of the biggest deficits in 50 years to
eliminate or severely curtail programs for all these people.

"We have a profound values problem in America," she said. She urged her
listeners to challenge "the unjust priorities" of the nation.

Two speakers focused on the problem of hunger. The Rev. Kenneth Horne Jr., a
United Methodist who leads the Society of St. Andrew, urged people who do
mercy ministries and those who do advocacy ministries to work together. The
Rev. David Beckman, a member of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America
who heads Bread for the World, called for support for President Bush's
Millennium Challenge Account proposal to aid poor countries.

U.S. Rep. Danny Davis (D-Ill.) raised questions about the high U.S. prison
population and the difficulties that ex-convicts face in ever achieving a
self-sustaining, productive life after release. In Illinois, he said,
ex-convicts are barred from 56 jobs and from much housing.

Jim Wallis, editor of Sojourners magazine and an evangelical Christian,
observed that John Wesley, the founder of the Methodist movement, would ask
how the Bush administration's budget proposal and a possible war would affect
poor people. That is the kind of question Wesley asked about alcohol and
slavery, Wallis said.

Before the briefing, Jim Winkler, staff head of the Board of Church and
Society, spoke to several advocacy networks about prophetic ministries.

"The logic of empire may well require good people to do bad things," he said.
"It does not require the church of Jesus Christ to support such actions."
Winkler cited Bishop C. Dale White's address to the 1992 General Conference,
in which the bishop named three interlocking, demonic systems: hunger-making,
war-making and desert-making. 

"That," Winkler said, "is the true axis of evil."
# # #
*Purdue is United Methodist News Service's Washington news director.

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United Methodist News Service
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