End Wars and Occupations IOT Monthly Conference Call - Progressive Democrats of America

 July 2012
sound  chat room 
 
Link to Sound File  Link to Chat Room Archive

The introduction began at the 5:30 mark and our guest, Andy Davies, gave us a thorough rundown on the situations in both Iran and Syria. The US appears to be misjudging Iran and is increasingly isolated in its hard-line policy towards that country. Sanctions are apparently working at cross-purposes with diplomacy. The US can't do both. The military has (very sensibly) concluded there is no good military option, but the countries are moving closer to war anyway.
In Syria, we've got the Bashar al-Assad regime, the Free Syrian Army/Syrian National Council and the National Coordinating Body for Democratic Change. The FSA/SNC is favored by the Obama Administration, but it's not related to the groups that make up the NCB and that started off protesting the Assad regime in the first place. The 13 parties that make up the NCB are opposed to foreign intervention and violence in general.
There was then some commentary about how to find items on the PDA website.
Alice Hammer spoke about her group's activities in Southeastern Arizona, noting with some disappointment that big progressive spokespeople are ignoring the wars overseas.
The Norman Solomon vote was agonizingly close, he missed by 172 votes out of over 150,000, despite 26,000 PDA calls. Mike Fox, our fundraiser, is pressing for more money for PDA to get more progressives elected.
Rusty Eisenberg spoke about Congress and the military appropriations bill ($670 billion) that crowds out domestic spending.
Lisa Savage spoke about her work with Code Pink in Maine and agrees there has been some positive progress in Afghanistan, but military authorities have hugely exaggerated it. Unfortunately, Amnesty International has been helping to spread the false narrative of dramatic progress. The Occupy Wall Street people don't know much about the situation over there and appreciated Savage's talk about it in Philadelphia. A single minute of the war in Afghanistan costs $230,000.