The following is a response I sent to one of the organizers of Oct. 27th sent a couple weeks ago. Not only are pro-war Democrats invited speakers; but opposition to an attack on Iran has been ruled out for the message of the day. I'm also going to suggest that the meeting this Wednesday (on stopping the plans for attacking Iran; 6:30 PM Wednesday, October 17, at the 8th Day Center for Justice, 205 W. Monroe St, #2) includes plans for injecting this message about Iran on the 27th in creative ways.

—————————
You wrote: "The antiwar majority has every right to demand of its officials that they represent them—and if they won't, to dump the question of 'Who Will, Then?" in their laps"

This is exactly the logic that has kept the antiwar majority on the sidelines, hoping for "those who represent them" to act for them. That hope was a major force in putting a Democratic majority in the House and Senate last November. And what has it brought us? More money for war, more war, more deaths, the "Protect America Act" (labeled "Police America" by the ACLU), and most recently the Kyl-Lieberman resolution paving the way for an attack on Iran and the unimaginable horror that could bring down on millions. People "recognize the need for a vehicle to express this outrage, yet they cannot find it; politics as usual cannot meet the enormity of the challenge and people sense this" (from the Call to drive out the Bush regime).

How are we to answer "Who Will, Then?" Vote for the Republicans instead? Hardly an option, and the Democratic leadership is very well aware of that. So you propose to put those same Democrats who have approved the trashing of the Fourth Amendment and voted over and over again for this war for empire on a stage, as long as they'll stand under your "Out Now" banner, turning what is billed as an anti-war protest into an election rally for Obama and a platform for them to continue their misleadership. "There is not going to be some savior from the Democratic Party. This whole idea of putting our hopes and energies into 'leaders' who tell us to seek common ground with fascists and religious fanatics is proving every day to be a disaster, and actually serve to demobilize people" (again, from the Call: worldcantwait.org).

No, the "box" people need to get out of is precisely the one you keep promoting. One definition of insanity is to keep doing the same thing over and over again while expecting different results. Your debates with people on websites like indymedia leave out the fact that "who's driving?" is the real question the "anti-war" majority needs to solve.

You ask for an alternative? The alternative was vividly apparent last week in Jena, Louisiana, the same alternative that drove the movement to stop the war in Vietnam and won civil rights in this country and every other progressive victory—the power of the people acting for themselves, in their own interests, not begging an entrenched political party to do it for them and confining their hopes to a biannual ballot box.

Yes, we need to move millions who have not yet acted against what they know is wrong—from war, to torture, to deadly racism, theocracy and these really huge questions that people are faced with right now. When these people come to the Oct. 27 rally, what will they hear? The voice of youth who dropped everything to go to Jena demanding that we all follow that example? The demand to end the "legal" torture being committed in our names? The call to do everything in our power to stop an attack on Iran? What challenge will be put to them? Vote for Obama and the Democrats will set us free of this madness? Or the truth that passively waiting for someone else to set things right will bring only a horror beyond what any of us can imagine?

Again, I urge you to draw the line against an attack on Iran. If that causes unity to break with Obama, Durbin, Daley, et al, so be it. It should already be broken.