Protesting the 9-11 Cover-Up Commissioner- Jamie Gorelick...

I believe Bush should be in jail and I felt the wave of horror, sadness, shared by billions with the news that he had stolen another election. Time to take to the streets, I would have liked to join the protests in San Francisco beginning at nine AM, however, every Wednesday for over three years, I’ve been clinging to my First Amendment Rights with a “listening project” in downtown Palo Alto, with banners, chairs, food, literature, creating a much needed space for public dialogue. So, despite predictions of rain, downtown Palo Alto is where I went. Longtime activists, and people we had never seen before soon surrounded the tables, hungry for information, wanting to do something. We talked; we organized; I shared my favorite materials- worksheets, and the “Social Movement Empowerment Project”’s Eight Stage Map, practical wisdom on how to build social movements and achieve the “paradigm shifts” that we all yearn for.

I hurried home, took care of my kids, repacked the car and left for San Francisco for the 5PM rally organized by Not In Our Name. The sky was extraordinarily dramatic with a black cloud hanging over San Francisco and multiple lightening bolts shattering the darkness. A deluge enveloped us, but by the time we found the rally it was just a light rain. Rain is a real challenge on marches- for paper signs, flyers, our usual organizing tools. We got as many “Stop the 9-11 Cover-Up” picket signs as we could manage to the rally and my cloth "Not in Our Name" banner (which has the pledge calligraphed across it- that we used at the altar of the Victims of War last Saturady night at the Spiral Dance). The size of the rally was impressive considering the weather. Unfortunately I couldn't stay long, becuse I had to get to the protest I was organizing at the World Affairs Council where 9-11 Commissioner Jamie Gorelick was speaking. Not in Our Name, while sympathetic and supportive of our cause, unfortunately couldn’t detour past 312 Sutter Street to support our protest.

We were fortunate to have clear skies, no rain at all, and people were very receptive to our fliers, Deception Dollars, messages. The great heroine of the 9-11 Truth Movement, Gypsy, arrived with her whistle, prepared to challenge Gorelick. Gypsy is visibly pregnant and had her two small kids with her (the babysitter hadn’t shown up). We had a film crew, people enough to hold banners, signs, pass out literature, so I took on the vital role of babysitter and played with the kids, so Gypsy could go inside.

She came out glowing and excitedly reported how well it went. She blew the whistle, stated that the Cover-Up Commission failed to address the key questions and listed them, until security removed her from the room. “And” she added, “People thanked me for speaking up, even the security guy.” We laughed, together. Our experience has been that security, the cops; they know who the real criminals are, and they support our efforts to challenge the Big Lie and speak truth to power, to get our voices heard over the din of the corporate press.

Last week, I came to the realization that I would not be shot in cold blood for my role in trying to expose the truth about 9-11, that the real battle was an information war and that the powers that be would use the networks, their ABC and NBC miniseries, docudramas about Richard Clarke’s “Against All Enemies” selling the “official narrative of 9-11” as loudly as possible to drown out the small, quiet, persistent voices of truth, the questions we were raising that they could not ever answer without incriminating themselves.

When asked about Building #7 later by someone in the audience, Jamie Gorelick was utterly stumped, “We don’t know.” was all she could say. It’s not even in the official report, as if a forty-seven story steel structure, not hit by airplane or significant debris, could just collapse spontaneously on a day when thousands are killed, and the event could be ignored. Ignored like all the other evidence which doesn’t conveniently fit into the “19 hijackers with boxcutters myth” that has never been substantiated, despite the “fake Bin Laden” tapes that they keep pulling out of various rabbit’s hats.

After our protest, we caught up with the march, which had attracted about 5000 people, according to Not In Our Name, at the close, we gathered up a few signs, saw old friends as the rain began to fall again. An effigy of Bush was lit and burned before the crowd which approved of this cathartic release of emotion. An enormous paper mache head resembling Bush was also set ablaze, then the police, firemen moved in and people began to disperse. We headed home.

With the election behind us, I don’t have to keep tossing myself against the hard wall of the mainstream press trying to break a story that they have refused to touch. It’s time to organize, educate all the people that are riled up, finish producing the documentaries, get our “Behind Every Terrorist There is a Bush” comedy event out there with bonus highlights from our International Inquiries into 9-11, print another million Deception Dollars, get a copy machine, hire a secretary, build our Northern California 9-11 Truth Alliance into a more functional organization that can do more than ad hoc demos, rallies and events. After three years of volunteer effort on the part of hundreds, we actually became a project of Agape Foundation and can build the infrastructure needed to support a grassroots movement and connect volunteers with all the work that desperately needs to be done.

Tonight, we will have our regular organizational meeting from 7- 10PM at 3220 Sacramento Street in San Francisco. On Saturday night, November 6, 2004, Solving ' '9/11' A People’s Grand Jury will take place at Theater Artaud in San Francisco from 7-11PM, with a different cast from the recent Grand Jury held in LA (http://www.911truthla.us/). The fact that so much is happening around the country- in New York, LA, Colorado, Washington, Oregon, Ohio is very healthy and that many groups are choosing different strategies, local, national and international, to emphasize what they believe to be important is also healthy. (Be sure to sign the petition in support of the Criminal Investigation of 9-11 by the NY Attorney General at http://www.justicefor911.org/) We are too many, too dispersed, too different from one another, to be summarily dismissed. Even the press is starting to attack us! Aren’t the stages- first they ignore you (check), then they ridicule you (check), then they attack you (check), then you win…?

Like childbirth, there is a moment when the pain and labor is so intense, that you wonder if you’ll survive, that is generally the critical moment, when the crowning head must get through, after that worst moment; it is relatively easy, there is the euphoric joy of birth, and then if you have never been a parent before- your life is changed forever in ways you could never have imagined. I have a feeling, when the truth about 9-11 crowns- unimaginable change will follow. Our best preparation is a Leaderful Movement fully integrated with the diverse, global peace, justice, liberation, equality, environmental, racial justice movements that are reeling from the NeoConservative assault upon the planet.