Protest: Money for People's Needs, Not for War and Corporate Bailouts!

Call to Action on March 20:
U.S. Out of Afghanistan and Iraq Now!
Free Palestine
Money for health care, jobs and education!
U.S. Hands Off Latin America
End foreign occupation of Haiti! Reparations now!

Buses and Carpools to San Francisco for March 20:
Marin: Contact 14 Friends of Palestine, 415-507-0633
Sacramento/Davis: Contact Sacramento Peace Action, 916-448-7157, sacpeace [at] dcn.org
San Jose/Peninsula: Contact ANSWER South Bay, SJPJC, PPJC, 408-829-9506
Santa Cruz: Contact SantaCruzANSWER [at] gmail.com
Santa Rosa: ANSWERsantarosa [at] gmail.com

If you can organize carpools or busses from your area or campus, call 415-821-6545.

Download flyer and poster PDFs at http://answersf.org/#local5

On Saturday, March 20, thousands of people will be marching in cities across the country calling for an end to wars occupations in Afghanistan, Iraq and everywhere. Every day people, mostly civilians, are dying in these wars, which cost more than $1 billion every two days. Meanwhile, more than 20 million people in the U.S. have lost their jobs, homes and health benefits in the last three years. On March 20 we will be saying: “Money for Healthcare, Jobs, Housing and Education – Not for War.”

Here in San Francisco, the Executive Board of UNITE-HERE Local 2 and many other unions have endorsed the March 20 march and rally. The march will be going to two of the boycotted hotels, the Hilton and the Westin-St. Francis in solidarity with the hotel workers. The Local 2 workers’ fight for a decent contract and to keep healthcare benefits is important to all working people.

People from all over the country are organizing to converge on Washington, D.C., and on the West Coast in San Francisco and Los Angeles.

We will march together to say “No Colonial-type Wars and Occupations in Afghanistan, Iraq, Palestine!” We will march together to say “No War Against Iran!” We will march together to say “No War for Empire Anywhere!”

Instead of war, we will demand funds so that every person can have a job, free and universal health care, decent schools, and affordable housing.

March 20 is the seventh anniversary of the criminal war of aggression launched by Bush and Cheney against Iraq. One million or more Iraqis have died. Tens of thousands of U.S. troops have lost their lives or been maimed, and continue to suffer a whole host of enduring problems from this terrible war.

This is the time for united action. The slogans on banners may differ, but all those who carry them should be marching shoulder to shoulder.

Bush is gone, but the war and occupation in Iraq go on. The Pentagon is widening the war in Afghanistan. They project an endless war with shifting battlefields. And a “single-payer” war budget that only grows larger and larger each year. We must act.

Both the Iraq and Afghanistan wars were predicated on the imperial fantasy that the U.S. could create stable, proxy colonial-type governments in both countries. They were to serve as an extension of “American” power in these strategic and resource-rich regions.

That fantasy has been destroyed. Now U.S. troops are being sent to kill or be killed so that the politicians in uniform (“the generals and admirals”) and those in three-piece suits (“our elected officials”) can avoid taking responsibility for a military setback in wars that should have never been started. Their military ambitions are now reduced to avoiding the appearance of defeat.

That is exactly what happened in Vietnam! Avoiding defeat, or the perception of defeat, was the goal Nixon and Kissinger set for themselves when they took office in 1969. For this noble cause, another 30,000 young GIs perished before the inevitable troop pullout from Vietnam in 1973. The number of Vietnamese killed between 1969 and 1973 was greater by many hundreds of thousands.

All of us can make the difference—progress and change comes from the streets and from the grassroots.

The people went to the polls in 2008, and the enthusiasm and desire for change after eight years of the Bush regime was the dominant cause that led to election of a big Democratic Party majority in both Houses of Congress and the election of Barack Obama to the White House.

But it should now be obvious to all that waiting for politicians to bring real change—on any front—is simply a prescription for passivity by progressives and an invitation to the array of corporate interests from military contractors to the banks, to big oil, to the health insurance giants that dominate the political life of the country. These corporate interests work around the clock to frustrate efforts for real change, and they are the guiding hand behind the recent street mobilizations of the ultra-right.

It is up to us to act. If people had waited for politicians to do the right thing, there would have never been a Civil Rights Act, or unions, women’s rights, an end to the Vietnam war or any of the profound social achievements and basic rights that people cherish.

It is time to be back in the streets.

Endorsers of the March 20 National Marches include: ANSWER Coalition; Muslim American Society Freedom; National Council of Arab Americans; Cynthia McKinney; Malik Rahim, co-founder of Common Ground Collective; Ramsey Clark; Cindy Sheehan; Medea Benjamin, co-founder of CODEPINK; Debra Sweet, Director, World Can't Wait; Mike Ferner, President, Veterans for Peace; Al-Awda, the Palestine Right to Return Coalition; Heidi Boghosian, Executive Director, National Lawyers Guild; Ron Kovic, author of "Born on the 4th of July"; Juan Jose Gutierrez, Director, Latino Movement USA; Col. Ann Wright (ret.); March Forward!; Partnership for Civil Justice; U.S. Labor Against War; Palestinian American Women Association; MANA - Muslim Alliance in North America; Alliance for a Just and Lasting Peace in the Philippines; National Assembly to End the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars and Occupations; Alliance for Global Justice; Claudia de la Cruz, Pastor, Iglesia San Romero de Las Americas-UCC; Phil Portluck, Social Justice Ministry, Covenant Baptist Church, D.C.; Blase & Theresa Bonpane, Office of the Americas; Coalition for Peace and Democracy in Honduras; Comite Pro-Democracia en Mexico; Frente Unido de los Pueblos Americanos; Comites de Base FMLN, Los Angeles; Free Palestine Alliance; GABRIELA Network; Justice for Filipino American Veterans; KmB Pro-People Youth; Students Fight Back; Jim Lafferty, Executive Director, National Lawyers Guild - LA Chapter; LEF Foundation; National Coalition to Free the Angola 3; Community Futures Collective; Advocates for Indigenous California Language Survival; Compañeros del Barrio; Barrio Unido for Full and Unconditional Amnesty; Michael Berg; Bay Area United Against War; Casa las Américas; Arab American Union Members Council; Malcolm X Center for Self-Determination; Unite Here Local 2; Unitarian Universalists for Peace – SF and many more.

VOLUNTEERS NEEDED! Call 415-821-6545 to volunteer today!