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MILITARY

Former US Attorney General Testifies for Plowshares Activists Ramsey Clark supports WA anti-nuke movement Ground Zero Center (Nov 28, 2010)

HEALTH

Hunger Up 36% in Washington State from Children's Alliance, cartoon by John Ambrosavage (Nov 28, 2010)

POLITICS

The Progressive Tea Party? Maybe when it comes to surveillance issues Doug Collins, cartoon by Dan McConnell (Nov 28, 2010)
Obama Wooing 'Economic Royalists' FDR was way gutsier Norman Solomon, cartoon by David Logan (Nov 28, 2010)

SUBSTANCES

The Dirty Secret Behind 'Demon Tobacco' Regulation doesn't cover cigarette additives Doug Collins, cartoons by John Jonik (Nov 28, 2010)

EDUCATION

America’s Education Gender Gap Bill Costello, cartoon by John Ambrosavage (Nov 28, 2010)

ELECTIONS

Washington State Votes Against Change Janice Van Cleve, cartoon by Dan McConnell (Nov 28, 2010)

FOLLOW FILE updates

DeCourseys v. Real Estate Giant; Amazon Prevails in Customer Privacy Doug Collins, cartoon by John Ambrosavage (Nov 28, 2010)

ENVIRONMENT

Poll: Southwest WA Supports Conservation Climate Solutions, cartoon by John Jonik (Nov 28, 2010)

CULTURE

What Color Is Your Santa? holiday cartoons by John Ambrosavage (Nov 28, 2010)

MEDICINE

WA Doctors Tell McKenna: Put Patients Before Politics Doctors for America (Oct 25, 2010)

ACTIVISM

No, Higher Consciousness Won’t Save Us Charles Reich got his second book right Norman Solomon (Oct 23, 2010)

LAW

Modern-Day Debtors’ Prisons in WA ACLU of WA, with cartoon by John Jonik (Oct 23, 2010)

RIGHTS

Report: Racial Profiling Pervasive Across America OneAmerica (Oct 23, 2010)

WORLD

Port Townsend Food Co-op Rejects Israel Boycott Jefferson County BDS, cartoon by George Jartos (Oct 23, 2010)

HISTORY

A Bellhop in the Swingin' Seventies Overly detailed resume plus cartoon by John Ambrosavage (Oct 20, 2010)
Johnny Horizon's Draft Physical Can he avoid Vietnam? John Merriam (Oct 20, 2010)

AROUND WASHINGTON

Gregoire passes the hatchet; Bears love garbage; Where does the PUD travel to? featuring cartoons by Dan McConnell (Oct 20, 2010)

ECONOMY

Now's the Time to Expand Social Security Good for both Americans and American companies Steven Hill (Sept 9, 2010)

WAR

Obama's Speech for Endless War Normon Solomon, cartoon by Dan McConnell (Sept 9, 2010)

ENERGY

Yellowstone: The #1 National Security Threat Unless we turn Wyoming into a new energy Mecca Martin Nix (Sept 9, 2010)

TECHNOLOGY

Biodefense, Biolabs and Bugs Seattle City Council takes an important first step to safety Labwatch.org (Aug 9, 2010)

WORKPLACE

Teenage Microsoft Sweatshop 15-hour shifts under poor conditions at Chinese factory from the National Labor Committee (May 16, 2010)

IMMIGRATION

Why US Immigration Policy Needs Tweaking Bill Costello, cartoon by David Logan (May 16, 2010)
Arizona Immigration Brouhaha Various opinions from near and far, cartoons by Logan and McConnell (May 2, 2010)

TRANSPORTATION

The Coming Microcar Revolution Martin Nix (May 16, 2010)

POETRY

A Poetic Look at Tacoma Glass Art Museum; a limer-ICK Gerald McBreen (Mar 28, 2010)
Fall Is For Falling Out Of Love, etc. three poems Bob Markey (Mar 29, 2010)

BUSINESS

Who Rules America? Corporate conglomeration is leading to neofeudalism Don Monkerud, cartoon by John Jonik (Mar 27, 2010)

TRUTH

Architects and Engineers Ask for New Look at 9/11 Doug Collins (Feb 20, 2010)

MEDIA

Is Olympic Coverage Sexist? Media coverage rarely gives women equal treatment Univ. of Alberta (Jan 24, 2010)

RIGHT BRAIN

Why I Don't Come at Christmas Anymore not-so-jolly Saint Nick (Dec 18, 2009) Santa Gets Political art by Ambrosavage, Lande, and Dees (Dec 17, 2009)

SPORTS

A People's History of Sports BOOK REVIEW Doreen McGrath (posted July 24, 2009)

CLIMATE

Cashing In On Earth's Cycles: Part 3 Alan Cheetham & Richard Kirby (posted July 24, 2009)
Obama: How Serious About Climate Change? Doug Collins (posted July 24, 2009)


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article below posted November 28, 2010    Bookmark and Share

Former US Attorney General Testifies for Plowshares Activists

Ramsey Clark embraces anti-nuke efforts in WA

from the Ground Zero Center for Nonviolent Action

At a motions hearing in the US Federal District Court in Tacoma on November 16, former US Attorney General Ramsey Clark testified on behalf of five Plowshares activists who are going to trial December 7 on charges of trespassing at the Bangor, WA nuclear submarine base.

Ramsey Clark was US Attorney General under President Lyndon B. Johnson from 1967 to 1969, and supervised drafting and passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and the Civil Rights Act of 1968.

Judge Benjamin Settle allowed testimony from Clark, who responded to questions from Disarm Now Plowshares defendants. When asked by Anne Montgomery if the Plowshares activists were justified to enter the restricted area of the US Naval Base, Clark said that they “had a duty to prevent harm, they were justified, and even required to prevent harm.”

Ramsey Clark with Anne Montgomery outside the Federal District Courthouse in Tacoma
photo by Leonard Eiger, Ground Zero Center


When asked by Susan Crane if Trident nuclear warheads are legal, Clark said no, and explained that the Supreme Court has ruled that international law is binding under the US Constitution. Nuclear weapons are unlawful under the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty (NPT) because of the agreement of the nuclear powers to eliminate them. Clark was in the Justice Department when the NPT was drafted.

“Had we abided by the NPT, we would be a nuclear free world. It’s hard to believe we’ve come to this stage,” Clark said. The US has ignored its obligations under the NPT, and now has enough warheads to destroy the planet.

“Possession of the bomb is a crime. Just like it’s illegal to have a switchblade or concealed weapon, the nuclear weapons are illegal," Clark said. He explained that 99 percent of the deaths in the Hiroshima bombing were non-military, and therefore extraordinarily disproportional. Possessing thousands of nuclear weapons, each one many times more powerful than the Hiroshima bomb, and which do not discriminate between combatants and civilians, is definitely a crime.

Ramsey Clark with Bix Bichsel
photo by Leonard Eiger, Ground Zero Center


Clark concluded that Plowshares activists are opposed to all violence, and particularly nuclear weapons, which are “the ultimate human degradation.”

The former attorney general testified on behalf of Bill “Bix” Bichsel, Susan Crane, Lynne Greenwald, Steve Kelly, and Anne Montgomery, who all face charges of Conspiracy, Trespass, Destruction of Property on a Naval Installation and Depredation of Government Property for their November 2, 2009 Plowshares action. They entered the US Navy’s nuclear weapons storage depot at Bangor, WA to symbolically disarm the nuclear weapons stored there, and expose the illegality of the government's continued preparations for nuclear war.

Among the documents being considered by the judge in the Disarm Now Plowshares case is a motion for dismissal.


A trial date has been set for December 7, 2010 in the US District Court for the Western District of Washington, Tacoma Courthouse.

On the evening of December 6, Disarm Now Plowshares supporters will gather for a Festival of Hope at St. Leo Church in Tacoma to hear Angie Zelter speak. Zelter, a peace, human rights and environmental campaigner, has written several books, including "Trident on Trial: The case for people's disarmament."

On the evening of December 7, Colonel Ann Wright will speak at St. Leo Church. Wright, who served in the US Army and Foreign Service, resigned on the eve of the US invasion of Iraq, stating that without the authorization of the UN Security Council, the invasion and occupation of a Muslim, Arab, oil-rich country would be a violation of international law. Most recently, she was on the May, 2010 Gaza Freedom Flotilla that was attacked by the Israeli military.

Clark in the past has provided legal defense for Plowshares activist Philip Berrigan, as well as other prisoners of conscience in the US, including Camilo Mejia, Leonard Peltier, and Lori Berenson.

There have been more than 100 Plowshares Nuclear Resistance Actions worldwide since 1980. Plowshares actions are taken from Isaiah 2:4 in Old Testament: “God will judge between the nations and will settle disputes for many people. And they shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. And nations will not take up swords against nations, nor will they train for war anymore.”

In November 2006, the Natural Resources Defense Council declared that the 2,364 nuclear warheads at Bangor are approximately 24 percent of the entire US arsenal. The Bangor base houses more nuclear warheads than China, France, Israel, India, North Korea and Pakistan combined.

The base has been rebuilt for the deployment of the larger and more accurate Trident D-5 missile system. Each of the 24 D-5 missiles on a Trident submarine costs approximately $60 million and is capable of carrying eight of the larger 455 kiloton W-88 warheads, each of which has about 30 times the explosive force of the Hiroshima bomb.

Further information and updates on Disarm Now Plowshares are available at disarmnowplowshares.wordpress.com.


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