[hq2600] "We Must Resist!" Cynthia McKinney Speaks at KPFK Fundraiser, Los Angeles

[HQ]

**Hello y'all!  I've been on a whirlwind speaking tour and I'm just now
getting back to homebase.  My most recent remarks are included below.  They
were given to a packed, standing-room-only crowd at Immanuel Presbyterian
Church in Los Angeles.  The event was organized by KPFK which is the Los
Angeles Pacifica affiliate as a part of its fundraising drive.  I am so
happy to say that the event was not only a political success, but a
financial one, too, for Pacifica.  Having a voice is so important and being
able to get our messages out to each other is critical if we are to organize
a potent resistance to what is being fed to us these days.  I hope you will
read this with the knowledge that this is the beginning for us and we have a
lot of work to do!  Also, please read it with the assurance that we can win!

I'm still working on my listserve.  So please bear with me.  And while I've
met just about every one of you whose e-mail I have, please pardon me if
this message has been sent to the wrong address or if you don't want to
receive my updates.  Just send me a message to change your e-mail address on
my contact list or let me know to remove it altogether.

Finally, please visit our website, www.allthingscynthiamckinney.com.  I'm
adding a photo gallery so you'll be able to see all the wonderful people I'm
meeting while I'm at home and on the road.  You might even see your own
photo if I took it with my camera phone.  Now, just let me figure out how to
download my phone photos to my laptop!!!  Oh, technology!

Please read my speech below, visit the website, send me a message and let me
know what's on your mind.

Oh, I've been asked to join the Hurricane Katrina Tribunal and the Brussells
Tribunal on Iraq.  More on those two worthy projects later . . .

"We must resist!"
Remarks by Cynthia McKinney
KPFK Pacifica Radio Station Fundraising Event
March 2, 2007
Los Angeles, California

First, thank you for the invitation to be with you this evening.  I love
KPFK and I love Pacifica.

I want to especially thank KPFK General Manager Eva Georgia for her very
warm embrace.  I'll have to tell you:  I'm not surprised when people run
away from me.  But, I get emotional when I am embraced.

Another KPFK sister is Margaret Prescod.  We wish her a speedy recovery.

The truth is controversial and, it seems sometimes, that only a few of us
believe in sharing the truth.

KPFK is committed to the truth.  Thank you to those of you who are here this
evening, and to KPFK supporters who put their money where their hearts are
during this pledge drive.

I'm hoping there are some folks here tonight who have never been to an event
like this before.  I'm hoping that people are so moved by their own
intolerable circumstances that they are now willing to do something
different in order to get something they've never had before.

For, in order to solve the massive problems this country now has, it can no
longer be business as usual for a critical mass of us.

Whether it's the thawing tundra in Siberia or the melting glaciers in
Greenland, our contribution to global warming is something that must be
dealt with.

Whether it's the massive amounts of money we spend on the war machine or the
fact that we still don't know what happened on September 11th, the values
and priorities of the American people must be reflected in the public policy
we pursue.  I do not believe that is the case today and there are specific
reasons why.

I have long said that the black body politic is comatose:  unable to sustain
itself after the massive infusion of COINTELPRO-type "clean Negroes" who
don't truly provide representation for a body of people in need.
Unfortunately, now, the entire American body politic is in dire straits,
too.

I have also said that the prescription for the black body politic is radical
surgery. So, too, now, I believe, is the case with the American body
politic.

The extreme corruption of our political system by the greedy, unseen hand
that comfortably operates in the backrooms of power is turning our heroes
into caricatures of themselves.

Why can't we know the truth about 9/11 and this war on terror?

Why can't we immediately repeal the Secret Evidence Law, the Patriot Act,
and the Military Tribunals Act?

Why can't we get back that 2.3 trillion dollars Rumsfeld admits is missing
and use it to fully fund education and health care and infrastructure?

They're asking poor, devastated university students to return their
Hurricane Katrina money, but I don't see anyone going after Blackwater
mercenaries, the law enforcement officials who took federal money and then
denied Katrina survivors safe passage over public thoroughfares.  They're
not going after the Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff whose
incompetent behavior directly led to the delayed response, causing as-yet
unmitigated pain and suffering on the people of New Orleans, and whose
continued bumbling results in one of the largest depopulations of an
American city in memory.

Why can't we know if there were explosions along the levies, as historically
was done before to safeguard certain parts of New Orleans?

The reason we can't get answers to our questions and doubts linger is
because our leadership today just isn't what it used to be.

The current state of black America didn't arise only because of Republican
policies.  Despite the election of thousands of black elected officials
since passage of the Voting Rights Act, nearly half of the black men in New
York City between the ages of 16 and 64 are unemployed—according to the New
York Times.  It will take 200 years for black Chicagoans to catch up to the
quality of life enjoyed by white Chicagoans—according to a Hull House/Loyola
University report.  It will take 1,664 years for blacks in this country to
achieve a homeownership rate equal to that of whites; racial disparities on
infant mortality, family income, unemployment, police stops, imprisonment,
and more, have not been eliminated and in some cases are worse today than at
the time of the murder of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

People of color have less wealth, less net worth, work longer hours with
insecure pensions and stagnant wages.

And now all Americans do, too!

We have got to do something different because we can't stand any more of
this.

So what are we to do?

Just voting isn't enough.  Voting is necessary, but it isn't enough to get
the kind of change we must now demand.  We have to change the structure
within which we cast our vote.

We must have a different kind of leadership than is possible now without the
kind of change I'm talking about.

This is revolutionary in its impact.

And so, will be fought even more fiercely than I've already been fought, and
all I wanted to do was improve the lot of people of color in the U.S. and
around the world; institute the kind of respect for human rights at home and
abroad that would change the policies of our government toward the global
community, including the American people; and make the U.S. government
accountable to the taxpayers for the way it spends their dollars.  Now,
that's all I wanted to do.  And you see what's happened to me!

So, what I have in mind won't be easy.  But it will be worth it.  And, I
believe, it's possible to achieve.
Now, it would be nice if we could count on someone else to do it for us.
And we would all join that person and make it happen.  But, I reluctantly
say that if no one else will do it, then I guess I'll have to do that, too!

Just like the Articles of Impeachment.

Finally, I have complete belief in the young people of our country and their
ability to lead the kind of change that I'm talking about.

After all, it was the young people from just a few generations ago who faced
attack dogs, water hoses, police beatings, and lynch mobs.  They sat in at
lunch counters across the country and stood up for our country.

And they won.  And I know we all can do it again.

Now, should you ever waiver in your faith, just acknowledge this:

The world's most marginalized and dispossessed are already ahead of us in
taking their countries back!  Of course, starting in 1959 with Cuba, but
then Venezuela, Cote d'Ivoire, Brazil, Argentina, Spain, India, Bolivia,
Chile, Ecuador, Haiti, and Nicaragua all have stood up to imperial
domination--and won!

In the meantime, we have to demand more from our representatives.  How can
you be against war if you finance war? And how can you be against George
Bush if you won't impeach him?

The American people are being fed madness as sanity.  But, this is not Oz,
Wonderland, the Twilight Zone, and it's not 1984!

With every fiber in our being we must resist.  Resist like Mario Savio told
us to resist:  with our entire bodies against the gears and the wheels and
the levers of the machine.

We must resist because we claim no partnership in war crimes, genocide,
torture, or crimes against humanity.  We claim no complicity in crimes
against the American people.

We will build a broad-based, rainbow movement for justice and peace.  And we
will win.

I want to thank Dedon, Adrienne Cole (my former Chief of Staff), Anastasia
King (Producer of American Blackout), Tracy Larkins (my scheduler, host, and
everything assistant), and all the people associated with this program, and
all of you for supporting it.

Thank you.


-- 
"Reasonable men adjust themselves to their environment. Unreasonable men
attempt to change their environment to suit themselves. Therefore all
progress is the work of unreasonable men."  George Bernard Shaw
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