Liberation and Deliverance - Kathy Kelly

[Wind Dancer]

Heartbreaking!

-snip-

Each time I’ve stepped outside the gates of a U.S. prison, a “free” woman, I’ve known that I’m leaving behind a world of imprisoned beauty, a world unrecognized by the majority of people in the U.S. who accept a “throw away the key” mentality.

People drive past prisons all the time. The razor wire, tall fences and elevated guard posts may seem to blend into the landscape. Why trouble oneself about who lives inside those walls?

There are many reasons to be troubled about the fact that one fourth of the world’s prisoners are incarcerated in U.S. prisons and jails. Certainly this statistic points to realities about how the U.S. deals with poverty. The prison-industrial complex, the fastest growing new industry in the U.S., represents a war against the poor. I think our entire criminal justice system shows a callous disregard for poor people and a shameful readiness on the part of many people to earn great profits by working in this system.

We’ve nurtured a callous disregard for poor people all over the world. I’ve seen it function in Nicaragua, Haiti, and Iraq where people have suffered horribly because of U.S. policies that wage war against the poor in order to exploit resources in the lands where they live.

What do we gain from this attitude? Are we actually benefiting from U.S. policies that subjugate poorer nations to serve our colonizing demands? If the fundamental purpose of U.S. militarism is to project immense military might all over the world so that other nations will submit to serving our national interests, then why is the cost of projecting this military might so great that we can’t afford to improve conditions amongst the poor in our country. Why are we making less social progress? Why aren’t we seeing more benefits?

The nuns exemplified the main ingredients of an alternative to U.S. military dominance. They practiced simplicity, service, sharing of resources, and a reverence for all of life. They “exported” these values through their everyday witness.

-more-

http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0124-21.htm

[Talismom]

1. For much too long now, the people in power in this country have

encouraged an, "I've got mine, the hell with you!" kind of attitude and suggested that it was "all american". In reality, the US that I was born into and nurtured by is one of neighborhoods that cared for and encouraged eachother. We had a country that was united during and after WWII and still had generous student loans when I went to college and real safety nets and workers/companies that showed eachother some measure of loyalty. It wasn't 'til after Reagan that women and children living in the street became common place--I know this because I was traumatized as a young teen in Spain in the early '70s when such a homeless mother and her two children begged me for money! We are moving, ever more rapidly each year, to form two separate societies--the filthy rich and the filthy and starving. Unless we demand that our leaders bring back the US we knew and loved, which at least aspired to achieve a measure of real decency and compassion,we will continue the current slide into a dark ages the likes of which we have only read about...g-d help us all...