Public Employee Press

Members march against the war

More than 45,000 New Yorkers —including DC 37 members — marched for peace, the end of the War in Iraq, and the safe return of U.S. troops on a rainy Oct. 27.

DC 37 stood with thousands of war veterans, military families, and students to protest the five-year occupation of Iraq and to speak out against President George W. Bush’s faulty foreign policies and his threat to invade Iran.

“This war has been a disaster from the beginning,” said DC 37 Program Director Frances Curtis, who spoke at the Manhattan rally. “It is an unnecessary war that was concocted by some of the most unscrupulous characters to ever occupy the White House in our country’s history.”

Speakers at the demonstration also included DC 37 members Jon Forster of Civil Service Technical Guild Local 375 and Gary Goff of Electronic Data Processing Personnel Local 2627. The anti-war march was one of several held across the country organized by United for Peace & Justice as part of the National Day of Action Against the Iraq War.

The Iraq War is one of the biggest and bloodiest foreign policy disasters since Vietnam. To move the nation to war, the Bush administration manipulated people’s fears about terrorism after the 9/11 attacks and lied about weapons of mass destruction.

Five years and $465 billion later, almost 4,000 U.S. troops are dead and thousands are maimed and face serious medical challenges. More than 80,000 Iraqis have been killed, some 4 million are displaced. Billions of dollars have gone to waste in no-bid contracts awarded to engineering firm Halliburton, which has ties to Vice President Dick Chaney, and to Blackwater, the security company that operates with impunity in Iraq.

Bush is asking for $200 billion more for the war. The majority of Americans want out of Iraq now, but President Bush continues to resist the will of the people.

“It is entirely appropriate that we are here as unionists, as working people, to oppose this immoral war,” Goff said. The war is about energy policies that ignore global warming and American imperialism, he said. “This is an oil war. But it’s not just about getting oil. It is about controlling oil and thereby controlling the world.”

“Our nation’s valuable resources, its youth and tax dollars,” Curtis said, “should be put to better use to rebuild New Orleans, repair crumbling roads and bridges, and fund the vital services public employees provide.”