Pittsburgh Statement: How to Unify the Peace & Truth Movements

The Pittsburgh Statement: How to Unify the Peace and Truth Movements into an Unstoppable Revolutionary Force

By Sander Hicks
Sanderhicks.com

"How can we broaden the movement and win new forces to our cause?"


-National Assembly to End the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars and Occupations


If the National Assembly wants to unite more people to our cause,
then we, the progressive/radical peace movement need to radically
expand our minds. For far too long, the "Left" has turned away from
potential supporters in other segments of the masses: the 9/11 Truth
Movement, the populists, the anti-Federal Reserve movement, the
spiritual progressives, and yes, even the "patriots" and the
survivalists have plenty of common cause with us.


My name is Sander Hicks. I'm a New York peace radical, Green,
media activist, and author. I have marched and organized against war
since 1990 and have done three national speaking tours around building
the movement for peace and transparency. My aim is to make the Peace
movement stronger, bigger, and unstoppable. I am here as a part of a
delegation from the nation-wide 9/11 Truth Movement. We will be
presenting on Sunday at 9 AM sharp. This position paper is one part of
the talk we will give, titled, 9/11 Truth: Educating the Public
Regarding Evidence About What Happened on 9/11 Will Help End Current
and Future Imperial Wars.


9/11 Truth is NOT a Rightist Movement


Unity begins with understanding. The Truth Movement is a
fascinating mass movement that could be compared historically to the
Greenback Party, or the Populists, the farmers against the bankers. It
is a post-partisan, grassroots, working-class movement. The Left
suffers from a fundamental misunderstanding that the Truth movement is
dominated by the Right, or by Anti-Semites. That accusation is
unsubstantiated and only serves to divide progressives from each other.
The Truth Movement does contain a new political tendency that rejects
the old categories. Radio journalist and producer Alex Jones speaks
often about the need to "go beyond the Left/Right paradigm." Jones is
not perfect, but this is a provocative idea. Mainly because it is a
praxis: It's being put into daily practice by a new breed of political
activists, the We Are Change movement, and others. The notion of
rejecting "Right" and "Left" is an interesting turn in the history of
social movements. A truly scientific, careful, disciplined
revolutionary would study this tendency, and build with it: Instead of
Left versus Right, the new paradigm now is "the people vs. the pigs."
It's Democracy versus The Elite. Which side you on?


9/11 Truth is Anti-Imperialist


At the core of the mission of 9/11 Truth is the subversion of
international capital power, which in this late stage of 21st century,
high-speed, global capitalism, has to rely on financial chicanery,
bailouts, and secrecy to achieve its aims. It's no wonder then that
many students of the 9/11 attacks end up studying bizarre
manifestations of finance, like the Bank of Credit and Commerce
International (BCCI) and the Iran/Contra scandal. Both showed a
militarist right wing forced to work outside "the law" and rely on
secretive flows of international money. Many students of 9/11 end up
critical of the Federal Reserve bank. This issue has long been
dominated by libertarians, but it's worthy of more serious study on the
left. (Note the great new self-published book "Web of Debt" by feminist
lawyer/author Ellen Brown). Why does a private cartel of private banks
own the mechanism that sets interest rates, sells currency to the US
Government, and enjoys zero accountability to the public? Capital
prefers to live in shadows. Capital hates democracy. Left
revolutionaries and Truth movement folks have fertile common ground
here.


9/11 Truth Shares Our Love of History


The Truth Movement shares a love of history with the "traditional
Left." This is a history "from below" critical of ruling class power,
propaganda and manipulation. If anything, the 9/11 Truth Movement needs
to take a lesson and further develop its love of history. All too
often, we stay on the "one note" melody of controlled demolition
theories. (That is not to take away from the excellent work of experts
like Richard Gage and Erik Lawyer, who show that logic and science
don't have three buildings explode from two planes. But there's a more
historical method to 9/11 truth work. I think this method has more in
common with the Peace Movement.)


We all need a specific critical historical analysis to be able to
recognize patterns. In the case of the Left, the pattern is class
struggle: the majority working class's domination by a ruthless but
tottering capitalist class who deliberately and consciously use war,
alienation, fetishization of commodities, as a superstructure of
distractions, numbing us from awareness of the system's fundamental
injustices.


The Truth Movement calls attention to the historical pattern of
"surprise attacks." This is a key element part of the larger
superstructure of distractions. Both camps are confronting the pattern
of a government of clandestine operations. We are not allowed to turn
around and see who is casting the shadows on the cave wall. Marxists
believe that revolution starts with the spreading of consciousness
among the masses. That is the same emancipation that the Truth Movement
is trying to effect. We want to free minds. We believe we are all built
for light, for truth, for peace, but something got in the way. That
something is the real world of capital, and its nefarious effects.


9/11 Truth is the Best Way to Indict
Bush and Cheney for the Crimes of Torture, and Iraq



Bush and Cheney controlled the lapdog 9/11 Commission and used it
to try to link 9/11 to the invasion of Iraq. Thus, 9/11 has yet to be
investigated objectively. When citizens and revolutionaries do study
how Clinton and Bush's intelligence services actually shepherded the
"9/11 hijackers" for years before 9/11, the historical documentation is
quite alarming.


The key 9/11 hijackers, Nawaf Al-Hazmi and Khalid Al-Mihdhar
enjoyed a thick layer of protection from CIA in Malaysia, from the US
Pentagon in the Able Danger fiasco, and from the FBI in San Diego and
Shreveport. The FBI even killed an American citizen, David Graham, for
getting too close to Nawaf Al-Hazmi. The key hijackers had financial
support from the Saudi Royals close to President Bush. DC Author Joe
Trento reports those key hijackers were agents of Saudi Intelligence.


Build the Movement, Build Against
Splits



Given the history of COINTELPRO, we need to guard against the ways
that law enforcement and intelligence split apart potent social
movement alliances. A movement between the Peace and Truth Movements
would be unstoppable. It's definitely not in the interests of the
ruling class, and we need to become more aware of outside efforts to
prevent this alliance.


This proposed Alliance is in the interests of the people. It's a
radical call back to real movement-building, as a way, and a means, to
peace. It's a more rigorous historical analysis, and it will lead to
more diversity and rigorous debate inside our movement.


Truth is Concrete


The truth is powerful, and it urges us onward. In New York City,
we just submitted 52,000 valid signatures to the City Clerk, to get the
first-ever, real, independent investigation of all the questions about
9/11 onto the ballot this Fall. Every New Yorker will be able to vote
about this, if all goes well. But we fully expect resistance from the
powers-that-be. And that struggle will be instructive to the world: the
war-mongers still are protective of all of their secrets.


LET'S TAKE ACTION!


NYC CAN would like all peace activists and organizations
nation-wide to make a statement of public support for NYC CAN's work to
get a new investigation into 9/11 on the NYC ballot. We have a formula
for success outlined at our site, http://www.nyccan.org.
The investigation will not be compromised. But we do know that the NYC
power structure will use the courts to try to keep this from being
votable. Donate what you can. Support us any way possible. Spread the
word. We are going after justice for our New York dead.


Also, I would urge all revolutionaries and peaceful paradigm
shifters to come to NYC to participate in our conference this
September: "Real Change and Transparency" takes place on the weekend of
the big 9/11 Anniversary, which is always an explosive time in NYC.


The open-mindedness I have proposed here could be applied to other
branches of outreach that this Peace movement could grow. Let's let a
thousand flowers bloom. Here's to a greater understanding among the
many creative revolutionaries out there in the USA and on the Earth.
Here's to a revolutionary change towards peace.


For more information on NYC CAN, the coaltion of Victim's Family
Members, and Concerned Citizens Advocating a 9/11 Investigation on the
Ballot in NYC:


http://nyccan.org


For More information on "Real Change
and Transparency"


the NYC 9/11/09 - 9/13/09 Conference around 9/11 Truth, Peace,
Economics, Reform, and Revolution, please see:


http://changeandtransparency.blogspot.com/





--



Sander Hicks


Canvass Director


NYC Coalition for Accountability Now


347 446 4461


http://nyccan.org


vote for 9/11 answers!

********

(I received via e-mail - just passing it along here)

First of all, because of the potential of the NYC ballot....

initiative, I wish that this had been put on the front page.

As for what I hope is the trans-partisan subtext of this blog, I would refer the reader to the following. Please note that, IMO, transpartisan, strategic voting, especially in primaries, is the key to rapidly dumping corrupted Congress critters who defy the public will, which, at least in this particular stage in our history, tends to be more spiritual than that of the depressing and death-loving elite classes. About 85% of House of Representatives' seats are "safe" for the incumbents' party. Therefore, there is little to lose if, in these districts, Republicans register as Democrats and help throw Democratic bums out of office, and vice versa. Voters can always switch back to voting for their 'original' party's candidate, in the general election.

References from "Voice of the People: The Transpartisan Imperative in American Life"

Taking out Senator Baucus - the trans-partisan, NO FORGIVENESS strategy

Empowering A Progressive Movement-A Web-Based Tool For Bottom-Up Self-Organizing

Industrial Areas Foundation

http://www.DemocracyABC.org
http://www.therealnews.com
http://www.pdamerica.org

Great statement. I hope it gets read. This should be on the fron

Great statement. I hope it gets read. This should be on the front page.

The Right vs Left meme

It is often said in the 9/11 Truth Movement that we are "beyond Left and Right," that the problem of power in America has co-opted the political spectrum. This is not entirely true. We should qualify such statements by saying "representative politics" has been co-opted. There is no Left or Right in the two parties that form a duopoly in representative politics. However, there is still a difference between Left and Right political philosophies. Rightists such as Alex Jones are republican constitutionalists and evangelical Christians. Jones may promote some truths about 9/11, but that doesn't mean he shares the same political orientation as everyone else who shares his views about 9/11.

So, there is still a Left and Right to the spectrum of political philosophies. What has been co-opted in America is the system of representative politics. Not everyone believes in representative politics: anarchists, for example, do not, and they belong to the Left of the spectrum.

I've never really known where to place anarchists

on the political spectrum, some often come across as radical libertarians while others do seem to share some more classical "left" tendencies.

While some tenets of anarchism are appealing, I don't think it's practical in an interconnected world with billions of people in it.

9/11 truth is a non-partisan issue, we all need to work together to expose and end the corruption of the ruling elites and then we can start debating in earnest how we all want to implement real change and move forward.

You make some important points. Thank you.

The truth shall set us free. Love is the only way forward.

Thanks for reading and for

Thanks for reading and for your comments.

I too felt it should have been front page. A friend of mine asked me to post it and I predicted that if I do, it will not make front page, but agreed to post it any ways, as I think it is a worthwhile initiative. My prediction was right.

That is why I seldom come here anymore, muchless post anything.

Ask RepreCensor why this was not worthy of front page.