Free Rick Larsen!

By Ellen Murphy

I forgot to attend Rick’s victory party.  Something about that word.  Victory.  Even today, the day America woke up, Bush was still calling for it.  It means to win.  How can you win an occupation?  Rick has spouted, no, mumbled, these same talking points.  Military objectives.  Victory.  When Iraq is stable.  When the Iraqi government stops the militias.

That last one is like a bully setting up another kid  as his front man, then blaming the other kid for all his victims. I preferred Rick over Roulstone.  Roulstone couldn’t be counted on to throw us a bone once in a while. But at least Roulstone is who he is.  Have to give him credit for that. Rick’s a Republican in disguise.  A Republican who appreciates trees and votes liberal when there’s no risk.

Some people told me tonight that they wrote my name in instead of voting for Rick.  Believe it or not, I did vote for Rick. It makes me more duty bound to hold his feet to the fire. But I forgot to attend his victory party. I was out gathering kindling, and it just slipped my mind.

From Carolyn DeSilva

Congressman Rick Larsen claims repeatedly that he listens to his constituents and addresses their concerns. Well, let’s test that claim.
For seven plus weeks, a group of peace activists has been peacefully requesting answers from Mr. Larsen, and asking for a meeting, or a telephone conference, or a written response - to no avail.  And in that same time period, there have been 8 arrests, 4 trespass orders, numerous protests, pleas and other futile attempts to get Mr. Larsen’s attention.  Eventually, we so distress his office staff with our peaceful presence and requests to see our elected representative that they lock the door and forbid our entry. Then and only then, when it is transparently clear that we will not cease our efforts, are we finally offered an impromptu meeting with a member of Mr. Larsen’s Washington staff, however not in the office but in the hall [no, we say], in the street [no, we say] and finally a public restaurant amid the clatter of coffee cups and a background of pop rock. With no time to prepare or to gather our entire group, we must accept these conditions since it is clear that this is our only chance for discourse.  And what if we had not engaged in the seven week campaign?  We have no doubt that our questions would have been forgotten, our requests ignored, our concerns dismissed. Constituents should not have to jump over these sorts of hurdles to get answers from their elected representatives.  Of course, the monied ones and favored ones do not.  The actions of Mr. Larsen’s Bellingham staff seem designed to discourage all but the relentlessly determined.

(The minutes of that October 27 meeting are posted here as Day 8.)

By Victoria Marx, mother of Iraq Veteran 

Today was a sad day for democracy.  I couldn’t make it because I had to baby sit, but I made the meeting afterwards, listened to the debrief, and  I was in contact with Wyoming, by cell phone, while she and the others were forced to sit in the hallway outside of Rick Larsen’s office.

That’s right. Luke (Rick’s assistant) would not let them in the office.  Our congressman’s door was locked and a sign that said Please Knock.  Luke told them he would meet with them for 15 minutes only and it would take place in the hallway. He refused to let them in Rick’s office. Read the rest of this entry »

When I ask a young musician to come and play at our next freerick sit in, his reply is in a different key. “I just don’t believe in governmental processes.” We do harmonize in the discussion that follows: he loves my activism. I love his music and I understand his renunciation of the system.   I think maybe he’ll show, but when we file into Rick’s office all in black, for the Day 6 naming of the dead, it is sans my young friend and his guitar. Read the rest of this entry »

Presented to staff at the offices of Congressman Rick Larsen in Bellingham, Washington, on October 2, 2006

STOP PRETENDING ! STOP GIVING US  USELESS TIMELINES !

We ask Congressman Larsen and his staff to stop pretending that this 3 1/2 year occupation, which followed another invasion and 12 years of deadly bombardment and sanctions, can be ended with endless timelines of movable indicators.  According to Larsen, he is for troop withdrawal, but absolutely against timelines of any kind.  Yet Larsen gives us nothing but timelines as his solution to the disaster in Iraq. First, we are given the timeline of “enough trained Iraqi military.” Then we are given the timeline of certain undefined military objectives and a trusted national police.  The latest timeline from the congressman’s D.C. office refers to “reconciliation” among the parties resisting in Iraq.  Interestingly, according to the Washington Post, Donald Rumsfeld has also changed his reference point for U.S. withdrawal from military to political solutions, and in particular, he refers now to “reconciliation.”  We find ourselves at a point of utter disgust and frustration with this murky and contradictory position on the part of our representative, and when his talking points match the administration’s right down to the exact wording, we feel outrage. Read the rest of this entry »

Presented September 28, 2006 

We, citizens of Whatcom County and constituents of Congressman Rick Larsen, hereby recognize our rights to peaceably assemble, to speak freely, and to petition for redress of grievances, under the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States of America, by gathering in the Bellingham offices of Rep. Larsen to ask him why he has not signed the Declaration of Peace pledge, which was presented to him at a public meeting on August 25, 2006.  Read the rest of this entry »

(Submitted by Brad Grower, Bellingham, WA, one of the participants in Free Larsen!)

The question is legitimate. It is a question being asked by returning veterans, and both the citizens of Iraq and the United States.
 
Without an answer which determines at what point in the future it will be time for our troops to return, any and all attempts to convince the Iraqi people of our benign intentions shall continue to fail miserably.
 
Representative Rick Larsen was informed last year by the President of Iraq himself, that any plan to stabilize that country through the deployment of civilian police was an ill-fated endeavor. Respect for the democratic process should create an urgency in the development of a solution to this challenge, and the safe and speedy return of our men and women to safety. Read the rest of this entry »