Honoring those who opposed war on Veterans Day

Honoring today US Representative Barbara Lee of California, the sole voice and vote against the 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Terrorists (AUMF). She claimed then such an authorization could easily be used to endlessly further US militarism in Afghanistan and elsewhere. Unfortunately, the following years of warmongering by Bush, Obama and now Trump administrations proved her right.

Honoring today US Senators Wayne Morse of Oregon and Ernest Gruening of Alaska, who spoke and voted against the 1964 Gulf of Tonkin Resolution. Both critiqued the resolution and those who supported it. Gruening sharply objected, "Sending our American boys into combat in a war in which we have no business, which is not our war, into which we have been misguidedly drawn, which is steadily being escalated." Morse added, "I believe this resolution to be a historic mistake", and later when interviewed, fervently questioned presidential presumption in the matter.

Honoring today US Representative Jeannette Rankin of Montana, and first woman to hold federal office, who alone voted against the declaration of war on Japan. "You can no more win a war than you can win an earthquake" she compared, and as one among very few others in government, questioned Roosevelt's posturing, "the United States was at peace" as well his later categorization of the Pearl Harbor attack as "unsolicited".

Come let us Reason. Peace is always a Choice.
Study, Ponder, Labor, till last Breath.