WWJD?

In my early adulthood, I read books on Saint Francis of Assissi (1181/1182 -1226). I was especially impressed by his living his life in imitation of Christ (imitatio Christi) and that set me on a  certain path. Later, in the 1980's, I encountered the book, In His Steps by Charles Sheldon, that portrayed late nineteenth century imitatio Christi in light of the Social Gospel. In the late 1990's and early 2000's, I read books by Marcus Borg and Dominic Crossan on the Historical Jesus that further widened my path.

The subtitle of In His Steps is What Would Jesus Do? In the 1990's this phrase became popular with Christian youth and they used the letters WWJD.

In the lead up to the Iraq War, this question, "What would Jesus do?", kept coming to my mind. I knew the answer in that regard and I became quite distressed when my local church and local churches in general would not stand up for Jesus as the old song said. The heads of the major denominations, though,  including my own, had come out in opposition to the war. I took to the street in protest.

Recently, I was interested in the remarks of President Obama at the National Prayer Breakfast in Washington on February 2. I was impressed at how he spoke of the role that faith, his Christian faith, plays in his job as President. He spoke of not leaving our values at the door. He spoke of the importance of the Golden Rule, treating others as we wish to be treated. He spoke of the financial difficulties of many Americans today. He spoke of treating people fairly and providing opportunities for all. He even mentioned the most vulnerable among us. He did have some good words.

There is a question, though, that I would like to ask our President. I have posted previously on our use of drones in warfare. The President has spoken of how few civilian casualties have come from our drone attacks.  However, in August of 2011, the London-based Bureau of Investigative Journalism produced a study that said at least 385 civilians had been killed by our drones in Pakistan in the last seven years and that at least 168 of these were children. Now my question is: Who Would Jesus Drone?

____________
As a postcript, I would like to link to a  very recent blog post-sermon by the Rev. Chuck Queen that speaks to WWJD. I believe it is quite worth reading.

Obama's Middle East and N. Africa

I have come to believe that my country, the United States of America, is two-faced. We tend to have great values, such as human rights, but tend to act toward other countries, and sometimes against our own people, in a completely contrary manner. I mentioned before that the Native Americans used to say, especially in those "Westerns" of my younger days, that the white man speaks with forked tongue. The Native Americans certainly experienced first hand our contrariness.

In their post for CODEPINK's blog, PINKtank, Medea Benjamin, a co-founder of both CODEPINK and Global Exchange, and Charles Davis, an independent journalist, seem to be saying the same thing about President Obama's major speech on May 20 at the State Department regarding the Middle East and North Africa. We speak of and commend non-violence, but act in a completely different manner.

Here are some excerpts ~

**Given that President Obama daily authorizes the firing of hellfire missiles and the dropping of cluster bombs in places such as Afghanistan, Pakistan and Yemen, it was awful odd seeing him wax eloquent this week about the “moral force of non-violence” in places like Egypt and Tunisia. But there he was, the commander-in-chief of the largest empire in history, praising the power of peaceful protest in countries with repressive leaders backed by his own administration.

Were we unfamiliar with his actual policies – more than doubling the troops in Afghanistan, dramatically escalating a deadly drone war in Pakistan and unilaterally bombing for peace in Libya – it might have been inspiring to hear a major head of state reject violence as a means to political ends. Instead, we almost choked on the hypocrisy.

* *Yet even for all his talk of human rights and how he “will not tolerate aggression across borders” – yes, a U.S. president said this – Obama didn’t even feign concern about Saudi Arabia’s repressive regime invading neighboring Bahrain to put down a pro-democracy movement there. In fact, the words “Saudi Arabia” were never uttered.

**The president also didn’t deviate from his policy of “unshakable” support for Israeli militarism, typified by his administration’s efforts to safeguard the Jewish state from accountability for its war crimes in Gaza – crimes that left some 1,400 Palestinians dead – and his determination to hand an already wealthy nation more than $3 billion a year in military aid, even as it flaunts the “peace process” and colonizes ever more Palestinian land. 

**Obama’s remarks on the killing of Osama bin Laden were likewise delivered with a complete lack of self-awareness. Describing the latter as a “mass murderer,” Obama – who since taking office has the blood of hundreds of Afghan and Pakistani civilians on his hands – said bin Laden’s philosophy of using bloodshed to achieve desired political changes had been discredited “through the moral force of non-violence” that has swept the region. 

You can read the full post here:  Obama Should Follow His Own Advice on the ‘Moral Force’ of Non-Violence | PINKtank.


Somehow: May Peace Prevail in the Middle East and North Africa. May Peace Prevail in United States Foreign Policy.

Osama bin Laden's Death

The US Needs to Focus on Not Creating Any More bin Ladens | | AlterNet

I would like to recommend this wonderful interview with Samina Sundas, the founder of American Muslim Voice, a post-9-11 group, by Rae Abileah, a Jewish-American of Israeli descent and a CODEPINK organizer. The interview is rather lengthy, but well worth the read. Sundas speaks to American foreign policy and I believe we need to take heed.

The interview was done the morning following the assasination of Osama bin Laden by the United States.

The Bomber's Message

In US District Court in Manhattan on Monday, June 21, 2010 Faisal Shazad, a Pakistan-born US citizen pleaded guilty to a failed car bomb attack on Times Square. Below is an excerpt of his testimony before Judge Miriam Goldman Cedarbaum as taken from an Associated Press article, "Failed NY Car Bomber: I'm Guilty," by Tom Hays and Larry Neumeister as published in the Lexington Herald-Leader of Tuesday, June 22, 2010. The bomber has a message for us. Think about it.

~~~

The judge repeatedly interrupted Shazad, including when he said his plot was to retailiate against the United States and the forces of up to 50 other countries, that had "attacked Muslim lands."

Cederbaum said, "But not the people who were walking in Times Square that night. Did you look around to see who they were?"

"Well the people select the government," Shazad said. "We consider them all the same. The drones, when they hit ... "

Cederbaum interrupted again: "Including the children?"

Shazad answered: "Well, the drone hits in Afghanistan and Iraq, they don't see children, they don't see anybody. They kill women, children, they kill everybody. It's a war and in war, they kill people. They're killing all Muslims."

Later he added, "I am part of the answer to the U.S. terorizing the Muslim nations and the Muslim people. and, on behalf of that, I'm avenging the attack. Living in the United States, Americans only care about their own people, but they don't care about the people elsewhere in the world when they die."

Books!

Books have guided me on my spiritual and activism journey. It seems there is usually another book with my name on it just around the corner.

Here is a list of some books of rather recent vintage that have guided this Peace Advocate and provided the backdrop to my blog. I provide the list by author and group by subject or relatedness. The year given is the year of publication. I share these books to let folks know where I am coming from and with hope that some may perk readers' interest. There are a number of other books by some of these authors that readers may find helpful.


I will have to give some credit to my husband. He and I have both had a chance to read the last few years since our children have been grown and he has retired. He has pointed out a number of them to me and we have had some good discussions.

Karen Armstrong ~ 

• 
  
  A History of God (1993)
• 
  
  Jerusalem: One City, Three Faiths (1996)
• 
  
  The Battle for God: Fundamentalism in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam (2000)
• 
  
  The Great Transformation: The Beginning of our Religious Traditions (2006)

John Dominic Crossan ~

• 
  
  Jesus: A Revolutionary Biography (1994)
• 
  
  With Jonathan Reed ~ In Search of Paul: How Jesus' Apostle Opposed Rome's Empire with God's Kingdom (2004)
• 
  
  God and Empire: Jesus Against Rome, Then and Now (2007)

Marcus J. Borg ~

• 
  
  The Heart of Christianity (2003)
• 
  
  Jesus: Uncovering the Life, Teachings, and Relevance of a Religious Revolutionary (2006)

John Dominic Crossan and Marcus J. Bog ~

• 
  
  The first Christmas: What the Gospels Really Teach About Jesus' Birth (2007)

Brian D. McLaren ~

• 
  
  Everything Must Change: Jesus, Global Crises, and a Revolution of Hope (2007)

Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin ~

• 
  
  Three Cups of Tea : One Man's Mission to Fight Terror and Build Nations--One School at a Time (2006) 

Greg Mortenson ~

• 
  
  Stones into Schools : Promoting Peace With Books, Not Bombs, in Afghanistan and Pakistan (2009)   

 Malalai Joya with Derrick O'Keefe ~ 

• 
  
  A Woman Among Warlords: The Extraordinary Story of an Afghan Who Dared to Raise Her Voice (2009)

Those Imperial Brits

I have started reading a fascinating book about Afghanistan, actually about a person of Afghanistan. The book by Eknath Easwaran is entitled Nonviolent Soldier of Islam: Badshah Khan, a Man to Match his Mountains  (Tomales, CA: Nilgiri Press, c.1984 and 1999.) Badshah Khan, who lived from 1890 to 1988, was a close associate of Mahatma Gandhi.

I bought the book after 9-11, but had not read it. I recently spotted it on our bookshelf and decided that with ongoing U.S. military activities and current offensive in Afghanistan, it was time to read it.

What I just read, in the first part of the book, in the third chapter, I believe I need to share. We need to pay attention to history and learn from it. Seeds have always been sown in the past which bear fruit later on. The British of the Empire had particular actions in Afghanistan which are continuing to play out and which we even seem to continue. Like today, this involved foreign policy doves and hawks and geopolitics.

What I just read and want to pass on involves the people we call today the Pashtuns, the primary ethnic group of Afghanistan that forms the basis of the Taliban. The British referred to these people as Pathans (rhyming with batons). Their lands involved parts of Afghanistan and what we call today, Pakistan. The Pashtuns have also been called, Paktuns--hence, the name Pakistan.

I quote from the book:

The borders between Afghanistan and India were ill defined and not easily defended. When Russian troops clashed with the Afghans in 1885, the Conservatives insisted it was Britain's's 'bounden duty'  to build a permanent buffer zone between British India and Imperial Russia along a secure border. The obvious location for the border was the range of mountains between Afghanistan and British India. High and rugged, their narrow passes were easily defended. The only problem was that this placed the buffer garrisons squarely within the homelands of the Pathans. Not even Forward School hawks were eager to arouse Pathan ire. But the protectors of the Empire felt that they had no choice: India, Britain's prize possession, must be defended at all costs.

In the autumn of 1893, Lieutenant Henry Durand was sent to Kabul to negotiate a border between Afghanistan and British India that would effectively hand over to the British most of the Pathan homelands, historically part of the Afghan empire. The proposed border--the 'Durand Line'--cut through the heart of the Pathan nation, leaving a third of all Pathans in Afghanistan.

The Afghan amir [ruler] warned the British that they had more to lose from the settlement than he did. 'If you should cut the Pathan tribes away from my domain,' he wrote the viceroy in desperation, 'they will not be of any use either to you or me. You will always be engaged in fighting them or be involved in some other trouble with them and they will always go on plundering.'

The British forced the issue. ... (pages 47, 48)

A few pages over in the book, the author quoted another author on Annie Besant, an English woman in India writing on the British Frontier War:

We loudly proclaimed that we had no quarrel with the Pathan nation, yet we burnt their villages, destroyed their crops, stole their cattle, looted their homes, hanged their men as 'rebels' if they resisted, while we drove out their women and children to perish in the snow.

From out of the darkness moans of suffering reach us, and we shrink in horror from the work which is being done in our names. These starved babes wail out our condemnation. These frozen women cry aloud against us. These stiffened corpses, these fire-blackened districts, these snow-covered, blood-stained plains appear to humanity to curse us.

Englishmen, with wives nestled warm in your bosom, remember these Pathan husbands, maddened by their wrongs. Englishwomen, with babes smiling on your breasts, think of these sister-women, bereft of their little ones. The Pathan loves wife and children as you do. He also is husband and father. To him also the home is happy, the hearth sacred. To you he cries from his desolate fireside and from his ravaged land. In your hands is his cause. (pages 52, 53)

Here is a short video to update:

For Valentine's Day

and Everyday

THINGS TO DO

  1. Love your neighbors.

  2. Love your enemies.

      --Jesus

~ ~ ~

Three Cups of Tea was the title of the first book of Greg Mortenson, founder of the Central Asia Institute. The three cups of tea referred to a Balti sayig that Haj Ali invoked during one of Mortenson's first visits to his village.

 

Ali told Mortenson that with the first cup of tea shared with them, one was a stranger. With the second cup, one was a friend. With the third cup, however, one became family--and for their families they were willing to do anything, even to die.

Mortenson wrote that of the many lessons that the old man, Haj Ali, imparted to him that this was perhaps the greatest. For Mortenson, it underscored the paramount importance of taking the time to build relationships, while simultaneously affirming the basic truth that in order to get things done in that part of the world it was essential fo listen with humility to what others have to say.

  --Stones into Schools: Promoting Peace with Books, not Bombs, in Afghanistan and Pakistan  by Greg Mortenson (p.51).

Open Letter To Citizens Of the U.S « Pak Alert Press

 Note to Readers,

I am passing on the letter below because I think it deserves a wider audience. I do not quite know its veracity or authorship, but it does give a point of view that needs to be heard by the American people.

I have opposed the War of Terror on Terror from its inception and continue believe that the US needs a thoughourly revised foreign policy that is not meddlesome and is not filled with hubris.

I am very concerned about our actions in Pakistan and our driving the Pakistani military to harm and displace those within its borders. The offensive in South Warzistan is the current example.

Military attacks and bribery by foreign aid will not bring peace.

AGW

------------

Dear Citizens of United States,

We Pakistanis are ordinary beings like you, having the same dreams, same needs, ambitions, emotions, reservations and same passion if not more for our country. We like you, to feel the same regret for wars, same grief for the world problems, same distress towards injustice, same hopes for a better tomorrow. We, like you, also fantasize having serene borders, comfortable homes for our children, fine education, some leisure, and a satisfied mind that what we are contributing to this country and the world at large today will benefit us and our future generations tomorrow. We fancy the feeling of living in sheer coziness of our homeland, away from overseas interventions and foreign-extremism in the exact same way as an average American desires.

We didn’t get our independence as a birthday present, we got it after much struggle and sacrifices (over 4 million lives were lost during the migration); after much strangling and many fatalities, we finally broke free of the quandary at the hands of British and Hindu rulers. After independence, we have shown remarkable progress in many areas despite having rulers who placed personal interests over national interests, who never really had to face the trauma of poverty, sickness, injustice, or leaving their loved ones behind to inhabit a land with no promises. Yet we did not give up and made a nation out of it. We did not fail as our current leaders try to put it, to solicit more and more aid to gratify their own greed. In our short history we have never been blessed with a true leader after our founder, and yet imagine our courage, we did not break down, we moved on and on. And we never really looked for shortcuts to this existence, we have paid plenitude.

We have now been presented with yet another aid package from your country which will be financed by American taxpayers money, which is the right of American citizens and on which we have got no claim.

Read more:
Open Letter To Citizens Of the U.S « Pak Alert Press

Ground the Drones

I know that there are people who think I am completely unrealistic when it comes to war. These are people who believe that wars are necessary evils, that you do what you have to do when it comes to protecting the nation--even waging wars of aggression and/or revenge, and that in wars people die, including civilians.

However that may be, I have been utterly distressed by our illegal and immoral war of aggression in Iraq and our subsequent occuption of that country. I have been distressed, too, by our war in Afghanistian that is spilling over into Pakistan. Many people have been sacrificed for our need (greed?) for hegemony and resources.

I am also distressed by our remote use of attack drones, especially in Pakistan. These drones are being used also in Iraq and Afghanistan.

These low-flying pilotless aircraft played like videogames with a joystick by mostly 19-year old soldiers are sent from Creech Air Force Base in the desert outside of Las Vegas. War is dehumanizing enough as it is. Aerial bombing has always been remote and dehumanizing and now here we are using robotics, including the Predator and Reaper drones, controlled from a greater distance, dehumanizing further. This, to me, is chilling.

Kathy Kelley of Voices of Creative Nonviolence made a trip to Pakistan and published a piece on Common Dreams concerning drones on June 25 entitled, Now We See You, Now We Don’t.

She wrote:

A villager who survived a drone attack in North Waziristan explained that even the children, at play, were acutely conscious of drones flying overhead. After a drone attack, survivors trying to bring injured victims to a hospital were dumbfounded when a driver stopped, learned of their plight and then sped away. Then it dawned on them that the driver was afraid the drone would still be prowling overhead and that he might be targeted for associating with victims of the attack.


The U.S. drone aircraft can see Pakistan - their pilots in air-conditioned Nevada trailers see the terrain even though they are physically thousands of miles away.


...


On Tuesday, June 23rd, U.S. drones launched an attack on a compound in South Waziristan. Locals rushed to the scene to rescue survivors. The U.S. drone then launched more missiles at them, leaving a total of 13 dead. The next day, local people were involved in a funeral procession when the U.S. struck again. Reuters reported that 70 of the mourners were killed.

Kelley concluded her article by saying:

If we want to counter Al-Qaeda, if we want to be safe from further terrorist attacks, we'd do well to remember that even when we don’t recognize the humanity of people bearing the brunt of our wars, these very people have eyes to see and ears to hear. They must be asking themselves, who are the terrorists?

As part of a series of interviews with women from war-torn countries, CODEPINK: Women for Peace interviewed Fawzia Afzal-Khan, a Pakistani-American and English professor at Montclair State University in N.J. about the escalating crisis in Pakistan. The interview was published as their PINKtank blog entry of July 8, 2009. Here is an excerpt:

Many have criticized the Obama administration for its efforts in Pakistan from the perspective of shifting attention from Afghanistan, or for being too supportive of the Pakistan government or not enough. How would you describe the relationship between U.S. efforts in Afghanistan versus those in Pakistan? Do you feel the situation in both countries are unreasonably or faultily linked?


Faultily linked — the war in Afghanistan is unwinnable and to broaden it with its drone attacks on the Pakistani side of the Durand line border is to inflame passions against U.S. involvement further amongst the Pakhtoons in both Afghanistan and Pakistan, and to further strengthen Pakistani citizens anger against U.S. interference and killings of ordinary people and thus also strengthen impression of Pakistani Taliban as freedom fighters standing up against U.S. imperialism.


…


Many argue drone attacks are the only way to kill Taliban or Al Qaeda members, others argue they must be abolished as they are not worth the number of civilians that may be killed. Based on your understanding, do you believe most Pakistani people support the use of drones?


I do not think most Pakistanis support the use of drones–but many do. Dr. Pervez Hoodbhoy, an eminent Pakistani physicist and social activist, has written extensively on this issue and he actually believes drone attacks may be the lesser of the two evils (the other being Taliban insurgency). However, he too in recent writings says that the drone attacks create bad publicity for the us which is already regarded unfavorably by the majority of the population. And if you think about it, how many Taliban have really been gotten rid of as a result of these attacks? I think the solution has to be political and economic, not military–or certainly not only or even predominantly a military one.


According to a poll released this week, more than 80 percent of Pakistanis view the Taliban and Al Qaeda as a critical threat to the country, and U.S. officials believe this will help efforts to fight both groups. Do you have a sense of what efforts Pakistanis feel the government should undertake to fight Taliban and Al Qaeda, and what the U.S. role in this should be?


Yes, Pakistani have finally woken up to the serious threat posed to the nation state by these Islamist extremist groups and want them to be eliminated–but not at the cost of their sovereignty. So I think most Pakistanis want to see real change in government policies which address the root causes of inequities in the country which have led to the rise and support for extremism and madrassa culture. What the U.S. and Pak govt must do is build educational and economic infrastructure of the country and help the people help themselves in their own ways…not impose solutions from the outside. The U.S. should also stop supporting corrupt regimes and leaders like Asif Ali Zardari and look to local, organic leaders and grassroots movements and support them.

A July 9 article in the D.C. publication called The Hill had this:

The poll of more than 2,500 Pakistanis, conducted across rural and urban areas at the end of July by Gallup Pakistan for Al-Jazeera, found that 41 percent favored their government's military operation against the Taliban, while 22 percent claimed neutrality and 24 percent opposed.


But only 9 percent approved of U.S. strikes by unmanned drones against Taliban and al-Qaeda targets. National Security Adviser James Jones said Sunday that the U.S. is 90 percent confident that Baitullah Mehsud, the leader of Pakistan's Taliban, was killed when a drone fired at the house of Mehsud's father-in-law on Wednesday.


"Mehsud was a very bad individual, a real thug," Jones said.


Pakistanis, though, fingered the U.S. as the enemy in the poll.


A whopping 59 percent -- a figure that cut fairly evenly across party lines, gender, language and age -- said that the U.S. is the greatest threat to Pakistan. Only 11 percent named the Taliban, and 18 percent said India was the greatest threat. Twelve percent responded "don't know."

In a July 6 article in TheTelegraph of the UK, a British judge spoke of the possibility of an international ban on the drones:

Lord Bingham, who retired last year as a senior law lord, said the aircraft could follow other weapons considered "so cruel as to be beyond the pale of human tolerance" in being consigned to the history books.


He likened drones, which have killed hundreds of civilians in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Gaza, to cluster bombs and landmines.


Lord Bingham made the comments to the British Institute of International and Comparative Law in an interview which addressed the issue of the state being bound by the rule of law.


"Are there, for example, and this goes to conflict, not post-conflict situations, weapons that ought to be outlawed?" he said.


"From time to time in the history of international law various weapons have been thought to be so cruel as to be beyond the pale of human tolerance. I think cluster bombs and landmines are the most recent examples.


"It may be - I'm not expressing a view - that unmanned drones that fall on a house full of civilians is a weapon the international community should decide should not be used."

Just a few days ago, on Friday, August 21, Al-Jazeera English published an article about a drone raid in Pakistan that included this:

At least 10 people have been killed after a suspected US drone fired missiles into Pakistan's North Waziristan region, Pakistani intelligence agency officials have said.


The raid on Friday on Darpa Kheil village was the third such attack this month in Pakistan's ethnic Pashtun tribal areas by what are believed to be CIA-operated pilotless aircraft.


"The attack caused a huge explosion," said a Reuters reporter in Miranshah, about 2km from the scene of the raid.
Drones were seen flying over the area after the blast, he said.


Darpa Kheil village is home to a large madrassa, or religious school, set up by Jalaluddin Haqqani, a former veteran Afghan fighter commander who is also a senior Taliban leader.


US drone aircraft attacked the complex in September last year, killing 23 people, most of them members of Haqqani's family.

On Monday, July 13, CODEPINK and others rallied at Creech Air Force Base in Nevada against the use of the drones. You can read the press release with the explanation here. In the PINKtank blog it was then reported:

In trying to engage in civil disobedience by trying to block traffic into the base, three people were arrested — Father Louis Vitale, Nobel Prize-nominee Kathy Kelly, and Lisa (not sure of last name) from Bellingham, WA. Several more people were injured. Seeing all of it, and men with their M16s, really gives you a taste of what it must feel like living under the horrors of occupation.

CODEPINK plans to return to the site September 25 through 30 for further demonstrations against those drones.

On Saturday, August 22, Kavita Ramdas the President and CEO of the Global Fund for Women, wrote in an article published on Common Dreams:

Ordinary people are the victims, caught in the crossfire between the Taliban and the West's precision drones that leave villages in towns with countless orphaned and maimed children and widows.

Mr. Obama, please stop the wars and ground the drones.

Independence?

If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear.
--George Orwell, Preface to Animal Farm (1945)

Proclaim LIBERTY throughout all the Land unto all the Inhabitants thereof Lev. XXV X
--From the inscription on the Liberty Bell, originally known as "Independence Bell" or the "Old Yankee's Bell", that comes from Leviticus 25:10, "And ye shall hallow the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof: it shall be a jubilee unto you; and ye shall return every man unto his possession, and ye shall return every man unto his family.“


Coming soon to this country--July 4, in fact-- is Independence Day: a day to wave the flag if there ever was one.

I have been thinking about this concept of “independence.”

I notice that our Declaration of Independence speaks of nations assuming among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature's God entitle them. It also includes, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” That statement is followed by, “That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men.”

Wikitionary give this definition of independence: “The state or quality of being independent; freedom from dependence; exemption from reliance on, or control by others; self-subsistence or maintenance; direction of one's own affairs without interference.“

Wikepedia has this:

Independence is the self-government of a nation, country, or state by its residents and population, or some portion thereof, generally exercising sovereignty.
The term independence is used in contrast to subjugation, which refers to a region as a "territory" —subject to the political and military control of an external government. The word is sometimes used in a weaker sense to contrast with hegemony, the indirect control of one nation by another, more powerful nation.
Independence can be the initial status of an emerging nation (often filling a political void), but is often emancipation from some dominating power. It can be argued that independence is a negative definition: the state of not being controlled by another power through colonialism, expansionism or imperialism. Independence may be obtained by decolonization, or by separation or dissolution.
We, as individuals and as a country, are very proud of our independence. However, this passage from Wikipedia should give us second thought. Independence for ourselves and for our country, but what about others and their countries from us? Shouldn’t we, as the great nation, keep other countries under our influence? I don‘t think so.

Let’s look at what is going on at present.

We have supported, especially by our actions, including our military aid, the State of Israel and its Occupation over the Palestinians who have been denied their own rights and land. In March 2003, we invaded the sovereign state of Iraq and still have a military presence there. Following 9-11, we invaded the rather failed state of Afghanistan and are now escalating our troops there. (Not to mention that we had supported insurgents there in the eighties in resistance to the Soviets and then deserted them.) We have been sending drones over Afghanistan’s neighbor, Pakistan, killing and displacing many there and encouraging their own country to do so. (This is all not to mention our many troops stationed at military bases all over the globe.) The Shia Islamic nation of Iran has recently had an election of which the results are in doubt and the people are rising up which in turn has been followed by the clerical regime cracking down. To our credit, our president is staying out of it, but has denounced the violent crackdown. (The Iranians still remember that in in 1953 we overturned their duly elected president and put in our own man, the despotic Shah, in his place.)

I do believe that we need to support human rights and independence, but I do not believe that war is the answer. I know that to some that sounds very naïve, but I am even saddened that our own independence was gained by violent revolution. I just noticed that Howard Zinn in an article called, “A Just Cause [Does Not Equal] a Just war,” in The Progressive of July even questioned this use of violence. (The issue is not online yet, but the magazine’s Website is here.) I think of Gandhi and his use of ahimsa (nonviolence) and satyagraha (truth force) in ending British rule over his India. I also think of King and his use of those principles in helping his African-Americans obtain their civil rights in this country.

In 2006, CODEPINK posted a page online and still there that gives passages for July 4 talking points. I would like to give some of them here for reflection.

James Madison wrote in his Political Observations of April 20, 1795:

Of all the enemies of true liberty, war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded, because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. War is the parent of armies; from these proceed debts and taxes; and armies, and debts, and taxes are the known instruments for bringing the many under the domination of the few. In war, too, the discretionary power of the Executive is extended; its influence in dealing out offices, honors and emoluments is multiplied; and all the means of seducing the minds, are added to those of subduing the force, of the people. The same malignant aspect in republicanism may be traced in the inequality of fortunes, and the opportunities of fraud, growing out of a state of war, and in the degeneracy of manner and of morals, engendered in both. No nation can preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare.
War is in fact the true nurse of executive aggrandizement. In war, a physical force is to be created; and it is the executive will, which is to direct it. In war, the public treasuries are to be unlocked; and it is the executive hand which is to dispense them. In war, the honors and emoluments of office are to be multiplied; and it is the executive patronage under which they are to be enjoyed; and it is the executive brow they are to encircle. The strongest passions and most dangerous weaknesses of the human breast; ambition, avarice, vanity, the honorable or venal love of fame, are all in conspiracy against the desire and duty of peace.
The then-Secretary of State John Quincy Adams in a speech to Congress on July 4, 1821 said of the United States:

She has abstained from interference in the concerns of others, even when conflict has been for principles to which she clings, as to the last vital drop that visits the heart. She has seen that probably for centuries to come, all the contests of that Aceldama the European world, will be contests of inveterate power, and emerging right. Wherever the standard of freedom and Independence has been or shall be unfurled, there will her heart, her benedictions and her prayers be. But she goes not abroad, in search of monsters to destroy.
She is the well-wisher to the freedom and independence of all.
She is the champion and vindicator only of her own.
She will commend the general cause by the countenance of her voice, and the benignant sympathy of her example.
She well knows that by once enlisting under other banners than her own, were they even the banners of foreign independence, she would involve herself beyond the power of extrication, in all the wars of interest and intrigue, of individual avarice, envy, and ambition, which assume the colors and usurp the standard of freedom. The fundamental maxims of her policy would insensibly change from liberty to force....
She might become the dictatress of the world. She would be no longer the ruler of her own spirit....
[America's] glory is not dominion, but liberty. Her march is the march of the mind. She has a spear and a shield: but the motto upon her shield is, Freedom, Independence, Peace. This has been her Declaration: this has been, as far as her necessary intercourse with the rest of mankind would permit, her practice.
Finally, Rep. Barbara Lee in a speech to Congress on September 14, 2001 opposing the Post 9-11 Use of Force Act said:

Mr. Speaker, I rise today with a heavy heart, one that is filled with sorrow for the families and loved ones who were killed and injured in New York, Virginia, and Pennsylvania. Only the most foolish or the most callous would not understand the grief that has gripped the American people and millions around the world.
This unspeakable attack on the United States has forced me to rely on my moral compass, my conscience, and my God for direction.
September 11 changed the world. Our deepest fears now haunt us. Yet I am convinced that military action will not prevent further acts of international terrorism against the United States.
I know that this use-of -force resolution will pass although we all know that the President can wage war even without this resolution. However difficult this vote may be, some of us must urge the use of restraint. There must be some of us who say, let's step back for a moment and think through the implications of our actions today-let us more fully understand their consequences.
We are not dealing with a conventional war. We cannot respond in a conventional manner. I do not want to see this spiral out of control. This crisis involves issues of national security, foreign policy, public safety, intelligence gathering, economics, and murder. Our response must be equally multifaceted.
We must not rush to judgment. For too many innocent people have already died. Our country is in mourning. If we rush to launch a counterattack, we run too great a risk that women, children, and other non-combatants will be caught in the crossfire.
Nor can we let our justified anger over these outrageous acts by vicious murderers inflame prejudice against all Arab Americans, Muslim, Southeast Asians, and any other people because of their race, religion, or ethnicity.
Finally, we must be careful not to embark on an open-ended war with neither an exit strategy nor a focused target. We cannot repeat past mistakes.
As we approach Independence Day, maybe besides our own independence, we should think about the independence of others and how to get there. Maybe we should wave a pink flag for peace. Maybe we should even think seriously about implementing true energy independence--green energy and conservation.

As the biblical Apostle Paul told the Philippians, “ Think about these things.”