posted May 09, 2008 04:30 PM            

Code Pink Protesters Try Witchcraft at Anti-Marine Rallies
Thursday , May 08, 2008

By Jana Winter

Code Pink is now resorting to witchcraft to beef up the number of its supporters protesting a controversial Marine Corps Recruiting Center in Berkeley, Calif.

The women's anti-war group has told ralliers to come equipped with spells and pointy hats Friday for "witches, crones and sirens" day, the last of the group's weeklong homage to Mother's Day.

"Women are coming to cast spells and do rituals and to impart wisdom to figure out how we're going to end war," Zanne Sam Joi of Bay Area Code Pink told FOXNews.com.

The group's week of themed protests, which included days to galvanize grannies and bring-your-daughter-to-protest, appears to have done little to boost its flagging numbers.

A FOX News camera, which has a 24/7 live shot of the recruiting center's front door, recorded little action, and the gatherings have, until this point, been ill attended.

•Click here to watch the FOXNews's Berkeley protest cam.

In February, the Marine Corps Recruiting Center was the site of fierce pro- and anti-war protests. It made national headlines when Berkeley's city council voted to send a letter to the recruiting station advising the Marines they were not welcome. Council members later moderated their position, saying they oppose the war in Iraq but support the troops.

Code Pink — which was given parking and noise permits by the city council and is allowed to protest during the recruiting center's business hours — has been protesting daily since September.

The group frequently announces bizarre theme weeks in front of the office, but their numbers have been dwindling and the events get little media attention.

Now, after three months of continual protest, their actions barely capture the attention of even the Marines at the recruiting center.

Capt. John Paul Wheatcroft said he's unfazed by Code Pink's antics.

"They're always in pink and wear funny things, half-shaved heads, one side with hair and the other one bald, yeah, I'm pretty much used to anything," he told FOXNews.com.

Code Pink said that grandmothers did show up for Monday's protest — some over 90 years old, some in wheelchairs — and began knocking on the door of the recruiting center.

• Click here to see pictures of past protests.

"The grandmothers were here and tried to get recruited," Joi said. "They tried to have conversations with the Marines, but the Marines were too scared to talk."

Wheatcroft, who was the Marine on the other side of the door, said that he was not afraid of the grannies. He just didn't open the door.

"Most of the time they are just practicing their right to protest and their freedom of speech or whatever, so it's not usually a problem for us," Wheatcroft told FOXNews.com. "But sometimes it crosses the line, and that happened [Monday] when the grannies were here blocking the entrance and banging on the door."

On Tuesday, Code Pink's theme was "fierce mothers raging against war," Joi said, to talk about all the mothers killed and raped in war. Wednesday's theme was "bring your daughter to the protest," where daughters explained why they don't want their parents fighting the war. Thursday is "sisters don't allow sisters to live in war zones" day, and the week wraps up Friday with "witches, crones and sirens" day.

Code Pink isn't the only group rallying around the Marine recruiting center that has seen its numbers drop.

Kimberly Wagner, Berkeley College Republicans activism chair, who is dating a Marine, said her group has been trying to keep up a presence outside the center since Feb. 13, when Code Pink's parking permit went into effect.

The college Republicans are fighting to acquire the same parking permits that Code Pink has. A resolution to grant the group an equal permit will be entered and voted upon in the May 20 city council meeting.

Wagner said showing up to rally is especially hard now due to final exams, which begin on Monday, but she said she will be there — this week and every week — "as a reminder to Code Pink that not everybody agrees with them."

When asked if she was planning any special events to counter Code Pink's theme week, Wagner said: "We try not to do anything embarrassing." She added, "We're just going to stick with our regular thing because we have lives and they don't."

But if events this week are an attempt by anti-war protesters to remarket their cause, the Marine recruiters in Berkeley tell FOXNews.com that Code Pink's presence outside their office has helped — not hindered — their mission.

"Ironically, it's actually helped us by putting our name out. We're now well known. And people know who we are, and where we are, and they come in to talk to us about enlisting. They've gotten us the publicity that we could've never afforded to pay for ourselves," Wheatcroft told FOXNews.com.

"Just in the last three weeks, 10 people came in looking to apply, looking to become Marine officers, and that's much higher than normal," he said.

Wheatcroft could not give exact figures on recruiting numbers, and officials at the Marine Corps' national headquarters did not respond to repeated requests for information.

As for what's brewing outside his recruiting center this week, Wheatcroft responded, "I think witches won't shock me, but it'll be a change of pace, so that's nice.

"Do you think they'll bring their cauldron?"

posted May 09, 2008 08:07 PM            

CODE PINK
Founded by pro-Castro radical Media Benjamin

Presented "pink slips" in the form of women's lingerie to President Bush

Launched on November 17, 2002, Code Pink for Peace describes itself as a "grassroots peace and social justice movement" whose self-defined mission is "to end the war in Iraq, stop new wars, and redirect our resources into healthcare, education and other life-affirming activities." Rejecting "the Bush administration's fear-based politics that justify violence," the organization calls instead "for policies based on compassion, kindness and a commitment to international law." Code Pink was founded by four radicals: Jodie Evans, Medea Benjamin, Diane Wilson, and a radical Wiccan activist calling herself Starhawk. Ms. Evans is the nominal leader of the organization, which works closely with Medea Benjamin's group Global Exchange and Leslie Cagan's antiwar coalition United For Peace and Justice.

As a parody of the Bush administration's color-coded security alerts (regarding terrorist threats), the "Code Pink Alert" warns that this administration poses "extreme danger to all the values of nurturing, caring, and compassion that women and loving men have held." Proclaiming that "women have been the guardians of life … because the men have busied themselves making war," Code Pink calls on "women around the world to rise up and oppose the war in Iraq … to be outrageous for peace." During one Code Pink demonstration in Washington, D.C., participants marched up the steps of the Capitol, unfurled their slogan-bearing banners, and stripped down to the dove-adorned undergarments they wore beneath their clothes. "We're putting our bodies on the line," they shouted. Another popular chant was, "We don't want your oil war. Peace is what we're calling for!"

During each of the first 100 days after its inception, Code Pink staged all-day antiwar vigils in front of the White House. Moreover, it initiated a campaign that involved presenting pink slips (women's lingerie) to President Bush and other pro-war officials - an allusion to pink slips of the paper variety, which are traditionally given to employees whose jobs are being terminated.

In 2003 Jodie Evans led a delegation of fifteen Code Pink women to Baghdad, where they met with Iraqi women for the purpose of "creat[ing] the understanding that the people of Iraq are no different than you and me." "We who cherish children," said Evans, "will not consent to their murder ... in a war for oil."

In addition to scorning America's military action in Iraq, Code Pink also condemns the racism, sexism, poverty, corporate corruption, and environmental degradation they claim are rampant in the U.S. Depicting the financial cost of the Iraq War as a drain on resources that would be better earmarked for other purposes, Code Pink laments that "[M]any of our elders … now must choose whether to buy their prescription drugs, or food. Our children's education is eroded. The air they breathe and the water they drink are polluted. Vast numbers of women and children live in poverty." The threat of distant terrorists, claims Code Pink, is insignificant when compared to the "real threats" that Americans face every day: "the illness or ordinary accident that could plunge us into poverty, the violence on our own streets, the corporate corruption that can result in the loss of our jobs, our pensions, our security."

In conjunction with Global Exchange and United For Peace and Justice, Code Pink helped establish Iraq Occupation Watch (IOW) to monitor potential American abuses -- including "possible violations of human rights, freedom of speech, and freedom of assembly" -- during the reconstruction of Iraq. Code Pink's and IOW's stated objective is to thin U.S. forces in Iraq by causing soldiers to seek discharges and be sent home as conscientious objectors.

During the last week of December 2004, Medea Benjamin announced that Code Pink, Global Exchange, and Families for Peace would be donating a combined $600,000 in medical supplies and cash to the families of the terrorist insurgents who were fighting American troops in Fallujah, Iraq. In an article dated January 1, 2005, the online publication Peace and Resistance reported that Rep. Henry Waxman had written a letter addressed to the American ambassador in Amman, Jordan to help facilitate the transport of this aid through Customs.

For much of 2005, Code Pink for Peace staged weekly protests outside of Walter Reed Army Medical Center, where many U.S. soldiers wounded in combat are treated. As one Code Pink sign put it, American soldiers were being sent overseas to "die for a lie."

As part of a national coalition led by the Ruckus Society, Code Pink runs an aggressive Counter-Recruitment campaign aimed at dissuading young men and women from joining the U.S. military. According to Code Pink, this project represents a way of "standing up to these warmongers and liars" in the Bush administration.

Code Pink also endorsed the Civil Liberties Restoration Act of 2004, which was designed to roll back, in the name of protecting civil liberties, vital national-security policies that had been adopted after the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

In July 2005, Code Pink joined a coalition including individuals and organizations ranging from Eve Ensler, Gloria Steinem, Not In Our Name, the Center for Constitutional Rights, the Culture Project, and United For Peace and Justice -- who together demanded the closure of the Guantánamo Bay prison camp and an "immediate independent investigation into the widespread allegations of abuse taking place there."

In 2004, Code Pink was a signatory to a letter urging members of the U.S. Senate to vote against supporting Israel's construction of an anti-terrorist security fence in the West Bank, a barrier that Code Pink described as an illegal "apartheid wall" that violated the civil and human rights of Palestinians.

Code Pink identifies another of its objectives as "creating space for women to speak out for justice and peace in their communities, the media and the halls of Congress." Code Pink was a Cosponsoring Organization of the April 25, 2004 "March for Women's Lives" held in Washington, D.C., a rally that advocated unrestricted access to taxpayer-funded abortion-on-demand.

Consisting of more than 90 chapters in the U.S. and elsewhere around the world, Code Pink is a member organization of the Abolition 2000, United for Peace and Justice, and After Downing Street anti-war coalitions, and a member of the National Council of Women's Organizations. As of July 2006, Code Pink claimed that more than 30,000 people were receiving its weekly updates and "alerts."

Code Pink works closely with Cindy Sheehan, founder of Gold Star Families for Peace.

In early 2008, the Code Pink website featured an anti-military-recruitment petition that read, in part:

I recognize that recruiting efforts by the US military are targeted disproportionately at young people in communities of color or lower income and that Military recruiters are often lying to young people with false promises of cash bonuses, education, jobs training, fun, travel, and adventure. I recognize that 60% of recruits never receive any money for college and that veterans returning from Iraq are far more likely than the civilian population to become homeless, commit suicide or other violent acts, and have long-term physical and/or mental health problems.
http://www.discoverthenetworks.org/groupProfile.asp?grpid=6149

posted May 10, 2008 09:47 AM            

"I recognize that recruiting efforts by the US military are targeted disproportionately at young people in communities of color or lower income and that Military recruiters are often lying to young people with false promises of cash bonuses, education, jobs training, fun, travel, and adventure. I recognize that 60% of recruits never receive any money for college and that veterans returning from Iraq are far more likely than the civilian population to become homeless, commit suicide or other violent acts, and have long-term physical and/or mental health problems. "