Arms Against War -- Visibly United

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It began with this open letter, from a longtime supporter of the Unified Settlement:


Dear Friends,

I am so worried and angry about the way our world is being treated by our governments. They spy, they invade countries illegally, they are involved in torture and at no point are they doing what they were elected to do - look after the interests of the people of their countries. I can think of no decision in the past few years that was made for my good by my government. I know too that many,many people feel the same. But what is worse, we feel unable to do anything about it.

Personally, I have attended marches, been to a major International Peace Conference, written countless letters to politicians and media and signed a ridiculous number of petitions - and nothing happened. My voice is not heard. My anger with the government grew even more when I recently searched Google for anti-war/peace groups and well over 3 million appeared. All these groups have concerns about the legality of the war in Iraq and concern about impending wars in Syria and Iran . The issues move faster than the protesters can keep up with and again, no-one is listening anyway (except the 'intelligence' agencies who are spying on their own citizens).

I wondered how many it would take - how many anti-war/peace groups increase the volume and visibility enough so that governments can realise we are more against the war, than for. How can we make them see that the people who elected them disagree with the decisions they are making and the actions they are taking in their citizens' names? I don't want my tax each week to kill an innocent civilian, mis-informed soldier or anyone else - I am responsible for this war waged by my government - in my name. I wish I wasn't.

So, to finally reach the point of this letter. How do you feel about the war in Iraq ? Would you like to have an end to it? Do you oppose your tax paying for it? Do you object to the death of our young soldiers? Do you object to the reasons for war? If you do want an end to the war in Iraq for any reason then please, please do me just one favour - one concerned human being for another - wear a strip of white fabric around your arm.

I realise it sounds small, insignificant and futile - but, I truly believe, that a show of opposition is essential in order to get media and government to be in a position where they can no longer ignore the many, many people who oppose this one point in unison. I realise there are so many issues that need to be tackled, but believe that tackling just one, gives us a united start. The reason a white armband of any fabric was chosen is important. I know that not all people the world over, who oppose the war in Iraq, can afford to attend demonstrations or spare the time, many people do not want to affiliate themselves with specific anti-war/peace groups as they may not agree the rest of the agenda, many people cannot spare the time to write letters, make calls and bother their (largely ignorant) governments who rarely, if ever respond - so a simple white piece of fabric is available to everybody, all the time, without purchase, without an agenda.

If you choose to wear the white armband you are saying just one thing "I WANT AN END TO THE WAR IN IRAQ". You are not agreeing to any agenda, movement or politics – you are acting as an individual saying just one thing "I WANT AN END TO THE WAR IN IRAQ". This form of voicing your opinion is a way to make this statement at all times, peacefully, until we are noticed. I know the instant response in your heart will be "what is the point?"….but please ignore that and just make this one move, take this one step in the direction you want the world to improve. No war in Iraq would be a start – and a start is exactly what we need, at this moment, to begin. This is a highly visible way to show the governments that their people object in large numbers, to the actions they are taking. Please, please join me – if only to make one person happy J

Thank you so much for reading and thank you so much for your support, each of us is a vital part of humanity with a right to have our say.

Namaste

ONE DAY......... www.armsagainstwar.info VISIBLY UNITED

PLEASE FORWARD THIS EMAIL TO EVERYONE

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Now, as you can see, this movement has a web presence -- and yes, more and more are visiting the site every day. Here are some of the sites that help by providing a link to Arms Against War:

http://rationalreview.com/land#action

http://www.rationalreview.com/content/6924

http://www.coary.com/

http://www.counterpunch.org/ (website of the day January 23rd 2006)

http://www.envirosagainstwar.org/know/read.php?&itemid=3659

http://news.antville.org/stories/1311211/

http://abutamam.blogspot.com/2006/01/women-under-occupations-rules-of.html

http://www.ugandannetwork.com/let1.htm

http://sandiego.indymedia.org/en/2006/01/113176.shtml

http://members.aol.com/_ht_a/jrudy585/Index.html

https://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2006/01/332228.html

http://www.Protest.Net/imcuk/calendrome.cgi?eo=1&eid=538187&auth=K1FJGU02BO
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0601/S00198.htm

http://newswire.indymedia.org/en/2006/01/832025.shtml

http://www.isil.org/fnd/

http://uslaboragainstwar.org/article.php?list=type&type=24
Now add: Nation of Earth http://unifiedsettlement.blogspot.com/


This is, as I have told the author of the open letter (and main force behind the effort), exactly what the Unified Settlement is about.

Once again, it is not important whether anyone recognizes the name, Unified Settlement, or has a clue that it was founded nearly 2 years ago. It is not important for anyone to know who I am. I founded this nation in hopes to help bring us more gently and more quickly into our bright future. If ALL the Unified Settlement has done so far is to be part of the inspiration behind Arms Against War, then it has helped to make a difference.

All along, I've wondered what it would take to begin to get the people united. The answer turns out to be very simple. Find something that at least half of us feel strongly about, create a simple expression for that sentiment, and set it loose.


It is a beginning.


Phil Smith
January 30th, 2006


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Tempus Edax Rerum

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Tempus Edax Rerum
(Time Devours All)

"...and I might not get there with you, but I want you to know, tonight, that we as a people will get to the Promised Land!" -- Martin Luther King Jr., less than 24 hours before his assassination.

Just before that, of course, he said, "...I have SEEEEEEEN -- the Promised Land."

What I feel that many people don't understand is that the Promised Land he was speaking of is Heaven on Earth. Many see him as having been a deeply religious, deeply spiritual man, and that he was, but he was also a human activist -- and a visionary.


MLK stood for the same things I stand for. I won't compare myself to him (though I'm soon to turn 39, the age at which he was so senselessly murdered, and our birthdays are only a few days apart), but if I were to choose only one hero, Dr. King might be it.


For the record, his birthday is January 15th, a fact obscured by this country's predilection for celebrating official holidays on Mondays. In case you're curious, mine's January 18th, and yes last year I declared it an 'official' Unified Settlement holiday, "Founder's Day", second only to "Settlement Day", which this year will be the 2nd anniversary of the founding of this Nation of Earth, February 27th 2004.

Realizing I'm now the approximate age of Dr. King when his activism caused 'them' to decide he should no longer live is strangely similar to my experience of the 'suiciding' of Kurt Cobain -- he was about my age at the time.

Do I feel old? A couple of my contemporaries are Janet Jackson and Tony Hawk. Are they 'old'?

There's a bit of a Logan's Run thing going on these days. No, I don't mean that people are customarily volunteering to end their lives at 30, but that there seems to be a similar obliteration of history. Maybe I don't know much from personal experience -- Dr. King was killed while I was still in diapers -- but I pay attention to history, because "Those who cannot learn from the past are doomed to repeat it."

Now, in whose interest is it that the each successive generation knows less and less about what came before? In whose interest is it to keep the general population ignorant of the lessons of history?

Does public school, and for that matter do expensive college and university courses help students understand what really happened, and why -- or do they give brief overviews and stress memorization of names and dates, instead of exploring the reasons behind events, and their impact?

If people really understood how we got to where we are and why, they absolutely would not allow the current shenanigans of the power elite. Thus, such knowledge has been closely guarded.

Excuse me, but it is my assertion (and that of many others) that the public in general has been deliberately 'dumbed down'. Some have gone so far as to track down the machinations of this process, and the source of it...

If I were to name names and point fingers, some readers of this weblog might balk at the information and label me a 'conspiracy theorist' -- which of course I would object to, because I am one who has studied the FACTs of conspiracy, a conspiratologist.


So, without naming names, even the names of groups, I'll lay the situation out once again:

Even if power doesn't necessarily corrupt, we observe that the corrupt seek power. Morally bereft as they may be, a lot of 'them' are very clever. And, just like anyone else, they seek out those of like mind. Then, instead of getting together and planning something beneficial to all, they will get together and scheme to benefit themselves -- not only with disregard to Joe Average, but with intent to exploit him, manipulate him, make him do their dirty work, give him a false ideology that serves their own purposes.

The very nature of their plans and schemes means that they must be made in secret -- defining their activities as conspiracy. 'They' thrive on deceit. They lie, they cheat, they steal, they threaten, they ruin lives, and they kill. The end, for 'them', always justifies the means.

They are heartless, almost soulless.

If you can understand that such people exist, and that some of them are very clever, and that they are able to form secret organizations, perhaps you can also understand that they have existed for a very, very long time. Maybe you can see that their organizations are made to appear beneficial, a deception that allows for their continued operation.

Can you imagine how long it's been going on? If so, expand that exponentially. Tempus Edax Rerum -- time devours all -- is a Latin phrase. Eventually, people will forget the lessons of the past -- at least, 'they' hope so, and will do what they can to ensure that it IS so.

If we can't recognize what THEY have done before, how will we know when it's being done to us again?

One thing 'they' have apparently not considered is that the concept of right & wrong is something that can be refined by LOGIC. Therefore those who are more clever than 'they' are can invariably be found within the opposition, the resistance.

It is unfortunate that those with a good sense of what is right and what is wrong tend to give others the benefit of the doubt. We are, to a fault, too trusting. It is difficult for us to see the motivations of the criminal mind. It's all too easy to view reports of conspiracy as 'crazy theory', especially when 'they' are clever enough to cover their tracks fairly well.

Yet, 'they' have become quite arrogant as they gain more and more power, nearly flaunting their actions. In this, the Information Age, they have 'blown their cover', and the word is spreading quickly.


Dr. King was right. We, as a people, WILL get to the Promised Land. It's just around the corner, and only 'they' and their deception stand in our way.

Time devours all, including the reign of the wicked.



Phil Smith
January 17th, 2006



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What Is the Unified Settlement?

THE FLAG OF EARTH
http://www.flagofearth.com/

The Unified Settlement was founded February 27th, 2004, in response to the question, "What are ya gonna do about it?"

If a global, peaceful, freedom-based nation isn't exactly an original idea, neither was it copied from anything else. The concept is too obvious not to have been thought up by many others, however separated by time and space. I'll freely admit to having been influenced by things I've read, then and now. We reach ever higher by standing on the shoulders of our predecessors.

The idea seemed right to me, so I went with it. Given the grip the power elite have over us, here on Earth where we are SETTLED, if the many are to be free from the relative few, those many must become UNIFIED. Activism is a good thing, but if activist individuals and groups were to realize that all their causes could be served by joining together, their combined power would assuredly change the world.

Think about that for a moment. All these causes -- What is the source of the problems they are trying to solve? In nearly every case, you will find government involved, either directly or indirectly. This is not a knee-jerk reaction, but a carefully considered position.

There was a time when I thought a direct democracy would be best, but it was pointed out to me that direct democracy invariably leads to 'mob rule', bringing everything down to the lowest common denominator. When I had to admit that people were in fact easily swayed, through propaganda and other means, I began to wonder if there could be any form of government that would be immune to corruption.

Another definition of 'mob rule' might be 'under the control of organized crime'. Well? Can someone tell me that the major governments of this world are not criminal organizations? Is government not a magnet for corruption?

Yes, there are some who seek office because they genuinely wish to be public servants. Some of them even manage to keep from being bribed or coerced into 'the family' and 'their' way of doing things. That rare beast, the actual public servant, is more likely to be found at the local level. The higher up they go, the more pressure they face to toe the 'company' line.

I happen to live in West Virginia, one of the United States that all too many Americans don't seem to know exists -- they think the name of the state simply refers to the western part of Virginia, which settlers west of the mountains first attempted to become seperate from as early as 1776. In 1783 they wanted to call it "Westsylvania" -- I suppose if that were the name today it would get confused with 'Wrestlemania'... Anyway it took another 80 years and a civil war (an oxymoron if ever there was one) for statehood to finally be granted. Some of our governors haven't exactly been ones to be proud of, but now we have Joe Manchin III, who is in my estimation one of those rare beasts -- an actual public servant, a real person who genuinely cares about other people.

If government were largely comprised of such men (and women), we would effectively have 'official activism' -- government representatives would more often than not do their best to, well, REPRESENT the people and SOLVE problems instead of creating them. However, this not being a perfect world, it is the greedy, corrupt, and power-hungry who are in control.

Sad, but true.

It is very possible for local governments to be kept in check, but less and less likely that governments can be accountable, the larger and larger they get. Thus it is the largest which must be dissolved first.

Do we need a United Nations? Do we need a European Union? Do we need individual nations, or even states and provinces? Do we even need cities to operate as anything but public service corporations? These are things for the people to decide, when they finally get it through their heads that big government is a big self-serving lie.


The Unified Settlement is NOT a government. As a global nation, it knows no boundaries. As workers unionize to keep from being taken advantage of by corporations, so must we all band together to reverse oppression by the power elite.

'They' have used every trick they could think of to fool us into giving them more and more power. WE have to stand up and demand our true freedom.


WE are the Unified Settlement.



Phil Smith
January 11th, 2006

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