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School of the Americas Vigil, 2007
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| It was a good and powerful weekend at the School of Americas vigil in
Columbus, Georgia.
PeaceRoots had a strong presence, including seven students from the Farm School. |  |
| Phil and Alan teaming up with Jeffrey Keating to record video and interviews, with Joel and Al connecting with the SOA legal team.
Biko and his proverbial drum performed on the main stage backing up several of the music acts on Saturday and at additional performances on Saturday night. |  |
| Liz and I manned our table behind the Farms Not Arms banner which as
always attracted a lot of attention and drew people to our table.
Over and over people would say "I grew up on a farm" or "my parents were
farmers" and even "I'm a veteran who has 10 acres and would like to get
involved."
We sold half a dozen hats and about that many T-shirts and
ran out of PeaceRoots newsletters.
It was a chance to reconnect with
some of our new friends in the movement, like George, a co-chair with
United for Peace and Justice and George Shrub, the singing CIA agent.
|  Many of you may remember Um Salama (formerly Sandra) who came down to
Georgia for the first time and marched holding the sacred mother's banner created by Elizabeth.
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| Back at our hotel as we had breakfast on Saturday morning, we sat next
to a retired Mennonite gentlemen from Pennsylvania who had come down for
the first time. On Sunday he crossed the line.
At about 11 a.m. on Sunday, the young woman who had been working in the booth next to me all weekend scaled the barbed wire fence to become person number 11 crossing the line this year. She and Don Nelson are now members of a group of just over 200 prisoners of conscience, people who have served time in civil disobedience at the school of assassins. |  Dennis Kucinich gave a rousing speech and Cynthia McKinney announced her candidacy for president on the Green Party ticket.
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| As Pete Seeger said a few years ago, "This is the singing this movement
I've ever seen." There was a wonderful concert on Friday night, music
throughout the day on Saturday, two wonderful concerts on Saturday night
followed by incredibly moving music throughout the day on Sunday,
including a couple of tunes by the Indigo Girls.
It's a unique opportunity to see some outstanding performers all singing music
saturated with meaning and heart.
I love it. |  |
| The crowd grew to over 20,000 this year, with greyhound buses bringing
college students from around the country.
It's a great mix of radical clerics, dreadlocked drummers, people of all ages and colors.
Clearly, we will go back again. |
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