Essential Dissent - Veterans for Peace Convention 2024 - Opening Program

Radio Project Front Page Podcast

A Zoom webinar from the Veterans for Peace 2024 convention (August 16 -18), presented here with their permission. https://www.veteransforpeace.org Wahinkpe Topa (Four Arrows) Professor in Educational Leadership for Change, Fielding Graduate University Wahinkpe Topa (Four Arrows), aka Don Trent Jacobs, Ph.D., Ed.D., is a professor at Fielding Graduate University’s doctoral program in Educational Leadership for Change. Former Dean of Education at Oglala Lakota College on Pine Ridge, he fulfilled his Sun Dance vows with the Medicine Horse Tiosopaye there and is a made relative. Having received his honorable discharge as a lieutenant in the US Marine Corps in October 1969, Four Arrows co-founded the VFP Chapter with Bud Day and Tony Van Renterghem in Flagstaff, Arizona. He served four tours of duty at Standing Rock. Jenny Pacanowski Funder and Director of Women Veterans Empowered & Thriving Jenny Pacanowski is the founder and director of Women Veterans Empowered & Thriving, a reintegration program utilizing free writing and performance to empower experiences and facilitate skills to thrive in daily life. In the military, she served as a combat medic in Iraq and in a medical evacuation unit. Jenny was betrayed by the Army when they did not follow through with the educational benefits written in her contract. This betrayal contributed to an extremely difficult transition back into civilian society. Due to almost losing her life to post traumatic stress, Jenny decided to create empowerment programming to help other veterans cultivate skills and rebuild their lives after military service through storytelling, community and retraining their brains to thrive. Marjorie Cohn Professor Emerita, Thomas Jefferson School of Law Marjorie Cohn is professor emerita at Thomas Jefferson School of Law where she taught from 1991-2016, a former criminal defense attorney, and past president of the National Lawyers Guild. She lectures, writes, and provides commentary for local, regional, national and international media. Professor Cohn is cohost of Law and Disorder on WBAI radio in New York and heard on 150 stations nationwide and online. She is founding dean of the Monique and Roland Weyl People’s Academy of International Law and Co-coordinator of the Vietnam Agent Orange Relief & Responsibility Campaign (VAORRC). Marjorie is a member of the VFP Advisory Board. Margaret Stevens (Omitted due to poor audio quality) Historian and Teacher Margaret Stevens served as a combat medic in the NJ Army National Guard from 1997 to 2004, where she was called up on 9/11. She has spent the past decade and a half teaching history at Essex county college in Newark, NJ, where she was raised. As a historian, teacher, filmmaker and parent, she has remained steadfast in her lifelong struggle to overcome global imperialism through supporting acts of international working class solidarity of all kinds. Margaret Kimberley Executive Editor and Senior Columnist of Black Agenda Report Margaret Kimberley is Executive Editor and Senior Columnist of Black Agenda Report and the current host of the Black Agenda Radio podcast. Her book, Prejudential: Black America and the Presidents was published in 2020 by Steerforth Press. Dr. Cornel West said, “Margaret Kimberley gives us an intellectual gem or prophetic fire about all the U.S. presidents and their deep roots in the vicious legacy of white supremacy and predatory capitalism. Such truths seem more than most Americans can bear, though we ignore her words at our own peril!” On May 20, 2024 she briefed the United Nations Security Council as a civil society representative, speaking about weapons transfers to Ukraine as a threat to international peace and security. She is a recipient of the Serena Shim Award for Uncompromising Integrity in Journalism, and the Women's Institute for Freedom of the Press' 2021 Women in Media Award. She is also a board member of Consortium News. Ms. Kimberley is a contributor to the anthologies "In Defense of Julian Assange," "Capitalism on a Ventilator: the Impact of COVID-19 on China and the U.S.," and "Killing Trayvons: An Anthology of American Violence." Her activism includes membership on the Administrative Committee of the United National Antiwar Coalition, the Coordinating Committee of Black Alliance for Peace, and the Board of Directors of the U.S. Peace Memorial Foundation. She has appeared in national and international media including CGTN, RT, Al Mayadeen, Deutsche Welle (DW), Al Jazeera English, and Sky News. Ms. Kimberley's work can be supported on Patreon, and can also be found on Youtube, Facebook, X @freedomrideblog, Instagram, Telegram, BlueSky and Linktree. She is a graduate of Williams College and lives in New York City. Link: https://www.margaretkimberley.com/ Harrison Mann Former U.S. Army major and executive officer of the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) Middle East/Africa Regional Center Harrison Mann is a former U.S. Army major and executive officer of the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) Middle East/Africa Regional Center who resigned in protest of his office’s support for Israel during its Gaza campaign. He previously served as a Middle East all-source intelligence analyst and led a crisis cell coordinating intelligence support for Ukraine. Prior to DIA, he worked at the U.S. Embassy Tunis Office of Security Cooperation and led Army Civil Affairs teams combatting regional smuggling under U.S. Naval Forces Central Command (NAVCENT) in Bahrain. Harrison began his Army career as an infantry officer. He received a B.A. from the College of William & Mary and a Master in Public Administration from the Harvard University John F. Kennedy School of Government. Juan Bettancourt Senior Airman and Conscientious Objector Juan Bettancourt is a Senior Airman in the United States Air Force, currently stationed out of Lackland, TX. He belongs to a growing cohort of public and anonymous conscientious objectors who refuse to stay silent in the face of the heinous acts of violence and destruction inflicted upon the people of Gaza by the Israeli army. This ongoing genocide, primarily funded by American taxpayer money, has served as a catalyst for our conscience to evolve and for us to remain resolute in our humanistic stance against participating in any form of war.