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January 31st Report from Chicago:
We Won't Live in a Torture State"

In driving snow and 12 below wind chill about 65 people converged on the State of Illinois Building Plaza at 12 noon. Vets for Peace and Code Pink from Indiana were the first to arrive followed by students from DePaul University, Columbia College, and Mother McCauley High School, who marched in chanting and agitating. Students from the Chicago School of Psychology, Loyola University, Northeastern University, and University of Illinois at Chicago also were present.

About 40 people wore the orange jumpsuits (mostly students) while others walked along with them carrying signs and banners. But the most important aspect of this action was the strong and spirited presence of students and their determination to break from the politics of the possible and actually bring to a halt the crime of torture and other outrages of the Bush Regime.

We marched single-file down the sidewalks of downtown Chicago and received positive responses from people shopping, on their lunch breaks, and tourists walking around. Many people took the fliers and wanted to know who we were. Along the way march monitors and a couple of the students acted as "Counter-Terrorism Unit" (the term the show "24" uses) personnel and gruffly and aggressively told those in orange > jumpsuits to get to their knees. When the detainees in orange fell to their knees in stress positions, the "CTU" agents would grab one of the detainees and perform a simulated waterboarding demonstration while someone else described what waterboarding is and that our government is torturing people in our name.

Many people looked on as they walked by and would stop to get fliers. But the most dramatic response we got was when approached the Barnes and Noble bookstore at DePaul University. Many people entering and exiting the building stopped as soon as they saw the orange jump-suited people on their knees and listened and watched solemnly as a detainee was waterboarded. Some people had horrified looks upon their faces. At one point security from DePaul told the cops that they no longer wanted us on their property so we moved on.

We then marched to the Federal Building, where a Vietnam vet gave a moving shout out to the high school and college students, drawing parallels to the White Rose of Germany and calling on this generation to change history. Then, down Clark Street to the FEMA/ICE/Department of "Fatherland" Security offices, where many felt moved to speak very eloquently to the outrages that are planned out and organized from within the walls of the unmarked building; including the horrors of Katrina, the round-ups and detentions of undocumented immigrants, and the wholesale big brother apparatus that has been constructed in the name of "homeland security."

A Columbia College student who organized the waterboarding demonstration explained the new "Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention" bill being spearheaded by the Democrats, once again showing that it is on us to change this fascist direction--no saviors from this Democratic Party! We also spoke to the the unjust and immoral plans to attack Iran, on top of all the other screaming injustices that have been perpetrated in our names over the course of the past 6 years.

Afterwards many of us went to a café to warm up and eat. From there, a small contingent decided to march to Obama's campaign headquarters to bring the resistance to all the volunteers looking for "hope" and "change;" but unfortunately were promptly turned away at the door by security. Apparently next time we try this, we'll need to go in a little more incognito than the full orange jumpsuits with signs and flags!

Although our numbers were small, our spirit was strong, and we felt the need to bring this message of resistance to the streets more often and with even more determination.