let us see what love can do

Kay Lucas, guest column Waco Tribune January 19th 2008

Serious attention deficit
So many issues. How do you choose?

Recently, we at the Crawford Peace House hosted a press conference on events in Pakistan and the threat of war with Iran. The event included two Pakistani-American speakers and one Iranian-American.

Our press release focused on a text message received by one of our board of directors, Hadi Jawad, from an aide to former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto. This was weeks before her assassination. Bhutto was attempting to get a message to the president and American people — through us.

Jawad is a Pakistani-American who has lived in the United States for many years. He still has family in Pakistan involved in the recent turmoil, and has close contacts with Bhutto’s aides.

The Crawford Peace House also sent out a notice that there would be a protest on that same day addressing three issues: the Pakistan emergency, U.S. threats to bomb Iran and U.S. use of torture.

We received a phone call from a reporter who expressed incredulity regarding the Bhutto aide’s message to Jawad, and seemed to take issue with our number of issues.

The reporter said the “left” could not seem to focus on one issue at a time and insinuated that the peace movement in Crawford was irrelevant.

Just how did we expect to get that message to the president, the reporter asked.

“Well, we are hoping the media might take notice and report it, “I replied.

“And just how do we choose one issue over another?” I continued. “Which is most important? The fact that our country is using torture? That we are supporting a dictator with both arms and dollars? That we are threatening to use a nuclear bomb on another country that is not a threat to the United States?”

These are only the most urgent foreign policy issues of the moment that threaten to create even more issues.

Under the current administration, issues crop up daily, crucial issues both foreign and domestic.

There are so many other issues it makes my head spin. At times I feel like I’m living in the twilight zone, or maybe a parallel universe.

Perhaps the reporter just defined the most pressing issue of the moment — the attitude of the so-called “liberal press” that the peace movement in Crawford, or anywhere for that matter, is irrelevant.

That was demonstrated the following weekend with the press’s lack of interest in a press conference and protest by about 40 average Americans.

Was it because we weren’t focusing on that week’s Western White House stage production issue of German Prime Minister Merkel’s visit to the Bush “ranch”?

I guess the 70 percent of average Americans who express unhappiness with our current government just aren’t relevant.

Kay Lucas of Moody is director of the Crawford Texas Peace House.