Speaker 0 00:00 KPI
Speaker 1 00:05 And it's time for the annual Memorial day special edition for 20, 20. And um, I have one of my favorite veterans for peace buddies, Dave logs denier and we have a mix of, um, all kinds of music, poetry and thought because so often, uh, in my view, these holidays, um, Memorial day and veterans day, which was originally armistice day, but they changed it. Um, let's, let's put the July all seem to be designed to get us all excited about participating in the next war. Uh, and um, I've decided long ago it's part of my job to make Memorial day be about not having a next war so we don't have more people to more and both soldiers and civilians. You're listening to Dave Luxton who's long time? Uh, twin cities peace activist. Um, one of the cofounders of the Minnesota chapter 27 of veterans for peace,
Speaker 2 01:12 Correct? You again? Oh no, you have to correct you. Yeah, I'm not the co one of the cofounders.
Speaker 1 01:17 Okay. You just been there for 20 years, I guess
Speaker 2 01:23 You've got a couple. There's actually, I think a one guy who's still active, Steve McCune. That was one of the founders in 86, but I was a chapter president for five years until I found somebody some sec. I mean I found somebody that was willing to become president and uh, and I stepped aside and now I'm on the national national board. They kicked me upstairs. So I'm on the national board of that sort of piece. But tell us a little bit about veterans for peace. Well, we are not your, you're a mom and pops veterans organization. We are, uh, we've always considered, uh, ourselves with much pride to be sort of the Outlaws of the, of the veterans community because we, uh, we're, we're the antiwar veterans. What are the people that are saying the narrative you're being fed by? A lot of the, uh, mainstream veterans organization is all done in support of the military industrial complex, which begets more Wars and more veterans and more deaths.
Speaker 2 02:31 And, and so, uh, we are, the group are saying, wait a second, folks, this is not a good idea. Uh, the war sucks and we're here to tell you that this sucks. And your military recruiters, they're going to tell you that it's wonderful and that, Oh yeah, you're going to, Oh, you're, you have a journalistic. Oh yeah. You, you'll be writing for a paper and yeah, you got a nice bell. It, that'll be really good. And then next thing you know, Oh, the bill, it's all filled. And so here's a gun, son. Yup. Hit hit the bricks. You know? So yeah. So it's a, it is really, you think, uh, selling used cars is they, they, the car that the engine falls out as soon as you fall of the driveway is bad. Talked about selling people a bill of goods that, you know, that is kind of that outright line and say, I'm not going to say recruiters lie.
Speaker 2 03:32 I would say that they twist the facts a little bit. Unless you, they certainly don't tell you that whatever it was that you were hoping to do in the military doesn't mean that's necessarily what you're going do to get in there. And you either they got 5,000 people wanting to get in that same belt that you were hoping to get into. And you're, you're very well called, very well qualified but not quite good enough. But anyway, so veterans for peace, that's pretty much what a lot of the things that we do through arts education, action. Uh, get into the schools, get on the streets, showcase what we have musically or with our art, with our newsletters to educate, to expand people's awareness of the incredible costs of war, which right now with the pandemic, the front lives of the war are in Hennepin County hospital, not in Kabul, not in Baghdad.
Speaker 2 04:34 It's right here. It's right here. And where's our, uh, just incredible resources and money it takes to maintain this bloated military, uh, establishment across, uh, here and across the world. And nobody, Democrat or Republican that I would say nobody. But for the most part, democratic Republicans all agree like wake, wig, nod, nod, let's keep the, let's keep the thing going. War war is definitely a bipartisan issue. Um, I'm so glad Dave, that you brought up the pit, the pandemic, um, because something's going on. I think a lot of people might not know. And of course folks heard about, there is parts of the military being called to help with the pandemic, whether it's uh, the SS comfort in, um, New York Harbor or SS mercy and Los Angeles Harbor. Also national guards had been called to like do the TA to testing. Um, and which, uh, uh, there was a case in Minnesota where they, they got, they, they, they screwed it up because they weren't, uh, properly trained I think. And they got some information there but, but what the testing was by da, but the idea is sound is that the, after all the got that national guard, is that supposed to be in Afghanistan? They're supposed to be right here. They're supposed to be here filling sandbags and they're supposed to be here as a R as to respond to emergency situations and guess what situation.
Speaker 1 06:26 And then our national guards are going to have an emergency situation. And this is part of what I wanted listeners to know. I just heard about this in the last 48 hours or less and that is that their, uh, assignment, uh, right now is for, I don't know what 60 days to work on the pandemic. Um, but they're going to be called back one day early so that they will not be eligible for any of the benefits that they would have earned through their service in the pandemic. I believe the deadline day is the 24th of June that if they could be brought back a day ahead, then they can get screwed out of their benefits, whatever those might've been. I understand healthcare access where they want to have access to healthcare, which they might need assistance, assistance. Yeah. I mean national guard is not the same as, you know, full on military. I mean, but it's not like they don't get anything at all and Trump is trying to screw them out of what look what they would have gotten. Not that this is unusual. He has a long history of screwing over people that are so called working for Dion. But people need to um, find out more about this, you know, use the Google machine as my,
Speaker 2 07:55 That's for the magic button. Yeah. Well this is just
Speaker 1 07:59 Disgusting when the national guards are stepping up, as you were saying Dave, to help at home and now they might be screwed out of benefits. They were counting on getting like education correct access or
Speaker 2 08:12 Healthcare. It's um, yep. The recruiter doesn't tell you the possible implications when you sign that contract. And I always tell people, I said just getting is to say we're going to bring it back
Speaker 1 08:25 Just one day early. This was like when they, they say, well, we're gonna give you three to three hours a week less than full time so we don't have to give you the health care. Yeah. The health insurance that supposedly you thought you were going to get on this job, but it's kind of worse because it's the national
Speaker 2 08:42 Guard. Yeah. They're doing it too. Well, it's part and parcel of the whole thing. And, and, uh, I would say as much as, uh, we work hard at, uh, counter recruitment, um, the, our good, our little friend Covideo Tim was a good friend. Our little friend, I say, uh, princesses covert 19 is probably doing a better job of counter recruitment than we'd ever dreamed of doing because people, cause right now people who have pre committed to join are saying, well, I've got to go to boot camp would be jammed into a paradox. No, I don't want, I, I'm out. I don't want any part of it. And so a lot of people are opting, uh, I think he wa I don't think I want to get in the military just right now, maybe later on. And I think, uh, um, that kind of, uh, uh, that's one of the, uh, one of the many subtle side of it.
Speaker 2 09:45 Try to affect something, the good things. And I'm not saying that the virus is a great thing, but I'm saying environmentally and a lot of way other ways, uh, it's an opportunity for, uh, the people in the world to kind of assess and go inward and say, well, what the hell are we doing? You know, what the hell are y'all doing? And we have this opportunity and I think they, and anyway, with veterans for peace, basically what we're doing is, is a lot of education. We have our newsletter that comes out quarterly and you'll probably see formative. I highly recommend it. And beautiful. I mean, yeah. Um, plus you can find out about the ongoing rigor events you guys do. Um, um, I highly recommend the newsletter, a bit of subscriber for years. Um, you guys also do, I don't know, like I can't tell you how many documentary films I never would have known about if not free off.
Speaker 2 10:44 There's the beautiful, um, events you do for Memorial day and arms to stay veteran's day. Um, which of course the pandemic has canceled these things. But yeah, I, I live in to me, Oh, I'll speak to the Memorial day. We, we will be doing a zoom. Uh, we have a zoom account and I guess everybody else, right. And, uh, so we will be doing a zoom, uh, program. Um, I think it will be on the, uh, uh, we're gonna, it's going be out in the veterans for peace.org that said, if you go to veterans for peace.org, type that in a KQ to the national website and we'll have, we should have a link on that this weekend. Probably today or tomorrow for a Monday morning, 10 o'clock in the morning. And what we'll have is, uh, we'll have spoken word, some music and just, and maybe people will be Monday, May 25th, 10:00 AM central time. That's right. It's actual standard time. Thank you.
Speaker 1 11:53 All those little details. That's why, that's why you make all the big bucks. Right? That's why she's the host. She's the boss in this room.
Speaker 3 12:04 And whenever someone says, Hey, there's the boss, I turned around and I expect to see Lydia Howell
Speaker 1 12:10 Every Friday afternoon from one, from one,
Speaker 3 12:13 2:00 PM. Hey, thanks a lot, David. We really do appreciate you coming in. And I'm learning more and more about veterans for peace. I'm learning more about the militant newsletters from the socialist workers party. I'm learning more and more about uh, you know, the suffragists and the abolitionists and I'm learning so much whenever I'm listening to cafe fresh air, community radio. Hey, thank you for listening right now you are listening to KFAN fresh air community radio 90.3 FM Minneapolis and HD online all the
[email protected] with Lydia Howell.
Speaker 1 12:48 It's a Memorial day 2020 special edition of catalyst or we could talk politics and culture on cafe Smedley, Butler, Google that name. Incredible general, wrote an amazing little book called war as a racket after 33 years in the military and it should be required reading Smedley Butler, you're listening to catalyst on Memorial day special edition and my copilot here, Rico Miralis has a beautiful feature that's up next and he's going to introduce it.
Speaker 3 13:22 Thank you. Thank you very much Lydia and everyone listening and calling in while the Minneapolis pioneers and soldiers Memorial cemetery is the oldest cemetery in Minneapolis. It was established in 1858, but the first burial was in 1853. By 1919, it was full with more than 27,000 bodies and more than 10,000 children are buried there right now. They are literally packed in on top of each other, um, in a, in a huge acreage of the Minneapolis. And I visited that place back in 2016 and recorded an interview here is that audio from 2016. This was four years ago. Please listen, as I walked through the stone pillars serving as Gates on Cedar Avenue in South Minneapolis, I was overwhelmed by the beauty and quiet space of the 27 acres of trees, newly cut grass and grave markers. And through Hunter Weir and Michael berth gave me a brief tour. The tour started with the caretaker's cottage, which contained books, ledgers, furniture, and other items which are being used this weekend for the 148 time.
Speaker 4 14:43 These are from the city council. Uh, so this is, and the reason they're here is because the cemetery was taken over at the, uh, in 1928. And so in some of the later ones you'll see, um, ordinances and things that have to do with the cemetery. So we have a collection of those. Um, these are some amazing little ledgers and these things go back to the 1860s. Handwritten tells you who's buried. Well, basically these are how much the graves' class. So you can see this one is $4 today, $40 would be to nothing. So these are really interesting. And these are the originals. That is probably world war two were there abouts. I've never seen another one like that with too many holes in it. And double death and double desk all in one. And people ask us, do we know where everybody's buried? The answers, pretty much.
Speaker 4 15:39 Um, we have a platform and the original, this is downtown because it's a work of art. Original one is Belgium and it's well is in the animal. So it's an actual <inaudible> but it's not paper. Yeah. So very things, and this was done during the depression. It's India ink and hand tempted the original hand tinted. But this shows you where everybody's buried. These are where the wealthier folks are and if you have no money, you're here. This is the Potter's field. So there are 2300 people buried in this one section and maybe a dozen markers. So there were four. So the poor folks, you can see that there aren't even aisles here separating the various endings are just solid. It's amazing. Yeah. Right, right, exactly. Which you know is very interesting because when you think about it, we think that Americans think of mass graves is like a really bad thing, but it's not uncommon in other parts of the world.
Speaker 4 16:47 And it makes a big difference if you think of them as mass Braves versus communal. Right? Because one is you're part of a membership in the community and the other is you've been robbed of your identity. So it's just different mindset. How many people total are buried here? Uh, over 22,000. Um, yeah. A lot of thoughts on your face. Yes. Um, it doesn't look like that because only that 10 or 11 graves has a Martha. And so when I get tourists, you know, a lot of us were told by our moms, don't step on grace. We weren't supposed to do that. But here it's impossible. It's impossible because you don't know where they are. Um, other 22,000 people, over 10,000 of them are children under the age of 10. Um, so she was not in common. They died from things like pneumonia because there were no antibiotics, there were no vaccinations and most people were getting their water out of the river, which before we had a municipal water supply was not a very healthy thing to do. So these are, we rent chairs for the Memorial day. Um, and this year is the a hundred in 48. I'm bad at math, 140 eighth annual Memorial day observance, 10 o'clock on Monday morning.
Speaker 3 18:01 My cemetery has put on a
Speaker 4 18:03 148 years and the sewage community concert band place and they're wonderful. Um, our keynote speaker is going to be Brigadier general Denny Shel Sten who has spoken here before. He's the Roosevelt high grad. And then we get some students from um, the transition school and they read the Gettysburg address and general Logan's orders and they're the ones who present the colors. There is one segment in the program where they play the medley of service songs. And so they do army, Navy, Marines and coast guard I believe it is. And as they play, as the band plays the song, the MC will call out Navy and the guys and women stand up and salute and we get a lot of help. We have, we'll have boy Scouts in here Saturday helping us plant the urns. Um, and on Sunday someone from a different scout troop will come out and put flags on all the veterans graves and then on Monday morning, more Scouts to put out the chairs. And we have these military markers, these things. They did these during the depression. This is a grand army of the Republic for civil war VAP. It's a flag of older metal flag holder. And as you can see, we have a lot of them, but we only put them out on the patch of a grand army of the Republic grapes, um, where the firing team does the, um, 21 gun salute and they play echoing taps over the graves.
Speaker 3 19:40 That was Sue Hunter. We were giving a tour of the Minneapolis pioneers and soldier's cemetery, formerly called the layman's cemetery special thanks to Michael Barth for his work maintaining and caring for the final resting place of approximately 22,000 people on Lake street and Cedar Avenue in South Minneapolis for K FAI. I am Rico Miralis and thank you very much. That was also done four years ago. So this is the first time in 152 years that the Minneapolis pioneers and soldiers Memorial cemetery will not have a Memorial day service. And unfortunately that's just a, it was a heartbreak. I was almost in tears when I was listening to this audio earlier this morning, getting it ready. My name is Rico, so I'm here with Lydia howl and Dave Lawson. Hey, I just want to say for more information about the friends of the cemetery, Minneapolis pioneers and soldiers Memorial cemetery. There is a Facebook page, you can Google it, you can look at it. The on the cemetery will be open on Monday, but there's no public events. There's no public buildings that are open, but it will be open. And I plan on being there, walking around and um, maintaining safe and healthy boundaries. When this pandemic, Lydia, what did you think of that audio?
Speaker 1 21:06 Yeah, yeah, I think it was quite wonderful. Um, one thing people might not know about me is I really love cemeteries. I think they are a beautiful repository of a history, both personal and public. And, um, I find cemeteries to be peaceful, not scary places. And um, I love cemeteries, especially really old ones.
Speaker 3 21:31 The cemetery is during the day though,
Speaker 2 21:35 So he had, uh, uh, in st Paul Indian burial mounds. Uh, it's a very nice, respectful place to be an a, an a Memorial day. And if you're not going to the soldiers in a cemetery, which is right, I biked by there all the time. That's in my hood there. My YWC is right across the street. So, uh, yeah, I, uh, I on Monday morning we will be on, uh, if you go to veterans for peace.org, we'll have a link to our program and, um, I can't promise you 21 gun salutes because we definitely have an unofficial policy against shooting guns and any kind of a ceremony having to do with <inaudible>. We don't, we ring the bells 11 times. We don't shoot the guns because, and I think they, the anthems who are, are all part of that, that glorification thing. So we, we try to shy away from that. But other than that, I think that they may have a real nice little, it's a nice little tribute thing that they do.
Speaker 3 22:49 And with the bells and the chimes, it's, it's actually, uh, I believe Pentecost Sunday in, in many of the Lutheran tradition. So they do the bells as well, the bells and whistles and stuff like that.
Speaker 2 23:03 Yeah. What is an organization that the, uh, that is promoting bell ringing that we've worked with before? Um, but, uh, on Monday, um, Tom, John Barone, our former president of invest for peace is going to be, uh, he's an enrolled member of the Mendota tribe and he'll, he'll be at the, he'll be at the Capitol with, uh, I think Barry Reese is going to film him, but he's doing a, he does that every year. He does a smudging of the, of the names with the Eagle feathers and Sage. Uh, so that smudgy logo will occur too. I'm not sure when John's going to be down there, but, um, uh, and Jim Northup would have enjoyed that because Jim Northrup has spoken at our Memorial day, I think, which is usually very powerful, but we're not, obviously, I have it again this year. We're going virtual is virtual virtual.
Speaker 2 24:01 Yes. Virtual very, very virtuous these days, you know. Um, and I've been called virtuous. I know. Really. I don't, that's the thing about say this about zoom. The zoom thing has been like, we're forced into, into the zoom generation, right. So we've been zooming all over the place. So, and the beauty of the zoom as the shrinks the world now, uh, I've been on, uh, veterans for peace, zoom things and we got people from all over the world that I've been in, uh, uh, Iowa. I've been to Iowa, to Michigan virtually. It's never, never have to take my pajamas off. This is true. It's true. I mean, I have to wear clothes when I'm on the zoom. That's too much information.
Speaker 1 24:54 So Dave, um, I think some of us, even those of us who didn't vote for Trump, full disclosure, I didn't, I did not. I'm sure that's a great shock to the listeners that whenever I did have this secret little hope that maybe he wasn't a big warmonger and that he might actually end some of these seemingly endless Wars. Obviously that hope has been dashed because he hasn't brought an end to any of them. And now he seems to be getting out of as many treaties as possible. The open skies one with Russia and the NATO countries is the latest one he's trying to get out of. I don't entirely understand it, but it's about being able to fly over each other's land with notice and kind of keep an eye on things. Um, so, so much endless nonsense happens with this guy. I didn't realize Todd was researching this latest trip.
Speaker 1 25:50 He wants to get out of that. Oh. And he got re got us out of the intermediate ballistic nuclear ballistic missile ban from 1987. I know. What's that? Well, that means you can't have short and medium range missiles, which is a good thing. Give mine back. Well, I mean it was something that kind of made it a little less likely that we'd have nuclear war, uh, at least, you know, on a regional level. Uh, so Dave Logston a veterans for peace, Minnesota chapter 27. Um, you know, this is another thing that you guys do that I've always really appreciated is really helping people see a bigger picture, whether it's talking about a current war and the realities of it or things like what did these treaties mean? What, what are they trying, you know, what are they trying to do? Yeah. Um,
Speaker 2 26:44 I mean it's like the peace movement sort of disappeared in the Trump years. Yeah. You know, it's interesting. Uh, Lydia, uh, um, we, um, wham women against military madness and veterans for peace started to drive to get signatures from every town and village in ms municipality in Minnesota, 851. Uh, and we started out to get signatures. I anti-nuclear signatures and interesting what we did. What kind of response did you get? Well, I, you know, uh, uh, we had a couple people that, and wham had a bunch of people and we had a bunch of people out. I've done my share, but we've had some people that are, who have been particularly amazing when it comes to, we took our peace bus to every corner of Minnesota and went into bars and VFWs and restaurants and got signatures from people signing an anti nuke signature, which is interesting because what across a lot of barriers had to go.
Speaker 2 28:00 A lot of people, we got to get all fair number of people. I'm going to, well, if we give up our, our nukes though, but we did have, we did have an incredible response from people that yeah, they surprisingly more whole lot more people were willing to do then you would have thought. Yeah. It's, it's, it's pretty, uh, pretty remarkable. And uh, um, and I'll, I'll, I'll give a a shout out to Steve McCune. He hates getting the shout out at getting any credit for it, but realistically he's got about 19,000 signatures himself and the rest of us pitched in and got another five solid 5,000. So we're up to about 24,000 signatures.
Speaker 2 28:47 But this is not like a, the beauty of this is, it's not like an online thing where he could just click on and that's good that that's a real, that's a force to, but to actually get people to write their name and address with or you know, where they're from was a pretty remarkable. So it is possible to get out there and, and communicate with people and meet people where they're at, where they live, just, you know, bus. Well and you know, you'd like to think if we actually talk to each other more, we might be quite pleasantly surprised. Absolutely. Communication, dialogue. Yeah. That's a good thing. Again, people can find out more. Um, uh, chapter 27 veterans for is on Facebook.
Speaker 1 29:43 Yeah. No. So, uh, but if you want the, the links and there's a, there's going to be a national veteran PhD yet, Monday, May 25th, 10:00 AM central standard time. And then, and what is the website? The website? Well, the website is veterans for peace. One word, veterans for peace.org and that'll get you right there. And, uh, what is the website for the, uh, twin cities veterans chapter 20 <inaudible> dot org. It's chapter, uh, VFP chapter 20 seven.org. Okay. Well this has been a beautiful, um, Memorial day 2020 edition. Also want to remind people, tune in this Sunday, 10:00 AM on Sunday, May 25th, 10:00 AM central standard time to KFC has way project. When Dave Loxton and other veterans for peace will be continuing Memorial day, mostly with music. It's been a pleasure as always, having Dave Loxton on.
