Good evening and thank you for joining us. It is my honor tonight to introduce three powerful women who will, each in their own way, share their thoughts about our nation’s involvement in Iraq. This event is sponsored by the Charlottesville Center for Peace and Justice. My name is Sean McCord and as I look out at this great gathering, I can sense that many of you share the same thought…Who?
I will tell you a little more about me in a moment, but first I want to talk about us…
We are Republicans. We are Democrats. We are Libertarians, Independents, Free Thinkers, Communists, Socialists, Hippies, Yippies, and Yuppies. We are Christians, Muslim, Jewish, Buddhist, and Atheists. We are married, single, dating, and engaged. We are heterosexual, homosexual, bisexual, and transsexual. We are white, black, brown, pink, deep thinkers, God-fearing, Odd fellows, and fellow travelers.
We launched the United Nations and ushered in an unparalleled economic juggernaut that lasted decades. We walked on the moon! We watched in horror as two planes slammed into twin towers, and we donned our gear and we ran inside to carry out the wounded. We packed up food and clothes and helped our neighbors in Louisiana. We hang our flag with pride, we pledge allegiance to our constitution, and we sing our national anthem in English, and Spanish, and Creole, and Klingon.
We are Americans. We are a good people. We are one, grand, passionate, often dysfunctional family. And like any family, we have our disagreements, but when it’s important, we sit down at the kitchen table and we talk.
That is why we’re here tonight. We need to talk.
So who am I? My name is Sean Michael McCord. I am a white, college educated, middle class, family man. My wife is a teacher. We send our three kids to public schools. I write a blog. And the past three years have been pretty good to me. We bought a new house. I started a new job. We got a minivan. So why am I standing up here, nervous as hell, and talking about Iraq? Because my child went to war. My Son. My Daughter. My Brother. My Sister. These are our children, all of them, sent by our leaders to go kill someone else’s child. This is our problem. This is the most important question facing our nation today, and when my three grade school children, who are here tonight, when they ask me “What did you do in the war, Daddy?â€, I don’t want to say, “well, I wrote nasty things about the war in my blog…”
I want to say to them, I am saying to them, kids, I did everything I could to bring peace and make this a better world for you.
I don’t know what to do about Iraq. I’m not alone in this. George Bush doesn’t know what to do about Iraq. We can’t stay. We need to do something new. The majority of our country understands this. You don’t need to be “anti-war” to understand. What you can be, and what I hope you will all be after tonight, is pro-peace.
This is an exciting time to be in the majority. We are hoping tonight that you will all hear the clarion call for peace and justice and become involved. The sponsor of this evening’s event is the Charlottesville Center For Peace & Justice, a local activist organization promoting education and action in our community. It is my great pleasure to introduce Bill Anderson, chair of the Steering Committee, to tell you more about the CCPJ.