VETERANS FOR PEACE WEEKLY E-NEWS, May 3, 2018 Full Disclosure: Memorial Day VFP’s Full Disclosure Memorial Day project continues as 2018 unfolds.  In terms of the American War in Viet Nam, this year looms large — fifty years ago the Tet Offensive exploded; the infamous My Lai massacre took its devastating toll; Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated; and on and on.  Perhaps a loved one of yours was caught up in the net of this murderous war or you were directly impacted yourself by the war. Over the past few years we have laid 371 letters at the foot of The Wall in Washington, DC (the Vietnam Veterans Memorial) on consecutive Memorial Days.  We plan on delivering more letters this coming Memorial Day.  Will yours be one of them?  We sure hope so.  To view previous years’ letters, please check out this page of our website— or to order our special edition of collected letters THE LETTERS TO THE WALL.  If you are writing a letter for us to deliver this Memorial Day (May 28, 2018), please send your letter to rawlings@maine.edu before May 15th. Your letter will also be posted on our website prior to Memorial Day.  Please note that the National Park Service collects each letter for their archival collection and may publicly display letters at a later date.  We also plan on putting together another collection of letters using the 2017 and 2018 letters, so by submitting your letter to us, you are also giving us your permission to use it in these ways.

Shawna Foster, About Face: Veterans Against the War (formerly IVAW) 5-25-18    via uark.onmicrosoft.com	11:22 AM (1 hour ago)
to James

Haymarket Books 5-25-18 info@haymarketbooks.org via mail128.suw18.rsgsv.net	11:06 AM (38 minutes ago)
to me 70% OFF Haymarket Books on Resisting Empire... View this email in your browser Share Tweet Forward “The memory of the dead deserves a different dedication... to peace, to defiance of governments.” —HOWARD ZINN This Memorial Day Weekend, we celebrate the long tradition of resistance to war and militarism in the U.S., in which active-duty soldiers and veterans have always played a central role. We’re offering 70% OFF our reading list on the tremendous violence perpetrated by the American Empire, and the role of soldiers and veterans in organizing resistance to war. Check out the reading list... Share Tweet Forward New This Month: A Nation Unmade By War Read an excerpt in The Nation...   “Unlike the myriad of lesser writers distracted by the latest antics of the man with the orange hair, the brilliant Tom Engelhardt keeps our focus where it should be: on the vast militarized empire whose leaders’s belief that they can control the world drains our tax dollars, undermines our children's future, and sends young men and women to die in an unending series of fruitless wars." —Adam Hochschild, author of Spain in Our Hearts Get the book

Curing Exceptionalism: What’s wrong with how we think about the United States? What can we do about it? (April, 2018) — U.S. exceptionalism, the idea that the United States of America is superior to other nations, is no more fact-based and no less harmful than racism, sexism, and other forms of bigotry. The purpose of this book is to persuade you of that statement. This book examines how the United States actually compares with other countries, how people think about the comparison, what damage that thinking does, and what changes we might want to consider making.  “I hope Curing Exceptionalism will be part of coursework in 
classrooms throughout the U.S.” —Kathy Kelly, co-coordinator of Voices for Creative Nonviolence.  “A must-read for every U.S. citizen.” —Robert Fantina, author of Desertion and the American Soldier 1776-2006.  Top of Form

“In two weeks, we’ll commemorate those who died in service to our country.  Is there someone you always remember on Memorial Day? ….tell us about it in 300 words or fewer, and we’ll do our best to get it in the Memorial Day edition.”  [The paper published 7 letters May 28.]