US Social Forum: Unity makes a better country possible

At a plenary session June 28, thousands jumped to their feet and roared approval when Judith Le Blanc, from United for Peace and Justice, said, “No headway can be made on justice while $600 billion is spent on wars abroad. We must unite with the 70 percent who are against this war even where that is the only thing on which we agree with them.”

Earlier that day, a plenary session on Gulf Coast reconstruction in the post-Katrina era laid out a searing indictment of Bush administration policy in the region.

“Katrina was not a natural disaster but a man-made disaster and Bush, not Katrina, is our disaster,” declared Monique Harden, a moderator representing Advocates for Environmental Human Rights. She went on to say that the destruction of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast only began with the storm but was “planned and continued by Bush who represents the historic forces of genocide, slavery, militarism, exploitation of all workers, white supremacy and sexism.”