VIRGINIA PEOPLE’S ASSEMBLY
Plowshare activists Kent Walton and Susan Tyree joined with a state-wide
coalition of some 100 protesters in Richmond on January 9 to rally and
march against proposed state budget cuts.
Plowshare activists Kent Walton and Susan Tyree joined with a state-wide
coalition of some 100 protesters in Richmond on January 9 to rally and
march against proposed state budget cuts.
Organized by the Virginia People’s Assembly, the protest featured a broad-based coalition of labor groups, immigrant and prisoner rights advocates and anti-war groups.
Prior to marching through Richmond’s financial district, Walton was one of several speakers invited to address the rally. His speech follows:
“Plowshare Peace Center in Roanoke, Virginia’s oldest peace and justice organization, dedicated to opposing war, torture and violence at home and abroad, stands united with you here today in opposing a different kind of war…a different kind of violence…a different kind of torture. We join with you … and we will march with you … in opposing a war … of economic injustice … a war which tortures not only the hungry, and the homeless, and the jobless, but a war which targets and oppresses all of us who believe that our own best efforts and our own hard work should not leave us with the constant and debilitating worry, anxiety and insecurity of not knowing whether we can afford our most basic needs. “This economic war … this economic oppression … affects all of us. When the largest and wealthiest corporations escape their responsibility to pay a fair share of the tax burden, what happens? The governor announces cutbacks in jobs and services. “Our schools lose teachers and classroom space. College tuitions soar out-of reach. Basic infrastructure–roads and bridges–are not properly maintained. Traffic congestion and accidents multiply. Health services disappear. And on and on and on. These are life and death issues which affect all of us … which oppress all of us. “We all suffer, directly, because of economic warfare waged by this commonwealth’s largest banks and wealthiest corporations, who team up with their corrupt political buddies, so they can avoid paying a fair share of taxes. “It is time to wake up the citizens of this commonwealth to the outrageous injustice that Virginia has the second lowest corporate income tax rate in the United States. It is time to march today … united in our cause … to awake public awareness to the injustice and suffering and torture of this economic warfare. It is time for this Virginia People’s Assembly to march and to wake up the Virginia General Assembly. Plowshare Peace Center of Roanoke stands with you … and we will march with you”.
