當小桃遇見議長

婦女救援會Tr.

　　東京的夏天短暫，但8月初仍是那麼炙熱、且陽光耀眼。

　　97年8月7日這一天，台灣阿嬤--前台籍慰安婦陳桃，應日本人權團體「銘心會」 （註）的邀請，代表亞洲所有受害者前往東京拜訪日本「?議院」江田五月議長和「眾議院」?路孝弘副議長，表達所有倖存慰安婦們的一致要求，要日本政府早日面對二次大戰未決問題。
前台籍慰安婦陳桃代表亞洲受害倖存者向日本參議院橫路副議長（中）提出協助受害者向日本政府求償。

　　瘦小的小桃阿嬤緩步慢行地隨著國際特赦組織歐洲代表、美國人權運動者和幾位日本國會議員走進橫路副議長的官邸。高牆之內是另一番景緻，映入眼簾的是一片鮮綠草地和幽靜的日式庭園，大家即刻暫停話題，心情似乎也即刻沈靜下來…..
日本「盛岡市」的證言集會後，支持者向阿嬤道歉致意。／婦援會提供

　　在橫路副議長官邸，小桃阿嬤禮貌地向橫路致意後，便娓娓述說自己當年無故成為日本軍「慰安婦」的遭遇…。她表示，在慰安所時曾喝廁所的消毒水自殺過兩次都被救活，當時已是萬念俱灰，只剩苟延殘喘度日。她對橫田說：「我是帶著傷痛過一生的，如今也和其他受害者一樣都老了，還能等多久呢？」

與日本眾議院江田議長合影／婦援會提供

議長的回應與支持
　　隔著會議桌，橫路蹙著眉，低聲說：「聽到妳悲慘的經歷，我完全無法用語言表達我的歉意！我雖不能代表日本政府道歉，卻要以日本公民身份向您致上萬分歉意！更對您的勇敢站出來深感敬佩！」那一刻，我們看到一位收起光芒的政治人物，以內斂、真誠的態度表達他的情感，小桃阿嬤輕揉著手中的手帕，眼眶充滿淚水，在場的人皆靜默。
在橫田副議長官邸／婦援會提供

　　橫路表示，日本人應該直視歷史，勇敢地面對事實。上個月他去波蘭的二戰「集中營」遺址，看到德國人誠懇地將歷史傷痕納入教科書，他說真是一項「優秀」的行動。

　「參議院」江田五月議長聽到小桃阿嬤訴說自己當年是在上學路上被日本警察強拉上吉普車，載到高雄港後被送到印度安達曼島。他表示，日據時代，台灣是日本的殖民地，女孩子在路上被日本警察拉走，已構成了強制罪，就是日本政府的責任！江田議長允諾將在日本國會提出，要日本國會議員正視此問題。

　　此行婦援會工作員和阿嬤同時參與東京、盛岡等地區之「2008和平證言集會」，讓更多日本民眾、年輕學生聆聽到受害者的見證，瞭解慰安婦對日求償發展，每場都獲得市民熱烈迴響。

　　會中提問時間，一位近代 史 教授分享：「聽了受害者的證言很感動，對阿嬤的勇氣尤為佩服！當然相信這是真實的！10月開學時我將告訴學生這件事。可惡的是，日本一些政府領導人和極右派份子仍否認慰安婦的存在。

　　戰爭中總會出現魔鬼，而日本就是二戰期間的魔鬼，真覺得日本人很可恥…..

　（註）日本「銘心會」，全稱為「悼念亞太地區侵略戰爭殉難者銘心會」

Sarah Palin: A Risky Move and A Gift to the Women's Movement

Jo Freeman


Thank you, John McCain!

Never thought I would say those words, but McCain's selection of Alaska governor Sarah Palin was a godsend to the women's movement.

With Hillary out of the picture, there was a serious possibility that women and women's issues would be ignored in the 2008 election. After all, there are so many other concerns fighting for air time from the candidates. Iraq, Afghanistan, the economy, housing, climate change, budget deficits ....the list goes on and on. The Bush Presidency has left us holding so many problems that "women" could well have dropped to the bottom of the list.

Not now.

Women have been roughly 60 percent of the Democratic base since 1980. Since anyone who looks at the platforms of the two parties knows that women's interests (well ... the feminist view of women's interests) are best served by the Democrats, the Party has tended to take the women's vote for granted.

There's been a lot of talk in the last few years about how the Democrats need to appeal to men more, because white men are more likely to vote Republican. McCain's selection of a woman as a running-mate puts the women's vote into play.

His choice for VP indicates that he thinks he can shave off a piece of that population who are still unhappy with how Hillary was treated. It's a small piece, but a small piece of a large population is still a lot of votes. It was a bold choice. A brilliant choice. A risky choice.

It's also a sign of desperation. Politicians don't make bold, risky choices, unless they think they have a lot to gain, or a lot to lose.

The first rule in choosing a vice presidential candidate is do no harm. Don't pick anyone who might turn off a portion of the electorate. When McGovern's first choice for running-mate in 1972 turned out to have been treated for depression, he was quickly replaced. In 1972, any history of mental illness was a turn-off (though we now know that many Presidents have suffered from depression, especially one of our greatest — Abraham Lincoln).

That's one of many reasons why Obama couldn't choose Hillary Clinton. Hillary hold-outs won't face the fact that there is a strata of the voting population who thoroughly dislike her, in addition to those who feel the same way about Bill. Those voters didn't count for much in the Democratic primaries, but they will in November.

Obama didn't need the Clinton baggage. This is a Democratic year. Because the election is his to loose, he needed to chose someone safe to run with. Senator Joe Biden was a very traditional, safe choice. Sarah Palin isn't.

Besides her gender, she has the additional virtue (from a Republican perspective) of being very conservative on all the issues which appeal to the Republican base — the voters Republicans are afraid will stay home on election day because McCain doesn't agree with them on absolutely every thing. The McCain campaign clearly hopes that having Palin on the ticket will encourage Democratic base voters to stay home (or even vote for McCain in order to vote for a woman) and Republican base voters to come out in droves.

Is this likely to happen?

Walter Mondale made an equally risky choice when he chose Geraldine Ferraro as the first woman to run for Vice President on a major party ticket in 1984. It was a bold, risky choice in a Republican year. Ferraro was attacked viciously by Republicans, who particularly went after her husband's finances.

Like Hillary's 2008 run for President, Ferraro's 1984 run for the second spot brought all sorts of sexism out of the closet. It was an eye-opener for everyone. In the end, this bold, risky choice didn't seem to affect the outcome. The exit polls showed that having a woman on the ticket was a prime concern for only a few. These voters about equally divided between those who told pollsters that they voted for a woman and those who said they voted against one.

Ferraro's candidacy had a bigger effect on those who answered the annual polling question (in a different poll): Would you vote for “a well-qualified woman of your own party for President”? After Ferraro a party gap appeared. Republicans were 50 percent more likely than Democrats to answer "No." Republicans have continued to say they would not vote for a well-qualified (but unnamed) woman for President at a much higher rate than Democrats.

Wonder what they will tell the pollsters this year?

A new beginnning? My thoughts at the finale of the Democratic convention

Jo Freeman

On July 15, 1960, my mother took me to the L.A. Coloseum to hear John F. Kennedy accept the Democratic Party's nomination for President. She had been an ardent support of Adlai Stevenson and was disappointed that he didn't get a third bite at the apple, but she knew that this was an historic occasion. She wanted her 14-year-old daughter to see it, in person, and not on a TV screen.

I thought about that day many times as I sat in Denver's Invesco Center waiting for Barack Obama to accept the Democratic Party's nomination. This too was an historic occasion, and I wanted to be there.

Like their counterparts in 1960, Party planners chose the largest arena available for their candidate to accept the Democratic Party's nomination for President so ordinary members of the public could see history being made in person.

Like his predecessor, Barack Obama spoke eloquently, and told the world that it was a time for change. He didn't coin a new phrase as Kennedy did, but he did inspire new hope.

It was in his acceptance speech that Kennedy gave his Presidency its label -- the New Frontier. He said “We stand today on the edge of a new frontier — the frontier of the 1960s -- a frontier of unknown opportunities and perils -- a frontier of unfilled hopes and unfilled threats.”

JFK was a better prophet than anyone knew at the time, but the New Frontier was not where he thought it was.

The new frontier of the 1960s was in the movements for civil rights and civil liberties that were just beginning. It was the youth of the 1960s who were providing the "new invention, innovation and imagination" that Kennedy called for.

They did it with their bodies.

On February 1, 1960 four black college students occupied the white-only seats of a five-and-dime lunch counter in Greensboro, North Carolina. This was the start of the sit-ins which would shape so much of the sixties civil rights movement. Although the movement had started earlier, the idea of sitting in caught the imagination of American youth and inspired sit-ins all over the country.

One of those youth was John Lewis of Troy, Alabama. The sit-ins led to the formation of the Student Non-Violent Co-ordinating Committee (SNCC). On August 28, 1963, Lewis, as the new chairman of SNCC, was one of the main speakers at the March on Washington, where Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. made his famous "I had a dream" speech.

Exactly forty-five years later, I watched Cong. Lewis of Georgia tell the assembled multitudes in the Invesco Center (and the world watching on TV) about that day, while on a large screen above the Center, photos flashed of Dr. King and other scenes from the civil rights movement. His talk was followed by that of two of King's children.

The 1963 March on Washington was controversial at the time. President Kennedy had tried to keep it from happening.
Now it was being celebrated as the Democratic Party nominated a black man for President -- one whose very conception (black father, white mother) was a felony in many states when JFK was President.

The dream of which Dr. King spoke is not yet fulfilled, Cong. Lewis told the Democrats, but it "still burns in the hearts of every American." He called the nomination of Barack Obama "a major down payment on the fulfillment of that dream."

However, there is another dream that was part of the New Frontier of the 1960s that is threatened with forclosure. That is the dream of every American to speak, write and think freely, and to conduct their lives without government surveilliance.

The Cold War put a major crimp on civil liberties, as government agencies were allowed to persecute ordinary Americans under the banner of ferreting out subversives.

In May of 1960 hundreds of Bay Area college students protested outside hearings held by the House Un-American Activities Committee, meeting in San Francisc's City Hall. They were washed down the steps with firehouses and 67 were arrested, but HUAC never came back to the Bay Area.

This event marked the beginning of the movement to regain the civil liberties lost in the Cold War security fever. It took 40 years of struggle to restore civil liberties and rein in government intelligence gatherers.

After September 11, 2001, in the name of security, government once again is nibbling away at American civil liberties. Only now they do it in the name of uncovering terrorists.

The Democrats ignored that parallel in the speeches and the imagery of the last night of the convention.

I hope they won't ignore it when they take back the federal government.