12/17/10 – Frank Dorrel – The Scott Horton Show

This is Angela Keaton with Anti-War Radio.
And on the line with me today I have Frank Durrell, and mostly associated with Addicted to War, but also the most indispensable mailing list I have ever been on, has absolutely every bit of information you need to know about anti-war and peace activism anywhere in Southern California.
Frank, how are you doing today?
I'm still alive and not incarcerated, Angela.
It's funny, one of the things I love about anti-war radio is I occasionally have to check in with guests beforehand to make sure they're not actually in the pokey that day.
Can you tell us a little bit about some of your activities this week?
Well, as you said, I have my email list, which is a local list to Los Angeles in the Southern California area where I send out daily emails about events that are happening mostly.
There's a lot of events happening, anti-war, peace and justice, human rights events.
And we actually put on three or four or five a year at our house here in Culver City.
And other than that, you know, the Addicted to War books continue to go out.
I put the book out in 2002, Addicted to War, Why the U.S. Can't Get Militarism, by Joe Andreas.
And to this day, eight years later, I put out about 240,000 of these books in English.
And, you know, I'm just connected to people in the anti-war movement, peace movement, and there's always something happening.
And I get a lot of emails and calls and messages from people about all kinds of things, and it keeps me really busy.
So that's what's happening here.
How are you doing?
Well, you know, it's another business day at AntiWar.com, which, you know, means the war is the health of the state.
And that's kind of the premise where we're starting from.
But I do want to talk a little bit, just before we get into some of the more policy questions, a little bit of background about how you, I mean, you're an extremely motivated activist, especially on the topic of war.
Why?
Well, it all goes back to, and I am a veteran.
I was in the Air Force.
I enlisted during the time of the Vietnam War in the Air Force because I didn't really want to be a soldier, you know, in an army or the Marines.
But I didn't under, I thought the idea of killing anyone or shooting anyone or being shot at seemed crazy to me.
But I didn't have any idea of, you know, the United States' role in all this.
It was years later after I was out of the Air Force when I had this job as a driver for the University of Southern California, and I discovered KPFK, 90.7 FM radio here in Los Angeles, a listener-sponsored.
And I started hearing people like Blaze Bompane and Noam Chomsky and Howard Zinn and all the other, you know, people you probably had on your show, actually.
And I learned something that I didn't know.
I learned the United States, you know, is addicted to war.
And I learned that we lived a big lie in this country, and it just made me very upset, and I got involved.
I got involved with Veterans for Peace, and I started going to hear the speakers when they came to town and reading their books and seeing their videos and listening to their audio tapes.
And then in 2000 I made my film called What I've Learned About U.S. Foreign Policy, which is a two-hour compilation of some of the most important truth-tellers and best documentaries I had at my disposal at the time.
And I put it together, and I think it's been seen by millions of people since then.
And it still goes out.
And then a couple of years later we put out the Addicted to War book from Joel Andreas.
So those were my two main things that I put out.
But I do support everybody and anybody that's doing this work that I can because the bottom line is we've just got to wake up more Americans.
This is what you do, obviously, anti-war radio, to wake up more Americans to understand that we're living in a big lie here, and it's really only going to change when more Americans stand up, wake up, stand up, and insist and make it stop.
It's not going to happen any other way, I don't believe.
Well, you talk about waking up people, and it's all a big lie, but I want to break that down a little bit.
What is it that most of you think that maybe average Americans, if you're looking through the lens of an ordinary person, what is it that he or she sees about U.S. foreign policy, if he or she sees it at all?
Well, a lot of people don't see it too much at all, really.
They don't pay much attention.
But probably a lot of people just think the United States are the good guys, and whatever we're doing around the world, it's because we're fighting evil, we're fighting to help people out around the world.
Although we may make mistakes and there may be aberrations, overall the United States are the good guys, and the other people are the bad guys.
That's what people have been taught here by the media, by our system here.
There are a lot of reasons to believe that until you really look at the truth and realize that it's the opposite of that.
It's really a big nightmare for the people of the world, and our own people too.
It's hard getting people to see it, though, because they're busy with their own life, and their own life might not be so easy.
Also, what we're trying to tell people isn't so fun to know, because once you understand this, that our country really is the biggest terrorist country in the world, really, and it's killing people all over the world and has for decades, it's not easy information to have.
It's much easier to not believe it and just go the other way.
But I will say I do believe there's probably more people aware of this now than any time in the history of this country.
I do believe it because of the Internet and because of anti-war radio, because of Democracy Now!
, Amy Goodman, because of Michael Moore, because of Veterans for Peace, and all the authors that are out there.
And because of a difficult war, it's become pretty well known also.
So I always try to be positive and try to tell people, yeah, we can do it, we just have to keep going.
You can do something by just learning, taking in the information, understanding, and then doing whatever it is you can do to try and wake up other people and make a change.
I guess I'm just trying to think about this in terms of using addicted to war and metaphor and language that we use to always discuss military service and patriotism makes it almost impossible for anyone to discuss these things without sounding like, quote, a traitor, and even that concept is an interesting one, or being anti-American.
And you're a United States veteran.
Obviously, you're going to bring credibility to the argument because what is it that we say?
Thank you for your service.
And when someone says that to you, is it awkward?
Well, usually when they say it, they mean it in a good way, of course.
And, of course, I understand exactly what you're talking about, because it's really Orwellian, what we're dealing with here.
It's really like the Matrix.
It's all turned upside down.
And our struggle really isn't against the soldiers, who most of them have been duped like everybody else.
It's against the system.
But it's really great to be working with Veterans for Peace, a national group of veterans from all over the country and the world, actually, who have been in wars, who have actually been out in the jungle fighting and shooting, who have come to see that wars are wrong, that they're lies, and speak out.
You know, I'm sure you're aware of this, that yesterday, I think like 135 people were arrested in Washington, D.C., protesting our policies in Afghanistan and Iraq, and a lot of them were Veterans for Peace.
Daniel Ellsberg was there and others.
And our previous guest, Deborah Sweet from World Can't Wait, she was arrested as well.
Right, right.
And those are very important public statements, and I think it's a powerful image to people who remember the Vietnam era to see Daniel Ellsberg get arrested so they understand exactly what is at stake here.
And just even our ability to maintain ourselves as anti-war activists and not be held under state scrutiny.
I mean, we're still barely lucky enough to be able to express our opinions freely, because if you notice in the past few weeks, WikiLeaks has brought out the insane fascists in everyone, including people bringing back the 1917 Espionage Act.
How is this going to affect activism?
Well, I guess we'll have to find out.
I don't know.
We just have to keep going.
There isn't much choice once you're involved with this.
There isn't much choice except to keep doing it in any way you can.
For me, it's easier than some people, I think, because the two materials I have here, the book, the Dikotor book and my film, What I've Learned About U.S. Foreign Policy, are very popular still, and people order them all the time.
And that's why I gave you that humorous answer when you asked me how I was doing because I'm still alive and not incarcerated.
That's the humorous answer I give people, but it's true.
So far, I don't know what the future is going to bring in that area, but I don't know.
I guess if we get arrested, maybe it means we're getting somewhere.
All right.
This is Antiwar Radio.
I'm Angela Keaton, and Antiwar Radio, of course, LRNFM, Anomaly Radio News Network, and a million other places that we will talk about in just a little bit.
Today with me on the line, I have Frank Darrell from Addicted to War and his amazing mailing list.
I'm talking a little bit about his activism.
Something I'd like to talk about a little bit is Antiwar.com later this year.
Justin Raimondo said he'd like to bring about a more activist focus to our mission.
It's really, really important because merely just putting out information alone has not made a change.
And what people ask are, what are practical things that I can do, an ordinary person, to stop the war or stop the next war or end the occupation?
And Frank, can you help me basically teach young activists how to get interested in the war and what they can do to stop this?
Well, I just have to go back to what I do with putting out information.
I know it isn't the only thing, but to me, nobody's going to be able to do anything if they don't understand what a lie we're living under here.
And so that information that is in the book, in my film, and in many other great works out there, antiwar works, is important for people to get out to others so they can educate themselves and understand this lie we're living.
I can't tell people what to do otherwise.
You can always contact your congresspeople and all that, but I don't know.
We've tried that.
I don't have the best answer for you.
I put out the book and my video and support other people doing this work, and I try to support anybody and everybody who's interested and always be positive that we can make a difference.
But it does seem tough at times, I know.
I like to give out my website.
It is the name of the book, addictedtowar.com, and people can find out how to order the book from the website or my film or to get on my e-mail list if you're in the Los Angeles area because it's really just a local list, really, addictedtowar.com.
Well, it's an amazing list, and it's absolutely indispensable to me.
But you said there, when you were talking about it, you made a list of things like writing to congressmen, and you seemed uneasy about it.
Do you believe that ordinary retail politics or just ordinary everyday, the conventional methods, can they stand a chance if everything is based around the notion of empire?
Yeah.
I don't want to put down anything that anybody, any effort anybody makes.
I want to support them doing it.
I would never want to put anybody down for trying anything.
So I think we need more numbers of people to understand this and be upset about it.
And, of course, part of the problem we've got right now is that the trick they pulled when they got Obama as president, a lot of people, even people I've known in the movement, thought when he became president things were different because he seemed different than Bush.
He seems smarter.
He seems more real and more kinder and all these things.
But if you really look at what's happening and listen to him, he does speak out of both sides of his mouth.
And I know we've increased the war military budget, and he's got more troops in Afghanistan.
So it's quite a big trick they've pulled on us here in this country, but they're always tricking us.
And a lot of people, of course, don't want to know this stuff because it makes them uncomfortable.
But we're doing the right thing, Angela, so we just have to keep going forward.
I don't know what else to say.
It's something I struggle and wrestle with too because people ask, how can I help?
And usually what I say is get the information out there.
Yeah.
But, you know, it's very, I mean, we're not just fighting against, you know, it's not just civil polite disagreement that's the situation.
I mean, we're talking about young people who are kind of, I mean, if I'm going to use such a harsh word, indoctrinated, you know, in the civic religion.
And this is both in private and public school.
I mean, you grow up learning the language of empire and war without ever, ever, ever knowing what that, I mean, there's no other way of communicating or describing the empire or having a discourse about the United States, forget just our foreign policy, without that language.
And how do I break through that barrier?
I mean, it's not just the mentality of, you know, thanking people for their service.
And I don't mean that in an ironic sense, but when people say that, a Marxist friend of mine from Austin who's a Gulf War vet said, please do not thank me for my service.
Why would you do such a thing?
I mean, that's how conflicted, because in that language, it's extremely difficult to talk about these things because the real religion of the U.S. is the civic religion.
It's not a Christian ethic.
It's not Judeo-Christian kind of Western understanding of morality.
It is the state at the center of this.
And without that, I mean, we would not be able to sustain the wars overseas.
I mean, the us versus them and the inherent racism and religious bigotry.
All of that, to me, seems like something that has to be broken down piece by piece at a cultural level.
Yeah.
Well, I agree.
You know, I don't know if you know that the Addictive to War book is actually in hundreds of high schools all around the country and colleges.
This is something when I was growing up would never have happened.
You know, a book like this would have never been able to be used in schools.
Actually, my daughter, a junior at Culver City High School here in Los Angeles, two of her teachers used the book.
So if there's any teachers out there, you know, if somebody's listening to your show, they obviously are open to these ideas.
The book is a great book to use in schools.
It's all documented.
It's got 161 footnotes.
And actually, it's a real history book.
I don't know if we said it's in a comic book format.
But, you know, that's what I focus on.
That's what I've been doing, Angela, is working on, you know, with the book and my film, educating people with those items.
There are other great items.
The Arnett and West film was a film made by Peter Dudar and Sally Marr.
It's a great anti-recruiting film.
They're showing it in high schools all around Los Angeles.
Have you seen that?
No, I have not.
When they go in there to the schools and show their film and see all these Iraq veterans speaking out against the war, people won't enlist.
So they're doing that work.
I work with Cole Miller and Ann Miller, who have brought 10 war-injured Iraqi children to the United States, and they bring them here to get medical treatments.
And when people see these children who have had their arms blown off and their legs blown off and who can't see or can't hear from what we've done to them, it affects people.
So there's a lot of different things that are happening out there.
We just have to keep whoever, to the listeners, find out.
Educate yourself.
Find out what it is you feel you can do and do it, you know.
This is a morbid and dark question, but it's important to ask, given the circumstances of your background with Vietnam.
Would a draft make a difference in terms of getting people in the streets?
I believe so.
I'm not for a draft, but I believe it would because I believe the difference between now and then is that when they had a draft, there were more people against the war because they were afraid of losing their sons, their brothers, their boyfriends, their husbands, their loved ones, their friends.
And right now, because there's not a draft, there's not as many Americans dying.
There's 5,000-something.
It's a lot, but it's not as many, and it's more out of sight, out of mind.
I think they won't bring back the draft for that reason.
I think you're right about what you were saying there.
Well, I mean, without basically conscription, I mean, by antiwar.com standards, conscription is slavery, and I'm not suggesting that that would be the ideal way of bringing about any change because that in itself is violence.
But most people, and I mean, granted, I'm kind of in a middle-class bubble, don't know anyone who's served in the past 20 years.
I mean, it's very few people, unless you're running in political circles or activist circles where you're meeting people who have firsthand experience.
Right.
And certainly, I mean, I watch CNN and I watch Fox News.
I mean, those are the choices on the menu on the television for mainstream news, and I'm barely getting information on what the war looks like, and that makes me question what it is that the everyday person understands about the occupation of the Middle East.
Right.
Well, you're right.
It's out of sight, out of mind, and the mainstream's not going there.
That's how it works.
That's the way it works in this country.
I asked this question of our last guest, Deborah Sweet.
We've had a midterm election in the last month, and I am increasingly nauseated by Barack Obama's right word.
Of course, some of us might say he was already kind of on the right when he came in, or his continued right-word trajectory.
How this is going to affect any possibility that we'll be out of Afghanistan in 2011, if you even think that's a possibility at this point?
No, I don't think so.
He's part of the system.
I don't know exactly how this has all happened.
If he's been there all along, or they've threatened him, or what it is, or they've brought him, they've trained him for this.
I don't know, but he's obviously part of the system.
In a way, he's worse for the peace movement and the antiwar movement than Bush was, because when Bush and Cheney were in power, people were riled up and out in the streets and were active, and Bush and Cheney were so obviously wrong, obviously arrogant, and obviously evil.
Obama is not so obviously that way.
He is to some of us, but it's not obviously the president.
It's this system we have.
It's this country we live in under this capitalistic society we have where they've turned war into some kind of a heuristic thing.
The bottom line is we're doing, our country's doing what the Nazis did.
We're invading countries, and we're killing millions of people, and we're oppressing people all over the world, and it's really a big nightmare.
Really quick, Frank, because we've got a lot of homeschooling moms out in the audience.
If you can tell them how they can get a hold of your books so they can teach their children about the U.S. foreign policy.
If you're on the Internet, go to dictatowar.com.
If they want to call me, it's 310-838-8131.
310-838-8131.
I sell everything for the lowest price, Angela.
If need be, I give it away.
I'm not a business person.
Thank you so much.