|
5TH DISTRICT US HOUSE CANDIDATE BURBANK DRAFTS KENNEBUNKPORT ORDINANCE TO INDICT BUSH-CHENEY FOR WAR CRIMES US House Candidate human rights attorney Harold Burbank, Canton, announced that he has drafted what he believes is the nation's first town ordinance to create a US war criminal free zone. He did so at the request of Kennebunkport resident and Maine US Senate Candidate Laurie Dobson, who March, 2008 announced her support of a "Kennebunkport Indictment" against President GW Bush and Vice President Richard Cheney for war crimes committed against the United Nations Charter, the Nuremberg Charter and the Geneva Conventions, in violation of the US Constitution, which makes these human rights treaties the supreme law of the land. The draft ordinance incorporates the Nuremberg Charter, and specifically creates town authority to investigate, arrest, indict, prosecute and refer for further legal action any suspected or known war criminal within Kennebunkport. The Bush family have had a Kenenbunkport summer home for generations. Burbank published the proposed ordinance last week at a Concord, New Hampshire event he organized advocating impeachment of Bush-Cheney featuring Pentagon Papers icon Daniel Ellsberg, former Star Wars missile defense shield program director Dr. Robert Bowman, author John Nichols, and former US Attorney General Ramsey Clark. Ellsberg and Bowman, staunch advocates of impeaching Bush and Cheney for crimes against the Constitution and humanity, have publicly announced their support of Burbank's 5th District US House campaign versus incumbent Chris Murphy, who refuses to support impeachment, and who continues to vote for budgets for the Iraq occupation. "At Chris Murphy's September, 2007 New Britain town meeting on Iraq, I asked him publicly why he was not supporting impeachment of Bush-Cheney, given that he agreed the Iraq war and many other administration policies were the results of their criminal actions," Burbank said. "Chris had no answers, which was inexcusable, since he swore the same oath I did as a Connecticut attorney, and another when he entered the US House, to uphold and defend the Constitution from all enemies, foreign and domestic. I then decided I had to run for his seat. Chris was denying his obligation to protect my family and my country by protecting the Constitution from fascism. My model ordinance, which incorporates the Nuremberg Charter, in effect since August 7, 1945 and never repealed, is a logical extension of my oath and campaign to protect the Constitution from war criminals and war crimes of the Bush-Cheney administration." Burbank is a Kennebunk native who was recommended to law school by the President's father, President GHW Bush. The family also recommended young Burbank to the US Naval Academy at Annapolis, to which he was later nominted. In 1986 the senior Bush helped Burbank's law school Amnesty International group gain release of a Thai political prisoner. Burbank corresponds to this day with President GHW Bush on war and peace issues, including possible US war with Iran. "I am a human rights lawyer specializing in international law, which includes war crimes. Kennebunk, Maine is my hometown, where I grew up golf caddying and grounds keeping for the Bush family. As a Maine and Connecticut licensed attorney I swore an oath to uphold and defend the Constitution, which makes all US treaties like the Nuremberg Charter the supreme law of the land. The American people, and people of the Middle East, need the benefit of the Nuremberg Charter now, not after Bush administration attacks and occupies a new country like Iran, which will surely plunge us into WW III. The Kenenbunkport war crimes ordinance is designed to give Americans and all others the maximum authority to prevent WW III from starting," Burbank said. "If the Congress will not stop current imperilaist US wars, and prevent future ones, especially in Iran, the people will have to do it, even if we have to build a ground-up system of local policing and enforcement," Burbank said. President GW Bush comes to the 5th District this Friday to raise funds for likely Republican US House candidate David Cappiello, at a $1000 plate dinner hosted by Henry Kissinger of Kent. Burbank will seek to hold an ice cream fundraiser in Kent the same day and play his tape of Dan Ellsberg's April 14, 2008 speech given in Concord, New Hampshire in support 87 year old New Hampshire State Representative Betty Hall's HR 24, a bill to impeach Bush and Cheney for crimes against the Constitution an humanity. "Ellsberg challenged all Americans to consider what it took to stop the Vietnam War; that it took great sacrifice by peace activists like Randy Kehler who went to Danbury, Connecticut Federal Prison for two years rather than serve in the immoral and illegal Vietnam War, or seek CO status, or escape to Canada. Randy went to prison to make the maximum moral statement that the war was wrong, that everyone had a moral duty to confront that issue, and do what they could to peacefully end the war. Randy was Dan Ellsberg's inspiration for his release of the Pentagon Papers. Dan faced over 100 years in prison for treason for what he did (he was released after Nixon had Ellsberg's psychiatrist's office burglarized). That is the kind of legal, moral and spirtual heroism it takes to build a war crime free world, and that is what I am for. It is terribly ironic that President Bush is coming to the 5th District to promote his immoral and illegal wars this week - the same District in which Randy served his time for peace which moved Dan Ellsberg to spark the end of the Vietnam War," Burbank said. "I am afraid that our major parties have yet to learn anything from what Randy and Dan taught my generation, but I am hoping to speak up for them in my 5th District campaign, for the sake of my children and theirs."
|