Iraq combat veterans, Agustin Aguayo and Camilo Mejia, were joined by fellow war resisters Pablo Paredes and Robert Zabala at a series of Northern California events May 9-18. One of the stops included Watsonville where the 4 men spoke in local high school class rooms and on local station KUSP 88.9 FM in the morning and at the First Presbyterian Church that evening. Read more

GUESTS: Arlene Inouye, Coalition Against Militarism in Our Schools, Pat Elder, Peace Action Montgomery Anti-recruitment activists are hailing the recent announcement by the Los Angeles Unified School District of a new policy to better protect students’ personal information from the military. The policy is the result of discussions with teachers and the ACLU.

Stretched to supply the manpower to fight two wars, the US military has stepped up efforts to recruit teenagers and young adults.  Videogames, social networks, and the schools themselves are all fertile soil for Pentagon recruiters.  On this edition, guest host Anna Sussman hosts a roundtable discussion about the new face of military recruiting, and counter-recruiting efforts taking place. 

Featuring:

Sandra Schwartz, American Friends Service Committee San Francisco Peace Education Coordinator; David Ledesma, One Voice Executive Director; Sokthy Mean, Bay-Peace counter recruiter.

Well known in the national peace and justice scene, Pat has been organizing resistance to the Bush administration’s wars since 2001. Based in the DC area, Pat works with a wide range of groups, attempting to confront the militarization of the nation’s high schools. Pat Elder serves on the Coordinating Committee of the National Network Opposing the Militarization of Youth, NNOMY.

On April 5, some 300 students and community members held a raucous demonstration at the UC Santa Cruz campus, where US military recruiters had a booth at the school's Job and Internship fair.

Block to block speaks with Dave Ledesma from South Bay Mobilization -- An anti-war organization and Think First -- a program that does counter-recruitment to high school students about enlisting in the military.

This is an interview with David, a member of Student Against the War, who organized the counter-recruitment protest. Interview was done as part of the Red X Show on Free Radio Santa Cruz (101.1 FM) Tuesdays, 6-8pm.

Pat Elder of the National Coalition to Protect Student Privacy (StudentPrivacy.org) explains how the U.S. military gets away with requiring students in thousands of U.S. high schools to take a 3-hour career inventory test with the results going straight to recruiters without students' or parents' knowledge.

Total run time: 29:00

Host: David Swanson.

Producer: David Swanson.

Engineer: Christiane Brown.

Music by Duke Ellington..

Syndicated by Pacifica Network.