If I, if we four on this mission, are not fighting for you, if we're not fighting for your children, for your grandchildren and theirs , please read no further. If we are not ably fighting, courageously, with our entire life limb and treasure for you , please read no further. If we are, then you should read further:
1. We leave, we have left, nothing on the table. We spend our lives fighting for the future of us all, as does every committed Soldier, no? And yes there are few soldiers on the left committed in that way. We leave nothing on the table. Did I say nothing? Did I mention nothing? We need and want nothing for ourselves, but our work will be ground to a halt without help.
2. Without money for fuel we are going to be stuck pretty quick. On our travel east from Standing Rock talking with groups along the way, evaluating several possible properties for our first extreme Eco community, we have our three pickup trucks. I think that's what they're called. We're pretty much out of money for gas let alone maintenance.
3. We have kept nothing for ourselves. For some of us this goes back more than a decade, for some at least the last year. If our bodies are to continue there are certain expenses that need to be covered. In my case two teeth need to be extracted and the periodontal disease that I have in Fairly Advanced stages which prior dentists have withheld telling me about, if not treated will have severe consequences. Rich people's dentist charge about $1,200. I have learned there's some prayer that I can find a community health center like the one here in Bemidji Minnesota to do it for about a third of that. I have two teeth that need to be extracted one of which soon will be somewhat of a mortal threat if that does not occur. Even the several hundred dollars that the community dentist will charge , 25% of the rich person's dentist, even that exhausts our resources.
I am not going to stop fighting no matter what until my body can no longer do so. I know of no price that I will not pay personally. But that does not mean I can't be rendered ineffective through lack of resources, I can, and will be, unless people step up. And the same is true with all four of us.
Note to self, it looks like another sleepless night unless I do some pain medication. What is it about tooth pain and night time that dislike each other so much?
4. The state maliciously inflicted thousands of dollars of damage on Joe's truck and my vehicle on the 23rd when they drove us off our land, destroyed other thousands of dollars worth of our property, and jailed us for protecting the planet and water of you and yours. It was determined today that his truck is totaled. What that means for our forward travel is not yet clear. The actions of the state caused roughly $1,000 worth of damage to my vehicle. Maybe More but that will not be known until it's drivable which is weeks away.
I don't really care what happens to me. Had things gone violent on the 23rd and I received a bullet to my head I would have only been thankful. But not by my hands. I will fight on with my last breath.
But I do care what happens to your nieces and nephews, and your children, your grandkids, and I, and my three comrades, to fight non-violently for them as we will, requires modest resources to be effective.
We have been, and always will be extremely miserly with our resources. Currently even though offered more by an extremely kind supporter here in Bemidji we sleep four to a room, me on the floor. Dinner tonight was a ham and cheese and bread from the grocery store as other recent nights before that. We don't want any more. We wouldn't spend more on ourselves if we could. But we need money for our work.
A. Initial needs. Within the next few days I hope that we develop and share with you a budget for our roughly next two months that will be largely exploration around the Central and Northeast and teachings and sharings to others of our mission. The major features of that will be gas money, extremely rare lodging that we would pay for the lowest-cost motels, and food, when lodging and modest food is not provided by allies. in another month we may have the option in some places of low-cost campgrounds instead of the occasional Inn motel but currently they are not open this time of year.
B. Phase 2 needs. I hope that in coming days we develop and share with you an initial statement of financial needs for the First Community to starve the corporate capitalist state that we will begin construction on in May. Once the weather permits. This Statement could well be in several flavors from extremely modest to less modest depending upon what support if any we receive from people like you.
C. Phase 3 needs. As you can guess, the community construction is a two-year project we anticipate and even this soon I hope that we develop and share with you a planning budget, order of magnitude, for what that might entail.
I suspect that we may do a series of GoFundMe, and yes, personally I have near zero expectation that will raise any significant funds. We know how to have the state take our money to kill people abroad, we don't know how to offer it ourselves for people that fight for our kids by not killing others but killing themselves Softly. But we owe to them and you and ourselves to give you the opportunity to step up in the way I've just described.
James, speaking for myself, and not the group. Eric Wallace-senft Val Armstrong Joe Britt Jr.
Oh, and I don't mean to suggest that we are perfect Warriors. Far from it. There is a huge temptation to be a holier-than-thou echo chambers to ourselves and we haven't yet always learned to resist that. We have been pretty Savaged by the state and our sick Society for months now and do not always transcend that and thereby sometimes are distracted. But we're as good a team as I've ever seen like this in United States and I think we might get better.
Important resources on this mission:
https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10210590862320683&id=1620551416
Beginning at 4 minutes, 45 seconds, https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10210610694216468&id=1620551416