GENERAL CONVENTION PROGRAM
Wednesday, August 25, 2010
8 am - Board Meeting
5:30 pm - Welcome Home (VFP Birthplace) Reception (cash bar and hors d’oeuvres)
8:30 pm - The Poetry Reading has traditionally been enticing enough to bring scores of early registrants and will certainly do that for the 25th. Poet/editors W.D. Ehrhart and Jan Barry will present work from their two collections of Vietnam veteran poetry, Winning Hearts and Minds (1972) and Demilitarized Zones along with other collection contributors, including Michael Casey, Michael Uhl and Doug Rawlings. Open Mic to follow.
10 pm - Movie: "Atomic Mom"
Thursday, August 26, 2010
10:30 am - Opening Ceremony. VFP founding member Doug Rawlings will preside over opening ceremonies largely dedicated to the commemoration of 25 years of working for peace. Doug will be joined on stage by other charter members and former national officers. Founder Jerry Genesio will relate the history that prompted him to convene that first VFP meeting in a restaurant in Auburn, Maine 25 years ago. Maya Kazazic, a war amputee survivor and beneficiary of VFP’s Children of War Project, now a motivational speaker, will join with VFP members involved in that early work of VFP. Welcome remarks from VFP President Mike Ferner. There will be a benediction drumming ceremony by elders and drummers of the Penobscot Nation from Indian Island, Maine.
1:00-5:00 pm – Plenary Sessions and Workshops
7:00 pm - Public Meeting: Following the convention theme, Lifting the Fog of War, participants will speak to the social and economic impact of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The public meeting will be held at the Unitarian-Universalist Meeting House, 425 Congress St.
Keynote by Congressman Bob Filner (D CA) — a Freedom Rider in the ’60’s, now Chairman of the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee and a member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus.
Keynote—Terry Tempest Williams—acclaimed author (Refuge: An Unnatural History of Family and Place, The Open Space of Democracy) and
fierce advocate for justice.
Mike Brennan—former Maine Senate majority leader, former Maine House Chair of Education Committee and of the Health and Human
Services Committee.
Dawud Ummah—Military veteran. Muslim Chaplain at University of Southern Maine, NAACP Executive Committee.
Gkisedtanamoogk—Mashpee-Wampanoag, Instructor of Peace Studies at the University of Maine and Bangor Theological Seminary, and author (Anoqcou, Ceremony is Life Itself).
Geoffrey Millard—Board Chair of Iraq Veterans Against the War.
Betsy Smith—executive director EqualityMaine—working for equality for all citizens.
Entertainment by Inanna, Sisters in Rhythm, the celebrated Maine women vocalists and drummers.
10pm - Open Mic Music
10 pm - Movie: "The Good Fight: The Abraham Lincoln Brigade in the Spanish Civil War, 1984"
Friday, August 27, 2010
9:00 am - 5:00 pm Workshops
7:00 Lobster Bake, Cruise by ferry to spectacular Peaks Island on Casco Bay, Classic Downeast feast of lobster with all the trimmings
10pm - VFP Speakers Bureau Auditions: William Collins Oxford Room
10 pm - Movie: "Agent Orange - a personal requiem"
Saturday, August 28, 2010
9:00 am - 5:00 pm - VFP Business Meeting
7:00 pm - Reception/Open Bar
8:00 pm - Banquet
Sunday, August 29, 2010
9:00 am - March and rally around the city of Portland ending at Tommy's Park featuring powerful folk duo Emma's Revolution
8 am - Board Meeting
5:30 pm - Welcome Home (VFP Birthplace) Reception (cash bar and hors d’oeuvres)
8:30 pm - The Poetry Reading has traditionally been enticing enough to bring scores of early registrants and will certainly do that for the 25th. Poet/editors W.D. Ehrhart and Jan Barry will present work from their two collections of Vietnam veteran poetry, Winning Hearts and Minds (1972) and Demilitarized Zones along with other collection contributors, including Michael Casey, Michael Uhl and Doug Rawlings. Open Mic to follow.
10 pm - Movie: "Atomic Mom"
Thursday, August 26, 2010
10:30 am - Opening Ceremony. VFP founding member Doug Rawlings will preside over opening ceremonies largely dedicated to the commemoration of 25 years of working for peace. Doug will be joined on stage by other charter members and former national officers. Founder Jerry Genesio will relate the history that prompted him to convene that first VFP meeting in a restaurant in Auburn, Maine 25 years ago. Maya Kazazic, a war amputee survivor and beneficiary of VFP’s Children of War Project, now a motivational speaker, will join with VFP members involved in that early work of VFP. Welcome remarks from VFP President Mike Ferner. There will be a benediction drumming ceremony by elders and drummers of the Penobscot Nation from Indian Island, Maine.
1:00-5:00 pm – Plenary Sessions and Workshops
7:00 pm - Public Meeting: Following the convention theme, Lifting the Fog of War, participants will speak to the social and economic impact of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The public meeting will be held at the Unitarian-Universalist Meeting House, 425 Congress St.
Keynote by Congressman Bob Filner (D CA) — a Freedom Rider in the ’60’s, now Chairman of the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee and a member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus.
Keynote—Terry Tempest Williams—acclaimed author (Refuge: An Unnatural History of Family and Place, The Open Space of Democracy) and
fierce advocate for justice.
Mike Brennan—former Maine Senate majority leader, former Maine House Chair of Education Committee and of the Health and Human
Services Committee.
Dawud Ummah—Military veteran. Muslim Chaplain at University of Southern Maine, NAACP Executive Committee.
Gkisedtanamoogk—Mashpee-Wampanoag, Instructor of Peace Studies at the University of Maine and Bangor Theological Seminary, and author (Anoqcou, Ceremony is Life Itself).
Geoffrey Millard—Board Chair of Iraq Veterans Against the War.
Betsy Smith—executive director EqualityMaine—working for equality for all citizens.
Entertainment by Inanna, Sisters in Rhythm, the celebrated Maine women vocalists and drummers.
10pm - Open Mic Music
10 pm - Movie: "The Good Fight: The Abraham Lincoln Brigade in the Spanish Civil War, 1984"
Friday, August 27, 2010
9:00 am - 5:00 pm Workshops
7:00 Lobster Bake, Cruise by ferry to spectacular Peaks Island on Casco Bay, Classic Downeast feast of lobster with all the trimmings
10pm - VFP Speakers Bureau Auditions: William Collins Oxford Room
10 pm - Movie: "Agent Orange - a personal requiem"
Saturday, August 28, 2010
9:00 am - 5:00 pm - VFP Business Meeting
7:00 pm - Reception/Open Bar
8:00 pm - Banquet
*Entertainment by singer and activist Noel Paul Stookey of Peter, Paul, and Mary.
*Keynote by journalist and war correspondent Chris Hedges, author of "War is a Force That Gives Us Meaning and Empire of Illusion: The End of Literacy and the Triumph of Spectacle. Also speaking will be Ann Wright, survivor of the Gaza Freedom Flotilla
10pm - Movie "No Gun RI Still Lives On"*Keynote by journalist and war correspondent Chris Hedges, author of "War is a Force That Gives Us Meaning and Empire of Illusion: The End of Literacy and the Triumph of Spectacle. Also speaking will be Ann Wright, survivor of the Gaza Freedom Flotilla
Sunday, August 29, 2010
9:00 am - March and rally around the city of Portland ending at Tommy's Park featuring powerful folk duo Emma's Revolution
