The IVAW Board Series: Seth Manzel

When I first started reading about Seth Manzel, I thought I was going to have to write a bio like TSO wrote yesterday for Cameron White. Manzel is one of the few who actually served in Iraq (2004-2005) and he’d served in an old regiment of mine (the 5th Infantry). So I settled in for writing a tongue bath. But I did my research.

I found him quoted in Dahr Jamail’s new book “The Will to Resist: Soldiers Who refuse to Fight in Iraq and Afghanistan” along side Geoffry Millard:

“So we would go and drop the dismounted people at some house with an air conditioner, where they would kick in a door and hang out and drink tea with those people, while we would proceed with the vehicles and bide time out of visible range.”

He founded the “Coffee Strong” coffee shop outside of Fort Lewis, WA and he’s a member of Port Militarization Resistance. Under contacts and influence he wrote:

My advisory board includes Howard Zinn, Noam Chomsky, Antonia Juhasz and Majorie Kohn.

Not a one of them gives a tinker’s damn about the troops – but for some reason they support “GI resistance”. Every last one of them is certifiably communist.

Seth is big on fund raising – not a crime, certainly. But does he want to raise money to help the troops?

I believe that the board needs to take a more active role in facilitating fundraising and helping local chapters raise money so that they can be more effective in their actions.

Emphasis is mine. More effective in their “actions” doesn’t mean help the troops find the help they need. It’s more “Against the War” and less “Iraq Veterans”. He’s all about the fund raising;

I believe that by periodically approaching our supporters and donors we can ensure the fiscal health of IVAW. More imporntantly [sic], we need to find other sources of income like concerts and events.

In other words, more sources of income like fleecing parents through their children – college students.

The single most pressing issue facing our organization is fundraising in a environment plauged [sic] by Obama and the recession. IVAW needs to formulate strategies to appeal to donors and potential members in this ever changing political environment.

Can you imagine typing a resume for a job in Microsoft Word and having so many spelling errors?

20. Where do you see the organization in 2, 5, 10 years?

In two years IVAW should have an active and thriving membership that is very involved in the running of the organization. Hopefully a large segment of that membership is Active Duty. By focusing on events like concerts and speaking tours we can hopefully move away from the need for individual and foundational money.

In five years if we haven’t ended these wars we should all consider leaving the country.

It’s all about activism. If he was concerned about the “Iraq Veterans” part of the title of the organization, he’d have answered something like “In five years, I see the IVAW as a strong advocate for disabled and homeless veterans” but he thought they should leave the country based on the fact that they failed to end the war five years from now. That says a lot.

21. What do you think should be IVAW’s response to the current financial/political crisis, and how does it impact our organization?

We need to capitalize on the discontent of the general population by connecting the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to the average American’s unfortunate financial situation. Furthermore, we need to find creative ways to fundraise in this dismal economic climate.

Sounds like something Lenin would have written in 1914 doesn’t it? In fact, that’s what the Bolsheviks did – they tied financial crisis to the Great War. How does that kind of rhetoric help “Iraq Veterans”?

So this is the fourth of the five we’ve covered in this series so far who is a member of the ISO, or at least sympathetic to the ISO. Six chairs to fill, eight applicants. At a minimum, two of these radicals are going to be on the IVAW board.

Category: Antiwar crowd, Iraq Veterans Against the War, Usual Suspects