 Next up, we have three former members of Congress who came to join us today. I think you know their names, Dennis Kucinich, Tulsi Gabbard, Ron Paul, we're going to start with Dennis Kucinich, former member of Congress from Ohio, take it away Dennis. Thank you Nick, it's a pleasure to join Ron Paul and Tulsi Gabbard and all the other speakers and all of you at this important event. Brothers and sisters, we gather here this afternoon before this National Shrine dedicated to an apostle of healing with the recognition that we are at an epoch of American history. No less fraught than that which was faced by Abraham Lincoln but with the knowledge that our nation has survived times of division by invoking the power of spirit, the light of truth and in the words of the prophet Isaiah through making justice the measuring line. We are here today in painful recognition that our government does not have the capacity to heal the divisions in this nation or the willingness to use the basic science of human relations, sincere diplomacy to avoid violent conflict and is in fact unwilling to end conflict peacefully. Its greatest talent is to craft misinformation and disinformation to subvert the media and misuse it as an instrument to incite fear and hatred among our people, exciting partisan divisions at home through crass politics and stirring ancient hatreds abroad through lies, deceit, false flag operations and provocations which profane the very essence of democracy. In blowing up the Nord Stream pipeline this government has deliberately circumvented Article 1 of the U.S. Constitution the authority of Congress to make war. It has violated international criminal law by conspiring to commit acts of sabotage and violence on the high seas. It has used illegal and unconstitutional means to destroy the energy resources needed to protect millions of people in Europe during the winter and then to profit from it to legal actions by selling energy to Europe at a four to six times markup. It has done so. It has done so blatantly, cynically, simultaneously taking credit for the destruction of the Nord Stream pipeline and then denying any role in it. I speak directly to those responsible thanks to a courageous journalist Seymour Hirsch, thanks to a courageous journalist Seymour Hirsch. We know, we know what each of you did at the Nord Stream pipeline, Mr. President, Mr. Secretary of State, Mr. National Security Advisor and Madam Under Secretary of State and we will not rest until you are held accountable by Congress by the International Criminal Court and by the American people at the next election for your reprehensible conduct which has debased our Constitution, undermined the rule of law, in our name committed an act of war which threatened the peace of the world and a stability of our own nation. No amount of balloon militarism will distract us from your profoundly lawless, reckless conduct. Even intelligence professionals are aghast at your White House's incompetence and have lost trust in your ability to defend America. Oh, yes, you want to hold Russia to account, that will ultimately be up to the Russian people. But it is up to we, the American people, to hold you to account, to affirm that we are a nation of laws, not of men or women, to hold those in high office to the highest of standards of national international law. If we fail to do this, we have only ourselves to blame while our government descends into depravity and tries to frogmarch us directly into nuclear war. Under the pretense of the pursuit of national security, our government's aggressive nature has alienated nations of the world and caused them the withdrawal from commerce with long-term implications for the value of our dollar and our financial security. Our government has ceded our sovereignty in matters of commerce to the World Trade Organization, to the detriment of American industry and American workers. It has ceded our national sovereignty in matters of peace to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, which prefers military escalation to peace and is content together with this administration to use the good, courageous people of Ukraine as pawns in a vicious and deadly geopolitical chess game which began well before the illegal Russian invasion. And it is now planning to do for the people of Taiwan what it has done for the people of Ukraine. Portraying China the aggressor while surrounding China with about 200 military bases. At home, our government has supported devastating gain of function research which loosed the pandemic across our land. It has perverted social media to suppress legitimate debate over COVID policy to the detriment of the health, welfare, and the will of Americans. And it has enabled the federal government law enforcement to be weaponized against political opponents and has injected itself into social media organizations to impose political and ideological censorship in a manner characteristic of totalitarian rulers attacking the patriotism of those Americans who dare ask questions. Such a government is neither deserving of the trust of the American people nor worthy of our tacit consent to make decisions in our own interests. This passage from the Declaration of Independence is compelling. Quote that when any form of government becomes destructive to these ends it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it and to institute new government laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form as to them shall seem most likely to affect their safety and happiness. We must change this government before it destroys our nation. We must change the way we are governed insisting upon a government dedicated to peace and that dedication must be to peace at home and abroad. Strength through peace ensures our defense and our readiness by not wasting our resources on ideological warfare. I speak not as a partisan but as an American who believes we are being led to the brink of annihilation by individuals lacking in self- control obsessed with the exercise of global power and incapable of invoking the power of nonviolent persuasion. As a congressman I warned America about going to war after 9-11. I led the effort against the Iraq war together with Ron Paul and saw the lives that took the lives of at least 4491 American men and women cost this nation more than three trillion dollars late waste the country of Iraq killing at least one million innocent all because our leaders lied about Iraq and weapons of mass destruction and provoke great fear across the land for fear is a weapon of mass destruction hatred is a weapon of mass destruction our nation used to leave the world in making steel cars and ships now we leave the world in making enemies confusing defense with offense aiming ourselves to the teeth spending trillions of dollars to advance an aggressive empire through the promotion of war but the wars my dear friends have come home while our nation spends one trillion dollars every year to prepare for war millions of Americans are ill fed ill cloth ill educated ill housed without hope for the future we cannot fuel wars across the world and prevent and pretend that there are no consequences the war is inevitably come home the carnage is down the streets of our cities as millions of Americans are overwhelmed by anger despair hopelessness and unrelenting mass violence America's destiny in its founding was to be the light of the world a free and independent nation among nations not a nation above nations not a military juggernaut roaming the world conjuring dragons to slay we were to be and are to be the land of the free the home of the brave not continually locked into fear by a government made of fearful people who are afraid of balloons but instead they really need to be afraid of the American people as we come to a realization that our government has been turned into a racket by corrupt incompetent leaders this then is a call for an American revival a revival of courage of authenticity of a willingness to participate in the work of rebuilding our nation politically economically and spiritually America longs for a return to government of the people which focuses on taking care of things here at home we as a nation cannot hope to favorably influence the conduct of other nations well at least 30 million Americans are food insecure a half million homeless struggle every day to have a roof over their heads while American communities do not have clean water and while our nation has shown itself incapable of even responding to the urgent needs of those affected by the derailment disaster in East Palestine this government's this government's chilling lack of compassion and empathy is on full display not only in East Palestine Ohio but across the globe policies which lack human sympathy portend greater and greater destruction my fellow Americans it is time to revive the spirit of America so that each one of us truly believes in the ability of the nation to function for the benefit of all of us it is time to make real the dream of prosperity for all it is time to make real the dream of education for all and healthcare for all and jobs for all retirement security and safe neighborhoods it is time to revive the spirit of patriotism which reflects a daily celebration of freedom where Americans are freed from government prying and spying into their personal lives and where each of us is free to make decisions about our own lives our own health and our own beings it is time to revive the spirit of peace the scriptures say blessed are the peacemakers it is time for America to establish a new role in the world where we demand of our leaders the ability to reconcile with other nations to make peace with our brothers and sisters we must coalesce as a nation to seek and to find the underlying unity which binds us as Americans love of life binds us love of peace binds us love of country binds us brotherhood and sisterhood binds us love of home binds us love of church synagogue temple and mosque binds us love of work binds us love binds us all in a union of hope and as we revive our oneness as a nation we proclaim the deeper meaning of our first national motto e pluribus unum out of many we are one it is then we can truly unite with the rest of the world for human unity is the ultimate truth we are interconnected and interdependent with people everywhere and as nations strive for self-sufficiency so too they must strive for cooperation it is human unity which will save our planet from destruction and enable us to achieve a heaven on earth it is the realization that we are all of us created equal and entitled to self determination and self-fulfillment individually and collectively my fellow Americans this our country this land we love to whom Americans pledge allegiance must in turn pledge its allegiance to we the people allegiance to truth to one nation under God truly with liberty and justice for all let us proceed then by these words from Lincoln 2nd inaugural with malice towards none with charity for all with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right thank you very much