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Internationally renowned peace activist and retired U.S. Army colo-nel Ann Wright gave a sobering lecture on Oct. 26 in Newman Au-ditorium about the proposed mili-tarization of Jeju Island, an interna-tionally recognized South Korean Island of World Peace. Home to more of the United Nation’s World Natural Heritage sites than any other single geographical location on earth, Jeju Island is sister city to Santa Rosa.

Don Taylor, local restaurateur and honorary citizen of Jeju Island, opened the event with a brief talk about the Santa Rosa-Jeju sister city program and his love of the island and its people.

Jeju City gifted Santa Rosa with two hand-carved “Dolhareubang,” or “Stone Grandfather” statues, placed near the Luther Burbank Gardens on Sonoma Avenue in 2003, and one “Woman With a Wa-ter Jar” statue, placed on Fourth Street, Downtown Santa Rosa in 2006. 

In July of this year, the City of Santa Rosa reciprocated with a bronzed “Snoopy” statue, which was personally presented by Taylor. 

The purpose of the sister cities program is to increase international understanding and foster goodwill and world peace by furthering in-ternational communication and exchange.

Since 2007, residents of Jeju Is-land’s coastal fishing and farming

village, Gangjeong, have unani-mously opposed the construction of a Naval base, which if allowed to be completed will facilitate 18 ships and two submarines. But build-ing the base will mean destroying a pristine shoreline and endanger-ing marine wildlife, including a soft coral reef and dolphin habitat as well as private farmland cultivated by local families for several genera-tions.

The people of Gangjeong have attempted to block construction both through bureaucratic chan-nels, and in some cases by physi-cally chaining their bodies to con-struction equipment.   As Wright spoke she displayed images of the most recent events on Jeju.

Kang Dong-Kyun, mayor of Gangjeong Village, was one of five residents arrested Aug. 24, 2011 during a nonviolent demonstration. Shortly after the demonstrations, sirens wailed into the countryside signaling citizens to quickly aban-don their work in the hot houses and groves of tangerine trees and go block the main gate of the base with trucks, cars and their own bodies. About 60 people surrounded the police car in which the mayor was held. The other four people who were arrested had already been moved to the local jail.

About 60 police reinforcements arrived shortly after, pushed their way through the crowd and formed a protective ring around the police car.

“The police seemed to be new recruits who were doing their oblig-atory government service,” said

Wright in an account of the event on Facebook. “They were very young, and looked very scared.”

In 1947-48, more than 30,000 people were killed on the island by the right wing govern-ment of Sigmund Rhee, in what is now called the April 3rd massacre. Many of the police of-ficers’ relatives were victims of the massacre and did not want to be seen as “heavy handed,” Wright explained. Re-markably, the otherwise unarmed police, did not use their batons on the demonstrators. The standoff lasted nearly five hours.

“The Mayor’s wife got on top of a vehicle, tell-ing the crowd to protect her husband, and then dove into the police line,” Wright said. She had pic-tures to prove it.

By midnight the po-lice had made a deal with demon-strators, promising that if officers were allowed to book Kang at the local jail, he and the other four ar-rested protesters would be released the next morning. The crowd re-luctantly allowed the police car to leave, but the next morning was in-formed that the mayor would not be released after all. The chief of police was later fired for being too lenient.

Wright has many similar experi-ences to share. She is most noted for

being one of three State Department officials to resign in direct protest of the invasion of Iraq in 2003. Al-though she served 13 years in active duty in the U.S. Army and another 16 in the Army Reserves prior to her resignation, her ideals have re-

mained continuous throughout.After receiving a master’s degree

in National Security Affairs from the U.S. Naval War College in New-port, Rhode Island, Wright was sta-tioned in Fort Bragg, North Caroli-na, where she drew up contingency plans for invading several countries, one of which was Iraq. Her eventual resignation was in response to what she considered the dismissal of such carefully laid plans in the 2003 inva-sion.

Since then she has spent her time organizing protests and dem-onstrations for peace. She has been willingly arrested several times for taking part in anti-war demonstra-tions. She has stated in previous in-terviews that she does not remove the arrest bracelets attached to her wrists during processing; instead she collects them.

Wright is currently on trial in Syracuse, New York along with 37 other protesters who were arrested in April at the New York Air Na-tional Guard Base at Hancock Field

for protesting the use of MQ-9 Reaper drones, which are piloted by remote control, and have been flown from Syracuse to Afghanistan since late 2009.

In an interview on Democracy Now on Nov. 3, Wright said, “Citi-zens have a responsibility to take action when they see crimes being committed. And this goes back to World War II, when German gov-ernment officials knew what other parts of the German government were doing in executing six million Jews in Germany and other places, and they took no action--and they were held responsible later, through the Nuremberg trials. And that is the theory on which we are acting, that we see that our government is committing crimes by the use of these drones, and that we, as citi-zens, have the responsibility to act.”

More information on Anne Wright and her current trial can be found at www.democracynow.org.

Wright’s work can also be fol-lowed on Facebook and Twitter.

Anne Wright against militarization of SR sister city

SRJC and surrounding community strive for a greener and more localized economy

Stock ImageAnne Wright advocates to SRJC against the militarization on Jeju Island. Jeju Island is an island off the coast of South Korea that is gaining interest from the U.S. Navy.

Occupy your time

Read the Oak Leaf

Houston Smotherson

Contributing Writer

11www.theoakleafnews.com SPORTS

Ranked first in Northern Cali-fornia and third in the entire state, the SRJC volleyball team showed no weaknesses against the Co-sumnes River College Hawks on Nov. 4. The Lady Bear Cubs beat the Hawks with ease in three straight games.

“It was a good overall match,” head coach Kelly Wood said. “Play-ers who would regularly not be able to play got an opportunity and everyone contributed.”

Throughout the match, the team’s dominating skills and com-munication were on display. The first game started with seven straight points from the combina-tion of sophomores Sam Siebert, Taylor Nelson and freshmen Kristyn Casalino. The most com-petitive game of the match was the first with Cosumnes River scoring four consecutive points, but Nel-son was able to spike a powerful kill for the winning point in the first match, 25-9.

Siebert began the second game on serve scoring 10 straight points with the 10th point questionably touching a Hawk’s player on the way out of bounds. Cosumnes River’s head coach, Minet Gunther, did not agree with the referees’ call and showed her discontent. She jumped off the bench to shout at the net ref across the court who

made the call and who did not have the best vantage point.

“It was a bad call, but I didn’t know why she had to make a big deal about it. It was only the second game, but the match was pretty much over,” Wood said.

During the second game, the Lady Bear Cubs sustained long rallies and executed perfectly timed defen-sive blocks. SRJC won the second game 25-7.

Most of the sopho-mores and starters rested during the third and final game with Nelson and fellow sophomore Karimah Hay not playing at all. Even with many ex-perienced players on the bench, SRJC still dominated the rest of the match, winning the third game 25-12.

“We accomplished our goal of consistency,” Siebert said. “That’s what we were talk-ing about leading up to this game. Just stay consistent and take it one game at a time.”

Siebert leads the team and is first in the state with a staggering 813 assists, averaging 11.1 assists. She has also compiled 47 aces. Nel-

son, along with freshmen Olivia Urban, are battling for the team lead in kills with Nelson earning 236 and Urban 233. Urban was a standout at San Marin High School and is expected to be a cornerstone for the Lady Bear Cubs in the fu-ture.

Freshmen Brianna Adviento

from Analy High School has been a pleasant surprise at libero leading the team in digs with 244 and aces with 68. Adviento’s high school teammate, Margaret Barnes, leads the team with 53 blocks.

SRJC has three competitive conference matches left on the schedule before the first round of

the playoffs Nov. 22, but the team is just trying to concentrate on the regular season.

“We have three tough matches left against conference teams,” Wood said. “Sierra, American River and Sac City are all capable of winning. We just have to stay focused.”

Mischa Lopiano/Oak LeafSam Siebert starts the second game with 10 consecutive points on serve that help the Lady Bear Cubs clinch their 23rd win of the season. The Lady Bear Cubs currently rank first in Northern California and intend to dominate the state playoffs.

Spencer Harris

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Lady Bear Cubs serve for a state title

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Entering the Big 8 Conference Tournament on Nov. 4 in Stockton the Lady Bear Cubs were locked into a three-way tie for third place. All the team needed to do was beat the Fresno City College Rams to gain a playoff berth, but Fresno pulled out the win 10-7 advancing the Rams to the playoffs.

Heading into the season head coach Jill McCormick possessed a team full of freshmen and faced a very rigorous schedule.

“In our first 15 games we played the top ten teams in the state,” Mc-Cormick said.

The team finished this sea-son with an overall record of 9-15 and 4-3 in conference. This season marks the first since 2007 that SRJC did not qualify for the NorCal play-offs.

Throughout the year there was plenty of great play from some promising new faces. Freshman Gabi Slavid from Terra Linda

stepped up and led the team in scor-ing.

“It’s always exciting when a freshman player comes in and is a leading scorer for your team,” Mc-Cormick said. “Sometimes it’s a hard transition going from high school ball to college ball so for her to come out and be an offensive weapon like that has been really great.”

Another promising freshman, Brooke Wolford, originally slated to be the back up goalie behind Becca Woodruff, earned a starting spot at field position due to her excellent play. “She [Wolford] worked her way up to being a starter now and she was a big surprise for us this season,” McCormick said.

Brianna McFadden from Vin-tage High School in Napa also played solid defense this year. “She’s one of our key defenders,” McCor-mick said. “She’s our guard, she’s the person who deals with the other team’s center.”

The Lady Bear Cubs’ were an-chored this season by sophomore team captain Becky Bennigson

and sophomore goalie Wood-ruff. Bennigson is a well-rounded player who provided the team with leadership and experience. “Becky Bennigson has just been all around solid player and a lead-er,” McCormick said.

Returning from a great season last year earning a Big 8 Confer-ence All-Tournament appearance, Woodruff carried the team early in the season through some tough games. “We looked to Becca to be our last line of defense and some-times our first line of defense as far as early in the season,” McCor-mick said. “She’s definitely one of the best goalies in the north this year. She’s done great in the cage for us this season and that has been key.”

There were eight freshmen on the roster this year who gained invaluable experience from the leadership of sophomores Jill Vickers, Kristen Rydberg and Bennigson. Next season’s team should make a successful run for the NorCal playoffs.

That is how close the 2011 St. Louis Cardinals were from leaving Busch Stadium losers after game six of the World Series.

Instead, an unsung hero arose from the Cardinal’s dugout wear-ing number 23 with an improbable destiny awaiting him. Twice, David Freese should have been the last bat-ter the Texas Rangers faced last sea-son, however, fate had something else planned.

Entering the playoffs, Freese, the third-year Cardinal’s third baseman was the most unlikely candidate on the team’s roster to earn both the NLCS and World Series MVP. How-ever, Freese became the sixth player in MLB history to earn both awards in the same postseason.

Freese has never played in more then 97 games in a full season, has never hit more then 10 home runs and has never driven in more than 55 RBIs, but he found a way in the most important moment in his life to keep the St. Louis dream alive.

In the bottom of the ninth inning with two strikes and two outs, Freese forced extra innings by belting a tri-

Spencer Harris

Co-Editor-in-Chief

One strike away...

No playoff run for SRJC ple off the right field wall and sliding into third base headfirst, erupting the Cardinal faithful into disarray.

Then in arguably the greatest World Series game six played, Freese, in the bottom of the 11th inning hit a walk-off home run over the center-field fence, sending the series into a highly anticipated game seven. St. Louis won game seven the next day 6-2 achieving the franchise’s 11th championship.

Born in Texas but raised near St. Louis, Missouri, Freese grew up a Cardinals fan. Drafted in 2006 in the ninth round, 273 overall by San Di-ego, he spent two and half seasons in the minor leagues.

He almost converted to catcher in order to make the Major Leagues before the Cardinals traded for him from the Padres in 2008. He was not on the Cardinal’s radar until 2009 when the team’s star third baseman Troy Glaus suffered a career ending back injury, forcing St. Louis to make a drastic decision and call up the fu-ture MVP from the Triple-A Mem-phis Redbirds.

His first couple seasons he bounced in and out of the starting line up until the end of this season, when manager Tony La Russa finally made him a full-time starter at third base. A decision the Cardinal organi-zation must cherish.

Freese’s tale symbolizes the rea-son why athletes from all sports de-cide to play and pursue the game they love. He proved resilience and hard work over time can accomplish goals. Throughout college and the minor leagues Freese was not expected to be a full time starter at the professional level, but against all odds he earned the most prestigious award in base-ball, World Series MVP.

Alex Campbell

Staff Writer

Upcoming SRJC home gamesNov. 8 3 p.m. women’s soccer Cosumnes RiverNov. 12 1 p.m. football S.F. City CollegeNov. 16 6:30 p.m. volleyball American RiverDec. 9 10 a.m. wrestling California Community College TournamentDec. 15-17 TBA men’s basketball Kris Kringle Tournament