Valerie Cassity
Special to the Sun

Doing our part as American citizens to affect positive change in the U.S. was the message last Saturday, Oct. 25, at Frandy Park in Kernville at the third annual Freedom Festival put on by the Kern Valley Progressive Alliance for Change (KVPAC). Over 300 people came to show their support on the summer-like day for Barack Obama, preserving our rights as Americans, community activism, and much more.

The event began with a performance by Out of the Blue’s Mike Gallagher and Pat Seamount, accompanied by Katherine Edmonson and Gary Mazzola. They played many folk songs relating to peace, ending their set by leading a group-sing of John Lennon’s “Imagine.” At the end of the song, Gallagher encouraged everyone to “Keep on singing and keep on believing.”

Lizzie West sings “19 miles to Baghdad” at Saturday’s 3rd annual Freedom Festival staged in Frandy Park in Kernville.

Emcee Tony LaScala then took the stage, entertaining the crowd with his stand-up comedy. LaScala grew up in Kernville, but currently resides in L.A. working as an actor, screenwriter, and high school motivational speaker. There was a great message throughout the event for a need for change from the policies that the current administration has implemented, and several people called for accountability for the many crises they have caused. “Getting justice for the crimes that have been committed by this administration is an important part of recovering from the past eight years,” said guest speaker Cameron Melville, “It’s not about revenge, it’s about justice and preserving America.”

Throughout the day, KVPAC members spoke about the importance of getting involved, not only voting but working for a better world through their actions. The first of such speakers were festival organizers Bob Gross and Holly Spohn-Gross. “We are the change; it’s community,” said Dr. Bob Gross, who is running for a seat on the Board of Directors of the Kern Valley Healthcare District, “We are the ones who will bring about the change by looking around and telling our neighbors that we will help take care of them.”

Next up was a new song from Lizzie West and Baba Buffalo, progressive performance artists and social activists who returned to the Freedom Festival after kicking off their nationwide tour here last year. Their 2008 release, The Tumbleweed Cabaret is an interactive peace revival that is transforming audiences and bringing hope to people across America. West had the audience members memorize and sing the chorus along with her: Call your Senators and your Representatives/call all of the people we’ve hired/Tell them we don’t like the job that they’re doing/and if they don’t change their ways/They’ll all soon be fired.

Bernita Jenkins from the Obama Camp in Bakersfield, who was a delegate at hte Democratic Convention in Denver, next took the stage and encouraged everyone to take some time during the day to head over to the Democratic Headquarters in Kernville to volunteer at the phone bank they had set up there to encourage “fence-sitters” to vote for Obama. She outlined Obama’s plans for America, including health care, tax cuts for the middle class, alternative energy, and stopping the war in Iraq. “We don’t need another four years of the same policies; we can’t afford it, my children can’t afford it, and our grandchildren can’t afford it,” she said, “If you want someone who is going to make it better for our country, Obama is your President.”

Pivotal California ballot issues were also prominently featured, and speaker Keri Gross spoke against Proposition 4, which has been defeated twice before by California voters, and has been repackaged with the deceptive message that it is to “stop child predators,” when the issue in fact is notifying parents of teen girls before they can have an abortion. Gross is a Health Educator for Planned Parenthood of San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara and Ventura Counties. She teaches comprehensive sexuality education in local high school and middle schools; on the front line working with youth daily to improve communication and reduce teen pregnancies. “As an educator I know desperate teens will go to desperate measures. Some teens can’t or won’t go to their parents for whatever reasons. Tragically, some live in dangerous homes. Prop 4 would put our most vulnerable teens at risk,” said Gross, “Join me, the CA Medical Association, The CA Nurse Assoc., the CA school counselors and teachers in protecting teens safety by voting No on Prop 4.”

Local resident Celia Madison spoke about the other controversial measure on the California ballot this year, Prop 8. Madison and her partner were one of the first same sex couples to get married in the state of California and Kern county in particular, and she has since become an activist against Prop 8. “If you believe in the constitution, it’s important to vote no on Prop 8. It’s my rights at risk today, whose rights will be at risk tomorrow?” asked Madison, “It’s a group taking away a right from another group; we are doing nothing illegal and nothing harmful. I’m all for religious freedom but against religious tyranny.”

In addition to local speakers, many people came from quite a distance to speak to the people of the Kern Valley; some from as far as the east coast. For instance, Marc Susman, host of the “Money Message” on Air America, spoke about the financial crisis and what can be done by each of us to reduce the damage in our own lives. "Our financial lives have become a green arrow up, or a red arrow down. A one-dimensional view; the how much. The other dimensions - families, communities, and the world, have been hung out to dry. The cancer of subprime has stolen the American Dream and replaced it with a nightmare," said Susman.

Speaker Nadia McCaffrey encouraged the crowd to support the troops by demanding that they are brought home. When her son, Sergeant Patrick McCaffrey, died on June 22, 2004 in Iraq, Nadia began to focus much of her work on promoting peace and justice and reaching out to parents that have lost loved ones in the U.S. invasion and occupation of Iraq. Nadia received international attention as the "mother who defied the Bush Administration" when she asked the media to be present at the airport to photograph her son's flag-draped coffin. In addition, Nadia McCaffrey went on Global Exchange's trip to the Jordan and Iraq border at the start of 2005 with the Families for Peace delegation which delivered over $650,000 of medical and humanitarian aid for the thousands of refugees, mostly women and children, made homeless by the U.S. attack on Falluja.

McCaffrey is the founder of Veterans Village, a nonprofit organization that promotes mental and holistic wellness and palliative care for veterans returning from the war in Iraq and Afghanistan, especially those suffering from post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), by providing a live-in retreat village wherein with the help of trained professional staff and volunteers, veterans find inner healing and an eventual re-entry into society.  The keynote speaker of the day was Scott Ritter, author of Target Iran, Waging Peace and Iraq Confidential, was one of UNSCOM’s most senior weapons inspectors in Iraq between 1991 and 1998, after having served for eight years as an intelligence officer in the U.S. Marine Corps. Other featured speakers included political strategist and public speaking coach to the powerful and famous Richard Greene; the Young Progressive Majority, who work to get young voters involved in the political process; and Dwayne Hunn from the American World Service Corps (AWSC). “We need a new and different army. This all-volunteer 21st-century army must grow smarter Americans by doing good at home and abroad. The AWSC is that army. Had we implemented the AWSC decades ago, we'd not be in today's mess. If we do the AWSC soon, we could avoid the next killing mess,” said Hunn.

In addition to rousing speeches and musical performances by local artists as well as Alexa, Lizzie West and Baba Buffalo, and RJ Eskow, several booths were set up to educate festival goers about different issues related to democracy, activism, art, and peace. Abundant Harvest Organics handed out samples of Gaia melons and grapes, and Kern Kids Rentals also provided a bounce house to entertain the many children present at the event. The KVPAC booth was handing out Obama paraphernalia, selling peace cookies and t-shirts, and distributing pocket-sized copies of the U.S. constitution. Organizer Holly Spohn-Gross said she keeps a copy of it in her purse at all times. “I had never read it while in school,” said Spohn-Gross, who was particularly moved by the reason that the constitution was created. “It was written because our forefathers were in bondage. They wrote the constitution to bring liberty, which leads to freedom, which leads to abundance, which leads to complacency, which leads to apathy, which leads to dependency, which leads back to bondage. Therefore, if we do not take the words of our forefathers seriously, we can end up right back in bondage. That won’t happen as long as there are people willing to read and abide by the U.S. constitution and get involved.”