OMNI NEWSLETTER: 4th SPECIAL NUMBER ON NUCLEAR WEAPONS AND GENOCIDE, JUNE 10, 2009, OMNI Building a Culture of PEACE, Seeking Truth and Taking Action Dick Bennett, Editor for Special Issues. (Contact Dick to help with them.) (See #1, June 14, 2007; #2, January 8, 2008; #3 May 16, 2008.)
If there were no nuclear weapons, they could not proliferate.
THANKS TO PRESIDENT OBAMA: The Obama administration has stopped talking about the unthinkable: using nuclear weapons in war. It and Congress should stop trying to fund new
nuclear weapons and work to eliminate them.
CONTENTS
Proposition One Team Coming to Fayetteville
Getting to Nuclear Zero
Obama’s Hope for Nuclear Disarmament
Fear- Mongering Iranian Nuclear Threat
For more of OMNI Nuclear Newsletter #4 go to www.omnicenter.org
Israel vs. Iran
Documentary Films
2008 Presidental Candidates on Nuclear Weapons
CND: Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (history)
Anti-Nuclear War Organizations
Vs. Univ. of California’s Nuclear Weapons Labs
UN vs. Nuclear Weapons
OMNI SPONSORING PROPOSITION ONE IN 2010 COMING TO FAYETTEVILLE FRIDAY JUNE 26, POTLUCK AT 5:00 PM AND FILM AT 7:00. Please help. We need coordinators for all and for the potluck and for the film.
Greetings. This letter is to connect with you, to let you know about the Proposition One in 2010! Campaign (our nationwide effort to mobilize grassroots support for Nuclear Disarmament), and to ask if you'd like to help us help you, and help President Obama, get rid of nukes ASAP. We will be coming through Fayetteville in late June and hope to organize a fun, energetic informational event at a good local venue. Can you help us?
Of course, we are thrilled to have a President calling for elimination of nuclear weapons. But if there is anything we know, it is that President Obama cannot succeed without the help of a mighty grassroots movement of support for Nuclear Disarmament. Like you, we know what enormous obstacles to disarmament he faces from the military, the nuclear weapons complex, the nuclear energy complex that feeds it, and the members of Congress who are ideologically and economically vested in the status quo.
Proposition One Committee knows the importance of grassroots action. Our continuous anti-nuclear vigil outside the White House since June 3, 1981, founded and still inspired by William "Doubting" Thomas, has planted seeds of hope with the millions of tourists who visit the White House each year (see http://prop1.org ).
In 1993, our petition drive put nuclear disarmament on the ballot as a citizen initiative in Washington, DC, and we won! As a result, DC’s Congressional Delegate, Eleanor Holmes Norton, has introduced Nuclear Disarmament to Congress nine times, and promises to do so as long as she's in office. This year’s bill in the 111th Congress is called the Nuclear Disarmament and Economic Conversion Act of 2009 (HR 1653). (Read the Bill at http://prop1.org/prop1/HR1653.ndeca.090319.htm )
Please make sure your Representative and Senators know about this bill, and ask them to actively support this legislation that would make the US a true leader towards global nuclear disarmament and economic conversion of the war machines to provide for human needs. (Solar panels and windmills, not missiles and bombs!) The phone number of the Congressional switchboard is 202-225-3121. If you achieve results, wonderful! If not, we can do more.
The single greatest obstacle to nuclear disarmament is the mistaken belief that it can’t be done. We know that we can and must do more to encourage hope and action. We want to share our story and inspire others with the conviction that global nuclear disarmament CAN be achieved. We recognize that little can happen without a major escalation in public education, advocacy and action. And we are doing it now, at this moment when President Obama most needs the support of a robust citizen movement.
Therefore, we are pleased to announce the Proposition One in 2010! Campaign. Our goals are simple: to inform local activists about the bill in Congress, and wherever possible to help put nuclear disarmament on the ballot in every state, city, and county jurisdiction that allows the citizen initiative. This summer, we will tour the country to visit every state in the continental U.S. that has the initiative process (and some that don’t), telling the story of DC Initiative 37 (Proposition One), and how it can be replicated across the country. Politicians pay attention to voter initiatives!
When we come through Fayetteville (on Friday, June 26), we’d like to link up with you to share some of our history and our vision, and to learn about yours. Since Arkansas provides for voter initiatives statewide, we'd love to talk with other interested people in your state about what it would take to put Nuclear Disarmament on the ballot there by 2010! (Also, there may be some cities or counties which allow initiatives, and there may be other means to compel nuclear disarmament onto the ballot - or legislative calendar - through citizen action.)
This is where you can help. We're looking for:
* Opportunities to present our story, program and proposition to your group, others like it, and to the public at large in your area
* Local venues where we could assemble, perform and organize (including already-scheduled events, like festivals or concerts in which we could play a part)
* Local performers, musical artists, educators and activists (ideally with popular appeal) willing to join the fun
* Contacts with friendly individuals who could provide short-term shelter for our team while we are in your area
* Endorsements of Proposition One itself (and our Prop 1 in 2010! Campaign) by you and organizations you're involved with
* Volunteers to help with publicity design, promotion and production of the event
* And of course, donations are always helpful. As a 501(c)4 non-profit organization, our work depends on contributions from generous groups and individuals.
Thank you for your time, and we hope to hear back from you. We value your help as an ally in the ongoing struggle to make our world a safer, saner, and more peaceful place. We hope you agree that this is a unique historical moment for previously unfathomable progress, and that the limits of what we can accomplish are only confined by the limits of our efforts and imaginations. And we hope you will support us by signing on to Proposition One, individually and organizationally, and in whatever other ways you can.
In Peace and Solidarity for a Nuclear Free Future,
Jay Marx, Campaign Coordinator and Ellen Thomas, Executive Director
202-682-4282 (DC Office) 202-210-3886 (Proposition One cell)
202-368-4690 (personal cell)
PROPOSITION ONE COMMITTEE, PO Box 27217, Washington, DC 20038
Peace House: 1233 12th St NW, Washington DC 20005
202-210-3886; 202-682-4282
http://prop1.org; et@prop1.org
GETTING TO ZERO
Recently, an informal poll by Gladys indicated that nuclear war was near the top of OMNI members’ concerns. These concerns can now share in a new, hopeful global movement for slowing the nuclear arms buildup and for eliminating nuclear weapons everywhere. It’s called “Global Zero,” the Global Campaign to create a World Without Nuclear Weapons (www.globalzero.org), and it kicked-off on Dec. 9, 2008 in Paris in a conference bringing together more than 100 leaders around the world committed to the goal of a world without nuclear weapons. Then on April 1, 2009, Presidents Obama and Russia’s Medvedev jointly “…committed [their] two countries to achieving a nuclear free world.” Three days later in Prague, Pres. Obama in a speech reinforced his commitment to leading an international effort to eliminate all nuclear weapons. Now global Zero is developing a step-by-step Action Plan for the phased elimination of nuclear weapons, and it will convene a world summit in early 2010. Did you miss the news? Well thank our mainstream media. The ADG gave an outrageously teeny report 12-7 on the Paris conference of Global Zero 12-9-. You would think a group of world leaders committed to eliminating nuclear weapons within the next 25 years, proposing deep cuts in US and Russian arsenals, offering a verification and enforcement system, and and phasingreduction leading to the elimination of all stockpiles would warrant front-page news. (See articles in The Defense Monitor (Nov.-Dec. 2008, April-May 2009). Each of us can begin to participate by supporting Pres. Obama in his commitment, and we can immediately contribute by writing/phoning our support and by signing the declaration on www.globalzero.org Also see “The Aspiration of Global Zero” by Robert Gard in In These Times (June 2009), a short but comprehensive summary of the problems facing Global Zero.. The Peace Movement has an important role to play in educating the public for nuclear disarmament and in ensuring the support of our congressional delegation. Dick
OBAMA’S HOPE FOR NUCLEAR DISARMAMENT
A rare opportunity to change U.S. policy toward nuclear weapons
President Obama has pledged to work to reduce and eliminate nukes. Urge him to take the concrete steps necessary.
In the next few months, his team will be composing the "Nuclear Posture Review."
Send a message.
President Obama laid out a compelling vision of a safer world free of nuclear weapons in his April 5, 2009, speech in Prague.
Right now, the Obama administration is conducting a Nuclear Posture Review that will set U.S. nuclear weapons policy for the next decade. This is the opportunity for the President's soaring rhetoric to be instituted in real world policy planning.
The President already understands that, in today's world, nuclear weapons create rather than reduce risks. Nuclear weapons do not help protect us from threats such as terrorist attacks, for example. The world has changed, and we need a new path to make us more secure.
In Prague, the President set off on that new path, stating "clearly and with conviction America's commitment to seek the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons." He pledged to "reduce the role of nuclear weapons in our national security strategy, and urge others to do the same."
Send a message. Please ask the President to ensure that his Administration's Nuclear Posture Review will "put an end to Cold War thinking," just as he has promised. The near-term plans that will be set forth in the Review should both reflect and further the ultimate goal of eliminating nuclear weapons.
Thank you.
P.S. If you’d like to work with WAND staff regarding these nuclear weapons issues, please contact me: krobinson@WAND.org, (202) 544-5055 ext. 2605 and participate in our Congress Meets Community Campaign.
Take action! Please consider these small but significant actions:
Write a letter to the editor! Click here to find media outlets in your area.
Women's Action for New Directions
781-643-6740 | e-mail: peace@wand.org
691 Massachusetts Ave.
Arlington, Massachusetts 02476
IRANIAN NUCLEAR THREAT?
Anti-Empire Report, June 5, 2009
http://www.killinghope.org/bblum6/aer70.html
SENATOR LINCOLN (202) 224-4843 Fax: (202) 228-1371.
Fayetteville office: 251-1380; www.lincoln.senate.gov; http://www.lincoln.senate.gov/index.cfm; http://www.lincoln.senate.gov/webform.html
SENATOR Mark Pryor: Phone: (202) 224-2353 Fax: (202) 228-0908. www.pryor.senate.gov ; http://pryor.senate.gov/contact/
CONGRESSMAN Boozman: Lowell office: 479-725-0400.
DC address: 1708 Longworth House Office Bldng., Washington, DC 20515; 202-225-4301.
For more of OMNI Nuclear Newsletter #4 go to www.omnicenter.org
--
Dick Bennett
jbennet@uark.edu
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