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January 2007  News Bulletin Archive     

The WAND News Bulletin is posted on the web site monthly.
When it appears, WAND sends out a condensed version via email. If you would like to receive these email Bulletins, please let us know.

WAND was delighted to turn out on January 11 for the NO! More Troops events around the country. That's Betsy Rivard there (l), who serves on the National Board of the WAND Ed Fund.


Table of Contents | Click to move to content within the Bulletin.

Capitol Hill Update

Federal Budget Watch

Women's Voices

Nuclear Notes

Iraq Updates

News from WiLL

Faith in Action

Notable National Events

Ideas, Visions, and Resources for a Better World

Jobs and Opportunities

In the Field: WAND Chapter/Partner News & Events


Capitol Hill Update, January 2007

Happy New Year. As the 110th Congress takes up its (new, and different, and often delightful) business, we hope you will let them know how you feel about it.

It's up to you to stay informed and active, and to make sure they listen!

Today, our DC office urges you to do all you can to prevent a war with Iran. Pretty good for a start, eh?

And make sure to listen to the State of the Union address on Tuesday night! We'll send you more info about this next week.

Diplomacy, not war, with Iran
Tell Congress: Let’s do all we can to avoid military action against Iran

Send a message to your Representative and Senators today.

  • Support direct negotiations with Iran
  • Promote stronger cultural and people-to-people ties with Iran
  • Require a National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) on the status of Iran’s nuclear program
  • Assess the usefulness of so-called pro-democracy provisions

And NOW IS THE TIME TO BRING THE TROOPS HOME FROM IRAQ
Urge your Representative to cosponsor HR 508.
Take action, read more: here.


FEDERAL BUDGET WATCH

Olbermann: Special Comment on Sacrifice of War
To see video, click here.

...This senseless, endless war. But -- it has not been senseless in two ways.

It has succeeded, Mr. Bush, in enabling you to deaden the collective mind of this country to the pointlessness of endless war, against the wrong people, in the wrong place, at the wrong time.

It has gotten many of us used to the idea -- the virtual "white noise" -- of conflict far away, of the deaths of young Americans, of vague "sacrifice" for some fluid cause, too complicated to be interpreted except in terms of the very important-sounding but ultimately meaningless phrase "the war on terror."

And the war's second accomplishment -- your second accomplishment, sir -- is to have taken money out of the pockets of every American, even out of the pockets of the dead soldiers on the battlefield, and their families, and to have given that money to the war profiteers.

Because if you sell the Army a thousand Humvees, you can't sell them any more until the first thousand have been destroyed.

The service men and women are ancillary to the equation.

This is about the planned obsolescence of ordnance, isn't, Mr. Bush? And the building of detention centers? And the design of a $125 million courtroom complex at Gitmo, complete with restaurants.

At least the war profiteers have made their money, sir.


Brother, can you spare many billion dimes for a high tech weapons system?
We think it's gotta get better, but it only gets worse! We think the federal government will stop funnelling biiiiiiiiiilllllllllllliiiiions of dollars to the MILITARY INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX to make crazy blinking new weapons that NOBODY NEEDS, and instead send a few million to healthcare for poor children (wacky!) -- but they don't! (That's an exoatmospheric kinetic vehicle, and I'm not making this up. Boeing makes it. Take that, silly people who can't afford health insurance!)

They keep offering more and more semolians to the big defense contractors! And not the ones that make, like, pancakes and juice boxes for our troops. Or the ones who supply healthcare to old and sick veterans. In other words: NOT REAL SECURITY.

Nope. These are the ones who make toys. And PROFITS. Lotsa profits. For the boys at the top.

Grrrrrrrrrrrr. The New York Times just reported on it; then our friend Sayre Sheldon responded in a letter to the editor.


Heady Days for Makers of Weapons
By LESLIE WAYNE | December 26, 2006

THESE are very good times for military contractors. Profits are up, their stocks are rising and Pentagon spending is reaching record levels.

The only cloud might seem to be what the Democratic takeover of Congress could mean for their business. After all, this is an industry that has generally supported the Republican Party by sending about 60 percent of its political contributions to Republican candidates.

But, even so, few in the military industry are worried. Next year’s Pentagon budget is expected to exceed $560 billion, including spending for Iraq. And, sometime this spring, President Bush has indicated he will seek an additional $100 billion in supplemental spending in 2007 for Iraq and Afghanistan...

Evidence of the industry’s good fortune is reflected in the stocks of major contractors over the last year. At the end of 2005, the Lockheed Martin Corporation, the largest contractor, was trading around $62 a share. Now Lockheed is around $92 a share. Over the last year, Boeing, which holds the No. 2 position, saw its shares rise from about $66 a share to around almost $89 a share. Meanwhile, Raytheon stock has risen from around $39 a share to more than $53 a share in the last year and General Dynamics has gone from the high $50s a share to almost $74 a share over the same period.

“We certainly don’t foresee any change,” said Thomas Jurkowsky, a spokesman for Lockheed Martin. “You certainly cannot deny that there is a lot of uncertainty in the world — North Korea, Iran, Iraq. The Democratic Congress will see the reality of the dangerous world we live in, and will make decisions accordingly.”


And from Sayre's letter:

Knowing that our soldiers in Iraq do not get the equipment they need, and that billions of dollars continue to pay for anachronistic cold war weapons, we do not expect our new Congress simply to knuckle under to the defense contractors as they have in the past.

Our representatives have to learn that the citizenry doesn’t see it as being “soft on defense” when they restrict the enormous profits of the weapons industries, cut unnecessary weapons programs and ensure that the people who actually fight our wars get the protection they deserve.


What $1.2 Trillion Can Buy
By DAVID LEONHARDT | The New York Times | January 17, 2007

...But the deteriorating situation in Iraq has caused the initial predictions to be off the mark by a scale that is difficult to fathom. The operation itself — the helicopters, the tanks, the fuel needed to run them, the combat pay for enlisted troops, the salaries of reservists and contractors, the rebuilding of Iraq — is costing more than $300 million a day, estimates Scott Wallsten, an economist in Washington.

That translates into a couple of billion dollars a week and, over the full course of the war, an eventual total of $700 billion in direct spending...

Whatever number you use for the war’s total cost, it will tower over costs that normally seem prohibitive. Right now, including everything, the war is costing about $200 billion a year.

Treating heart disease and diabetes, by contrast, would probably cost about $50 billion a year. The remaining 9/11 Commission recommendations — held up in Congress partly because of their cost — might cost somewhat less. Universal preschool would be $35 billion. In Afghanistan, $10 billion could make a real difference. At the National Cancer Institute, annual budget is about $6 billion.

“This war has skewed our thinking about resources,” said Mr. Wallsten, a senior fellow at the Progress and Freedom Foundation, a conservative-leaning research group. “In the context of the war, $20 billion is nothing.”


Don't Grow the Army
Expansion Ducks the Real Question of Defining the Force's Mission

By Gordon Adams and John Diamond | December 31, 2006
Full article, click here. Washington Post

Army Chief of Staff Gen. Pete Schoomaker, The Post, the New York Times, and many Democrats and Republicans have converged over the past month in support of a serious expansion of the U.S. Army -- a permanent addition of 40,000 to 90,000 over the current ceiling of 507,000 troops.

This proposal is a bad idea. It is irrelevant to the stresses the Army is experiencing in Iraq. It would build enormous long-term costs into the defense budget, and it presumes a role in the world for the U.S. military that the voters emphatically opposed in November.

WOMEN'S VOICES

Notes from the WAND News Bulletin editor
Nancy Pelosi is Speaker of the House. Nancy. Not only is she a woman (!), she's a mom. And a grandmom. And these roles mean a lot to her.

I don't care if she manages to implement policies that make a real difference (though I certainly hope she does, and I think she might). Just her being there -- her panache, her presence, her personality, and her gender -- are making a difference.

I'm no pollyanna, that's for sure. And I find politicians a shady bunch, most of the time. But this thing -- this woman grabbing some real power -- it just rocks. It makes reading the paper in the morning just a little bit more fun.


Nancy Pelosi holds a tea; WAND staff go and celebrate "A New Direction"!
If you're a political addict like we are, it just doesn't get any better than that... Here are WAND Public Policy Director Marie Rietmann and WiLL Associate Christina Cernansky at the tea, flanked by those big video heads of Ann Richards and Nancy Pelosi. (And the cucumber sandwiches? We're not sure.)


More on a Woman Speaker of the House

David Broder on "Pelosi's House Diplomacy"

After a decade of bitter partisanship that has all but crippled efforts to deal with major national problems, Pelosi is determined to try to return the House to what it was in an earlier era -- "where you debated ideas and listened to each other's arguments."

That does not mean she is abandoning the Democratic agenda. Far from it. But it does mean that she has grasped the key to doing her job: "I am the speaker of the House," not the leader of the Democratic Caucus. She expects few interventions in floor debate, and she is picking her spots carefully from a flood of television interview requests.


Ruth Marcus on "Grandma with a Gavel"

The images as California Democrat Nancy Pelosi took office last week were striking -- and stirring -- in their unfamiliarity. Pelosi, holding her infant grandson swaddled in a white receiving blanket, as she sat in the well of the House, awaiting her election. Pelosi, with the assurance of a mother experienced at dispensing cookies to impatient toddlers, giving each child his -- and her -- turn with the gavel. Pelosi raising her hand to take the oath as her grandson, at her side, fiddled with grandma's papers.

As a journalist, I understand the calculations at work here: This plays to Pelosi's advantages, humanizes her image as shrill San Francisco Democrat. As a woman and a mother, especially as a mother of daughters, I was quietly thrilled. About the marble ceiling cracking, yes, but also about the way Pelosi cracked it -- reveling in, not minimizing, her mother- and grandmother-hood.

"Powerful" and "mommy" are not concepts we're used to holding simultaneously. We've become accustomed to women who appear comfortable wielding influence without denying their femininity; think Condoleezza Rice in those high-heeled boots or posing for Vogue in a strapless black gown.

But powerful women who also happen to be mommies have tended to play down the mommy thing, almost as if they think it would diminish their ability to be taken seriously. In a world where women are suspected of failing to comprehend throw-weights, having a baby on board isn't a traditional road map for success.


Victor Fazio on "It's really about '08, Nancy"  

Pelosi's First 100 Hours initiative has drawn some comparisons with the Republicans' 1994 "Contract With America," a package that sought to bring about major policy change over 100 days. But for Pelosi, the effort is less about radical policy shifts than about bringing policy in line with what Democrats believe is common wisdom to Americans. Stem cell funding, which has passed once and enjoys bipartisan support, is the quintessential example. However, even pay-as-you-go budgeting garners support on both sides of the aisle, including from Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan. Perhaps most significant, there has been bipartisan cosponsorship of proposals for lobbying reform, the minimum-wage increase, the 9/11 commission recommendations and Medicare drug pricing.


UN Report: January 2007
by Sayre Sheldon, WAND representative on the NGO Working Group for Women, Peace and Security

The major press interest for the U.N. this month has been the new Secretary General Ban Ki-moon. Before leaving, Kofi Annan made several very critical statements about U.S. policies. His tenure has been favorably judged and his ability to challenge the world to improve was notable. The new Secretary General arrives with more of a low-key reputation and immediately was criticized for seeming to tolerate the death penalty for Saddam and then for appointing as management undersecretary, Alicia Ibarra who is not seen as interested in making changes.

Secretary Ban was then highly praised by choosing a Tanzanian woman, Asha-Rose Mtengeti-Migiro, for the U.N.'s second highest post. Her appointment was greeted with enthusiasm by many: the South African ambassador said."Women are multi-tasking people. And African women are even better. Watch out!". Also favorably commented on so far has been the indication that Bush will send our present ambassador to Iraq in the place of retired John Bolton.A recent summary of U.N. peacekeeping missions lists them as 18: we are apt tp forget how much the U.N. is doing due to most of the attention going to places where it has had trouble being allowed in, such as Darfur.


Okay, so this is somewhat frivolous, but it's also quite tasty; and the piece itself does address why/how women's fashion choices are scrutinized more than men's... Plus, we just think Nancy Pelosi is the cat's pajamas, ya know...

Speaking Chic to Power
New York Times | January 18, 2007

During her first week on the job, Mrs. Pelosi clinched votes in the House on the minimum wage, financing for stem cell research and Medicare drug prices, drawing two veto threats (for research and drugs) from a notoriously veto-averse president.

And she did it looking preternaturally fresh, with a wardrobe that, while still subdued and overreliant on suits, has seldom spruced the halls of Congress. On Jan. 9, a Tuesday, she wore an impeccable black and white tweed skirt suit, with strong shoulders and the jacket nipped at the waist; on Wednesday, she draped a red shawl insouciantly around a red suit outside the White House; and on Thursday, she appeared in a mod, deep-blue velvet, slimming pantsuit.


NUCLEAR NOTES

Notes from the WAND News Bulletin editor
Today, I'm wearing my Chicken Little suit, and flapping my wings and squawking.

The sky actually is falling. We really are about to (take your pick): melt the polar icecaps and flood the rest of the world; get into a nuclear war that will incinerate us all; destabilize the Middle East to the extent that chaos reigns and energy supplies dwindle and halt the economy; incite the radical Islamic anarchists to wage war on the West for generations to come...

And this is all stuff we've done to ourselves... You do have to wonder if women would've made such a mess of it. Maybe so. Maybe not. But you don't have to wonder if women need to help fix it: the answer is clearly YES.


"Doomsday Clock" Moves Two Minutes Closer To Midnight
Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists Adjusts Clock From 7 to 5 Minutes Before Midnight; “ Deteriorating” Global Situation Cited on Nuclear Weapons and New Factor: Climate Change.
17 January 2007 | Full press release, click here.

The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists (BAS) is moving the minute hand of the Doomsday Clock two minutes closer to midnight. It is now 5 minutes to midnight. Reflecting global failures to solve the problems posed by nuclear weapons and the climate crisis, the decision by the BAS Board of Directors was made in consultation with the Bulletin’s Board of Sponsors, which includes 18 Nobel Laureates.


Busywork for Nuclear Scientists
New York Times Editorial
| January 15, 2007

The Bush administration is eager to start work on a new nuclear warhead with all sorts of admirable qualities: sturdy, reliable and secure from terrorists. To sweeten the deal, officials say that if they can replace the current arsenal with Reliable Replacement Warheads (what could sound more comforting?), they probably won’t have to keep so many extra warheads to hedge against technical failure. If you’re still not sold, the warhead comes with something of a guarantee — that scientists can build the new bombs without ever testing them.

Let the buyer beware. While the program has gotten very little attention here, it is a public-relations disaster in the making overseas. Suspicions that the United States is actually trying to build up its nuclear capabilities are undercutting Washington’s arguments for restraining the nuclear appetites of Iran and North Korea.

Then there’s the tens of billions it is likely to cost. And the most important question: Nearly two decades after the country stopped building nuclear weapons, does it really need a new one? The answer, emphatically, is no. This is a make-work program championed by the weapons laboratories and belatedly by the Pentagon, which hasn’t been able to get Congress to pay for its other nuclear fantasies...

America would be much safer if the president focused on reducing the number of old nuclear weapons still deployed by the United States and the other nuclear powers. The new Congress should stop this program before any more dollars are wasted, or more damage is done to America’s credibility.


WAND co-sponsors event with Iranian Human Rights Leader; No war on Iran

Women Nobel Laureates Dr. Shirin Ebadi and Professor Jody Williams visited Washington, DC January 8 to urge constructive US-Iran engagement. Dr. Ebadi, an Iranian human rights lawyer, won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2003 and Professor Williams, founder of the International Campaign to Ban Landmines, was the 1997 recipient. According to Dr. Ebadi, “It’s the people of Iran who have to gain their own freedom and human rights improvements. Military action or other punishments against Iran will make the situation for political reformists and human rights advocates in Iran a lot more difficult. I don’t think that Iranian human rights advocates need help of that sort of help from the governments of the West.”

Dr. Ebadi was one of the first female judges in Iran. She served as president of the city court of Tehran from 1975 to 1979 and was the first Iranian woman to achieve Chief Justice status. WAND cosponsored the visit of the two Nobel Laureates.

Dr. Ebadi and Professor Williams are members of the Nobel Women’s Initiative. It was established in 2006 by the six women who have won the Nobel Peace Prize. (Seven have won it but Aung San Suu Chii is not allowed out of her house by Burmese authorities.) It is the heartfelt mission of the Nobel Women’s Initiative to address and prevent the root causes of violence by spotlighting and promoting the efforts of women’s rights activists, researchers and organizations working to advance peace, justice and equality. It is the Nobel Women’s Initiative’s vision to create a culture of peace defined by a commitment to choosing non-violence and working for equality with justice. For more information, please visit www.nobelwomensinitiative.org.


A World Free of Nuclear Weapons
By George P. Shultz, William J. Perry, Henry A. Kissinger and Sam Nunn.
The Wall Street Journal | January 4, 2007

Nuclear weapons today present tremendous dangers, but also an historic opportunity. U.S. leadership will be required to take the world to the next stage -- to a solid consensus for reversing reliance on nuclear weapons globally as a vital contribution to preventing their proliferation into potentially dangerous hands, and ultimately ending them as a threat to the world.

Nuclear weapons were essential to maintaining international security during the Cold War because they were a means of deterrence. The end of the Cold War made the doctrine of mutual Soviet-American deterrence obsolete. Deterrence continues to be a relevant consideration for many states with regard to threats from other states. But reliance on nuclear weapons for this purpose is becoming increasingly hazardous and decreasingly effective.


U.S. moving to refurbish its nuclear arsenal
By William J. Broad, David E. Sanger and Thom Shanker

January 7, 2007 | WASHINGTON

The Bush administration is expected to announce this week a major step forward in the building of the country's first new nuclear warhead in nearly two decades. It will propose combining elements of competing designs from two weapons laboratories in an approach that some experts argue is untested and risky.

The new weapon would not add to but replace the nation's existing arsenal of aging warheads with a new generation meant to be sturdier, more reliable, safer from accidental detonation and more secure from theft by terrorists...

If Bush decides to deploy the new design, he could touch off a debate in a Democratic-controlled Congress and among allies and adversaries abroad, who have opposed efforts to expand the arsenal in the past. While backers of the new weapon said that it would replace older weapons that could deteriorate over time, and reduce the chances of a detonation if weapons fell into the wrong hands, critics have long argued that this is the wrong moment for Washington to produce a new warhead of any kind.

As the administration tries to persuade the world to put sanctions on North Korea and Iran to halt their nuclear programs, those critics argue, any move to improve the American arsenal will be seen as hypocritical, an effort by the United States to extend its nuclear lead over other countries. Should the United States decide to conduct a test, officials said, China and Russia — which have their own nuclear modernization programs under way — would feel free to do the same. North Korea was sanctioned by the UN Security Council for conducting its first test on Oct. 9.


Bush Picks New Head of Nuclear Agency
January 5, 2007 | AP Photo NY128
By H. JOSEF HEBERT, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) - The White House said Friday that President Bush has chosen a replacement for the man ousted as head of the government's nuclear weapons program in the wake of reports of embarrassing security breakdowns.

Bush selected Thomas P. D'Agostino, who currently serves as deputy administrator of defense programs at the National Nuclear Security Administration, to succeed Linton Brooks in the top job there on an acting basis.


Nuclear Traffic Doubles Since '90s
Reports cite sales, mishaps, scams
By Richard Willing, USA TODAY

Annual incidents of trafficking and mishandling of nuclear and other radioactive material reported to U.S. intelligence officials have more than doubled since the early 1990s, says the director of domestic nuclear detection at the Department of Homeland Security.

Also up: scams in which fake or non-existent nuclear or radioactive material is offered for sale, often online, says Vayl Oxford, nuclear detection director at the department.

"We sense that people have recognized the value of nuclear material as a useful way of making money," Oxford said. "Nuclear material is becoming a marketable commodity."


IRAQ UPDATES

Notes from the WAND News Bulletin editor

On top of everything else about this foolish foolish war, here's something that bugs me: the words.

Success. Victory. Cut and run. Losing. As if. As if there would EVER be winners and losers in this mess. As if our staying/escalating/surging could lead to success. Nothing we do now will fix this mess. The question is rather: how to make it least awful for our troops, our people, the Iraqis, the Middle East.

Okay, so. Success. The original "mission"? To root out those WMD. Well, that's done, sort of. So that's successful, I guess; or completely unsuccessful, take your pick.

The next "mission"? Topple Saddam. Done. Get an elected government. Done. Ensure their oil pipelines go in our direction. Done.

And then? Defeat the terrorists. Not done, never will be done. Stabilize the Middle East. Nope. Ensure peace within Iraq. Um, have you learned anything about it?

Here's some words: cockamamie. Pouring good money after bad. A strategic, moral, political blunder of the worst kind.

Ralph Nader, you got some 'splainin' to do...

And NOW IS THE TIME TO BRING THE TROOPS HOME FROM IRAQ
Urge your Representative to cosponsor HR 508.
Take action, read more: here.


NO MORE TROOPS! Over 1,000 events across the country 1/11/07 to say NO! to the esacalation in Iraq
To read media reports, click here.
The Win Without War coalition, and partner organizations, successfully organized over 1,000 events across the country.
Next up: January 27 March on DC!

In one town... WAND activists pitch in to say NO MORE TROOPS!

Residents protest Iraq plan

By THE GOSHEN NEWS STAFF | Click here for full article.

Approximately 75 residents of Elkhart County and the surrounding areas congregated on the Elkhart County Courthouse square Thursday to say “NO!” to President Bush’s recent announcement of an escalation of troops in Iraq.

“I didn’t know what to expect of the event,” said Karen Jacob, chapter president of Women’s Action for New Directions (WAND) of Northern Indiana that sponsored the “NO!” campaign Thursday. “There were 22 people signed up online when I left the house Thursday, so to have 75 show up, I was very encouraged to see that.”


Bush's legacy: The president who cried wolf
Olbermann: Bush's strategy fails because it depends on his credibility
Read or listen on msn.com

Only this president, only in this time, only with this dangerous, even messianic certitude, could answer a country demanding an exit strategy from Iraq, by offering an entrance strategy for Iran.

Only this president could look out over a vista of 3,008 dead and 22,834 wounded in Iraq, and finally say, “Where mistakes have been made, the responsibility rests with me” — only to follow that by proposing to repeat the identical mistake ... in Iran.


The Mess We Left Behind
By John A. Graham | The Washington Post | January 14, 2007

What President Bush wants to do is Vietnamization in all but name. Its purpose is not to win an unwinnable war, but to provide political cover for a defeat, and eventually to blame the loss on the Iraqis.

A temporary surge of troops will make no difference -- except to the Americans and Iraqis who will be killed. Increased training also will make no difference. What the Iraqi military and police need is not just technical skill, but loyalty to a viable central government that is nowhere in sight.

The surge will be reversed. The military force left behind to protect the president's "provincial reconstruction teams" will be drawn down to a bare minimum, further increasing the dangers for the Americans who remain.


William M. Arkin on National and Homeland Security | The Washington Post
War With Syria and Iran = Peace With Iraq?
Seek out and destroy.

If there's anything in the President Bush's remarks tonight that we didn't already know or didn't anticipate him saying militarily about Iraq, it is his evident willingness to go to war with Syria and Iran to seek peace.

Speaking about the two countries tonight, the president said that the United States wiill "seek out and destroy" those who are providing material support to our enemies.

It is only a threat. But it is a far cry from the diplomatic proposals floated just last month for making Syria and Iran part of the solution. Can the president really be saying that we are willing to risk war with the two countries, and even attack elements inside them, to achieve peace in Iraq?


Bipartisan Senate Measure Confronts Bush Over Iraq
By Jonathan Weisman | Washington Post | January 18, 2007

A bipartisan group of senators announced a formal resolution of opposition yesterday to President Bush's buildup of troops in Iraq, calling for more diplomacy, international cooperation and an "appropriately expedited" transfer of military responsibilities to Iraqi security forces.

The nonbinding resolution, which could come to a vote within two weeks, moves Congress a major step closer to a public confrontation with the Bush administration over war policy. A Senate vote would be followed quickly by action in the House. But even before the resolution's introduction, prominent lawmakers, including Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.), were pushing for far tougher measures that could cut off funding for the war and legislatively thwart Bush's "surge" of 21,500 additional troops.


Anatomy of a Wrong Approach
By David S. Broder | January 18, 2007 | Washington Post  

The third or fourth time I heard Vice President Cheney tell Fox News's Chris Wallace on Sunday that al-Qaeda was gambling that the United States "doesn't have the stomach" to keep up the fight in Iraq, it crossed my mind that Cheney may be staring at the wrong part of the national anatomy.

The question, really, is not whether we have the stomach for the fight but the brains to figure out what to do in Iraq.

The vice president's effort to reduce it to a question of courage -- to suggest that those who want to expand the war are braver than those urging steps to limit it -- is a standard rhetorical trick. Whenever any Bush policy is questioned, someone from the administration almost automatically charges that its critics are soft on terrorism.

Iraq requires thought, not just gut instinct, because we are struggling with a situation we've never faced before. What does America really know about how to deal with a Shiite-Sunni civil war in a land devastated by years of dictatorship, damaged by invasion, infiltrated by terrorists and surrounded by countries with their own territorial ambitions? Not much, which is why it behooves us to move with caution.

NEWS FROM WiLL

National Legislative Campaign to Highlight Impact of Troop Escalation on the States
On January 17, 2007, WiLL participated in a national conference call with state legislators all over the country to launch a state legislative campaign to prevent President Bush's escalation in Iraq.

Senator Ted Kennedy (D-MA), who is sponsoring federal legislation to prevent the President’s escalation, briefed over 200 legislators on Congressional efforts. Women Legislators' Lobby worked with MoveOn.org and Progressive States Network on the call.

Read an article about this effort.


WiLL at CPA conference
WiLL President, State Senator Nan Grogan Orrock (GA) (r) spoke with Congressman John Lewis (l) at the Center for Policy Alternatives conference, December 8-10, in Washington, DC. The focus of the plenary was the Common Sense Budget Act.

WiLL extends congratulations to Georgia Representative Roberta Abdul-Salaam, who just received the Hosea Williams Award for Community Activism in the individual category from the Office of Student Life and Leadership/Intercultural Relations at Georgia State University.

The award was presented January 18, 2007 in the Student Center Speaker's Auditoriumin at a celebration of the life of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.


Faith in Action

There is a Balm in Gilead
"For a decade now, I have owned a CD collection of some of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s speeches and sermons. I listen to it anytime I'm in need of some spirited inspiration. There's one excerpt from a sermon that I turn to whenever I need some encouraging..."

Awaiting the Birth of Peace
"Winter is the season of waiting, the season of faithful anticipation. In the midst of cold wind on frozen ground, we anticipate the warmth of God’s promise. In the days that become shorter and nights that become longer, we anticipate the light of God’s presence. We wait, we anticipate, we hope, because we need God to come to us again in a new way."

NOTABLE NATIONAL EVENTS


March to End the War | Washington, DC
January 27, 2007
Join United for Peace and Justice in this crucial push for peace!

The peace and justice movement helped make ending the war in Iraq the primary issue in this last election. The actions we take do make a difference, and now there is a new opportunity for us to move our work forward.

On Election Day people took individual action by voting. On January 27 we will take collective action, as we march in Washington, DC, to make sure Congress understands the urgency of this moment.


The Women’s Equality Summit and Congressional Action Day -
March 26 & 27, 2007

Over 400 will attend for a day of sharing information and strategies followed by a day of meetings with Senators and Representatives on Capitol Hill. Click here for more information!


IDEAS, VISIONS, RESOURCES FOR A BETTER WORLD

"The Dark Side" on PBS
Watch online or buy the video
Amid revelations about faulty prewar intelligence and a scandal surrounding the indictment of the vice president's chief of staff and presidential adviser, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, FRONTLINE goes behind the headlines to investigate the internal war that was waged between the intelligence community and Richard Bruce Cheney, the most powerful vice president in the nation's history.


Women Leading Change International
Professional, Personal, Spiritual Development for Women
Women Leading Change is an intensive program that has the potential to significantly impact your leadership and your life. The trifocal nature of the program entails a deep dive into self, career and soul. Since we also believe in having fun and providing space to rest the spirit as we grow, we have designed a five-day, four-night residential program to meet three times a year on the following dates:
April 11 - 15 2007 | October 10 - 14 2007 | March 12 - 16 2008

Graduate Certificate Program for Women in Politics & Public Policy at UMass Boston. Join other women from around Massachusetts, the nation, and the world in a challenging and exciting learning environment designed for women who want to make a change - and make a difference! Discover your public passion, develop your intellectual capacity and leadership skills, and meet women from diverse cultural and professional backgrounds in an environment that features both academic excellence and professional development.

Want to get a taste of how public policy works and how to make a difference? Understanding Public Policy, offered by the University of Massachusetts Boston's McCormack Graduate School of Policy Studies and the Division of Corporate, Continuing and Distance Education.


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Ah, but now you can get every little thing you need on amazon.com
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WAND is turning 25! It's a great time to be celebrating Women | Power | Peace!

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The WAND Bulletin Board is an announcement service of WAND. The purpose of the WAND Bulletin is to share news and ideas, and to offer the support of a national network of active WAND, WiLL and STAND members and partner organizations.

WAND / STAND chapters and partner organizations are encouraged to submit news for the Bulletin Board. Please send text in a form that is ready to be published without further editing. Email submissions to: bulletin@wand.org.

Statements posted on WAND’s Bulletin Board do not necessarily reflect the position of WAND.

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