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of Contents | Click
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Capitol
Hill Update, February 2010
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It's
here! The
famous American budget pie!
Now with an even more gigantic
slice for the Pentagon!
Please download
this colorful PDF one page summary
and share with your friends and
family. You know they've been
wondering how much for the Pentagon
this year? More than ever!
58%! Yikes! |
| The
FY11 funding for Pentagon base budget
(Dept. of Defense plus nuclear weapons)
and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan:
$733 billion. This is 58% of the
federal discretionary budget. That
funding was $687 billion for FY10.
In the new FY11 budget the parts
of the budget not directly related
to security are FROZEN. |
|
State
of the Union: Hopeful but struggling
Why should the
Pentagon thrive while all other
"security" measures
suffer?
Tell President Obama that security
means caring
for all our needs; and budget
cuts HURT
Please
send an email today to encourage
him to modernize our defense budget
and be smarter with our dollars. |
 |
A
chance to CHANGE our nation's policies
on nuclear weapons
Raise
your voice about the upcoming "Nuclear
Posture Review"
Urge the President to keep his promises
about moves toward a world free
of nuclear weapons | Send
a message to your local media today.
|
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Join
in WAND’s campaign
Congress
Meets the Community
In the next year, Congress will
play an essential role in setting
the agenda for vital security
and budget priority issues.
Let
them know how you feel! We
can help. |
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The
Defense Budget
The
New York Times | Editorial
| February 4, 2010
Congress
now gets to poke, prod and, we
hope, seriously debate the budget
and the defense review. It must
start with another post-cold-war
notion: The country cannot
afford to write the Pentagon a
blank check. And that
means that Congress will have
to spend less time listening to
defense lobbyists and more time
thinking about the country's real
strategic needs. |
|
Slimming
Down the Defense Budget
By Lawrence J. Korb, Laura Conley,
Sean Duggan | February 2, 2010
Center
for American Progress
...Our troops
in Iraq and Afghanistan and their
families here at home must receive
every dollar needed to keep them
well equipped and safe. But the
federal government can and should
do more to rein in spending on
the investment portion of the
defense budget, which still includes
a number of outdated, over budget
weapons systems.
|
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Cut
the Pentagon, Too
Why Obama's spending freeze
should apply to (most of) the
military.
By Fred Kaplan | Slate
| Jan. 28, 2010
...Most
of this $382 billion consists
of weapons systems—combatant
ships, fighter jets, submarines,
heavy armored vehicles—that
the individual branches of the
military have been cranking out
for decades. If some Rip
Van Winkle had fallen asleep in
1982, woken up in 2009, and looked
at the U.S. military budget as
an indicator of what was going
on in the world, he would assume
that the Cold War were still raging.
|
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Nancy
Pelosi stays firm on defense funds
Politico
| January 28, 2010
Speaker Nancy Pelosi isn’t
backing down from her call to
freeze some military spending
— even as President Barack
Obama said that his proposed spending
freeze would apply only to domestic
spending while exempting military
and homeland security funds.
Pelosi said Thursday morning that
there should be a “bifurcation”
within the defense budget between
money that goes to troops and
money that goes to defense contractors.
|
|
...Women
in the arena don't need a brief,
polite round of applause for
their efforts; it's not enough
when they often have had to
work twice as hard just to get
into the fight. They need to
be recruited, supported, and
coached. Our political parties
need to encourage women to run,
donors need to open their wallets,
and the media needs to stop
with the random critiques of
female candidates' clothes or
hair or belabored debates about
whether a tear is from empathy,
grief, or exhaustion.
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Afghanistan's
Women: Are We Still Paying Attention?
by Sayre Sheldon, WAND's representative
to the UN
January
29, 2010
...87% of women suffer domestic violence, illiteracy is
88%, one in nine women die in
childbirth, 57% of brides are
under 16 and most marriages
are forced. These figures reflect
long-term problems for Afghan
women but now they are rising.
|
|
Membership
month events a big success!
Please
join us! We need YOU.
Arkansas
celebrated!
Our annual membership meeting on January 12 was a huge success! New and old
friends joined us for music,
great speakers, door prizes,
and delicious Mexican hors d'oeuvres.
Bobbie Wrenn Banks, WAND's Education Director,
was here to inspire us to take
advantage of the unprecedented
opportunity we now have to work
toward a nuclear-free world.
Christina Cernansky,
national coordinator for WILL,
also attended. Thanks to
our supporters for making this
a memorable event!
REAL
State of the Union returns to
Atlanta!
Tuesday, February
9th, 2010 -7:00 pm
Central Presbyterian Church
| 201
Washington St. SW
GA
WAND members march in the Martin
Luther King Jr. Parade 1/18/2010
Indiana:
State of the Union Watch Party
Oregon
WAND members present
to students at University of Oregon
A student wrote Prof.
Kirk after the class and said,
"It is quite rare that
we, as college students, get
to be involved in presentations
that are hands on and somewhat
youthful. Our attention was
definitely not lost and I think
everyone enjoyed the class as
a whole and learned a lot."
|
WiLL
Washington Director Christina
Cernansky (l) had a good romp
in the snow, which shut down
DC operations for quite a while
after the storm over the first
weekend in February! |
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Global
Zero Summit
Remarks
by Ellen
Tauscher,
Under Secretary for Arms
Control and International Security
Paris,
France | February 3, 2010
...My
friends, George Schultz, Bill
Perry, Henry Kissinger and Sam
Nunn, who some call the Four Horsemen
or the Four Wise Men have compared
the vision of a world free of
nuclear weapons to the summit
of a very tall mountain.
It's hard to see that peak from
where we stand today, and so we
first must make forward progress
that allows us to see that goal
as attainable and realistic. We
have a long journey ahead of us
and it's a journey that won't
be easy, but with your help and
your energy I believe that we
can get there.
|
US,
Russia nearing nuclear arms control
agreement
PARIS
-- The first major U.S.-Russian
nuclear arms control treaty in
nearly two decades should be ready
for signing by the end of March,
a senior Russian legislator said
Wednesday.
President
Barack Obama's top arms control
official, U.S. Undersecretary
of State Ellen Tauscher, said
the talks toward a successor
agreement to the now-expired
1991 Strategic Arms Reduction
Treaty are "in the endgame."
|
| Debate
heats up on Obama's nuclear agenda
Laura Rozen | Politico
| January 29, 2010
As Vice President Joseph Biden
took to the Wall Street Journal
oped page today to argue for Obama's
nuclear vision, security experts
and non-proliferation advocates
seized the moment to try to advance
Obama's ambitious non-proliferation
goals in the face of recent political
setbacks...
Obama
will have allies from across the
political spectrum if he goes
for the big enchilada in his nuclear
non-proliferation goals, including
a bunch of former Cold Warriors
now advocating the global nuclear
zero goal. One recent convert
to the global zero group, former
U.S. ambassador to Germany Richard
Burt, explained his conversion:
"Basically, my line on all
of this is that I think nuclear
weapons did play an important
[deterrent] role during the Cold
War," Burt said in an interview
last week. But "since the
end of the Cold War, whatever
deterrernt effect [they] provided
has been vastly overshadowed by
new risk of proliferation, especially
the specter of nuclear terrorism."
"I
think the U.S. has come to rely
very little on nuclear weapons
for defense," Burt continued.
|
|
New
documentary about the nuclear
tipping point
Order
a free copy of the movie on DVD.
Nuclear
Tipping Point is a conversation
with four men intimately involved
in American diplomacy and national
security over the last four decades.
Former Secretary of State George
Shultz, former Secretary of State
Henry Kissinger, former Secretary
of Defense Bill Perry and former
Senator Sam Nunn share the personal
experiences that led them to write
two Wall Street Journal
op-eds, in support of a world
free of nuclear weapons and the
steps needed to get there. Their
efforts have reframed the global
debate on nuclear issues and,
according to the New York
Times, "sent waves through
the global policy establishment." |
|
IRAQ
-- and now! Afghanistan as well!
|
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A
diplomatic surge for Afghanistan
by Lisa Schirch | Common
Ground News Service | 26 January
2010
After drinking
many cups of tea with over five
dozen Afghan civil society leaders
and government officials, one
theme stood out in my notes: Afghanistan
needs a coordinated, multi-pronged
peacebuilding approach to contribute
to the region’s complex
political chess game.
The
slow US diplomacy with the Taliban
may result from the conventional
notion of first imposing a painful
stalemate on the Taliban, bending
their will toward negotiation.
Yet history suggests successful
peace processes require a more
proactive, comprehensive diplomatic
approach.
...Most
importantly, if this country can
risk the financial and human costs
of sending 30,000 new US troops
to Afghanistan–costing up
to a million dollars each–surely
it makes sense for US Congress
to directly fund comparably cost-effective
Afghan-led civilian peacebuilding
efforts.
|
WiLL
member loses a squeaker in primary
for Congressional race
IL
State Rep. Julie Hamos narrowly
lost (48 to 47 percent) to Dan
Seals in the Democratic primary
for the 10th Congressional District
seat being given up by Republican
Mark Kirk.
WAND
endorsed Hamos, and the PAC
helped raise money for her campaign.
WAND and WiLL work hard to build
a pipeline of women leaders
who are willing and ready to
run for higher office; we count
48 women in the 111th Congress.
We
understand the challenge to
women in running, and express
our appreciation to everyone
who tries -- and one day, wins!
|
|
National
Events and Inspirations! |
Come
to Washington DC to Lobby Congress
March 14-17
The Alliance
for Nuclear Accountability’s
(ANA) annual DC Days training and
lobby meetings is an excellent opportunity
for activists to come to DC. This
year the training will be on Sunday,
March 14 followed by three days
of lobbying and activities (including
a fun pizza party and an awards
reception).
ANA
is a network of grassroots groups
around the country that live and
work in the shadows of nuclear
weapons facilities. ANA addresses
both nuclear weapons production
and disarmament issues and also
cleanup and protection of public
health and the environment at
nuclear weapons sites. The annual
DC Days training and lobbying
event provides a wealth of information
AND an opportunity to learn and
develop powerful grassroots lobbying
techniques. Students are especially
welcome.
For
detailed information and to register
go to ANA’s DC
Days
If you have any questions at all
please don’t hesitate to
contact Kathy
Robinson and be sure to let
us know if you are planning to
participate!
|
 |
Eliminating
War by Alan F. Kay and Dan Smith
Now in its third printing, Eliminating
War offers "practical and specific
ways to reduce the likelihood, risks,
costs, and lethality of current
and future wars." Get
your copy today! |
Click
here and find out more.
|
News
from WAND chapters and the
field |
Click
here and find out all about
what our chapters and partners are
planning for this month.
The
WAND News Bulletin is an announcement
service of WAND. The purpose of the Bulletin
is to share
news and ideas, and to offer the support
of a national network of active members
and partner organizations. WAND 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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