Peace Voter 2012 – Tools to Bring Peace to the Polls!
When the lights went out at our Silver Spring home last Friday evening I got to thinking about how our tax dollars are constantly being squandered on war and militarism instead of our communities’ real priorities. And, I had plenty of time to think about that as the power was out for three days. Right now hundreds of thousands of people in the Midwest and Mid-Atlantic are still in the dark.
We could put people to work burying electric lines that are constantly brought down by storms like last Friday’s derecho that raged from Chicago to the Delmarva peninsula.
Climate scientists are already speculating wild storms like that one are part of human-caused climate chaos and more are to be expected. There’s a cost to building a national smart grid, but electrical blackouts cost the nation $80 billion dollars per year in lost business.
Federal spending priorities will be a central issue in the coming elections. Peace Action’s Move the Money campaign aims to turn out the lights on war and militarism. It’s time to bring the war dollars home.
I want to share some online tools I hope will help you in your online activism. Your messages to your elected representatives get their attention and our collective actions have a real impact.
First, Peace Action’s Voting Record will show you how Members of Congress voted on key peace and economic justice issues in the last session. This is the first year we designed our annual voting record as an interactive tool. I hope you find it useful.
Second, Peace Action is a member of Trusted Sources which will provide you information on election laws in your state, including what ID is required, how to register and where to go to report a problem.
Finally, I would like to draw your attention to a “Shaky Assumptions About Military Spending,” great piece published by North Carolina Peace Action’s Betsy Crites in the Durham Herald-Sun. It offers online activists an excellent set of talking points for your blogging, emails to your elected representatives, or letters to the editor.
The power came back on Tuesday evening at our home. Now it’s time to direct our collective power to stop the extreme right wing in this country from sending us back to the Dark Ages.
