Please see these 2 very important articles and do everything you can to stop the House and Senate from giving away thier power to declare war; before one more person is harmed, before one more dollar is appropriated for war - without a Constitutional declaration first; no optional conflicts, no striking first ever! We can't afford it, and it's not very effective anyway; and it teaches our kids that using violence as a starting point is a "solution".
In Peace,
Colleen Fernald
http://warisacrime.org/...
The Worst Bill Ever in Congress
Submitted by davidswanson on Tue, 2011-05-24 04:36 Activism Afghanistan Congress Corporatism and Fascism Corruption Libya
The "Defense Authorization" bill now before Congress, HR 1540, is arguably the worst bill ever considered likely to pass into law. It includes $118 billion for wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, wars a majority of Americans wants ended. But that's not why it's the worst bill ever.
This bill also includes $553 billion for other military waste. That's enough money to save and improve a lot of lives if it weren't being dumped into the war machine. But that's not why this is the worst bill ever.
The bill limits the President’s ability to implement the New START agreement unless there is full funding for the nuclear weapons complex, bars the retirement of nuclear weapons until
http://davidswanson.org/...
Republicans in Congress to Crown Obama King
Thu, 2011-05-19 19:37 — davidswanson
Political Ideas
In what will come as a shock to the Tea Party and yet probably not rival the recent royal wedding in London for viewership, Republican Congressman Buck McKeon and Republican Senator John McCain plan to crown President Barack Obama King of America. They're not kidding, and this is no stunt.
Here's what noted Republican Abraham Lincoln once wrote on the subject:
"Allow the President to invade a neighboring nation, whenever he shall deem it necessary to repel an invasion, and you allow him to do so, whenever he may choose to say he deems it necessary for such purpose -- and you allow him to make war at pleasure. Study to see if you can fix any limit to his power in this respect, after you have given him so much as you propose. If, today, he should choose to say he thinks it necessary to invade Canada, to prevent the British from invading us, how could you stop him? You may say to him, "I see no probability of the British invading us" but he will say to you "be silent; I see it, if you don't." The provision of the Constitution giving the war-making power to Congress, was dictated, as I understand it, by the following reasons: Kings had always been involving and impoverishing their people in wars, pretending generally, if not always, that the good of the people was the object. This, our Convention understood to be the most oppressive of all Kingly oppressions; and they resolved to so frame the Constitution that no one man should hold the power of bringing this oppression upon us."