Dear Members. One needn’t be a pacifist to observe this: war isn’t solving the world’s problems. After years or, sometimes, decades of bloodshed, war has not brought peace, justice or security to Iraqis, Israelis, Palestinians, Afghanis, Pakistanis, Congolese, or Syrians. Americans who think a blank check for the Pentagon and an open-ended commitment to wage war on terror will make us safer should look at those conflicts and think again. When Congress elected to blow town without a debate or vote on President Obama’s war on ISIS, it told us all we needed to know. Its Members are more concerned with their reelection than they are with doing their job. A job they are both running for, and running from, at the same time. They need to be held to account. I’m writing to ask you to lets work together and hold them accountable. While the President maintains he has the authority to proceed with a full scale aerial assault and some 1400, and steadily increasing, ‘boots on the ground’, the House disagreed back in July, passing H. Con. Res. 105 stating clearly there is no legal authority for U.S. military involvement in Iraq without express Congressional approval. Now, back on the campaign trail, Lets all seize the opportunity to ask the hard questions at community meetings and candidate forums. Your contribution will help us all mobilize ourselves in this critical month prior to the November 4 elections. In the near term, forsaking the rule of law in favor of violent strikes may give some false satisfaction. In the long run though, a massive violent response to a small army of extremists means more mothers, brothers, fathers, sisters and children will be killed and even more radicalized to carry on this endless war. In the end, we will pay the price for giving in to fear and hate. This plays right into the terrorists’ hands. They want us to be controlled by fear and to resort to indiscriminate revenge. Resorting to wholesale violence brings us to their level. Such violence will produce the fear and hatred in their homelands that they need to prosper. It enables them to bring ever more violence against those they see as their enemies. There are alternatives: The President and Congress should: 1. Stop the bombing and military escalation. We’ve seen before how unintended consequences can spiral out of control, causing more pain and suffering in the region and hurting U.S. security. 2. Hit ISIS where it hurts: the wallet! Take steps to cut the cash flowing to ISIS. Crack down on Turkish, Iraqi, and other oil dealers who are purchasing ISIS’s oil on the black market, which would cut ISIS off from its most important revenue stream. 3. Build a coalition for a political solution, not military action! Support a United Nations-led effort to convene Iraq, Egypt, Turkey, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Iran, European Union and Russia to develop strong diplomatic, economic and political initiatives to restrict the flow of arms, militias and finances across borders. Support restarting UN-sponsored negotiations to end the Syrian civil war. Your support is pivotal to the success of our nation-wide organizing efforts to stop this cycle of endless war and bloodshed. We need your help to end this. Humbly for Peace.
Posted on: Thu, 02 Oct 2014 18:09:26 +0000
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