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Ask your Elected Officials to Work for Peace

As the Bush Administration pushes ahead with troop increases and further stop-loss orders, Organic Consumers are urging state legislators to pass anti-war resolutions. The horrors of Hurricane Katrina proved that the states need the National Guard here for the inevitable disasters of the urgent climate crisis. We need to break our addiction to oil to bring an end to oil wars. Please send the letter below to your state representatives.

November 22, 2009

Subject:

It's time to end the war in Iraq, bring our troops home, restore Iraqi sovereignty and give the Iraqi people the support they need to rebuild their war-torn country. It is absolutely not the time to escalate troop levels. Over the last four years, the Bush Administration has been engaged in the invasion and occupation of Iraq, threats against neighboring countries, and a "global war on terror" that has undermined US and international law.

In the meantime, the climate crisis has grown from a threat to a reality. When the levees broke in New Orleans, the world watched as the the most powerful government in the world turned its back on hundreds of thousands of people who were killed, injured, or lost their homes.

There is a link between the war on Iraq and the failure to address global warming. The most obvious of these is expressed in the slogan that war resisters have used since the first Gulf War: No Blood for Oil. With every other reason for the war exposed as a lie, it is clear that the Bush Administration invaded Iraq to take control of its massive oil reserves.

In August 2002, Dick Cheney told the Veterans of Foreign Wars why Saddam had to be removed: “Armed with these weapons of terror and a seat at the top of 10% of the world’s oil reserves, Saddam Hussein could then be expected to seek domination of the entire Middle East, [and] take control of a great portion of the world’s energy supplies.”

In the words of President George W. Bush, it's time to break our country's addiction to oil. As long the US is addicted to oil, it will be involved in wars of aggression in the Middle East. I hope that you will use your position to help bring an end to oil wars and encourage investment in clean energy.

States have a unique role to play in this debate. Any attempt to escalate the war poses grave dangers to the National Guard -- a key emergency responder to natural disasters for state governments. Constantly
increasingly military spending means less federal resources are available for our states and local communities for health, education, and other vital programs.

Bush's proposed escalation is opposed by military experts, who know it threatens our military, and will do nothing to end the civil war in Iraq.

Please, make it clear that this escalation is unacceptable to you as our elected representative and opposed by the people of our state: Introduce a resolution opposing escalation in Iraq.

Details on what states can do regarding Iraq, the consequences of escalation, and model resolution language are all available from the Progressive States Network:

http://www.progressivestates.org/iraq

For more information on the links between war and the climate crisis, please see the Organic Consumers Association's Planting Peace Campaign:

http://www.organicconsumers.org/plantingpeace.cfm

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Organic Consumers Association - 6771 South Silver Hill Drive, Finland MN 55603
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