Forum Post: "URGENT! Please Forward Widely!"

URGENT! PLEASE FORWARD WIDELY!

Dear Friends in the Peace Movement,

We can't afford to let this opportunity slip by. By taking action over the next five days the peace community has a chance to inject a compelling and courageous peace advocate into the 2012 presidential campaign, to have a voice in the national debate over war, militarism, and military spending.

You know what is going to happen if we leave this election up to the two major party candidates. President Obama will defend his troop surges, his excessive Pentagon budgets, his preparations for war with Iran, his escalation of the drone wars, his crackdowns on whistleblowers, his indefinite detention policy, and his new role as manager of the White House assassination list. Mitt Romney will not question these policies, but will promise to pursue them with even more enthusiasm. In debates and interviews, the American people will have the Big Lie drilled into their consciousness: that our nation must accept escalating military engagement and must visit worldwide violence against all who defy the U.S. government.

Jill Stein stands ready to challenge the Big Lie. Jill Stein, a physician from Massachusetts, who has been a national board member of Physicians for Social Responsibility, has just won 29 state primaries to secure the presidential nomination of the Green Party. She is putting some badly needed fundamentals for peace on the table: Cut the Pentagon budget by 50%. Halt the drone wars. Pardon the whistleblowers. Restore our civil liberties. Make the Middle East a nuclear-free zone. She is driving home the point that the Obama/Romney fascination with war and violence is dangerous for our nation and the world. We need to make sure she is heard.

Jill Stein is closing in on federal matching funds that would double the value of donations to her campaign. Because she doesn't receive big checks from Pentagon contractors and their lobbyists, public funding is essential to her campaign. She needs to raise about $24,000 by midnight on June 30th so that she can apply for matching funds.

That's not much money to ask of a national peace movement. We can do it. And the payoff for peace will be tremendous.

So we urge you do two things. First, go to Jill Stein's website: http://www.jillstein.org/donate, and make a generous donation to her campaign. Second, please forward this email to your friends and networks. Forwarding this message is critically important.

Thank you for helping us open up a dialogue for peace.

Sincerely,

David Swanson, author of War is a Lie and also of Daybreak: Undoing the Imperial President and Forming a More Perfect Union

Medea Benjamin, co-founder of CODEPINK

Chris Hedges, Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter and senior fellow at the Nation Institute

Leah Bolger, retired naval commander and current president of Veterans for Peace

George Martin, three term national co-chair of United for Peace & Justice

Bruce Gagnon, coordinator of the Global Network Against Weapons & Nuclear Power in Space.

Kevin Zeese, executive director of Voters for Peace

• organizational affiliations listed for identification purposes only

PS. While all donations are valuable, Jill Stein especially needs donations from the following key states to help her reach the required $5000 per state threshold. If you know anyone in these states, please ask them to make a donation of up to $250: AZ, CO, CT, DC, FL, ME, MI, MO, NC, NM, OH, OR, SC, TN and VA. Read all the nitty gritty details and updates here: http://www.jillstein.org/funding