[PAA-Discuss] Cluster Bombs, Made in America

[juli3 at aol.com]

Friends Committee on National Legislation

A Quaker Lobby in the Public Interest

















Dear Juli Kring,

The path to banning cluster bombs leads through Lansing, Columbus, and Indianapolis. If senators from Michigan, Ohio, and Indiana support a cluster bomb ban, the next administration and Congress are more likely to join the rest of the world in banning these bombs that keep on killing, years after they are dropped. The United States is the world's largest producer, exporter, and stockpiler of cluster bombs.





 
"Soraj Ghulam Habib lost both his legs to a U.S. cluster bomb he picked up when he was just 10 years old, playing in a park. You can't hear his story without wondering why the U.S. insists on using these weapons."
~FCNL Legislative Representative Lora Lumpe
Please support FCNL's work for a cluster bomb ban! 




That's why FCNL's Lora Lumpe spent two weeks this month driving a wheel-chair-accessible van around the Midwest. She organized this tour because FCNL wanted people in these key states to hear the stories of the 17-year-old Afghan boy who lost his legs, the Lebanese father whose five-year-old son was killed by these weapons, and the mother of a U.S. Marine who died in Iraq cleaning up cluster bomblets that the United States dropped.

Lora's cluster bomb tour succeeded. Now we need your help to sustain FCNL's effort back on Capitol Hill. In FCNL's 65th anniversary year on the Hill, will you make a special contribution of $65, $650, or $6,500 to help our uphill work for peace? With your partnership, we can ban cluster bombs.

FCNL's tour resulted in a city council resolution urging a cluster bomb ban, many public events, and media coverage across the Midwest. It touched the hearts and minds of more than a thousand people including representatives of the Catholic Archdiocese of Chicago and other religious communities, local elected officials, Arab Americans, Quakers, and college and high school students.

In each state Lora urged local leaders to reach out to their senators, and she explained why their particular senators need to act. Because of their committee positions and respect among their colleagues, Sens. Carl Levin, Richard Lugar, and George Voinovich could all be leaders in winning bipartisan support in the Senate for the cluster bomb ban.

Lora and her team need your help to sustain this work. In FCNL's 65th anniversary year on the Hill, will you make a special contribution of $65, $650, or $6,500 to help our uphill work for peace? 

Lora is also paying attention to the next administration. The Midwest tour included a stop at Barack Obama's campaign headquarters to meet with a sympathetic military and foreign policy advisor to the campaign. Here in Washington, she's reached out to John McCain'scampaign. Cindy McCain, John's wife, is on the board of directors of a group that specializes in removing landmines.

The cluster bomb ban still has powerful opponents in the United States. While the military leaders of more than half the world, including most U.S. NATO allies, have agreed to ban these indiscriminate weapons, the Pentagon insists the United States needs to keep them in its arsenal until at least 2018.

None of us can predict what the next president will do, but FCNL will make every effort to ensure that he and Congress understand these issues and are ready to act for human security.

Your contribution today will make a real difference.Can you make a special, secure online contribution of $65, $650, or $6,500 to help FCNL continue this work to ban cluster bombs? 

Thank you, 





Joe Volk
Executive Secretary

P.S. Read the stories the tour participants told audiences across the Midwest, and check out media coverage of the tour. 





















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