PNA was published in the New York Times Sunday Dialogue, on how to safely cut nuclear spending by hundreds of billions of dollars.
If you agree, you can call your Senator now, at the Capitol Switchboard, (202) 224-3121, and ask for your Senators’ office. Also, you can support PNA’s efforts through your generous, tax-deductible year-end gift and become a Friend of PNA.
Thank you, and happy holidays!
Click here to read the November 12 New York Times Sunday Dialogue
Dear Friends,
First, thanks to all who helped send 5000 petitions to the Department of Energy to stop a new plutonium-pit facility, which could lead to new nuclear weapons, if a future president should order them. Our action, with many partners from coast-to-coast, helped spur the Congress to cut funding for this facility. (“Stop Nuclear Plant, Earthquake Zone”)
But there are plans for yet other new nuclear facilities. So, now PNA supports the Ed Markey Letter (D-MA), seeking co-sponsors to sign on to cut $200 Billion, over the next ten years, from the nuclear budget. (Markey Letter). We, and allies at PSR and other national organizations seek your help to send another 5000 letters in support to your Member of Congress. In Pennsylvania, so far none of our Congressional delegation have joined the House members from 17 states, to sign on to the Markey Letter.
Please call, or send your personal email or fax, through this easy link –just Click Here, to join this important campaign.
Finally, on Thursday, October 27, PNA will co-host with PSR/Philly, a Phone Bank Pizza Party, to get together to stop the large increases in nuclear spending. As Rep. Ed Markey has said: “That money should instead be funneled to protect social programs such as Medicaid, Medicare, and the Federal Pell Grant program” for college scholarships. We’re calling on the Super-Committee to cut such spending by $200 billion over 10 years– but they’re voting soon, so please join us this Thursday at 5:00- 7:30 PM! We will also ask people to call their Senators, to support the CTBT, or Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. PNA and PSR have supported early ratification of this treaty, which strengthens national security, and has been ratified by all our European allies, plus Russia and over 140 countries. The international monitoring system (IMS), already running, is not only preventing illicit nuclear tests from being carried out in secret, but detected the Fukushima tsunami and earthquake as well, in time to save many additional lives from being lost. We need to ratify the Test Ban, and you can help, by attending the October 27th Phone Bank Pizza party, 5:00 PM, at the PSR/PNA building, 704 N. 23rd Street, in Philadelphia. You can sign on for this, by calling PNA at 215-546-3030, or by Emailing infopna@gmail.com, by October 25th.
Thanks, and don’t forget you can also support PNA’s efforts financially, at Online Contributions.
We’ll look for your letter, and see you at the Pizza Party!
The New START Treaty will reduce the number of deployed nuclear weapons in both the United States and Russia from 2200 to 1550, and help build peaceful foreign relations. The treaty is supported by almost every past and current Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, by former Secretaries of State George Shultz, Henry Kissinger, James Baker, and Madeleine Albright, Colin Powell, and former Secretaries of Defense James Schlesinger, Frank Carlucci and William Cohen. However, the treaty can’t pass the Senate without pressure from constituents.
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If you are from one of the key states of ME, MA, NH, SC, GA, FL,TN, MS, KY, OH, IN, IA, SD, MO, KS, NE, OK, TX, WY, ID, UT, AZ, NV, and AK, we need your help getting your Senators to support the treaty. Their vote will help get the 2/3 majority support in the Senate needed for ratification. Send an email to your Senator asking for his or her support of the treaty, and call their office using the contact information compiled in our Key Senators list.
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The link below will lead you to the New START petition page. Enter your zip code, or copy the zip code from the Key Senators list we have provided. This will lead you to a draft letter in which you can add your thoughts to customize your own message.
On July 30th, the Project for Nuclear Awareness sponsored a packed screening of the provocative film by Lucy Walker and Lawrence Bender, Countdown to Zero. Afterward, there was a discussion at the Ritz Theater, featuring speakers Todd Fine, Countdown to Zero Researcher, Mary Boardman, PNA Assistant Director, and Kim Thao-Nguyen, of Ban All Nukes Generation USA, and producer of Disarm TV.
We’re grateful for all who attended, many of whom said they are moved to act on what they learned. Look for an audio recording of the discussion, and video interviews with audience members responding to the film, coming soon to DisarmTV. Share your thoughts about Countdown to Zero in in a video and send it to Emily at emily.pna@gmail.com, to have it featured on Disarm TV.
During the discussion, we agreed that the new START Treaty is not just needed, but essential. The Senate Foreign Relations Committee may vote on the Treaty as early as this week—so call or write your Senator, which you can do right here- every call and letter counts! PNA fully supports the Treaty, but not the deal to increase spending on the nuclear weapons complex. We believe this is both wasteful and counter-productive, in terms of the credibility that new START is regaining, after years of previous rollback on our solemn international commitments.
Another important conversation was about “nuclear policy champions” in the Senate. PNA has been working with Senator Bob Casey (D-PA), who has already stepped up on START and other key issues. An audience member noted: “We hope that both the Senator and others step up in support of the ultimate disarmament of our nuclear weapons.” In fact, Casey has supported the call by the President for a world free of nuclear weapons. What we’d like is a clearer statement by the Administration of the ways and means we’ll get there. In the end, we believe that people often lead their governments to change, as much as the other way around. This is why your votes, and your calls and letters are so important.
Yet another hot topic discussed on the agenda: We need policy champions on bloated spending, both on nuclear weapons and other weapons systems. We’re happy to see forward motion in the Report, Debt, Deficits, & Defense: A Way Forward, by the Sustainable Defense Task Force, commissioned by Rep. Barney Frank of Massachusetts.
As reported by CLW blogger Laicie Olson, we can save “nearly $1 trillion over ten years,” in this area alone. This is not just rhetoric, but carefully planned reductions that would not jeopardize security, according to discussions we’ve had with defense experts.
“I do not believe after this proposed plan is circulated that people will be able to dismiss the argument that you can responsibly, and at no cost to America’s genuine security, make reductions of over a trillion dollars for what has been proposed for the military budget,” Frank said at the release on Friday.
Cuts include further reductions to the U.S. nuclear arsenal and limits on the planned modernization of the nuclear weapons complex, which could save approximately $140 billion over 10 years. When missile defense and space spending are also selectively curtailed, that number is increased to $194.5 billion.
So write your Senator and House Member, the first on START and Zero Nukes, and both in support of the Task Force’s conclusions: We can safely cut levels of missile defense, we can cut unneeded systems, and we need to use the savings productively, in at least two ways.
One, we need to fund better verification of our treaties; this will make the ultimate dream of a nuclear-free world come closer to reality, as people gain assurance that all nuclear fuel cycles, all states with nuclear power, and all nuclear weapons remaining in arsenals are closely monitored. Two, we need a Fissile Materials Control Treaty. This is on the Obama administration’s agenda, and we need to push strongly for it to happen and not wither on the vine after the November election. This treaty, like START, will need money for verification—but much less money than we would spend on new weapons complexes, by a factor of ten or more.
The American people have to ask themselves: Do we want business-as-usual from the US Congress? Or do we want superior security and a peaceful foreign policy at a more reasonable price? Let them know what you think. Call, write, or visit Congress. If you are interested in upcoming PNA visits to Congress in early August and mid-September, please call executive assistant Emily Gleason, or Ed Aguilar, executive director, at 215-546-3030, or email emily.pna@gmail.com.
Target: U.S. Senate
Sponsored by: Countdown to Zero
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Nuclear weapons are the greatest threat to our personal safety and national security. The US and Russia are the largest possessors of nuclear weapons worldwide with over 9,000. Fortunately, we have an historic opportunity to reduce this threat.
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The US and Russia recently signed a treaty called the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) which will remove significant numbers of weapons from both countries arsenals. This is the first step in moving towards a world without nuclear weapons, but in order to be implemented, it requires approval by the U.S. Senate.
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Send a letter to your senators urging them to ratify the New START Agreement.
On Tuesday, May 18, the Project for Nuclear Awareness presented the inaugural Global Stewardship Award to Rev. Dr. Bob Edgar, CEO of Common Cause and life-long advocate for the sustainability, protection, and preservation of the global community. The evening featured an impressive array of speakers who discussed Rev. Edgar’s work as an advocate for peace, social justice, and good government.
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Rev. Bill Gray, former U.S. Congressman and longtime friend of Rev. Edgar’s, presented the award and discussed the ways in which their careers as ministers and elected representatives have run parallel to each other. Rev. Gray, a highly distinguished public servant and minister who remains the highest ranking African-American Congressman in the history of the House of Representatives, went further to note that his career and inspiration had, in fact, followed Rev. Edgar’s over the course of their long friendship.
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Rev. Gray was joined by Dr. Matthew Schwartz, John Grant, Craig Eisendrath, John Haas, Thomas Paine Cronin, Patricia Harner, and Rev. Bob Moore in honoring Rev. Edgar’s work. In addition to those community leaders offering remarks, the reception was attended by a diverse group of Rev. Edgar’s friends and colleagues from his time in Congress, at the Claremont School of Theology, at the National Council of Churches, and at Common Cause.
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The event offered these friends, colleagues, and activists an opportunity to re-connect and reflect on the intersections between environmentalism, peace advocacy, and social justice work. Rev. Edgar offered concerned citizens a list of five simple actions they could take to stand shoulder to shoulder with him:
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1. Campaign for the development of a flexible plan for military disengagement from Afghanistan by Congress and the White House.
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2. Insist that your Senators stand up now in support of the New START Treaty, which reduces the number of high alert missiles in Russia and the United States.
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3. Urge your Senators to support the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, which is the next step for US leadership in global nuclear disarmament and nonproliferation.
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4. Call attention to the gross distortion of our budget and wasteful military spending.
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5. Work with NGOs like Rev. Bob Edgar’s Common Cause, in passing the Fair Elections Now Act to ensure that the representatives in Congress speak for the people and not corporations and other special interest groups. To learn more, read Bob Edgar’s recent article in the Philadelphia Inquirer about the eletorate’s frustration with the status quo.
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Please honor Rev. Edgar’s work and join the Project for Nuclear Awareness and Common Cause in these important initiatives. To find out more about how you can take action, please contact the Project for Nuclear Awareness at infopna@gmail.com.
Check out more pictures from the Global Stewardship Award Reception on our Flickr page!
Tell President Obama and Secretary Clinton: Now is the time for concrete action on nuclear disarmament! Not only will your signature express support to the White House, but also to your Senator, throughout the United States.
Much has been promised. Let America’s president know that you expect his promises to be fulfilled.Click here to sign the petition!
Much encouraging progress was made at the recent Non-Proliferation Treaty Preparatory Committee session but we need to ensure that Secretary Clinton continues to provide leadership and commitment to the cause of nuclear non-proliferation.
Read the open letter and then sign on! CLICK HERE TO SIGN