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The Progressive

NewsWire

A project of Common Dreams

For Immediate Release
Progressive Democrats of America (PDA)
Contact: Mike Hersh, PDA Communications Director,mike@pdamerica.org,Alan Minksy, PDA Executive Director:,alan@pdamerica.org

PDA Mobilizes Against Supplemental War Funding, Calls for Withdrawal Plan for Afghanistan

As the vote on the supplemental funding
bill has faced delays due to lack of support on both sides of the
aisle, Progressive Democrats of America has mobilized its members to
contact their representatives to ask they vote against it.

WASHINGTON

As the vote on the supplemental funding
bill has faced delays due to lack of support on both sides of the
aisle, Progressive Democrats of America has mobilized its members to
contact their representatives to ask they vote against it.

"Since
March of 2008, PDA's Healthcare NOT Warfare campaign has called for an
end to wasteful military spending and to redirect those funds to
meeting our domestic needs, starting with single-payer healthcare,"
said PDA national director Tim Carpenter. "The supplemental funding is
wasteful spending--we are supposed to begin bringing troops home from
Iraq in July of this year, and studies indicate that the allocation of
our resources in Afghanistan and Pakistan should be 80% for diplomacy
and humanitarian aid with 20% allocated for military purposes--not the
other way around, as it is in this bill."

Carpenter
continued, "We stand with Reps. Raul Grilalva, Jim McGovern, Lynn
Woolsey and others who will vote no on the supplemental, most likely
later today." See this video.

In
addition, PDA with major national anti-war groups will join together
for a National Day of Action on Afghanistan. The groups will ask
members of Congress to co-sponsor a bill by Congressman Jim McGovern, HR 2404 calling on the administration to develop, and present to Congress, an exit strategy for the war in Afghanistan.

"What
we are calling for today is a no vote on the supplemental, and if that
fails we will continue to push for support of Jim McGovern's HR 2404
and a clear exit strategy from Afghanistan," said Carpenter. "Members
of Congress will be hearing from grassroots activists throughout the
country today demanding an ending to funding of military escalation in
Afghanistan and Pakistan."

For more information on the McGovern bill, please visit: https://capwiz.com/pdamerica/issues/alert/?alertid=13483136

For more information on the Healthcare NOT Warfare campaign, please visit: https://pdamerica.org/articles/misc/2008-02-29-14-19-42-misc.php

Progressive Democrats of America was founded in 2004 to transform the Democratic Party and U.S. politics by working inside and outside of the party by working to elect empowered progressives and by building the progressive movement in solidarity with with peace, justice, civil rights, environmental, and other reform efforts. For more information about PDA, please see PDAmerica.org.

Progressive Democrats of America