AfD signs onto letter requesting end to war funding

Alliance for Democracy has joined other organizations in signing on to a letter from United for Peace asking members of the congressional Progressive Caucus to amend the Defense Appropriation bill to eliminate funding for the war in Afghanistan, and to vote against the bill as a whole.

Your group may still be able to sign on to this letter--see this link for more info.

Dear Progressive Caucus member,

We write to you at a time of great peril for our nation. With an economy teetering and an exorbitantly expensive, protracted military engagement in Afghanistan, Congress has been asked once again to prioritize military spending over domestic needs with a total bill of $648.7 billion for the next fiscal year. A decade of war has brought us no closer to success in Afghanistan, where fewer than 100 Al Qaeda fighters remain.

The American people have grown weary of hearing that there is not enough money for schools, jobs, health care or housing yet always enough funding for wars. The US Conference of Mayors overwhelmingly passed a resolution to end the wars and bring the money home, amplifying the voices of their constituents.

The FY 2012 Defense Appropriations bill not only allocates $530 billion for the Pentagon, it also includes $118 billion to continue the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Now that the Obama Administration has clearly decided to continue the war in Afghanistan until at least 2014, the reasons to object are stronger than ever.

What values does the appropriation of $118 billion more for war suggest to the American people and the rest of the world, while at the same time the government is closing libraries and firehouses, laying off public servants and teachers, denying care to the sick and elderly, and abandoning quality education for children?

We note that the content of the proposed FY 2012 Defense Appropriations bill is directly at odds with the important principles, expressed in the CPC People's Budget, introduced earlier this year.

We therefore urge that the Progressive Caucus and its individual members support an amendment to the FY 2012 Defense Appropriations bill, which strikes out the funding to continue the war in Afghanistan and that the Caucus vote against the bill as a whole.

By signing below, we express our commitment to supporting the Progressive Caucus in its efforts to redirect our national priorities away from militarism and towards social justice here at home.

Respectfully submitted,