AfD - Campaign To End Nuclear Weapons In Space

The solution isn't to spend $85 billion and put a missile defense across this country which, in truth, couldn't work anyhow. It ends up being a flim-flam. And it really gets away from what we need to be doing, and that is talking, negotiating. And that's why I came up, that's why this idea of a Department of Peace becomes important, because we can start to use the considerable intellectual abilities which we have in this country, and spiritual talents, to talk about ways in which we can nurture each other, and provide for the survival of our specie, and all species. I have a website, and that website discusses this proposal, and we welcome the input from people, because we really need to have participation, and start a new dialogue.

Who says that this is what we are stuck with? That we are stuck with a world which is forever to be at war, and a country that is always going to use the treasure of its people to prepare for war? Why don't we start preparing for peace? Why don't we start making peace an inevitability? And do the work of peace? The daily work of human interaction, of people cooperating and working together and creating a new vision in this new millennium.

When we saw, in city after city, people letting go of their fear this new years eve, and letting go of the predictions of Armageddon, of Y2K failure of all kinds of support systems, of some kind of cataclysm being visited on the day of the new millennium. We saw people let that go, and go out into a joyous celebration of hope on the day of the new millennium, when the clock struck 12 across and around this world, that is what people are waiting to express, this sense of joy, this sense of togetherness. People are ready for that. It's there. We are seeing it. This idea of annihilation needs to continue to be balanced with the hope and the joy that we have as human beings for expression of ourselves and hope for others. We are at a moment in time where we can&emdash;it's all still within our hands.

And even though the policy-makers, and the Pentagon, some of them would envision this scenario of assured destruction, even though we have some people in elected office in Washington who want to conjure that, we can through our collective consciousness, create peace, through our desire to see peace, inform policies which are pacific. And we need to do that. We need to take responsibility.

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If someone is seeking a commercial opportunity in space, they take the risk. There's no obligation on the part of the United States of America to build a whole defense infrastructure to assure that satellites that go up there are always going to work. We don't know if satellites are going to work. They go up, they go down. That's, uh, we're not under any obligation as a nation to change our policy, with all the implications it has for world peace, by the way. It's ridiculous.

Furthermore, we have some real concerns here which we need to address. The NPT is at risk today. The ABM treaty is at risk, simply because the United States wants to put up a National Missile Defense, a nuclear umbrella over this country, which would violate the ABM at a time that the Russians, with their new leadership, have moved to improve START II, which would strongly limit their strategic arms. At a time when the Russians have moved ahead to approve a Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, while our US Senate has not.

We should be seizing this moment to move toward peace. And take the initiative, once again, which we have through seven US presidents, and find a way to come up with a constructive arms treaty, which does not defeat this whole concept of eventual, total, global nuclear disarmament. That's where we ought to be headed on earth and in the heaven.

- Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH)

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Video Interview on Book TV On Sunday, June 16 at 12:50 pm

The New Nuclear Danger: George W. Bush's Military-Industrial Complex

Helen Caldicott

Description: Antinuclear activist Dr. Helen Caldicott, author of "The New Nuclear Danger: George Bush's Military-Industrial Complex," discusses the Bush Administration and its connection to the nuclear weapons industry. Dr. Caldicott contends that the merging of weapons firms in the 1980s created powerful corporations able to influence foreign policy and manipulate public opinion. She argues that by lobbying for increased use of military force, weapons manufacturers ignore the best interests of the country and increase the threat of nuclear war.

Author Bio: Dr. Helen Caldicott is the founder of Physicians for Social Responsibility and a nominee for the Nobel Peace Prize. In addition to writing for numerous publications and she has authored four books, "Nuclear Madness," Missle Envy," "If You Love This Planet: A Plan to Heal the Earth" and "A Desperate Passion: An Autobiography." Dr. Caldicott is establishing a new organization called The Institute for Common Sense in the Nuclear Age. The institute seeks to educate and organize citizen for the purpose of opposing the nuclear policies of President Bush.

Publisher: The New Press 450 West 41st Street, 6th floor New York, NY 10036

http://www.booktv.org/General/index.asp?segID=2457&schedID=132

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An Urgent Call ...

End the Nuclear Danger

http://urgentcall.org/

UrgentCall.org is a new initiative to engage and educate a broad public about the growing danger that nuclear weapons will be used, and about practical steps to reduce that danger.

Previous waves of public concern&emdash;the protests against nuclear testing in the late 1950s and early 1960s, and the nuclear freeze movement of the 1980s&emdash;helped constrain and delegitimize nuclear weapons. Now the threat of nuclear catastrophe is increasing, and we need your help.

From the Nation

http://www.thenation.com/special/20020606call.mhtml

END THE NUCLEAR DANGER

AN URGENT CALL

A DECADE after the end of the cold war, the peril of nuclear destruction is mounting. The great powers have refused to give up nuclear arms, other countries are producing them and terrorist groups are trying to acquire them.

THE EVENTS of September 11 brought home to Americans what it means to experience a catastrophic attack. Yet the horrifying losses that day were only a fraction of what any nation would suffer if a single nuclear weapon were used on a city.

THE DRIFT TOWARD catastrophe must be reversed. Safety from nuclear destruction must be our goal. We can reach it only by reducing and then eliminating nuclear arms under binding agreements.

See the full article and additional websites at this web page.

http://www.thenation.com/special/20020606call.mhtml