Congress is about to consider whether to vote for another $33 billion, not to continue but purely to escalate the level of war in Afghanistan by sending more troops and contractors. A No vote needs to be rewarded, and a Yes vote punished. So I am committing to vote for the reelection of any incumbent who votes No and against any who votes Yes. Here's a whip list:
Defund War

The peace movement shrank dramatically when a Democrat was elected president and the wars became "good wars." But it's been crawling its way back. After a small but impressive campaign against the June 2009 war supplemental, one would have expected a larger campaign against this spring's escalation supplemental. After all, the war in Afghanistan has worsened as a result of last year's escalation, the "this is the last supplemental" excuse looks even dumber the second time, the shine has worn off the new president in Washington, and a No vote just leaves the war at its current level (no "abandoning the troops" scares possible).

This week marks the celebration of the 40th anniversary of Earth Day, created in 1970 to raise awareness about unchecked environmental problems like air and water pollution.

The unexpected and overwhelming public support for the first Earth Day, which inspired 20 million people to demonstrate in rallies across the country, helped drive Congress to pass major regulations that remain the backbone of U.S. environmental law.

Four decades later, we need another groundswell of support to push lawmakers to address the biggest challenge now facing the earth: climate change.

This week, Senators John Kerry, Lindsey Graham and Joe Lieberman are expected to introduce their version of the long-stalled climate change bill passed by the House last year. One of our partners, Earth Day Network, will be holding a climate rally in Washington, DC late this week to demonstrate support for a comprehensive climate and clean energy bill that helps to rebuild our economy, secure energy independence, and address the climate crisis.

The Climate Bill is due on Earth Day. By all accounts it will be a nuclear bomb.

It will be the ultimate challenge of the global grassroots green movement to transform it into something that can actually save the planet.

For the atomic power industry, the bill will cap a decade-long $640-million-plus virtual cleansing of its radioactive image.

It will have the Obama Administration and Senators John Kerry (D-MA), Joe Lieberman (I-CT) and Lindsay Graham (R-SC) embracing very substantial taxpayer subsidies for building new nuclear plants.

Ditto new offshore drilling and "clean coal." The markers have been laid for a greenwashed business-as-usual approach toward pretending to deal with global climate change and the life-threatening pollution in which our corporate power structure is drowning us. All without actually threatening certain corporate profits.

The Editorial Board of the only daily newspaper of a major city plays an important role in addressing the conscience of the community.  Your editorial of April 15 accusing Governor Strickland and Chief Justice Eric Brown of politicizing the court sounds like an appeal to conscience but in its historical context appears more an act of hypocritical political partisanship. The Court was targeted for politicization in 2000 when even though Republicans held a five to two advantage, Democratic Justice Alice Robie Resnick was writing for a bipartisan four judge majority in the most important cases.  The Ohio and U.S. Chambers of Commerce spent $7 million of illegal corporate treasury money to defame Justice Resnick with a view to securing a more "business friendly" court. 

Congressman Dennis Kucinich said on Friday that he is working with Congressman Jim McGovern, a member of the Rules Committee, who has drafted a letter asking that the upcoming war supplemental be a clean vote not muddied by the inclusion of unrelated measures, such as aid to Haiti. I asked Kucinich if that request for a clean vote included a commitment by McGovern not to propose his own amendments, and Kucinich clearly did not know or did not want to speak for his colleague, but he expressed his own support for McGovern's exit timetable proposal. Kucinich said he expected the vote on $33 billion to escalate the war in Afghanistan to come up in the next two weeks.

Kucinich is, thus far, the only member of Congress who, to my knowledge, has publicly urged his colleagues to vote No. I asked him if he would urge them to join him in publicly committing to vote No ahead of time and in urging others to do the same. Kucinich said he was writing letters urging them to vote No, but did not reply on the matter of urging them to go public and whip.