On September 14th, by a one vote margin and one Republican voting "present" (abstention), the House International Relations Committee voted to block House Resolution 375, a Resolution of Inquiry introduced by Rep. Barbara Lee (D-CA) demanding that George Bush release relevant documents related to his administration’s use of intelligence to start the war in Iraq.
Since the publication of the Downing Street Memo and related documents (read them at AfterDowningStreet.org), it became clear to a growing number of people that Bush and his administration "fixed" pre-war intelligence and manipulated facts to support his long-held policy and firm intention of starting a war with Iraq.
It became clear that Bush and his officials lied to the public and to Congress about WMD in Iraq, terrorist links, and the imminence of Iraq's threat in order to gain support for war.
As a result 1,900 US troops have been killed, as many as 100,000 Iraqis have been killed, 13,000 troops have been injured, countless Iraqis have been injured, left homeless, without jobs, facing some of the worst terrorists in the world, and in a torn country.
The treasure of the United States – better used for preventing natural disasters and human catastrophe, provide universal health care, maintain our public schools, rebuild our infrastructure, create meaningful jobs with living wages, end poverty and homelessness, clean up a deteriorating environment, find alternatives to oil usage for our energy needs, and cure diseases – has been stolen to pay for this war.
While Saddam Hussein was a vicious dictator who held no love for the Iraqi people, a war based on lies and conducted by a single nation (we know the "coalition of the willing" was a fabrication) whose administration had ulterior motives for war was not a just answer.
As a result a broad coalition of organizations, publications, and individuals called on Congress to demand the truth by supporting Rep. Lee's resolution. While this specific action failed, the struggle for truth continues.
Tell your representative that you want him/her to fight for the truth today:
Supporters of democracy had a crucial victory last week, when a federal court told the FBI to lift a gag order that limits the Patriot Act debate. If affirmed on appeal, the judge's ruling would allow our client to speak about the dangerous provisions that allow FBI demands for library and Internet records.
This win in court could not be better timed for our work in Congress. And the momentum is on our side. As a joint "conference committee" prepares to meet on Patriot Act renewal, nearly 100 lawmakers have already joined "Dear Conferee" letters asking their colleagues to support the Senate reforms to the Patriot Act.
While not perfect, the Senate bill is a significant improvement over the proposals in the House version, which would do nothing to fix serious civil liberties threats in the Patriot Act and would actually make the law worse in many respects.
Urge your senators and representatives to support the Access to Legal Pharmaceuticals Act, ALPhA, S. 809 introduced by Senator Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ), and H.R. 1652 introduced by Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-NY) and Christopher Shays (R-CT).
This important bipartisan legislation will protect an individual's right to have access to legal contraception. If a pharmacist has a personal objection to filling a legal prescription for a drug or device, the pharmacy will be required to ensure that another pharmacist employed by the pharmacy who does not have a personal objection fills the prescription. This includes all legal prescriptions.
Under ALPhA pharmacists cannot prevent or deter an individual from filling a legal prescription for drugs or devices. Refusing to return or transfer a prescription would be prohibited under the ALPhA as well. The pharmacist cannot harass, humiliate or intentionally breach the confidentiality of the individual attempting to fill the prescription. The prescription must be filled without delay, and in a time frame consistent with the amount of time it would take the pharmacy to fill a prescription that is not personally objectionable to the pharmacist. Example: If it takes a pharmacy one hour to fill prescriptions for diabetes medication, it should take one hour to fill a prescription for birth control.
Reports of pharmacists refusing to fill legally-prescribed prescriptions for birth control, including emergency contraceptives, have surfaced in states across the nation, including California, Georgia, Louisiana, Illinois, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Missouri, New Hampshire, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Texas, Washington state and Wisconsin. These refusals to dispense prescription contraceptives appear to be based on a pharmacist's personal religious beliefs, not on legitimate medical or professional concerns about safety and the welfare of the customer.
The same pharmacists who refuse to dispense contraceptives because of their personal beliefs often refuse to hand a woman's prescription to another pharmacist on site or refer her to a different pharmacy. This further compounds their unprofessional action and seriously impedes the right of women to seek timely and safe prescriptions, especially when their whole physical, psychological and family planning future is at stake.
Save Our Courts Coalition Calls for Rejection of Roberts
Tell Senators: Roberts Fails to Demonstrate Commitment to Protecting Rights and Freedoms of All Americans
Judge Roberts is not committed to ensuring that the federal government will continue to play a strong role in protecting the civil and human rights of all Americans.
Judge Roberts firmly believes that states' rights trump civil rights and would render the federal courts or Congress powerless to remedy discrimination.
John Roberts opposes the empowerment of federal courts to invalidate "widely accepted state practices," even if such practices undermine voting rights. In previous years such a view would have compelled Judge Roberts to approve the poll tax or literacy tests because those were "widely accepted practices?" If his view had prevailed, our country's voting rights revolution would never have happened.
Roberts opposed intervention in a sex discrimination case against a state institution, claiming that "tight prison budgets" made discriminatory treatment of women "reasonable." Would Judge Roberts then apply the same argument to equal educational opportunities for women generally? Could states, in the name of saving money, refuse to provide equal health services to men and women?
John Roberts believes that Congress could exclude all school desegregation cases from the jurisdiction of the federal courts, applying a states' rights argument to allow segregation, a view that is simply a rejection of Constitutional law and one of the same basic arguments that justified Jim Crow
Intelligence and smooth talking is not the Constitutional test for determining whether a person is fit to lead the highest court in the land. Commitment to the fundamental principles on which our country was founded and the general expectations of mainstream Americans are the real tests.
John Roberts fails these tests.
***Take action! Call your senators (202-224-3121) and urge them to oppose the confirmation of John Roberts to chief justice of the United States. Tell senators that America can and should do better!***
