“If they’re having an Arab Spring against militarism and injustice and inequality, can we have an American Spring?” asked Maryland State Senator Jamie Raskin at a Sept. 20 town hall at the Silver Spring Civic Building.
Tuesday’s “Take Back the Budget Debate” was sponsored by over 60 progressive groups from Maryland and organized by the statewide coalition “Fund Our Communities, Bring the War Dollars Home.” Other speakers included State Senator Roger Manno, Heather Boushey with the Center for American Progress and Karen Dolan with the Institute for Policy Studies.
(Video courtesy of Thomas Nephew)
Jean Athey, chair of the Fund Our Communities coalition, said in a press release, “This Town Hall targets the disgraceful budget deal, unending wars, and other current outrages. Money spent on unnecessary wars, weapons systems, and foreign military bases should instead be invested in our communities. We demand a politics that is right and fair and just.”
Raskin said, “We gather tonight in a nonpartisan or a bipartisan or a multi-partisan fashion, so I thought I would just kick us off by citing our last great Republican president, Abraham Lincoln, who spoke of ‘government of the people, by the people, for the people,’ which is the proposition that’s being tested tonight.
“It’s the same proposition that was being tested… by President Eisenhower, who over 50 years ago warned us of the growth of permanent war as a threat to democracy, to liberty and to people. And it’s perhaps a sign of how far we’ve come, or how far we’ve sunk, that no one in national political life, Republican, Democrat or other, cites to that great speech by President Eisenhower.”
Related Links:
www.OurFunds.org
www.NewPrioritiesNetwork.org
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