Election Materials Coming As we’ve mentioned before, the only consistent-life strategy for voting on candidates (as opposed to referendums) is to vote for a consistent-life candidate. Since those are hard to come by, certainly for higher offices, consistent-lifers use different voting strategies for the options actually available. But election campaigns are a prime opportunity to get the message out. During election season, we encourage attending forums and asking questions about the Consistent Life Ethic, leafletting and holding signs, and otherwise raising the connections between issues to call all candidates to more consistency. Such efforts are aimed also at educating the voters. We will soon have available a card for passing out, and a bumper sticker similar to the design of the front of our card: a photo of an unborn baby and a rainbow peace sign, saying “We’re Pro-Life Peace Voters. Where Are Our Candidates?” The other side of the card details what our ideal candidate would do.
Our ideal candidate would:
find creative ways to prevent and heal from war; actively pursue nonviolent options for genuine security that have been proven to work; know that recent wars have destabilized whole regions and increased terrorist attacks.
find creative ways to prevent and heal from abortion; actively pursue the well-being, health, and equality of women and children; encourage nurturing and avoiding harm to prenatal children.
work to abolish the death penalty.
pursue proper care of the terminally ill and respect for people with disabilities so “assisted suicide” wouldn’t be pushed on the lonely or disdained.
pursue remedies to poverty, racism, misogyny, and bigotry against people with disabilities, all of which can have lethal impact.
We are also working on two trifold brochures: one designed for our fellow prolifers and the other designed for our fellow peace advocates. We’ll have a page of action suggestions and resource downloads. Coming soon!
Planning for the U.S. Political Conventions
The Democrats’ convention will be held in Philadelphia July 25-28. The purpose of our presence would be to educate, at least at the level of handing out a card (content above), to whatever delegates, protesters, and journalists are willing to take them, with hope that helpful dialog ensues. CL board member Rob Arner (pictured with his children) will be coordinating our presence there. Anyone who would like to participate can contact weekly@consistent-life.org and we’ll send the message on to Rob.
There is no one yet volunteered for such work at the Republican convention, which is in Cleveland July 18-21. The Libertarian Party convention is May 27-30 in Orlando, Florida, and the Green Party convention is August 4-7 in Houston, Texas. For both of those parties, an exhibit table might be a possibility. If anyone is already going to any one of these and would like our leaflets, or would be willing to go in order to spread the consistent-life message there, please let us know at weekly@consistent-life.org.
Quotation of the Week Cyprian of Carthage, third-century North African bishop The world is going mad in mutual extermination. Murder, considered as a crime when committed individually, becomes a virtue when it is committed by large numbers. It is the multiplication of the frenzy that assures impunity to the assassins.
