BILLBOARDS FOR PEACE

The Lafayette Area Peace Coalition (LAPC) is committed to continuing the campaign for peace in 2008. One new, and we think exciting, project is the display of highway billboards that call for peace in Iraq. We are planning to have billboards that say “Out of Iraq: NOW,” on display for one year at locations in the Lafayette area.

The first one has been been placed on I-65, approximately 1 mile south of exit 178 (State Road 43 near Battleground). It is visible to northbound traffic. LAPC continues to fundraise for the second. The cost is about $1,200 (about $100 a month) to rent each billboard for one year. If you are committed to bringing about peace in Iraq, please contribute to this project. Send a check to Sharron Howard, Treasurer, Lafayette Area Peace Coalition, 515 Kerber Road, West Lafayette, IN 47906. If you have any questions or comments contact: Sheila Rosenthal at rose.fam@verizon.net or Harry Targ at targ@purdue.edu)

LAPC believes that a permanently visible call for peace on public highways is an important addition to local efforts for peace. We hope you agree and will participate.

LAPC will have a table near the Lafayette Farmer's Market on Saturdays from 9am-12noon. Come visit us to sign petitions, get information, buy books, bumper stickers or buttons or find out about upcoming activities. This is a great place to reach out with our message to people in the community. If you can help staff the table, please contact Shirley Bosler at sbosler@tipmont.net or (765) 583-4747.

 What’s New

Read about the March 17, 2007 Rally in Terre Haute in the Trib Star:

“Wabash Valley Residents Protest Iraq War” Click here:

www.tribstar.com/local/local_story_076221319.html

LAPC t-shirts are here!
The new LAPC t-shirts are here. They are light blue with the LAPC logo in black and white on the front, and "Lafayette Area Peace Coalition" on the back. The shirts are available for $10 (to cover the cost) and a suggested $5 donation. Contact our treasurer Sharron at treasurer@lafayettepeace.org to purchase a shirt.

Public Forum on the War in Iraq

Four Purdue University Professors will speak to the unfolding crisis of events in Iraq on Thursday, January 19^th from 7-9 p.m. in Purdue’s Stewart Center Room 206.

 This free, public forum on the war, its causes and consequences will feature Janet Afary, Professor of History at Purdue and an expert on issues related to the Middle East; George Horwich, Professor Emeritus at the Krannert School of Management; Keith Shimko, Professor of Political Science, and Harry Targ, Professor of Political Science and American Studies.

 The Forum comes at a time when legislators in Washington are in fierce debate about timetables for bringing home troops and public support for the war is waning. President Bush has tried to make the war on Iraq the centerpiece of his war on terrorism. The Purdue panelists will discuss and debate these issues in short, prepared remarks. The audience will then be invited to discuss and debate the issues.

 The forum on Iraq has been organized by Professor David Parrish, Visual and Performing Arts at Purdue. Local sponsoring organizations include the Purdue College of Liberal Arts; the Purdue School of Visual and Performing Arts; the Purdue Department of Political Science; the Purdue Department of History; the Purdue Department of Foreign Languages and Literatures; The Purdue Program in American Studies. Other sponsors include Purdue Student Government; the Lafayette Area Peace Coalition; Pax Christi of St. Thomas Aquinas and Lafayette Friends Meeting.

 For more information about the Forum contact Bill Mullen at 494-3735 or bvmullen@purdue.edu or Sharron Howard at howardsp@purdue.edu 765-583-4178. 0

Looking for an easy way to protest Bush foreign policy week after week? And an easy way to help alleviate global poverty? Buy your gasoline at Citgo stations. And tell your friends. Of the top oil-producing countries in the world, only one is a democracy with a president who was elected on a platform of using his nation's oil revenue to benefit the poor. The country is Venezuela. The president is Hugo Chavez. Call him "the Anti-Bush."

T o t a l F e d e r a l F u n d s ( O u t l a y s ) : $ 2, 1 3 0 B i l l i o n

HOW THESE FIGURES WERE DETERMINED
From War Resister’s League see: http://www.warresisters.org

These figures are from a line-by-line analysis of detailed tables in the “Analytical Perspectives” book of the Budget of the United States Government, Fiscal Year 2006. The percentages are federal funds, which do not include trust funds — such as Social Security — that are raised and spent separately from income taxes. What you pay (or don’t pay) by April 15, 2005, goes to the federal funds portion of the budget. The government practice of combining trust and federal funds began in the 1960s during the Vietnam War, thus making the human needs portion of the budget seem larger and the military portion smaller.

“Current military” includes Dept. of Defense ($427 billion), the military portion from other departments ($106 billion), anticipated “supplemental allowance” ($25 billion), and an unbudgetted estimate of supplemental appropriations ($85 billion). “Past military” represents veterans’ benefits plus 80% of the interest on the debt. Analysts differ on how much of the debt stems from the military; other groups estimate 50% to 60%. We use 80% because we believe if there had been no military spending most (if not all) of the national debt would have been eliminated. For further explanation, see box at bottom of this page.

The Government Deception The pie chart below is the government view of the budget. This is a distortion of how our income tax dollars are spent because it includes Trust Funds (e.g., Social Security), and the expenses of past military spending are not distinguished from nonmilitary spending. For a more accurate representation of how your Federal income tax dollar is really spent, see the large chart (above). Source: New York Times, Feb. 8, 2005, based on Budget of the United States FY2006, Feb. 8, 2005.

lafayette area peace coalition
p.o. box 3125
west lafayette, IN 47906
E-mail: lafayettepeace@yahoo.com
Member of Indiana Peace and Justice Network
Contact the webmaster at webmaster@lafayettepeace.org
Last modified: Wed Mar 30 14:12:37 EST 2005