Subject: [big campaign] F-22 vote: 'The old ways are dead,' says USAction/TrueMajority
From: "Charney, Alan" <[email-masked]>
To: [email-masked]
Date: Tue, 21 Jul 2009 14:04:40 -0400
List-Id: <bigcampaign.googlegroups.com>

For immediate Release
For More Information Contact
July 21 2009
Matt Holland
More info online at
Pentagon Budget Campaign Director
http://truesecurity.usaction.org/ <http://truesecurity.usaction.org/>
[email-masked] <mailto:[email-masked]> 
 
802-318-5206

'THE OLD WAYS ARE DEAD:' SENATE VOTE STRIKING DOWN F-22 SHOWS WASTEFUL
PENTAGON SPENDING IS NO LONGER SACROSANCT 

Meanwhile, new USAction/TrueMajority radio spot tweaks House member who
took defense contractors' money and did their bidding

 

Washington, D.C. - Today's U.S. Senate vote to end funding for new and
unnecessary F-22 fighter jets shows a new willingness among some members
of Congress to examine wasteful Pentagon spending, despite the
considerable amount of influence defense contractors wield, USAction
said Tuesday.

"Common sense wins out," said Matt Holland, Pentagon Budget Campaign
Director for USAction/TrueMajority. "Now we will see if House members
get the message. The old ways are dead, and from here on out voters will
be scrutinizing the Pentagon budget to scrub wasteful and obsolete
weapons systems.

USAction/TrueMajority helped build the nation's leading coalition
educating the public about wasteful defense spending in general and F-22
fighter jets in particular. Members of the coalition include VoteVets,
Business Leaders for Sensible Priorities, Taxpayers for Common Sense,
Common Cause, Physicans for Social Responsibility, Women's Action for
New Directions and other groups.

Holland continued: "For the first time, we have seen a broad-based,
bipartisan agreement that we need to stop spending money on programs
that don't protect us and start spending money on things that do. And
that includes investments like quality, affordable health care for all,
education, clean energy and infrastructure."

Holland also announced that beginning Wednesday, a radio ad will air in
the St. Petersburg, Florida district of a member of Congress who took
more than $100,000 in campaign contributions from defense contractors
and repeatedly did their bidding in a House defense subcommittee and on
the House floor.

The ad features Mike Burns - a former US Air Force pilot and POW who
spent years in the same 'Hanoi Hilton' prison camp as Senator McCain -
who calls on Congressman C.W. Bill Young to reject his campaign
contributors and vote to end the F-22 Raptor fighter jet. 

"This is one of the most worthless and unnecessary programs and we've
spent 30 years dumping money into it," Burns says in the ad, "I'm asking
Congressman Young to vote against [the F-22]. Be a lion, not a gopher
for Lockheed Martin."

Congressman Young is one of a handful of Representatives who write the
FY10 Defense Appropriations bill, which includes the F-22. He is also
one of those appropriators that is the focus of a new report by
USAction/TrueMajority that profiles the web of connections between
powerful weapons manufacturers and House appropriators. The report,
Putting the Pork out to Pasture, can be viewed at
http://truesecurity.usaction.org/node/2

"Rep. Young received more than $100,000 in contributions from defense
contractors in 2008," Holland said. "So far this year, Young has already
asked for $40.1 million in earmarks for those same donors. Vets and
voters are asking - and rightly so - who Rep. Young represents: them, or
weapons-builders."

The F-22 was designed to fight the Soviet Union in futuristic dogfights
that never occurred. The plane has come under fire recently because it
has never been flown in combat or deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan - but
each F-22 costs over $350 million to build, and over $44,000 per hour to
fly.

Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and President Obama have led a major
push to end the plane's production - including multiple threats from
Obama to veto any military procurement bill that contains additional
F-22s.

Burns is a member of Florida Veterans for Common Sense, a group that
works to bring responsibility and effectiveness to military decisions.

USAction/TrueMajority's half a million members have pledged to keep
pressure on any member of Congress who continues to spend billions on
weapons we do not need while lining their campaign war chests with money
from weapons builders.

--~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~
You received this message because you are subscribed to the "big campaign" group.

To post to this group, send to [email-masked]

To unsubscribe, send email to [email-masked]

E-mail [email-masked] with questions or concerns
 
This is a list of individuals. It is not affiliated with any group or organization.
-~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---