Pax Christi asks "What should Obama do first?"

cross-posted from: Progressive Blue: http://www.eenrblog.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=3428 Pax Christi asks "What should Obama do first?" by: Karita Hummer Thu Jan 22, 2009 at 02:01:52 AM EST

(Now, let's get down to business... - promoted by poligirl) Mr. President, we ask you! Pax Christi has asked its members on Facebook: "What should Obama do first?" Never shy at response, I offered my wishes, hopes and prayers there for Obama's first acts. This was my reply: 1. Obama should close Guantanamo and commit to International Law. He should end the War in Iraq. He should set up an international conference to deal with the Palestine/Israel conflict.*1 2. He should review the abuses of the (Bush) Administration and consider if crimes were committed regarding torture, wiretapping and civilian injuries in Iraq. *2 3. He needs to address Darfur. He needs to address the refugee crisis the Bush Administration inflicted on Iraq, and provide American remedies for the crisis we caused. 4. He also should investigate past election abuses and determine if crimes were committed in the execution of electoral processes. Old crime should not be swept under the rug. 5. He should commit to the Global Marshall Plan*4.. He should establish a Poverty Cabinet position and a department to address poverty in the world and here toward the end of eradicating poverty here and in the world. 4 6. He needs to strongly support unions right to organize and worker right to choose to join a union. 7. He should consider a Dept. of Peace. 8. He needs to set up a Watchdog Oversight mechanism for Lobbyists. Now that I think of it further, I would suggest that President Obama: 9. act boldly to initiate big infrastructure(as in building and digging and services, like Universal Health Care projects that resolve unemployment and global warming reduction at the same time - as among the biggest imperatives he has before him. *9 What would be on your wish list? More below...

That's all for now, Mr. President! So glad we have an ear in the White House. Karita Hummer For an abundance of information on solutions and remedies, and for ideas on how to advance and collaborate on such solutions, here are references for my wish list above: *1. On Gaza: http://www.spiritualprogressiv... *2. On Imperial Presidency and High Crimes: Elizabeth Holtzman, Holding Bush Accountable, The Nation: http://www.thenation.com/doc/2... and John Dean, John Dean: Will Obama Investigate Bush War Crimes? , the Nation: http://www.thenation.com/doc/2... *3 on Refugee Crises (of our making or that of others: International Rescue Committee http://www.theirc.org/, Catholic Relief Services, http://crs.org/ and Amnesty International, http://www.amnesty.org/ *4 On Election Theft and Electoral Reform and not letting high crimes of election theft go untried and unpunished and uncorrected, Velvet Revolution, http://www.velvetrevolution.us... Harvey Wasserman, A "Ten-Point Solartopian Starter Agenda for the Age of Obama", sub-section,"Universal Hand-Counted Paper Ballots", http://www.commondreams.org/vi... {{Harvey's total list with some surprises is great.}} Wikipedia has an enormous list of election reform groups and th national ones include: http://activism.wikia.com/wiki... [edit] United States [edit] National Election Activist Groups * 51 Capital March * Alliance for Democracy * Americans Coming Together * Answers.com * Audit the Vote * Backbone Campaign * Ban The Machine * Baker-Carter Commission * BlackBoxVoting.com * Black Box Voting.org * BradBlog.com * Bush Cheated '04 * Citizens Act * Citizens for Ethics * Citizens for a Fair Vote Count * Coalition Against Election Fraud * Coalition for Visible Ballots * David Cobb for President * Code Pink * Common Cause * Computer Scientist for Social Responsibility * Constitution Project * Count Every Vote * Dean People * Democracy for America o Election Reform Discussion Group * Demos * Election Assessment * Election Line * Election Science Institute (formerly VoteWatch) * Electoral Integrity * Electronic Frontier Foundation * Electronic Privacy Information Center * Electronic Vote and Democracy * ExitPollz * Fair Elections * Fair Vote * Help America Recount * Hunger for Democracy * Instant Runoff National List - Working to implement IRV everywhere in the United States * Investigate the Vote * Juice for Justice * Just a Fly on the Wall * League of Women Voters * Left.org * Lynn Landes - Voters Newswire * Mercury Coalition for Honest Elections * MoveOn * National Ballot Integrity Project * National Committee for Voting Integrity * National Network for Election Reform * National Voters Rights Coalition * National Voting Rights Institute * No Confidence Resolution * No Mandate * Nov2Truth.org * Nov3.us * Open Voting Consortium * Perfect Voting System * People For the American Way * Project Vote Smart * SAVE Democracy * Solar Bus * Stolen Election 2004 * This Time We're Watching * True Majority * Truth in Voting * US Counts Votes * US Voting Integrity Project * Vote America * Velvet Revolution * Verified Voting * Voice 4 Change * Vote Scam * Vote Trust USA * Voters For Open & Transparent Elections * VOTERGATE Resource Center * Voters Unite! * We Do Not Concede Coalition * Where's the Paper? * Working Assets: Work for Change * Email National Coalition for Verified Voting With that many groups(above)working on the problem of election reform (there is a recognition of the enormity of the problem and many solutions among them, to be sure.KH *5. On Poverty and Global Marshall Plan: Half in Ten: http://halfinten.org/ and http://www.spiritualprogressiv... *6 On Unions, Organizing and Joining Working America http://www.workingamerica.org/ and for a total potpourri of Union information, go to: http://www.aflcio.org/ Esther Kaplan, Can Labor Revive the American Dream?, The Nation, http://www.thenation.com/doc/2... *8 On Lobbyist Reform and oversight Obama should run (and we all should) to Change Congress and join with Lawrence Lessig and Joe Trippi in their efforts for lobbyist reform: http://change-congress.org/ *9. Environmentally Sound Jobs Creation: Bruce McF, "Transport Stimulus: You're Doing It Wrong" with commentss, Progressive Blue Blog, http://www.eenrblog.com/showDi... PLUS Green Jobs, Half in Ten, http://halfinten.org/category/... Green for All: http://www.greenforall.org/?gf... OK, enough of the problems and solutions, let's get to work on them in the Obama Administration and in Congress! Let's hear it for Progressive Law and Order. K.H.

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Prayers Before Going to Vote

Rabbi Michael Lerner



Karita Hummer's Gold Pen awarded to Rabbi Michel Lerner for his beautiful and inspirational prayer on the eve of the Election, after 8 long years of hardship. KH

Prayers Before Going to Vote
Posted Monday, November 03 2008 @ 01:00 PM PST

Cross-posted from Tikkun Magazine and sent to me as a member of Network for Spiritual Progressives

http://files.tikkun.org/current/article.php/20081016155033441

By Michael Lerner and David Seidenberg

Meditation or Prayer Before Going to Vote
by Michael Lerner

Thank You, the Power of Healing and Transformation in the Universe, that Your energy has moved through human beings in the past and inspired them to create democratic institutions that would give me and others this wonderful opportunity to participate in shaping our world. I know that the outcome of this election will have consequences for all six billion people on the planet, and that if democratic norms were to be fully established that they too would be able to participate in shaping the decisions about how the world's resources should best be used.

So I hereby take it upon myself to vote in a way that is sensitive to the needs of all the people of the planet, not just to those who are blessed to live in the richest and most powerful society. I recognize and affirm the unity of all being, and the interconnectedness and mutual interdependence of all people with each other and with the well-being of the planet itself.

As I approach this holy act, I recommit myself to the message revealed to the prophets and sages of old: that our highest task on earth is to bring more love and kindness, generosity and sanctity into the world, and that to do so we must vigorously pursue a world of justice and peace and avoid violence and hurting others directly or indirectly. May my votes actually contribute to these results.

Please give strength to those for whom I vote. If they are elected, let them actually contribute to achieving a world of greater peace, justice and love. If they are not elected, let my vote be one of the factors that contributes to empowering them to play a positive role in continuing their efforts for peace, justice and love, so that they represent my intentions and so that they do not personally fall back into despair or into personal opportunism and forget that they have the task of vigorously articulating the aspirations of those who were seeking through voting for them to bring more caring and more generosity into the world.

Give me the wisdom to understand those who do not vote in the way that I do. I already know that most people on this planet share with me the desire for a world of peace, justice, loving-kindness and caring. So it is hard for me to understand why they don't support the candidates who I see representing those values.

Please give me the wisdom to understand the complex psychological, social and political factors that could take fundamentally decent human beings and lead them into paths that may, I believe, lead to a world exactly the opposite of what they really want. And let that understanding empower me to be more compassionate in the way that I think and talk about those with whom I disagree, and more intelligent in finding ways to reach them, speak to their goodness, and bring them through my love and compassion for them to be able to see a better path to achieve the goals that they share with me.

From this point forward, I commit myself to seeing the good in all others, and to finding the decency and generosity in those who disagree with me, and to keep that in front of my consciousness even as I continue to disagree with the paths that they have chosen - and let that understanding give me even greater energy to act for the causes of social justice and peace.

Meanwhile, let me also have compassion for the leaders of movements and candidates for office whom I do support - let me not judge them for their personal failings, for the ways that they are not in their PRIVATE LIVES the fullest possible embodiments of the ideals that they articulate. Yet let me simultaneously have the energy and commitment to hold them accountable in their PUBLIC ACTS to working even harder for social justice and peace and ecological sanity.

I know that my vote is only one little part of the whole, and nevertheless I will not belittle what I am doing today in going to vote. But neither will I use this vote as a way of excusing myself from doing more. I commit myself to putting more of my time and more of my energy and more of my money into activities explicitly aimed at tikkun olam, the healing and transformation of our planet.

Please let me be witness to a dramatic surge of the world's energies toward love, justice, peace, nonviolence, spiritual awakening, and ecological sanity - quickly and in my lifetime, and let it be so. Amen. Shalom. Salaam.

Let there be peace on earth, and let it begin with us!

Rabbi Michael Lerner
Tikkun Community


Voting Prayer
by David Seidenberg

With my vote today, I am prepared and intending
to seek peace for this country, as it is written (Jer. 29:7):
"Seek out the peace of the city where I cause you to roam
and pray for her sake to God YHVH, for in her peace you all will have peace."

May it be Your will that votes will be counted faithfully,
and may You account my vote as if I had fulfilled this verse with all my power.
May it be good in Your eyes to give a wise heart to whomever we elect today
and may You raise for us a government whose rule is for good and blessing,
to bring justice and peace to all the inhabitants of the world
and to Jerusalem, for rulership is Yours.

Just as I participated in elections today,
so may I merit to do good works and to repair the world with all my actions,
and with the act of...[fill in your pledge]...which I pledge to do today
on behalf of all living creatures
and in remembrance of the covenant of Noah's waters
to protect and to not destroy the earth and her plenitude.

May You give to all the peoples of this country the strength and the will
to pursue righteousness and to seek peace as a unified force
in order to cause to flourish, throughout the world, good life and peace,
and may You fulfill for us the verse (Ps. 90:17):
"May the pleasure of Adonai our God be upon us, and establish
the work of our hands for us; may the work of our hands endure."


If you can't pray in a voting booth, where can you pray? And where would you need more to pray? This prayer is not about casting a winning vote or supporting a particular party. It's a prayer that peace may come through whomever is elected, on behalf of the whole planet. It's also more than that: you, the pray-er, are invited to add your own pledge that embodies the ideals you are praying for and voting for, to live your prayer. This pledge is based on the Jewish custom of pledging to give charity, when going up to the Torah. What is your pledge on the occasion of "going up" to the voting booth? The two lines following this pledge express the intention to act in the highest interests of all creatures. Please modify these lines to express in your own words why you act. Read the Hebrew version at http://neohasid.org/resources/votingprayer.

~ Rabbi David Seidenberg, rebduvid86@hotmail.com www.neohasid.org, www.savethenegev.org. © 2008