Democratic National Convention Protests Need Help

This is Jim's email. Jim is a local organizer with Alliance for Real Democracy, which I have also been working with the past two months.

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Hi everyone,

As many of you know, for well over a year, I and countless others have been organizing the protests around the August 2008 Democratic National Convention in Denver. Many people have been asking me why I am protesting the Democrats as the belief is we need to do everything in our power to get them elected. Well, among many of the reasons I have for this, I can tell you I firmly believe history clearly shows us that if we want to see real progressive change in the United States and throughout the world, we must remain independent and speak truth to power. Thus, if we want to end the war in Iraq and Afghanistan, if we want environmental justice, if we want to challenge the racist criminal justice system, if we want to support immigrant rights, if we want equality for the LGBT community, if we want to truly support a woman's right to choose, and if we want to build real progressive social movements in the United States, then we must continuously challenge the Republicans and Democrats on their polices, or lack there of.

Therefore, come the middle of August I will be standing with and marching for real progressive change in our political system with a coalition of local and national organizations and activists called the Alliance For Real Democracy. This coalition represents some of the most powerful voices from Colorado and the nation, such as Iraq Veterans Against the War, CODEPINK, United for Peace and Justice, Veterans for Peace, Students for a Democratic Society, Rocky Mountain Peace and Justice Center, the International Socialist Organization, Jobs with Justice and many others.

I hope if you can make it to Denver you will stand and march in solidarity with us. If you can not make it, I ask that you still help us build the event. The Alliance For Real Democracy is planning large-scale marches, innovative workshops, teach-ins, non-violent trainings and concerts featuring major musical acts. Of course it takes a lot of money to make an event of this magnitude successful. Therefore, we need to immediately raise as much money as possible. If you or someone you knows supports this exercise of free speech please go to

www.realdemocracy2008.org

and use the chip in function on the front page to donate. If you would like to send a check, please send it to:

The Alliance for Real Democracy
P.O. Box 1156
Boulder, Colorado
80306, USA

(Checks made to Rocky Mountain Peace and Justice with ARD in the Memo)

ALL DONATIONS ARE TAX DEDUCTABLE.
And please remember what Frederick Douglass said in 1857:

"If there is no struggle, there is no progress… Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did, and it never will."

In Solidarity,
Jim