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Dear MoveOn member, Today's the day. Today we're launching a hard-hitting TV ad across the nation to underline our key message: "Let the Inspections Work." In December, we asked members to contribute $27,000 for a print ad in the New York Times. Within days, we had more than $400,000 committed to our ad campaign. This allowed us to do several print ads, including an ad in USA Today. To follow up, we ran a radio ad created by Betsey Binet, one of our members. But once we saw the avalanche of support, we knew it was time to go to TV. Over the holidays, we worked on the spot you'll see today. Our goal is to underline the risk of war and we've created a piece intended to provoke discussion and controversy. Without further ado, you can view the ad on the main page of our website at: http://www.moveon.org The ad is airing on TV stations in Washington, DC, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Philadelphia, Chicago, Dallas, Miami, Boston, Minneapolis, Phoenix, Cleveland, Portland and Seattle. The ad buy is largely on cable networks, and will show heavily on public interest shows on channels such as CNN and MSNBC for the next week. At 10am today in each of these media markets, MoveOn volunteers will be running press conferences for the local media. The press has already shown a great deal of interest in this story. Dan Rather broke the story last night, and Eli will be appearing on Good Morning America this morning. I've attached below an Associated Press story that's just hit the wire. The big story that's gathering steam is just how mainstream and broad the opposition to war is, as highlighted today in a Boston Globe article I've also excerpted below. That's exactly our intent with this ad. And just to drive the point home, more than 7,000 MoveOn members will be visiting more than 500 congressional offices across the county next Tuesday. Please stay tuned. And thanks everyone, - The MoveOn Team Carrie, Eli, Joan, Peter, Randall, Wes and Zack January 16th, 2002 P.S. By the way, for the congressional meetings this coming Tuesday we asked for your help to get another 30,000 signatures and hit the 200,000 mark. In 24 hours, you've given us three times what we asked for -- we've gotten another 90,000, putting us well over a quarter-million. You don't just hit our goals, you shatter them. Thanks. _______________ Excerpt from AP article ANTI-WAR GROUP REVIVES "DAISY" AD CAMPAIGN January 15, 2003 By IAN STEWART Associated Press Writer Revisiting one of the most effective television commercials in the annals of U.S. politics, a grassroots anti-war group has produced a remake of the "Daisy" ad, warning that a war against Iraq could spark nuclear Armageddon. The provocative 30-second commercial - released to the media Wednesday and appearing in 12 major U.S. cities on Thursday at a cost of $400,000, was prepared with the help of thousands of donations to the Internet-based group MoveOn.org. The original Daisy ad aired only once, during the 1964 presidential race. Produced by the campaign of incumbent Lyndon B. Johnson, it depicted a 6-year-old girl plucking petals from a daisy - along with a missile launch countdown and then a nuclear mushroom cloud. The suggestion was that if elected president, Republican Barry Goldwater might lead the United States to a nuclear war with the Soviet Union. Goldwater lost by a wide margin. The 2003 version follows the same format, with an added montage of scenes of military escalation: burning oil wells, tanks in the battlefield, wounded soldiers, chaotic protests in a foreign city and an ambulance racing through U.S. streets. Then, a similar mushroom cloud, and the screen goes to black, with a dire warning: "War with Iraq. Maybe it will end quickly. Maybe not. Maybe it will spread. Maybe extremists will take over countries with nuclear weapons. Maybe the unthinkable." Then, another "10... 9... 8...," countdown, and a final message: "Maybe that's why the overwhelming majority of Americans say to President Bush: let the inspections work." MoveOn.org's leaders hope the ad will enliven the debate on the specter of war - and persuade Americans to oppose a military solution in Iraq. "We're playing with matches in a tinderbox," Eli Pariser, MoveOn.org's international campaign director said. "We wanted to run an ad that would highlight that very real possibility and help encourage a national discussion about the consequences of war." ________________ Excerpts from today's Boston Globe FOES OF A WAR IN IRAQ SPREAD THEIR MESSAGE January 16, 2003 By Robert Schlesinger, Globe Staff WASHINGTON - The ad starts with a little girl pulling petals off a daisy and ends with a mushroom cloud - a startling image underscoring an appeal for peace. In an updated version of an infamous 1964 political spot, modern-day activists are trying to urge mainstream Americans to join the movement against war with Iraq. The 30-second television spot, which is scheduled to start running today in 13 cities including Boston, is illustrative of a preemptive peace movement that has been organizing against a war that hasn't started. The movement's leaders are using 21st-century tactics to spread their message beyond the traditional ranks of the antiwar movement. "Our members don't really consider themselves activists," said Eli Pariser, international campaigns director for MoveOn.org, the group that funded and produced the ad. "It's the first time they've been involved in political issues. So getting out in the street for them is a scary thought, but making contributions and helping pay for an ad is something they're only too willing to do." To produce and air the ad, MoveOn.org raised more than $400,000 over the Internet from more than 14,000 members between Dec. 5 and Dec. 7, according to the group, which came into existence in 1998 to advocate against impeaching then-president Bill Clinton. The group raised more than $26,000 from 1,000 donors in Massachusetts. ... "On Saturday, you will see many, many people in Washington, D.C., and some of them will be our members,'' said Pariser. ''But what's exciting about this is we can get people who are housewives in Arkansas or plumbers in Ohio also involved in the same political push. I don't think it's a change in tactics necessarily, [so much as] adding new tactics that haven't been available in the past to reach more mainstream audiences." The television ad is calculated to get this movement noticed by mainstream America. Starting with the girl and the daisy, the images shift to what peace activists say could result from a war in Iraq: burning oil wells, wounded soldiers, angry crowds. "War with Iraq. Maybe it will end quickly. Maybe not. Maybe extremists will take over countries with nuclear weapons," a voice-over says. The image returns to the little girl before flashing to a nuclear explosion. The final message in white letters over a black background is: "Let the inspections work," referring to what the UN weapons inspectors currently assessing Iraq's efforts to develop weapons of mass destruction. The ad mirrors the television spot "Daisy," which then-president Lyndon B. Johnson's campaign ran against Republian challenger Barry Goldwater, suggesting that Goldwater was too dangerous to have control of the US nuclear arsenal. That ad ran only once before being pulled, but it has been rerun countless times as a classic of negative political advertising. The new ad may mirror the old in more than just its theme: MoveOn.org spent the relatively small sum of $185,000 on air time, apparently hoping just a short run would generate media attention. "The 'Daisy' ad was this ad about the danger that we face as a country and about the choices we have to make sure the worst doesn't happen," Pariser said. "We felt like we're in a very similar situation right now. With the prospect of this war in Iraq, we are playing with matches in a tinderbox." MoveOn.org is part of the Win Without War coalition, one of several groups trying to organize a peace movement that encompasses people who have in the past been slow to join. David Cortright, the founder and staff coordinator of Win Without War, recalled that the group's genesis came during the October antiwar protest in Washington. The rally, said Cortright, "was all over the map politically and not very appealing to a mainstream perspective." At dinner that night, he and a few others discussed forming a coalition that would be "more welcoming to mainstream constituencies." "We wanted to project a more mainstream, patriotic message. We feel that the number-one concern about this whole policy is that it's going to harm our country," Cortright said. "We don't go off and start wars, at least that's our tradition." The Win Without War group, announced last month as a group of "patriotic Americans who share the belief that Saddam Hussein cannot be allowed to possess weapons of mass destruction" but which also opposes a military solution, was the result. The coalition includes groups ranging from the National Organization of Women to the National Council of Churches. "It's an attempt to recognize that it's not just the liberal left or the theological left or the political left that is organizing," said Dr. Bob Edgar, a former House Democrat from Pennsylvania who is now the general secretary for the National Council on Churches. "It's just average, ordinary, common people who don't normally get excited about issues of war and peace, but on this issue they believe that the administration has not made its case." Roger Stroope Austin College "Ideas are more powerful than weapons." "Individuals have international duties which transcend the national obligations of obedience…Therefore [individual citizens] have the duty to violate domestic laws to prevent crimes against peace and humanity from occurring" -- Nuremberg War Crime Tribunal, 1950 _______________________________________________ Sent via the discussion list of the Campaign Against Sanctions on Iraq. To unsubscribe, visit http://lists.casi.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/casi-discuss To contact the list manager, email casi-discuss-admin@lists.casi.org.uk All postings are archived on CASI's website: http://www.casi.org.uk