As you you know, tomorrow is the 2008 US presidential election. With millions of citizens—and a ton of ONE members amongst them—heading to the polls in a matter of hours, we wanted to remind you that both presidential candidates have gone On The Record for the ONE Campaign, and told us in great detail what they plan to do to fight extreme global poverty.
With the election fast approaching (tomorrow!) Brian Sweeney wanted to reflect on some of the great accomplishments ONE volunteers and activists have achieved in the great state of Pennsylvania this election season.
I wanted to take the opportunity to thank all of our Pennsylvania ONE Volunteers for all of their hard work in helping to raise awareness for ONE’s initiatives! The ONE volunteers seen here with Congressman Tim Holden are Dan Donmoyer, Marie Smith, and Renee Allen. All three volunteers have been extremely active and have been very successful in energizing people around them to get involved with advocacy.
I also want to mention volunteers Abbey Fisher and Matt Schaeffer. Abbey does a lot of work with Jubilee USA and helps support ONE by attending as many events as she can. Matt Schaeffer is a senior at Lebanon Valley College where he has started a ONE Chapter and participates in our OCC program.
Thank you to all of our amazing Pennsylvania ONE volunteers who also participate by making phone calls and signing petitions to help the world’s most vulnerable! Many people are contributing in various ways and I simply cannot say enough or give enough praise to everyone who has given their time! THANK YOU ALL!
Here’s a brief update on some of the exciting activity going on in Ohio
Candidates and campaigns are jockeying in the final days until Election Day to earn votes and get their message across. ONE is also working hard to get our message across to not only voters, but also to the candidates.
Over the past six months, Ohio has become ground zero for the presidential candidates. As the candidates have crisscrossed Ohio, ONE has been there, discussing the issues surrounding global poverty. In the week leading up to the election ONE has been to several McCain and Obama events, each time drawing the attention of the crowd, the media, campaign staff or even the candidate.
While ONE in Ohio will spend the next 48 hours making its presence known, ONE’s work does not end on Election Day. Just last week ONE delivered petitions to the state campaign offices pushing for whoever is elected to keep their promises of ending global poverty.
With less than a week before Election Day, ONE volunteer Dan Donmoyer and I joined volunteers across the country in dropping off petitions at various state offices. We stopped by both the Obama and McCain headquarters in Harrisburg, PA to help remind both presidential candidates of the commitments they made to help the world’s poorest people when they went On the Record with the ONE Campaign.
During these times of economic instability in both domestic and global markets, we must not forget about the world’s poorest people who are especially vulnerable during times of economic hardship. We should continue to support smart, affordable initiatives that are making a real difference for millions around the world.
This month over 68,832 ONE Members nationwide and 2,849 in Pennsylvania, signed a petition asking that:
As you work to find a solution to the global financial crisis, please do not waver in your support for the world’s poorest people. It is now more important than ever to stand up for effective, efficient solutions that save millions of lives, strengthen the global economy, and win the hearts and minds of people around the world. I’m keeping my commitment to fight global poverty, and I ask you to do the same.
Even when we face challenges here at home, we must continue to lead, work to strengthen America’s global reputation, and make our world a safer and better place.
South Florida ONE volunteers were hot on the campaign trail yesterday, representing ONE at back-to-back rallies for Senator John McCain and Senator Barack Obama.
In the morning we went to the Everglades Lumberyard in Miami to hear Senator McCain speak. He was accompanied by fellow Republicans Governor Charlie Crist, Representatives Mario Diaz-Balart and Lincoln Diaz-Balart and Florida’s former Governor and current ONE Vote ’08 Co-Chair, Jeb Bush.
Just a few hours later Senators Obama and Biden held a campaign rally at the Bank Atlantic Center in Fort Lauderdale. Just when we thought we were not going to be able to get in, the security guards let us through and we found great seats just behind the stage.
With the election right around the corner, ONE volunteers are working harder than ever to maintain their strong presence on the campaign trail in Florida and to show the candidates that regardless of party affiliation, fighting global disease and extreme poverty must be a priority in the next administration.
America.gov this week featured two articles outlining and detailing each US presidential candidate’s policies in regards to combating poverty and disease in Africa. Each article features a major campaign surrogate discussing his respective candidate’s plans—Howard Wolpe for Obama, Herman J. Cohen for McCain. Both are rather illuminating and definitely worth the read.
A McCain administration would place even more emphasis on promoting private-sector economic development in Africa, Cohen said.
“The Millennium Challenge Corporation is very strong on private-sector [development], and I think you will see the United States Agency for International Development moving to finance even more private-sector activity to help even more Africans themselves become investors,” he predicted. “Now that Africa is becoming more open to the private sector, they need the infrastructure to make it work. “
An Obama presidency will “greatly facilitate the diplomacy required to try to make some progress on these difficult issues,” such as the humanitarian crisis in the Darfur region of Sudan or the political situation in Zimbabwe.
In the long term, Wolpe said, the central challenge facing Africa is the building of cohesive states. An Obama administration would be particularly focused on helping Africans search for common ground and eliminate conflict across the continent, he predicted. “Unless you can tackle that issue, the prospects for long-term sustainable economic development will be constantly compromised,” he said.
Cindy and Rudy were greeted by hundreds of elementary and high school students at the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia yesterday. But of course their visit wouldn’t be complete without greetings from the ONE Campaign.
Cindy McCain noticed me in the crowd and crouched down beside me for a picture! “I love your shirt,” she said, “I went to Rwanda with ONE!” It is obvious that her experience stays with her as she travels on the campaign trail.
ONE is campaigning to ensure that the Congressional budget does not cut foreign assistance programs like Feed the Future that help people break the cycle of poverty and hunger.
The Horn of Africa is experiencing its worst drought in 60 years. More than 11 million people, mostly nomadic pastoralists and farmers in south-central Somalia, north-eastern Kenya, and south-eastern Ethiopia, are severely lacking access to food.
2011 marks 30 years since the first cases of AIDS were documented. Take a closer look at the specific, achievable goals we must hit by 2015 to make this year the beginning of the end of AIDS.
As aid agencies warn more than 9 million people could be affected by a food crisis in East Africa, world leaders are failing to keep their 2009 promises to tackle the causes of chronic hunger and support farmers in the world's poorest countries.
