Early yesterday morning, I went to the University of Vermont and then to downtown Waterbury, Vermont with some ONE members to catch up with Vermont Senator Pat Leahy.
As many ONE members will recall, Sen. Leahy has been a true champion for ONE and the world’s poorest people for years now. Sen. Leahy has been a staunch supporter for the very small, but very important part of the budget that houses all of the US’s international life-saving programs that ONE advocates for and supports.
He was also instrumental in the recent Transparency Amendment that will help fight corruption in resource rich, but highly impoverished countries in Africa. So we were very excited to meet Sen. Leahy in person and thank him for all he has done for ONE, and the world’s poorest people!
As ONE members across the nation continue to take action and urge their elected leaders to fight extreme poverty and preventable disease, we are exploring more and better ways to support ONE members in their own community.
If you live in New Hampshire or Vermont, please join us in the first of a series of local ONE Conference Calls to update you on important local actions, events, and opportunities. Your voice is critically important in making sure that our nation is doing all we can to help save millions of lives around the world.
ONE member Scott Simpson of Vermont, who helped make Vermont a State of ONE, made it down to his local Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream Store in Burlington to check out the new ONE Cheesecake Brownie flavor and explore ONE’s new and unique partnership with the famous Vermont Ice Cream makers.
Scott told me that there was a lot of new excitement around the partnership and many people had seen ONE on Idol Gives Back. He even told me that they had already signed up many new ONE members at the store. Free Cone Day is approaching on April 29th and his local store has agreed to set up a ONE table too.
By uniting as ONE, and ONE lick at a time, we are spreading the word that saving lives in some of the most desperate places on Earth is not only possible in today’s world, it is a priority.
Historically, as we move closer to the general election, campaigns, media and electorate itself, tends to talk a lot more about the horse race and a lot less about the issues.
Today, with critical presidential primaries in four states, I and my many ONE member friends and colleagues must work that much harder to raise the profile for global poverty in this country.
Remember, you can look at the candidate’s plans for global poverty on ONE Action’s On The Record site. If you happen to live in Ohio, Texas, Vermont or Rhode Island, you could consider talking about global poverty while in the voting line.
And, as always, stay tuned for more urgent actions in the days, weeks and months ahead.
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.
