We had a busy day in Las Vegas on Friday. First, former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright was in town to hold a foreign policy discussion at UNLV. I was able to attend with a few ONE volunteers and students.
During the discussion Secretary Albright talked about the need to reevaluate the way we approach our foreign policy including towards the continent of Africa. She also mentioned the need to do more to eradicate disease and genocide.
As a follow up I was able to ask her if she thought fighting poverty and disease was essential to our national security. Here was her response:
Also on Friday, Joe Biden held a rally in Henderson, NV. We had about a dozen ONE members there to remind the Senator about his commitment to fight AIDS in Africa.
ONE volunteers aren’t the only people letting the next president know which foreign policy issues are priorities to them – former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright’s new book, Memo to the President Elect, outlines her vision also. Last week, I was lucky enough to get a chance to thank Dr. Albright for including “addressing the negative effects of globalization” as one of her top five foreign policy priorities for the next president and hand her information about ONE. She accepted it with a smile and said she already knew us though. Riding home on the L, I flipped directly to the relevant chapter in her new book, and was pleased to read this (page 137):
“Reducing poverty should be a central theme of your administration. This is smart politically, right morally, and makes sense economically…. Take advantage of the global antipoverty movement, which includes rock starts, billionaires, evangelists, students, and the producers of American Idol; don’t underestimate the power of enthusiasm – some jobs can best be done by people too inexperienced to know exactly how hard the jobs are.”
I’m proud to be counted in the “inexperienced” and will keep working to grow the antipoverty movement. I hope the next president joins us in the fight against extreme poverty and makes me unemployed.
-Annisa Wanat, ONE Regional Field Organizer, Chicago
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.
