IVAW Needs Your Help

Friends,

This is an appeal from Stan Goff on behalf of Iraq Veterans Against the
War.  It is an appeal for money, so let me get that right out front.

I am asking you to go to Iraq Veterans Against the War (IVAW), to click on “Donate Online”, and
to become a “recurring” supporter, by providing an automatic monthly
deduction transfered to IVAW of as much as you can afford — $10, $100,
$500… as much as you can afford.

No group of women and men has more credibility with the public in its
opposition to the war than the people who participated in it, and who
are now speaking out against it.  IVAW’s membership includes hundreds
of highly-motivated, talented young people, who have shown a special
character.  They are now students, workers, musicians, philosophers,
geographers, playwrights, public speakers, writers, film-makers, and
several have spent time in prison for their beliefs.  People like
Camilo Mejia, Stephen Funk, Kevin Benderman, Charlie Anderson, Mike
Hoffman, Kelly Dougherty, Pablo Paredes, Tim Goodrich, Pat Resta, Jimmy
Massey, Jose Vasquez, Ivan Medina, Tina Garnanez, Alex Ryabov, Garret
Reppenhagen, and many others.  These are the people whose voices are
amplified by contributions to IVAW.

IVAW has never had a lot, but after the expenses incurred to support
Cindy Sheehan, the Crawford to DC Bus Tour, and the September 24
antiwar demonstration, there is not enough money in the bank right now
to even make payroll for the part-time staff that keeps the
organization afloat.

The organization needs around $10,000 a month cash flow to support its
recent expansion in membership and the next year’s organizational
development and objectives.  Those objectives include organizer
training for members, chapter concentration to develop local
self-sustaining nuclei, Katrina survivor self-determination support
work, and counter-recruitment initiatives.  These are the IVAW
priorities for the next year, in addition to the primary mission — to
stop the war against Iraq.

IVAW is the only organization of its kind, with its membership drawn
from armed services veterans who were on duty after September 11, 2001,
the day of the event upoon which the Bush administration built it’s
so-called Global War on Terror.  IVAW could seek a lot of foundation
money if it were to change one thing in its mission statement, and that
is the demand for immediate and unilateral withdrawal of all American
forces from Iraq.  Calls for indefinite plans of “phased” withdrawal
are much more popular with foundations who are reluctant to endanger
quietly favored elected officials who have been less than sterling on
the war by confronting them with their complicity in letting the Bush
administration have its way.  IVAW could change that mission and have
access to more money.  But it will not.

IVAW will not take money that  has these kinds of unstated strings
attached.  So it needs the support of independent antiwar activists who
share IVAW’s core beliefs that the occupaiton must leave as a moral
imperative and that the Iraqis will be better off without the
occupation — that the occupation itself is the catalyst for most of
the violence there, including attacks by Iraqis against other Iraqis.

The way this movement becomes independent and stays independent is
through the support of people who share its core mission and values.

Please, please help us build a sustianing financial floor under this
extremely important organization.  They need to be focused on their
work, not on finances.

Thanks so much for your support of my work, and for whatever you can
commit to IVAW.

Yours very sincerely,

Stan Goff