Action Ideas!

NELSON BALLOT BOXES

These can be left at your local alternative video stores, coffee houses, book stores, vegetarian restaurants and any small business with a progressive owner along with a stack of “Focus on Nelson” post Cards. Contact Hillary (not Clinton) for Nelson post cards!

From CODEPINK Sarasota:
Just wanted to send these pics of our ballot boxes. We purchased "touch up kits" from Sherwin Williams paint co. They are in the shape of a home. So we just primed them & painted them up.
We went to our Downtown farmers market yesterday and received 84 signatures! We also passed out flyers with information about the war in Iraq and the phone numbers to call Congress.
(that's 202 224-3121)

Toy Soldier Project


In her column today, Ana Menendez brings to light a quiet anti-war campaign, called the Toy Soldier Project, that's being waged by the Unitarian Universalist Congregation in South Miami.
You may have seen them somewhere around Miami -- tiny plastic toy soldiers enlisted in the war against the war.

''Bring them home!'' says the front of the tag wrapped around the soldier's leg. On the back, the numbers for Senators Bill Nelson and Mel Martinez.

The pacifist toy soldiers are popping up in supermarkets, drug stores and other public places.

Ana accompanied 64-year-old Judy Homer on a "drop" at the Dadeland Mall.
Stealth protesting is not for the shy. Even the most experienced agitator can find herself suddenly caught in a crisis of nerve when, for example, sitting in a parking garage with a paper bag full of mission-bound soldiers.

''I do get nervous, but I won't let it deter me,'' said Homer, 64. ``I like that it's a protest and that it's a peaceful one. I'm an old hippie.''

Within minutes, she was through the doors of Macy's and tucking a soldier between the athletic shoes at a Skechers display.

''We'll see if it's still there when we get back,'' she said, delighted.

Ha! This is great. And Judy wasn't done.
Homer headed out of Macy's and toward J.C. Penney. On the way, she propped a soldier on a marble tabletop and another on the counter at a smoothie cart.

Ana laments that there should be some deeper message attached to the soldiers. I disagree. The Unitarian Universalist Congregation' s efforts reminds Americans that soldiers are fighting and dying as we go about our mundane, and very safe, lives right here in the good 'ole US of A.

That's good enough for me.