Tag Archives: Respect for Diversity

From violence to healing: Journey of Hope events planned statewide

From Nebraskans for Alternatives to the Death Penalty:

The Journey of Hope Tour is Coming!

This week NADP has been hard at work with our partners to coordinate a series of events that we are very excited about: The Nebraska of Journey of Hope Speaking Tour. An amazing group of speakers who have been immediately affected by the death penalty will travel all throughout the state to share their stories of moving from violence to healing. Their experiences illustrate the critical need to keep the death penalty out of Nebraska permanently. We hope to see you at an event near you!

Check the schedule for an event near you this July.

Attend the Green Party’s Presidential Nominating Convention in Houston

From Jill2016.com:

Jill Stein supporters from around the country will be in Houston August 4-7 for the Green Party’s Presidential Nominating Convention — and you’re invited!

This may just be the most exciting national Green Party meeting ever, with Jill Stein climbing in the polls and record numbers of Americans demanding a better choice than what the establishment parties are offering. If you want to get involved in the surging national movement for an America that works for all of us, Houston is the place to be!

One of the highlights of the convention will be the Party for the Revolution on Saturday, August 6, where Jill will kick off the final phase of her game-changing presidential campaign. There will be great music, inspiring speeches, and a chance to get to know Jill’s Vice-Presidential running mate.

Before that, starting on Thursday, August 4, the Green Party will host workshops and presentations on all aspects of the exploding movement for independent progressive politics.

Staff from the Stein campaign will be on hand to lead a number of workshops on the techniques and strategies that are being used in 2016 to fight for people, planet and peace over profit. There will also be a set of hands-on workshops on Sunday morning to help you plug in to the action and take the revolution back to your home state. Don’t miss what’s sure to be an unforgettable and historic gathering of revolutionaries in the fight for a better future.

It’s in our hands!

Read more about the agenda in Houston and register to attend.

Nebraska Green Party State Convention: June 26 in Lincoln

The Nebraska Green Party will hold its 2016 State Convention on June 26 in Lincoln. Members will gather at The Meeting Place, 1239 South 14th Street. The meeting begins at 1 p.m.

Members will select the party’s choice for the U.S. presidential election and select delegates to represent Nebraska at the Green Party National Convention, held this year in Houston, August 4-7.

Read more about the two recognized candidates seeking the Green Party nomination, William Kreml and Jill Stein.

Read more about the National Convention.

 

 

Death penalty incompatible with faith, humanity

From the Lincoln Journal Star:

The death penalty has survived not in spite of Christians, but because of them, according to Shane Claiborne, social activist, author and pioneer in the New Monasticism Movement.

For a long time, Claiborne believed that scripture supported the death penalty: an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth… But his gut told him something else. He believed it was not as simple as good versus evil, right versus wrong and life versus death.

“I went back to study Scripture, and I saw how complex it is,” Claiborne said during a recent visit from Philadelphia to Lincoln and Omaha, as part of Nebraskans for Alternatives to the Death Penalty and Retain a Just Nebraska — both efforts to retain a state law abolishing the death penalty.

More than 200 people attended Claiborne’s June 7 presentations, which coincided with the release of his newest book, Executing Grace: How the Death Penalty Killed Jesus and Why It’s Killing Us. The book examines the death penalty from all angles: religious, moral, just and practical. Many Nebraska stories are included in the 300-page book.

Claiborne’s appearance was the first in a series of guests invited to Nebraska over the coming months to help convince voters to uphold LB268 which calls for abolishing capital punishment in the state, said Dan Parsons, spokesman for Retain a Just Nebraska.

Read the full story from the Lincoln Journal Star.

Retain a Just Nebraska has two upcoming open-house events for faith leaders to discuss the death penalty:

  • In Lincoln June 14 from 6 to 8 p.m.: FUSE Co-Working Space, 151 N. Eighth St. (fifth floor).
  • In Omaha June 16 from 6 to 8 p.m. at the Retain a Just Nebraska headquarters, 440 Regency Parkway Suite 234.

Learn more at Retain a Just Nebraska and Nebraskans for Alternatives to the Death Penalty.

Former Nader campaign manager: Revolution is difficult and necessary

From Theresa Amato writing for Vox:

Every four years, we come to this point: Dissatisfaction with the major party candidates cries for alternatives, and then reality comes crashing in. As an initial matter, the problem can be squarely laid at the feet of voters themselves as they are unwilling to take a risk outside the two parties once their nominees lose inside the two major parties.

I know because I tried twice to open up the system to candidacies outside the two parties: first, in 2000 as the national campaign manager for Ralph Nader when he was the Green Party nominee, and then again in 2004, when Nader ran on a potpourri of third-party and independent ballot lines.

Until we fix our Byzantine ballot access system, our partisan electoral administrations, our campaign financing system, our inexplicably exclusive Commission on Presidential Debates, and a media fixated on horse-race politics, it is a myth that anyone can run — successfully — for president outside of the two parties.

Read the full First Person essay at Vox.

Jill Stein: We Need a Constitutional Right to Vote

From Jill2016.com:

The 2016 primary season is exposing a crisis of democracy in America.

The prevalence of voter suppression, from voters forced to stand in line for five hours in Arizona to over one hundred thousand voters purged from the rolls in New York, is inexcusable.

Meanwhile in North Carolina, a federal judge has upheld new voting restrictions, including a voter ID law that will disproportionately block poor and minority voters from the polls.

It’s no secret that reducing voter turnout benefits the political establishment.

It’s time to bring real democracy to America by eliminating unfair barriers to voting and ensuring every vote counts.

Voter suppression across the United States has reached crisis levels, largely because the Constitution does not explicitly guarantee our right to vote. An explicit Constitutional right to vote would empower Americans to challenge systemic voter suppression and restore the integrity of our elections.

Stand with Jill Stein’s call for an explicit Constitutional right to vote today!

Read more and sign the petition.

Action Alert: Help petition for ballot access at Earth Day events

Upcoming Earth Day celebrations provide opportunities to gather signatures and ensure that the Nebraska Green Party appears on the ballot for Nebraska voters in November:

Earth Day Omaha

  • Saturday, April 16
  • 11 a.m. to 6 p.m.
  • Elmwood Park
  • Contact markalanzimmermann (at) gmail.com to help.

Earth Day Lincoln

  • Saturday, April 23
  • 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.
  • Union Plaza
  • Contact  mjberry (at) inebraska.com to help.

People’s Film Festival Upcoming Shows

As always, the People’s Film Festival is held at First Unitarian Church, 31st and Harney streets, Omaha, at 7 p.m. Note that the schedule has changed from Tuesdays to Mondays.

1913: Seeds of Conflict (Thursday 3/24): 1913 examines a critical yet overlooked moment of transformation in Palestine, long before the Balfour Declaration and British Mandate period usually considered the matchstick for today’s ongoing struggles. It was a time when identities were fluid and few Arabs or Jews living there could imagine the conflict that would engulf their region for the next century.

Feeding Frenzy: The Food Industry, Marketing & the Creation of a Health Crisis (Monday 4/4): Over the past three decades, obesity rates in the U.S. have more than doubled for children and tripled for adolescents — and a startling 70% of adults are now obese or overweight. The result has been a widening epidemic of obesity-related health problems, including coronary heart disease, high blood pressure, stroke, and Type 2 diabetes. While discussions about this spiraling health crisis have tended to focus on the need for more exercise and individual responsibility, Feeding Frenzy trains its focus squarely on the responsibility of the processed food industry and the outmoded government policies it benefits from. It lays bare how taxpayer subsidies designed to feed hungry Americans during the Great Depression have enabled the food industry to flood the market with a rising tide of cheap, addictive, high-calorie food products, and offers an engrossing look at the tactics of the multibillion-dollar marketing machine charged with making sure that every one of those surplus calories is consumed. Features industry analysts, health experts, and advertising scholars, including Marion Nestle, Kelly Brownell, Sut Jhally, Brian Wansink, and Michele Simon.

Call of Life (Monday 4/18): Call of Life is the first feature-length documentary to fully investigate the growing threat posed by the rapid and massive loss of biodiversity on the planet. Featuring leading scientists, social scientists, environmentalists and others, the film explores the scope, the causes, and the predicted global impact of a mass extinction occurring on a scale not seen since the disappearance of the dinosaurs 65 million years ago. If current trends continue, scientists warn that half or more of all plant and animal species on Earth will become extinct within the next few decades. Entirely caused by human activities, this contemporary mass extinction is disrupting and destroying the complex, interconnected biological systems that support life on earth. Through interviews with eminent biologists and ecologists, the film examines the primary drivers of species loss: habitat destruction, global warming, pollution, and invasive species, all compounded by the expanding human population and our consumption patterns.

GMO-OMG (Monday 5/2): This provocative documentary follows one father’s search for answers to the question “What are we feeding our families?” and examines the risks of consuming genetically modified foods, or GMOs. Features Jeremy Seifert.

Charles E. Richardson: 1935-2016

Founding Co-chair of the Nebraska Green Party, Dr. Charles Richardson, died on Monday, March 7, 2016, in Hastings. Thank you, Charles, for your early Green Party support, your tireless District 3 work gathering hundreds of signatures in each petition campaign, convening meetings, and providing NGP visibility where we needed it most. Members of the Nebraska Green Party extend sympathy to your family and friends.

Read Charles’ obituary.