WNPJ member group Voices for Creative Nonviolence is planning a 200-mile walk and speaking tour to protest drone warfare.

From June 8 to 23, walkers will trek from the Rock Island Arsenal (where launch mechanisms and bomb components are manufactured) to the Iowa Air National Guard’s 132nd Fighter Wing in Des Moines, the proposed site of a new command center where drones can be remotely-piloted to fly over other countries.

Voices for Creative Nonviolence is seeking walkers, places to stay and groups interested in hosting a presentation.  The walkers will include Voices co-coordinator and activist Brian Terrell, of Maloy, IA, who will have just completed 6 months in prison for nonviolent civil resistance at a drone base, and Kathy Kelly, who will have just returned from Afghanistan, where U.S. drones have tragically impacted so many lives.

Contact Voices at 773-878-3815 or info@vcnv.org.

Action Alert 1: Support Bangladeshi garment workers
Action Alert 2: Host a talk on Palestine
Action Alert 3: Nominate a global citizen
Action Alert 4: Call for CAFO oversight

"After the passage of Act 1 [the Bad River Watershed Destruction Act], one of the last protections for ecologically critical watersheds in gold and base metal exploration areas in Oneida, Taylor and Marathon counties is the Mining Moratorium Law," write Al Gedicks of WNPJ member group Wisconsin Resources Protection Council (and former WNPJ Board member) and Dave Blouin of the Sierra Club in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

Yet mining companies have said their top priority is repealing Wisconsin's mining moratorium - also called the "prove it first" law.

"That the North American mining industry cannot meet the Moratorium Law is a problem of its own making and purely reflects the fact that mining metallic sulfide ores remains proven to be unsafe," add Gedicks and Blouin.  "Our clean air and drinking water and the critical habitats and healthy environment we all depend on are threatened by the mining industry's so-called reforms."

From WNPJ member group the Autonomous Solidarity Organization:

Got 15 minutes? An hour? 3 hours? We're looking for great volunteers like you to come help us get the word out to friends and neighbors about this year's best festival of brats! We appreciate any and all time you can spare to help out.

Saturday, 5/18 and Sunday, 5/19 we're asking folks to stop by our office (at 122 State St, room 404) for snacks, fun, talking to folks at the Farmer's Market, and flyering our neighborhoods.

Can't make it for the weekend of flyering? Stop by our office any time to pickup flyers for your friends and neighbors. Can't do that? How about volunteering at this year's PBF? Can't make it for that either?  Then, feel free to help us help out some amazing charities by donating to the Peoples' Bratfest online, here.

A bill introduced by state Representatives Tyler August (R-Lake Geneva), David Craig (R-Town of Vernon), Frederick Kessler (D-Milwaukee) and Chris Taylor (D-Madison) would prohibit law enforcement and individuals from using drones without a warrant, except in special circumstances. It would also bar the private use of drones equipped with video or audio equipment, or with a weapon.

The ACLU of Wisconsin applauded the bill. 

"Without a public uproar, U.S. could spend more than $600 billion on nuclear weapons over the next 10 years," warns John LaForge of WNPJ member group Nukewatch, in a Counterpunch article

"For 2014, the President plans a nuclear weapons spending increase over the current level of $7.227 billion. Where’s the money to come from? Taking a page from the Reagan/Thatcher play book, Obama plans to get it from the nuclear non-proliferation budget."

WNPJ members comment on important issues.

Global Warming:  WNPJ member Eric Hanson compares today's efforts to earlier conservation movements. "Conservation, whether the relatively complex notions of catastrophic global climate change or the familiar concepts of contour plowing or catch and release fishing, boils down to the common-sense goodness of one theme: What we have today we also want to be here for tomorrow."  Read his article here. Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 4/22/13.

Gun Control:  Two letters to the editor by WNPJ members. Click on their names to view their letters.

Action Alert 1: Speak up about Wisconsin's proposed budget
Action Alert 2: Demand environmental justice for Vieques
Action Alert 3: Join WNPJ's nominating committee
Action Alert 4: Propose a peace resources presentation

Are you interested in engaging a broad range of community groups and local officials to raise vital economic justice, workers' rights and military spending issues?

WNPJ is hiring a Bring Our War Dollars Home Grassroots Organizer!

This is a 10 hour a week part-time position that will last for one year, and can be based either in our Madison office or elsewhere in the state.  Click here for position details.

Applications are due by May 8.

WNPJ members continue to make their opinions known. Please click on titles to read the entire stories.

Two Op-eds:

Al Gedick: The Fight Against Wisconsin’s Iron Mine. "Tribal leaders, environmentalists and local officials have united to fight a massive mine which could be toxic to a water-rich area known as “Wisconsin’s Everglades.” Urban Milwaukee,  4/16/13. Al Gedicks is with the Wisconsin Resources Protection Council, a WNPJ member group.Wisconsin Resources Protection Council.

Daniel Pneuman: Need to transition from defense jobs in Oshkosh. "When the federal government has been the primary buyer (and sometimes the only buyer) of a product, it bears the responsibility to make the transition for the adversely affected company as painless as possible."JS Online, 4/15/13. Daniel Pneuman is president of Peace Action Wisconsin, a WNPJ member group.

The New Yorker magazine recently reported on a ceremony held in the village of My Lai, Vietnam, to commemorate the massacre that took place there forty-five years ago. It featured the life journey Mike Boehm, a Viet Nam veteran who founded Winds of Peace, Projects in Viet Nam, a WNPJ member group,  to help the people of My Lai. “I dug up some old photos and there were children outside a primitive, dirt-floored school. I was looking at those photos and I saw what we had done. ...Those kids are now adults and their children now go to one of our new schools.” Read the story here.

Photo: Mike Boehm accepting the UNA -USA Global Citizen Award, 2008.

And the Capital Times interviewed Madeleine Para, of 350.org, a WNPJ member group concerned with climate change. “With a problem as big as climate change, if our government doesn’t move on it, all the other important things that are going on will not be sufficient,” said Para. read the interview here.

Dede Mayberry, one of WNPJ's founders, passed away in March.  She was active with many WNPJ member groups, including Church Women United, Democratic Socialists of America - WI and SOS Dane County - Senior Council "Save Our Services."

A memorial will be held Saturday, April 27 at 1 pm, at Dale Heights Presbyterian Church (5501 University Avenue at Norman Way, next to Brennans) in 
Madison.  Please email her son Forest at forest@dmcilink.com if you plan to attend or have any stories or pictures you would like to share.

Forest wrote:  "Dede passed away peacefully in her sleep.  This event leaves a space in the hearts of so many.  As the news breaks out and the calls come in, it takes my breath away-the impact my mom had on so many beyond our family."

Charles Sweet, a long-time activist with Veterans for Peace and other groups, also recently passed away.  His family is honoring Charlie's social justice commitment by asking that memorials be made to: World Can’t Wait, 305 West Broadway, New York, NY 10013; Veterans for Peace Chapter 25, P.O. Box 1811, Madison, WI 53701-1811; and/or the Wisconsin/Nicaragua Wheelchair Project, 641 Knickerbocker Street, Madison, WI 53711.

A warm thanks to all who presented, attended, made food for, helped organize and otherwise made WNPJ's member assembly and awards reception at the Milwaukee Friends Meetinghouse on October 27th a wonderful event!

At left, Lifetime Achievement Award winners Rev. Joe and Joyce Ellwanger listen to warm introductions from Rev. Marilyn Miller and WISDOM President David Liners, before accepting the award.

At right, Pardeep Kaleka of the Sikh Temple of Wisconsin in Oak Creek opens the assembly with his reflections on peacemaking and his interfaith collective, Serve2Unite.com, founded following the tragic attack and killings at the temple last August. 

Thanks to Carlos Miranda for these pictures.  Click here to see more pictures from the day.

More WNPJ history here, including an interview with past Chair, Alfred Meyer ...and you can find interviews of other 20-year members here -

WNPJ's first User's Manual is designed to help WNPJ member groups and individual members make greater use of the services we offer, including: statewide lobby days, event publicity, weekly action alerts, WNPJ work groups, meetings and awards and website features like In the News and Success Stories. Printed copies of the WNPJ Users Manual are free to member groups and individual members, or read the full Users Manual online here...