End the war, help end poverty.

In 1968, a war raged on in a country most Americans couldn't find on a map.

In 1968, deep poverty was prevalent in many parts of the country.

Robert Kennedy's presidential race highlighted the struggles of those in poverty but rarely talked about the War in Vietnam. Martin Luther King, Jr. also worked with Kennedy to bring the discussion of poverty into the homes of all Americans. Even still, they knew that one of the ways to alleviate poverty in America was to end the war abroad.

This article highlights how ending the war in Iraq will help alleviate poverty today.

The premise is simple according to the article:

We can’t do this unless the war ends. There isn’t enough money. Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr. saw the connection. If they had been around today, their words would have been so powerful that the political journalists couldn’t ignore them. Kennedy and King would have led, and the country would have followed.

We have a health care crisis in this country. We have an on-going threat of global warming that not only harms our world but also our health and how and where we live. We have more and more young boys from the poorest places of our country enlisting to join an unjust war because they have no other way out of the poverty that has surrounded them their entire lives.

I find it sad that, not only have the presidential campaigns begun over a year BEFORE the actual election, but also that there is not a substantial focus on poverty-related issues or how we can end it and the War. (Except for John Edwards which is why I am supporting him).

What does it say about our country when the front-runner Presidential candidate talked about poverty as his main campaign platform 40 years ago and today, even though we are still faced with the same problems, only one is saying something about it?

Who will speak for them? Who will speak for residents of New Orleans who still don't have a place to call home? Who will ensure a tragedy like that never happens again?

How can we promote and fight for Democracy and freedom in other countries when many of our citizens aren't free because of the chains of poverty that hold them down?