H.R. 4140/S. 2016, the No Unconstitutional Strike Against North Korea Act, would (as its title suggests) prohibit our government from launching a strike against North Korea without Congressional authorization per Article I, Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution. Since the end of World War II, Congress has ceded far too much war-making power to the Executive branch, and now we have an Executive who frankly doesn't seem particularly sane most of the time getting into a war of words with a North Korean executive who doesn't seem particularly sane any of the time. Does that sound like a recipe for victory? The Founders wisely wanted Congress to have the power to declare war, rather than etting the President do as he likes, of which I think we've all had quite enough. Hence the Friends Committee on National Legislation helps you tell your Congressfolk to support sane and Constitutional foreign policy by supporting the No Unconstitutional Strike Against North Korea Act.
Meanwhile, with China phasing out its participation in the illegal world ivory trade, Hong Kong is now the world's number one ivory trader, and given that you have to slaughter elephants to get ivory, number one is not be the number you want to be on that list. (Don't tell President Trump, though -- when he hears we're not number one in the illegal ivory trade, maybe he'll send all his children to Africa to fix that.) The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species banned the international ivory trade almost 30 years ago, and elephant numbers did recover for a while, only to drop again about a decade ago, as demand for ivory from Asia boomed, until last year poachers killed African elephants faster than new elephants were born. Hong Kong's government has proposed legislation shutting down the ivory trade, but of course ivory traders are fighting it, so Avaaz helps you tell Hong Kong's legislature to protect endangered elephants by shutting down their ivory trade.
Finally, the Trump Administration has apparently decided, on the "advice" of the Interior Department, to shrink the size of two Utah national monuments, Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante. Don't believe they hype that it's because these monuments exemplify federal government overreach, not just because right-wingers tell you that anything government does that doesn't actually suck is "overreach," but because the real issue here is these monuments are now off-limits to mining corporations. Now, we have considerable doubt, if we know anything about the Antiquities Act, that the President can actually shrink the size of a national monument after its creation, but President Trump has never been much for law and order; he's more the kind of fellow who likes to do stuff and dare you to stop him. We accept his dare, as we have accepted his dare all year, and so The Wilderness Society helps you tell your Congressfolk to stand up to Mr. Trump and stand up for our national monuments.
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