Triple Package (3 people to a room) $185.00 per person Notice: Durham, Greensboro, and Winston-Salem now have a limited number of seats available ........ We have no Inauguration access opportunities beyond those who will be awarded to citizens who ride the buses ....
Hello Change Agents;
Many of you who have worked so hard to get President Elect Barack Obama into the White House have been asking about inagural tickets. Please see the trip below being sponsored by the MLK association, I sent my deposit over a month ago, and I know many others have too. I don't know if they have any seats left, but contact them, it's worth a try.
Also, contact your local state representatives and get on any waiting list they have.
Lastly, go online a google "inauguration" to see if anything come up.
YAY!!!!! Yes, we did!!!
Peninnah
Change Agent 002
MONDAY, JANUARY 19
North Carolina Presidential Inauguration Trip To Washington, D.C. - - January 20, 2009
Various Martin Luther King Committees from throughout North Carolina are sponsoring a bus trip to Washington D.C. on January 19-20, 2009 to commemorate the Inauguration of Senator Barack Obama as President of the United States. Come join us for this historic occasion to celebrate both the King Holiday and the Presidential Inauguration Ceremony. We have room for a limited number citizens. Please make your reservation now. We expect great interest in this trip. Please contact one of the representives shown below.
In Asheville contact: Orleane Simmons (828) 281-1624 E-Mail Orleane In Durham contact: Elouise Watson (919) 949-4249 E-Mail Elouise In Charlotte contact: Delores Reid-Smith (704)335-9380 E-Mail Delores In Charlotte contact: Ahmad Daniels (704)537-1533 E-Mail Ahmad In Fayetteville contact: Lula Gray Crenshaw (910) 488-5549 E-Mail Lula In Greensboro contact: Earl Jones (336) 941-5199 E-Mail Earl In Kinston contact: Theresa Bethea (252) 520-0225 E-Mail Theresa In Raleigh contact: David Prince (919) 368-5767 E-Mail David In Wilmington contact; Monika Daniels (910) 233-5998 E-Mail Monika In Shallotte contact: Fonstena Peck (910) 200-2957 E-Mail Fonstena In Winston-Salem contact: Mutter Evans (336) 971-7852 E-Mail Mutter Statewide contact: Bruce Lightner (919) 834-6264 E-Mail Bruce
ONCE IN A LIFETIME JOURNEY .... GET ON THE BUS ....
A $25 check will hold your seat. Final payment is due anytime before December 1, 2008. Trip package includes luxury bus transportation, hotel room @ the Comfort Inn Hotel & Conference Center, Bowie, Maryland, The Gala North Carolina Obama Reception and tickets to President Obama's Swearing In Ceremony and Inaugural Parade.
Refund Disclaimer The $25.00 deposit is required to secure and hold our hotel rooms and is non refundable. It will be extremely difficult to obtain rooms in the Metro D.C. area during Inauguration Week. Sending the hotels a deposit assures that we will have rooms. If, for whatever reason, we cancel the hotels will not refund the deposit. Please look at it as an investment for a spectacular opportunity.
N.C. Obama " From The Dream To The Promise " Gala Reception Hosted and organized by BTA & Associates Public Relations (919) 833-6394 or toll free 1-888 833-5003 E-Mail BTA & Associates
Obama Inauguration Registration Form Departure City ____________________
Name: _____________________________________
Phone: ____________________________________
Address: _________________________________
City/Town _________________________________
E-Mail Address: _________________________________________
# Seats Needed _____
# Rooms Needed ____ Non-Smoking ____ Smoking ____
Names Of Guests In Room # 1
______________________________ ________________________
______________________________ _________________________
Names Of Guests In Room # 2
Depost Sent: $_________ Date: _______________________
“The commander in chief doesn’t just need to know how to lead the military, he needs to understand what war does to military families.” --Michelle Obama
Michelle's focus group: Military families
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1008/14733.html
FAYETTEVILLE, N.C. – Once portrayed as unpatriotic, Michelle Obama has quietly carved a niche on the campaign trail as a sounding board for military families, taking up a cause that could define her agenda as first lady. Every few weeks, Obama meets with military spouses in swing states, where she presents herself as a kindred spirit and Barack Obama as the best choice for their families. She attended the two debates with military family members. And at the Democratic National Convention, she led a day of service on behalf of Blue Star Families for Obama, a two-month old group with the tagline: “Pro-Military, Pro-Obama.” Obama aides say her work with military families has nothing to do with the controversy created by her February comment suggesting that the presidential campaign made her proud of the United States for the first time. But the effort could be viewed as an exercise in counterprogramming, serving as a rebuttal to criticism from Cindy McCain and others for a comment that Michelle Obama insists was misinterpreted – and the notion that her husband, a Democrat with no military service, cannot peel off voters from John McCain, an ex-Navy pilot and war hero. “Barack and I know that too often it feels like you are alone, on your own,” Obama told military spouses last month in Santa Fe, N.M. “I know you become everything. In a small way, I have experienced that over the course of this campaign, but in no way does it compare to what you are going through.” Michelle Obama's focus on military families puts her at the leading edge of the Democratic nominee's campaign to reclaim some of the military vote from Republicans – an effort that brought Barack Obama here Sunday for a rally near Fort Bragg, where a military wife introduced him and he touted his endorsement from Colin Powell, the retired four-star general and President George W. Bush's first Secretary of State. Since the start of the campaign, Michelle Obama says she has focused on three things: keeping life normal for her young daughters, electing her husband, and discussing the work-life balance with women around the country. The spouses of service members captured her attention during a roundtable with working mothers, and she later hosted her first military-focused event in Fayetteville in May, a day before the North Carolina primary.She will hold her seventh military spouses meeting Tuesday in Pensacola, Fla., following similar events in recent months in states heavily impacted by deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan, including Virginia, New Mexico and Pennsylvania. At each roundtable, she sits on stage with several spouses, delivers prepared remarks and opens a discussion. The roundtables draws local media coverage, and she answers questions about her involvement when asked by national reporters, as she did during an interview with CNN at the Democratic convention. “Mostly I am here to listen and to do a lot of learning and then to transfer that information into the heart and mind of my husband as he moves forth,” Michelle Obama said in Norfolk, Va., in August. “The commander in chief doesn’t just need to know how to lead the military, he needs to understand what war does to military families.” Her work in this area offers a hint at what could dominate her time in the White House. “If she becomes first lady, this will be her cause,” said Amanda McBreen, 47, a Marine wife who participated in the Norfolk roundtable and helps coordinate 24 state chapters of Blue Star Families for Obama.Michelle Obama pledged to do so in the Oct. 27 issue of U.S. News and World Report, when she explained what she would do if her husband became president: “I would work daily on the issues closest to my heart: helping working women and families, particularly military families. … I'd continue these conversations with working women and military spouses, and I'd take their stories back to Washington to make sure that the people who run our country know how their policies touch their constituents' lives.” But Kathy Roth-Douquet, a founder of Blue Star Families and a Marine spouse who supported Hillary Rodham Clinton in the primary, said she wishes more voters knew about Michelle Obama’s work. “She is probably the most motivating figure in the military family community,” Roth-Douquet, 44, said. “We like Obama, but we love her. She gets what we are getting.”
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Military Trifecta
School Choice: The Freedom to Attend a Religious School of your Choice Is a First Amendment Right Not a Privilege
The founders placed two clauses in the First Amendment of the Constitution to protect our religious freedom (Nelson, Palonsky, & McCarthy, 2007, p.148). The first clause is called the Establishment Clause which mandates that religion and the state be kept separate so people would not be forced to practice a religion they did not believe in (Nelson, Palonsky, & McCarthy, 2007, p. 148). The second clause is called the Free Exercise Clause, which prohibits governments from limiting the people from exercising their religious beliefs (Nelson, Palonsky, & McCarthy, 2007, p. 148). When we shift our emphasis from the Establishment Clause to the Free Exercise Clause, it becomes clearer how truancy laws could be a prohibition of the free exercise of religion for some economically disadvantaged students.
School Choice is a solution to resolve other injustices in public schools in addition to prohibition of the exercise of religious beliefs. Students who are ill may not be able to afford to get a doctor’s note to prove they are sick. Parents’ notes stating their children are sick are not excused absences in most public schools. Teenagers and parents are fined and jailed for truancy in public schools but in private schools they can go with their parents on vacations with only a note from the parents and stay for weeks without governmental being jailed or fined for trauncy.
An extreme example of injustice involved an economically disadvantaged girl, who was jailed seventeen times and forced to pay fines up to $10,000 before reaching the age of seventeen. She worked several jobs to pay the fines and often was too tired to get to school on time. She was late several times which was counted as an additional absence and a violation of her probation. She and her brother had to endure community service assignments cleaning cages of vicious pit bull dogs that were not muzzled. They were afraid of the dogs and did not comply.
Fear of dogs was a torture and a cruel and unusual punishment to endure as a result of being forced to attend a public school instead of their choice of a private religious school.
In addition, their parent who served as Vietnam veteran was given a deportation charge after complaining to high government officials about the injustice. Some juvenile courts do not make transcripts of truancy trials. Parents can not use courts transcripts to prove their innocence. For example, the parent alleged he was not told by the judge to attend parenting class and could not prove it as the juvenile court did not have transcripts. Further more, these injustices can lead to high school drop out, unless students choose to endure public school until graduation.
The colleges have federal student loans and grants that allow students to finance their education. We should increase the aggregriate amount of student loans to $500,000 and lower the age so that infants are eligible to finance their lifelong educational goals. This will eliminate school property taxes and increase the economy. Public schools should not have any authority to control how the money is spent except the money they receive when there is competition between privatized schools, religious schools, satellite schools, charter schools, and home schools.
Economically disadvantaged students should be able exercise freedom of religion in school. School Choice vouchers would allow religious freedom for those who can not afford to pay to attend a private school and escape the cruelty felt by the enforcement of truancy laws and other injustices and educational inequalities.
References
Nelson, J. L., Palonsky, S. B., & McCarthy, M. R. (2007). Critical issues in Education:
"The Unobserved Strength of Military Families"By Blue Star Families For Obama members Kathy Roth-Douquet and Laura Dempsey
The recent AP story on the toll of the recent conflicts on military families may be well meaning, but also is skewed journalism that leaves people with the impression that there is a widespread epidemic of violence and mental instability in the military community. Like many stories covering military families the piece quotes no hard evidence to back its more sensational claims then goes on to make the claims anyway.
We need to be careful about how we discuss the effects of these conflicts on military families. Clearly multiple deployments have taken their toll. The problems listed in the article are occurring. But the extent of the problems is not known, nor is the prognosis for these families once the war ends.
The bottom line is that our military has never experienced this kind of sustained long term foreign war with such a relatively small and largely married force, and we need to find ways to make it more endurable. But there is a lot more health and resilience in our combat forces than the story reflects. It is also not a foreign experience for people to find strength in their marriage and bonding as a result of weathering the challenges of deployment. And the Marine Corps, which has a similar proportion of its force deployed with less distress, is not mentioned, and therefore whatever lessons there are to be learned there (hint: 7 months for battalion-level combat deployments instead of 15 month deployments) are also unmentioned.
We cannot dismiss the very real problems facing military families as a result of the current OPTEMPO. But exaggerated claims of families on the brink of mental instability and emotional ruin are premature, and run the risk of offending those who are proud of the strength they've brought to the challenge.
Another potentially awful byproduct of articles such as this is the risk that the American public will revive the Vietnam-era stereotype of the combat soldier (and now it would appear his family as well) as a dangerous, mentally unstable character. This is especially troubling given the total lack of comprehensive, analytical data on the issue.
Bottom line:
Clearly this war is taking a toll on our military families, who have had to bear the burden of the Iraq war alone for too long. Combat troops and families have been heroic in the resources they've brought to bear, but we need to do far more to make the burden more bearable.
We need to take a closer look at the damage being done, get better numbers on the extent of the problems and find out if the problems continue after a soldier separates from the service. We also need to take lessons learned of the success stories, and recognize and celebrate the successes.
Finally we need to make absolutely sure that our country is providing a robust support system for its military families and recent combat veterans and their families that is commensurate with the honorable and heroic service that they continue to provide for this country.
Blue Stars For Obama ~ Pro Military, Pro Obama
Your link to the campaign and to Michelle Obama’s Roundtables on Military Families
Blue Stars for Obama is an organizing site for military families to take action in the campaign! Through Blue Stars for Obama we’ll collect list of endorsements, ask you to help us grow the group, and seek ideas that we can feed back to the campaign. Blue Star members may have the opportunity to get invitations to Michelle Obama’s roundtable discussions with military families held near bases around the country.
Help us take action! Even if you belong to another MyGroups military family site, please join Blue Stars too. Blue Stars for Obama is “Pro Military, Pro Obama.”
It was started by Army and Marine Corps Spouses who believe supporting Senator Obama reinforces our support of our loved ones serving in the military and sees our commitment to the country as military family members echoed in Barack Obama’s unyielding personal commitment to public service and his dedication to make America safer by increasing the prestige of the US around the world. The essence of Senator Obama’s candidacy reflects the traditional military values of courage, commitment, honor, loyalty and selfless service ~ values needed in the White House. You can help bring about this change by becoming a “Blue Star for Obama.” This exciting comprehensive grass roots initiative borrows the symbolism of the blue star flag which immediate family members of active duty service members in times of war may fly, but it is not in any way affiliated with the Service Flag or the Blue Star Mothers organization. Blue Stars for Obama is open to all who have any family member serving in the military ~ that includes a spouse, child, parent, grandchild, niece, nephew and so forth.
For more information on this exciting group and updates on Michelle Obama’s activities, check out the blog at our site:
. http://my.barackobama.com/page/group/BlueStarsForObama
Thank you,
Heidi & The Blue Stars for Obama Team
In these final days, it is more important than ever that we talk to our friends, neighbors, collegues and associates and get them to the polls. Since last Saturday, I have taken 15 people to the polls. Right now I'm in the middle of a PCS move a nd it has been difficult to volunteer in ways that I would like to. But I figured I can go door to door in my neighborhood, encourage people to vote. I don't live to far from an earyl vote poll station so once I have them ready to vote for Barack, I throw in "let's go right now"! I even took the people that were painting my home. Please, let's do all we can to make sure NC sends a resounding message to all the media pundits: We will not be dissuaded or disillusioned in NC.
