June 16, 2000

Free trade for weapons

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US weapons makers may soon be able to peddle their wares in Britain and Australia without so much as a license, reports CAPITOL HILL BLUE, thanks to new arms-export rules being drafted by the Pentagon and State Department. This is great news for defense contractors, but not everyone in Washington is pleased.

Arms-control advocates fear that what lines Lockheed‘s pockets today may bite the rest of us in the butt tomorrow. Similar trade rules with Canada were scrapped because of arms leaking through to Iran. “It’s ridiculous to think the technology we spill into Europe won’t spread,” says one arms-control expert. Republicans on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee have threatened to kill the new rules, and even Madeleine Albright was reportedly forced to swallow her objections to the deal.

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We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

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