SourceWatch:Identify supporters of the Responsible Plan

In March 2008, a group of Congressional candidates - working with national security experts and retired generals - drafted and released the Responsible Plan to End the War in Iraq. Centered around a seven-point strategy of non-military options, the plan was crafted from pieces of legislation already debated in Congress. When it was announced, eleven Democratic candidates for the U.S. House of Representatives announced their endorsement, and more than 30 have since signed on as supporters.

The following is a list of known plan endorsers, followed by suggestions on how to indicate their support on each candidate's Congresspedia profile page. Please add any additional information that you find (specifying your sources) to the article on that person.

How-to

Instructions are below, but if you need help, don't hesitate to email Congresspedia staff editors Conor Kenny or Avelino Maestas for assistance. If this is your first time editing here, you'll need to briefly register here, and learn more about adding information to the site here, here and here.

Add endorsement to candidates' profile pages

Step 1:

Open the profile for one of the candidates that has endorsed the plan from the list below (you might want to open the link in a new window so you can keep this instruction page open).

Step 2:

Look for the "Positions, record and controversies" section and see if they have a section on "Iraq War" or something similar. If so, click the "[edit]" link next to that section title or, if they don't already have one, click the "[edit]" link by the "Positions, record and controversies" heading.

• If they don't have an "Iraq War" section already, add one by clicking the "[edit]" link and entering the line "===Iraq War===" right under the "==Positions, record and controversies==".

Step 3:

Enter information about their support for the Responsible Plan into the editing window. There's no "right" way to do this - see the citizen-created section on candidate Mary Pallant's page for an example, or you can just copy and paste this block in:

CANDIDATE NAME has endorsed the [[Responsible Plan to End the War in Iraq]], which follows many prescriptions of the [[Iraq Study Group]]. The plan's objectives include removing all U.S. troops from Iraq and renouncing control over Iraq's oil and the establishment of permanent military bases in the country.

To remove U.S. troops from Iraq To end the war, the plan calls for:
* U.S. troops to be completely withdrawn from Iraq, beginning immediately;
* The use of diplomacy to engage Iraq's neighbors;
* Humanitarian assistance for the Iraq refugee crisis; and
* The creation of a framework for the prosecution of war criminals.

The plan also aims to prevent the "future Iraqs" by:
* Including war funding in the regular budget (instead of including it as an "emergency appropriation" every year);
* Removing fraud and abuse in the U.S. contracting process;
* Increasing transparency and accountability in the executive branch by eliminating [[presidential signing statements]], restoring [[habeas corpus]] and ending warrantless wiretapping of U.S. citizens;
* Increasing America's standing in the world by renouncing torture and rendition;
* Reducing the use of private militias and rebuilding the U.S. military;
* Funding veteran education (through a new GI bill) and healthcare;
* "Restor[ing] public trust in the media" by rolling back media consolidation;
* Decreasing dependence on foreign oil by funding a massive renewable energy "Apollo Project"; [http://www.responsibleplan.com/]

This should generate a block of text that looks like this:

CANDIDATE NAME has endorsed the Responsible Plan to End the War in Iraq, which follows many prescriptions of the Iraq Study Group. The plan's objectives include removing all U.S. troops from Iraq and renouncing control over Iraq's oil and the establishment of permanent military bases in the country.

To remove U.S. troops from Iraq To end the war, the plan calls for:

• U.S. troops to be completely withdrawn from Iraq, beginning immediately;
• the use of diplomacy to engage Iraq's neighbors;
• humanitarian assistance for the Iraq refugee crisis; and
• the creation of a framework for the prosecution of war criminals.

The plan also aims to prevent the "future Iraqs" by:

• Including war funding in the regular budget (instead of including it as an "emergency appropriation" every year);
• Removing fraud and abuse in the U.S. contracting process;
• Increasing transparency and accountability in the executive branch by eliminating presidential signing statements, restoring habeas corpus and ending warrantless wiretapping of U.S. citizens;
• Increasing America's standing in the world by renouncing torture and rendition;
• Reducing the use of private militias and rebuilding the U.S. military;
• Funding veteran education (through a new GI bill) and healthcare;
• "Restor[ing] public trust in the media" by rolling back media consolidation;
• Decreasing dependence on foreign oil by funding a massive renewable energy "Apollo Project"; [1]

Step 4

After saving your text, scroll down to the very bottom of the page and click the last "[edit]" link on the bottom. Enter this text (it doesn't matter where):

[[Category:Endorser of the Responsible Plan to End the War in Iraq]]

This will enter the candidate into the category of people endorsing the plan, so the entire list can be easily viewed here.

Step 5

On this page, scroll down and remove the candidate from the list below so other citizen editors can know which ones are left to be done.

That's it!

There's still plenty of information to be entered about candidates for Congress. You can find your state's candidates by selecting it from the map at the Wiki the Vote portal. Also, the article on the Responsible Plan itself could use some fleshing out, if you feel like working on it.

Candidates left to enter

1. Darcy Burner - candidate for U.S. House, Washington
2. Donna Edwards - candidate for U.S. House, Maryland
3. Eric Massa - candidate for U.S. House, New York
4. Chellie Pingree - candidate for U.S. House, Maine
5. Tom Perriello - candidate for U.S. House, Virginia
6. Jared Polis - candidate for U.S. House, Colorado
7. George Fearing - candidate for U.S. House, Washington
8. Lawrence Byrnes - candidate for U.S. House, Florida
9. Steve Harrison - candidate for U.S. House, New York
10. Sam Bennett - candidate for U.S. House, Pennsylvania
11. Harry Taylor - candidate for U.S. House, North Carolina
12. Alan Grayson - candidate for U.S. House, Florida
13. Dennis Shulman - candidate for U.S. House, New Jersey
14. Larry Grant - candidate for U.S. House, Idaho
15. Leslie Byrne - candidate for U.S. House, Virginia
16. Jim Hunt - candidate for U.S. House, Montana
17. William O'Neill - candidate for U.S. House, Ohio
18. Jill Derby - candidate for U.S. House, Nevada
19. Alice Kryzan - candidate for U.S. House, New York
20. Ed Fallon - candidate for U.S. House, Iowa
21. Mike Waltner - candidate for U.S. House, Pennsylvania
22. Joe Garcia - candidate for U.S. House, Florida
23. Steve Marks - candidate for U.S. House, Oregon
24. Debbie Cook - candidate for U.S. House, California
25. Don Wiviott - candidate for U.S. House, New Mexico
26. Darius Shahinfar - candidate for U.S. House, New York
27. Faye Armitage - candidate for U.S. House, Florida
28. Tom Wyka - candidate for U.S. House, New Jersey
29. Cheryl Sabel - candidate for U.S. House, Alabama
30. Timothy Cunha - candidate for U.S. House, Florida
31. Ron Shepston - candidate for U.S. House, California
32. Barry Welsh - candidate for U.S. House, Indiana
33. Gretchen Clearwater - candidate for U.S. House, Indiana
34. Roger Waun - candidate for U.S. House, Texas
35. Ellen Greenberg - candidate for U.S. House, New Jersey
36. Clint Curtis - candidate for U.S. House, Florida
37. Jane Mitakides - candidate for U.S. House, Ohio
38. Jennifer Dougherty - candidate for U.S. House, Maryland
39. Gilda Reed - candidate for U.S. House, Louisiana
40. Kyle Foust - candidate for U.S. House, Pennsylvania
41. Mike Turner - candidate for U.S. House, Virginia
42. Cheryl Ede - candidate for U.S. House, California
43. Richard Carter - candidate for U.S. House, Nebraska
44. Samm Simpson - candidate for U.S. House, Florida
45. Bill Hedrick - candidate for U.S. House, California
46. Steve Blythe - candidate for U.S. House, Florida
47. Mike Carroll - candidate for U.S. House, Ohio
48. Howard Shanker - candidate for U.S. House, Arizona
49. Mary Pallant - candidate for U.S. House, California
50. James 'Clyde' Malloy - candidate for U.S. House, Florida
51. Steve Young - candidate for U.S. House, California
52. Tony Barr - candidate for U.S. House, Pennsylvania
53. Phillip Steck - candidate for U.S. House, New York
54. Doug Tudor - candidate for U.S. House, Florida
55. Jeff Merkley - candidate for U.S. Senate, Oregon
56. Greg Fischer - candidate for U.S. Senate, Kentucky
57. Bob Tuke - candidate for U.S. Senate, Tennessee

Related SourceWatch resources

• Responsible Plan

External links

ResponsiblePlan.com