Why Rosie’s our girl

Rosie, our One Minute for Peace poster guinea, shares a lot in common with many of us here at the American Friends Service Committee: she’s vegetarian, she doesn’t talk a lot, and she’s cute and cuddly.



OK, I made that last part up.

Let’s be up front about this: We’re determined to raise $1.9 million for peace. Sound like a lot? Not to the U.S. government, which spent that much every minute in 2008 on the military – and which plans to spend a whopping 57% of all discretionary spending on the military next year.

But how could we make those mind-boggling numbers seem real?

Videos!

We discussed a number of ideas for one-minute videos when we started this campaign: earnest, off-the-wall, humorous, and possibly demented.

Everyone had excellent points about what type of videos would be best, but we couldn’t come to consensus. So our web team did the next best thing: Aaron, Ralph, Terry, and Carl went out and created their own videotapes. (I stayed here to write.) Some are earnest. Some are off the wall. Some are humorous.

None are demented.

We’ll put up a new video every week for your viewing enjoyment.

But there’s a catch. (Oh, come on – you knew there’d be a catch from the get-go.) We want you to respond. Post your own videos on YouTube or other video services. Comment on this blog. Respond on our YouTube site at www.youtube.com/oneminuteforpeace.

Most of all, we hope you’ll open your hearts – and wallets – to help us raise One Minute for Peace.

Coming soon to a peace blog near you: What we could do with $1.9 million.