Senator Gary Hart speaks to Council for a Livable World supporters

Senator Gary Hart spoke to about 30 Council members and potential supporters at a breakfast on March 7 the Nassau Inn in Princeton, NJ.

Also in attendance were the Council’s Executive Director, John Isaacs, the Secretary Treasurer Paul Castleman, and Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation National Advisory Board member Frank Von Hippel, Professor of Public and International Affairs at Princeton's Woodrow Wilson School

Hart spoke about the importance of a clear and cohesive national security policy for the current Congress and for presidential candidates in the upcoming 2008 elections. He also emphasized the need to integrate various policies typically separated from matters of national security, though related to it, into one consistent policy. Offering climate change as an example of such an interrelated policy, he explained the connections between the scarcity of resources and nuclear policy, which thus leads to national security problems.

When it came time for questions, various members of the community, including Princeton University professors, asked the Senator about the policies that the Council advocates for Iraq and Iran as well as the current role that congress is taking in effecting such policies. There were also questions about what individuals can do to advance our positions, the recent problems at the Walter Reed hospital in Wahsington, nuclear power and energy independence.

Senator Hart and John Isaacs spoke on behalf of the Council, answering these questions and generated an interesting discussion on the importance of advocating a positive strategy, rather than simply opposing an adversary’s position. The issue of using positive language to describe the Council’s position on pulling out of Iraq was discussed and there was a general consensus in the room that it might catch the attention of American people.

By describing the atmosphere in Iraq as detrimental to the “safety” of the region, arguing that the region would only become “safe” without the presence of U.S. troops, and calling for Congress to “save” American lives, the Council might effectively persuade people that the American and Iraqi people would in fact be better off without the War in Iraq.

One major hurdle for the Council is overcoming the association of the War in Iraq with the War on Terror that various Administration officials have ingrained in the minds of many Americans. Senator Hart discussed the role of the media in perpetuating this association especially at the beginning of the war when the press did not want to be seen as “soft on terror.”

Overall, the breakfast generated thoughtful discussions among the attendees on various national security issues and the future direction of the Council’s policies.

As Princeton student Barbara Bruce and former Council intern Barbara Bruce said, “As a college student focusing in national security policy, I found the discussions at the breakfast to be extremely interesting and thought-provoking. I couldn’t agree more with Senator Hart’s idea of integrating all the policies having to do with national security into one, coherent policy. Inspired by his idea of climate change as a national security – not simply environmental – issue, I have discussed it with my advisor as a potential Senior Thesis topic.”