Have you adopted the awful Samantha Power's R2P? Your group seems once again to be 'lending critical support' to the Obama administration's war in the Mideast:
"...to pressure [sic] Turkey to allow Syrian Kurdish civilians to escape Kobane” - i.e., to open the recently-closed border - is hardly the same as "...to pressure [sic] Turkey to allow Kurds to defend [sic] the Syrian Kurdish border town of Kobane..." (with Turkish troops and/or bombs?)
Turkey (vis-a-vis the Kurds) has roughly the same relation to the US as Israel (vis-a-vis the Palestinians). In each case, the USG could effectively demand the cessation of its client's oppression of its minority. Instead, the USG continues its hypocritical calls for 'restraint' while its clients do as they wish, so long as their actions are consistent with US imperial control of the region.
But rescuing the Kurds of Kobane (with US airstrikes) is roughly similar to rescuing the Yazidis on Mount Sinjar (with US airstrikes) - an excuse for the continuation of the war that the US wants in the region <http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/aug/14/iraq-crisis-us-britain-rescue-yazidis-mount-sinjar>.
The Obama administration is particularly good at inventing lying excuses for extending their control of the Mideast (and its energy resources). Their lies are simply sneakier - they lack the bluff candor of the Bush administration's lies.
But they seem adequate to garner the support of 'Just Foreign Policy' and 'MoveOn.'
The US is by far the power most responsible for mass murder in Iraq in this century. If our government were in fact concerned with a 'just foreign policy' in the region - or the safety of the Kurds - it would take the matter to the Security Council, as the UN Charter requires: "...the Security Council ... may take such action by air, sea, or land forces as may be necessary to maintain or restore international peace and security" (Art. 42).
But the Clinton, Bush and Obama administrations have consistently avoided the requirements of international law because they knew that their actions were crimes under that law - as they continue to be.
If you don't mind the split infinitive, how about a petition to "Urge President Obama and Members of Congress to strongly back the U.N. Charter, to which it is committed by treaty, as the supreme law of the land"?
--CGE
On Oct 10, 2014, at 9:49 PM, Robert Naiman <naiman at justforeignpolicy.org> wrote:
> President Obama and U.S. officials, including Members of Congress, should
> do everything in their power to pressure Turkey to allow Kurds to defend
> the Syrian Kurdish border town of Kobane from the ISIS assault, and should
> do everything in their power to pressure Turkey to allow Syrian Kurdish
> civilians to escape Kobane.
>
> http://petitions.moveon.org/sign/obama-press-turkey-to?source=c.url&r_by=1135580
>
> ===
>
> Robert Naiman
> Policy Director
> Just Foreign Policy
> www.justforeignpolicy.org
> naiman at justforeignpolicy.org
> (202) 448-2898 x1
> ___________________________________
> http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk