Disinvest Terror

One of the best ideas I've seen to help combat terrorism comes from Frank Gaffney, a Reagan-era Pentagon official, who, through his website, disinvestterror.org, is leading the way to curb the funding of businesses and organizations that do business with known terrorists and terror harboring states. Here is the mission statement from their website.

Throughout our history, Americans have risen to the challenge of defending our beloved country and our liberty. Following the 9/11 attacks, however, most Americans felt powerless. Powerless to respond to the tragic attacks in New York and Washington, DC. Powerless to express meaningfully their outrage. And powerless to help defeat terrorism. What we did not realize -- until now -- was that each and every one of us actually can play a pivotal role in winning the War on Terror. How? By demanding that our public and private pensions plans, college endowments, individual retirement account managers, 401(k) plans, and other investment vehicles exploit the leverage represented by investments in publicly traded companies that operate in terrorist-sponsoring states. In a unified front, we should all be saying "This is my money and it will not go to support terror." DivestTerror.org is a nationwide campaign aimed at some 400 public companies worldwide that are providing revenues, technology and moral cover to governments that sponsor terrorism.

The primary objective of this campaign is to force governments to choose between their sponsorship of terrorism and critical partnerships with publicly traded firms. To illustrate how such a campaign can achieve this objective, please review our synopsis of the South African model of the 1980's that succeeded in ending apartheid. DivestTerror.org provides the empirical analysis and architecture that can enable such a campaign. Its success, however, can be assured only if you and other Americans enlist. Doing so will allow each and every one of us to help wage the war on Terror by opening new divestment fronts through our universities, local communities and states, individual retirement accounts, churches and unions.

DivestTerror.org provides the tools. Now, patriotic Americans can once again do their part to counter the threat confronting our country. Join us and help ensure that dangerous terrorist organizations - and those that sponsor them - will not continue to flourish with our money.