DON'T LET BUD HAVE THE LAST WORD ON UNDERAGE DRINKING

The Marin Institute -- Anheuser-Busch still uses kid-friendly mascots like these dancing lizards on Budweiser.com. Perhaps you’ve noticed a letter to the editor from your local paper promoting Anheuser-Busch’s latest answer to underage drinking. We’ve heard that similar letters from local Bud distributors have appeared in papers around the country. We don’t think the world’s largest brewer should have the last word on efforts to prevent underage drinking - especially when Anheuser-Busch is using its considerable public relations clout to shift responsibility for this tragic problem to others.

If you see such a letter in your local paper, we invite you to respond by customizing and sending our sample letter to the editor.

After seeing Anheuser-Busch letters in two of her local papers, Linda Pratt, a prevention advocate in Solano County, CA and member of the Marin Institute Board of Directors, adapted our sample letter and was published in both papers: The Reporter and the Daily Republic.

SENATE ACTION NEEDED TO PRESERVE EUDL

Protect Our Youth! Save the Federal Enforcing Underage Drinking Laws Program Now! http://capwiz.com/beawarenow/mail/oneclick_compose/?alertid=5406606

Funding for the federal Enforcing Underage Drinking Laws Program (EUDL) has never been included in the President's budget. For this reason, we have always asked the field to reach out to members of Congress to fund the EUDL initiative. Without the support that EUDL provides, states and communities will be faced with combating an already growing problem with even fewer resources.

In 1998, Congress recognized the seriousness of underage drinking and related problems when it created the EUDL program to strengthen enforcement of underage drinking laws nationwide that keep alcohol out of our youth's hands. EUDL is a $25-million annual federal initiative that addresses youth alcohol use and the only one focused exclusively on underage drinking prevention. This program also provides block grants to states to create and maintain statewide task forces to combat underage drinking.

Recently the House Appropriations Committee provided $25 million to preserve this vital program. This victory was the result of letters and phones calls from public health advocates, law enforcement personnel, and others like you to their members of Congress urging support for maintaining the program. Now the Senate is poised to consider the Justice Department spending bill for fiscal year 2006.

Your immediate help is needed to save the EUDL program.

Please tell your Senators in Washington to fully fund the EUDL program that provides states with the federal support they need to prevent underage drinking and the tragedy associated with it.

You can still save this program, but time is running out. Act now!

Please click here http://capwiz.com/beawarenow/mail/oneclick_compose/?alertid=5406606 to send a letter to your Senators in Congress in support of funding the EUDL program. Feel free to edit the letter and add information about underage drinking in your state and community.

(Link = http://capwiz.com/beawarenow/mail/oneclick_compose/?alertid=5406606 )

Thank you for helping to protect youth in your state and community.

DOJ OPENS INVESTIGATION INTO BIG TOBACCO RICO TRIAL

Thanks to smokefree supporters like you, progress is being made in the U.S. Justice Department's tobacco lawsuit fiasco.  

Now we need your help getting the word out more broadly about Big Tobacco/political tampering with this important legal case...a case focusing in part on how tobacco companies misled the American public about the dangers of secondhand smoke.

On Monday, June 13th, Department of Justice Inspector General Glenn Fine declared that an investigation into alleged political interference during the DOJ suit against Big Tobacco was outside the scope of his office.  Instead, H. Marshall Jarrett, the head of the DOJ's Office of Professional Responsibility, has agreed to investigate.

Thanks to the emails sent by many of you, as well as the requests of numerous lawmakers and public health groups, the investigation will shine light on the highly suspicious turn-of-events at the close of the trial last week.  If you would like some background on the trial, please click here.

Additionally, consumer advocate Ralph Nader has asked the Office of Professional Responsibility to investigate Assistant Attorney General Robert McCallum's connections to the tobacco industry, and the DOJ's decision to allow him to work on this case.

While some print media have begun to pick up this story, the major news outlets sadly still have not. 

Please help by encouraging your local media to cover the investigation into the alleged political tampering, and also to report on any role that Big Tobacco may have played.   The integrity of our judicial system is at stake.

1) Please write letters-to-the-editor of your local papers;

2) Call in to talk radio programs;

3) Email your local tv news stations.

As always, THANK YOU for taking smokefree action.

SHIFT IN TOBACCO SUIT IS ASSAILED

The Los Angeles Times reported yesterday that the lawyers representing the people of the United States in the fraud trial against the tobacco industry were forced to reduce their demands "by higher level, politically appointed officials of the Justice Department". The change in the government's demands was so abrupt that even the tobacco industry's lead lawyer was quoted in the Washington Post as saying, "We were very surprised. They've gone down from $130 billion to $10 billion without any explanation."  

http://rs6.net/tn.jsp?t=qg7bojbab.0.4cvapjbab.uhz9u9aab.13292&p=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.latimes.com%2Fbusiness%2Fla-fi-tobacco9jun09%2C1%2C2277686.story%3Fcoll%3Dla-headlines-business

http://rs6.net/tn.jsp?t=qg7bojbab.0.bdvapjbab.uhz9u9aab.13292&p=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.washingtonpost.com%2Fwp-dyn%2Fcontent%2Farticle%2F2005%2F06%2F07%2FAR2005060702019.html  

Complex cases like this often settle by agreement between the parties before a final ruling from the judge. The government's sudden change in court may be a signal that it is getting ready to settle the case with no finding of liability against the tobacco industry and only small voluntary corrective actions by the industry.


 If this happens, the decades of struggle to improve the health of the American people by getting them to stop or never start smoking may end in partial failure. More than 45 million people in this country still smoke and 440,000 die from smoking related causes every year. Thousands of teens are still getting lured by the industry into tobacco dependence to replace those who die.


 I urge all of our readers to send a loud and clear message to senior political leaders: we are watching and we want the strongest possible public health remedies to prevent and end smoking paid for by the industry, not a weak, politically motivated settlement that favors the tobacco industry.


 Please use these links to send your personal message now. Thank you.


 White House http://rs6.net/tn.jsp?t=qg7bojbab.0.cdvapjbab.uhz9u9aab.13292&p=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.whitehouse.gov%2Fcontact%2F


 Justice Department http://rs6.net/tn.jsp?t=qg7bojbab.0.ddvapjbab.uhz9u9aab.13292&p=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.justice.gov%2Fcontact-us.html


 US Senate http://rs6.net/tn.jsp?t=qg7bojbab.0.edvapjbab.uhz9u9aab.13292&p=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.senate.gov%2F


 US House http://rs6.net/tn.jsp?t=qg7bojbab.0.fdvapjbab.uhz9u9aab.13292&p=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.house.gov%2F

ENFORCING UNDERAGE DRINKING LAWS PROGRAM (EUDL) FUNDING AT RISK

-- --- --- ---

FROM IIAA:

To view on the web: http://capwiz.com/beawarenow/mail/oneclick_compose/?alertid=5406606 http://capwiz.com/beawarenow/mail/oneclick_compose/?alertid=5406606

Protect Our Youth! Save the Federal Enforcing Underage Drinking Laws Program Now! http://capwiz.com/beawarenow/mail/oneclick_compose/?alertid=5406606

Funding for the federal Enforcing Underage Drinking Laws Program (EUDL) has never been included in the President's budget. For this reason, we have always asked the field to reach out to members of Congress to fund the EUDL initiative. Without the support that EUDL provides, states and communities will be faced with combating an already growing problem with even fewer resources.

In 1998, Congress recognized the seriousness of underage drinking and related problems when it created the EUDL program to strengthen enforcement of underage drinking laws nationwide that keep alcohol out of our youth's hands. EUDL is a $25-million annual federal initiative that addresses youth alcohol use and the only one focused exclusively on underage drinking prevention. This program also provides block grants to states to create and maintain statewide task forces to combat underage drinking.

Your immediate help is needed to save the EUDL program.

Please tell your lawmakers in Washington to fully fund the EUDL program that provides states with the federal support they need to prevent underage drinking and the tragedy associated with it.

You can still save this program, but time is running out. Act now!

Please click here http://capwiz.com/beawarenow/mail/oneclick_compose/?alertid=5406606  to send a letter to your elected representatives in Congress in support of funding the EUDL program. Feel free to edit the letter and add information about underage drinking in your state and community.

Thank you for helping to protect youth in your state and community.

Learn more about the Campaign for Alcohol-Free Sports TV: http://www.BeerFreeSportsTV.org

--> The Institute of Medicine issued a landmark study in 2003 recommending a national media campaign targeted at parents as the centerpiece of a national effort to combat the health crisis of underage drinking.  

--> Underage drinking prevention champions on Capitol Hill have been successful in  including funds in the Labor-HHS-Education bill for the start-up costs of a media campaign -- to conduct research on effective messaging using focus groups, and devise a creative strategy.  

--> Continued funding will allow the Ad Council to distribute media kits to 28,000 media outlets nationwide, monitor the placement of the ads, and conduct on-going longitudinal studies for evaluation of the campaign's success.  

--> This modest investment in helping parents protect their children from the widespread harms of underage drinking is expected to leverage up to $30 million per year in donated media per year -- a return of 70:1.

If your Representative's staffer isn't sure who to contact to sign on to the letter, tell them they may call Courtney Schlieter (Rep. Wolf) at x55136 or Don DeArmon (Rep. Roybal-Allard) at x51766.

PLEASE FORWARD THIS ALERT TO COLLEAGUES AND FRIENDS!