Safe Energy Campaign Plans Aim for New Energy Policies

The next step in the campaign against Nuclear Power is "to go door-to-door in New Hampshire with the safe energy platforms, talking to local folks and encouraging them to confront presidential candidates at public speakings on the nuclear issue," Harvey Wasserman, a founder of the Clamshell Alliance, said last night.

"We're trying to build a grass-roots consciousness around the nuclear issue," Wasserman said at an organizational meeting at Phillips Brooks House.

Members of the Safe Energy campaign advocate a national program to increase energy efficiency and waste elimination, a moratorium on the licensing of nuclear power plants, and a government organized phase out of all existing plants.

America should "put the money going into nuclear plants into solar energy and start becoming energy self-sufficient," Wasserman said.

Wasserman added that the situation in Iran and Afghanistan "has drowned out the issue of nuclear energy, and we want to make sure that people don't loose sight of the real issues confronting the nation."

"It's all directly related--nuclear power and Afghanistan, Iran and the Seabrook power plant, the Mid-East and the nuclear problem here," he said.

The Safe Energy Campaign strategy in New Hampshire also calls for a door-to-door canvassing operation to raise public support for the anti-nuclear, pro-alternative energy issue.

"I think going door-to-door is worth doing. It gets people involved in the issues, and it's the ultimate political action for organizing a mass movement," Wasserman said.

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Across the country, safe energy campaigners confront candidates "everywhere they go," producing "a considerable effect on the audiences," Susan Birmingham, a full-time Safe Energy campaigner said last night.

"We have three weeks to identify safe energy sympathizers in New Hampshire," Birmingham said, adding, "All we have is people power. We have to door-knock-it."

"The success of the campaign depends on how many people we can convince to spread the Safe Energy platform in New Hampshire and around New England," Birmingham said.