By Cheri Roberts-Piper
Last week - Seventeen-year-old peace powerhouse Ava Lowery, registered to vote in what will be her first presidential election. Ava has been galvanizing America’s youth for years and the 2008 election just may show how many of our country’s first time voters have been listening. With Ava’s eye and attention on presidential candidates John Edwards and Barak Obama you can be sure her followers are watching as well.
We came to know Ava years ago by her hard hitting, inspiring, and often excruciatingly graphic anti-war videos posted on youtube and other websites across the Internet. Ava’s videos on youtube alone receive many thousands of views from people of all parties and ages and have garnered the attention of media outlets like Mother Jones, Rolling Stone Magazine and CNN.
I asked Ava what she intends her videos to accomplish and who are they targeted at. Her response was simple and to the point,
"All of my videos are directed at educating people about the war. What they do with that information is all up to them. Hopefully my videos will cause some voters to think about the Iraq war and how it will be handled by the candidates they support when voting this year."
Peace Takes Courage - Ava’s main web presence, received 1.45 million hits last month alone while her newly launched Ava’s Army received more than 80,000 hits in its first month. With numbers like these one has to wonder if this young activist realizes the power she potentially wields on a whole new generation of America’s voters.
CA. Congressional Candidate and Peace Mom Cindy Sheehan – who has known Ava for some time, shared her thoughts with me regarding Ava entering the electorate for the first time,
"If young people followed Ava's lead in trying to make the world a better place, and if we have young leaders like her, I feel our world will be in great hands. Voting is only a small part of our part in democracy, but our votes have to be informed and intelligent, I am sure Ava will be an active participant in our democracy."
A Texas father – Steve Mauk, who has a.......
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