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KucinichMoveOnUpDate * WMD Accountability * K-Videos
24 June 2003
"We must use time wisely and forever realize
that the time is ripe to do what is right"
- Nelson Mandela1) Vote for Dennis - June 24 - MoveOn Presidential Primary
2) Demand White House Evidence on Iraq- - Whimper of Mass Destruction
- - Online Petition: "Demand White House Evidence on Iraq
3) Kucinich - Power Parable for an Unlikely Crusade- - Ben Cohen endorsed Dennis Kucinich for President
- - Kucinich Videos / DVDs available from JusticeVision.org
4) Running the Nation into a ‘Fiscal Trainwreck'
Editor's Notes:Coming from the vintage point of a news publisher out of a campaign to stop/expose the high risk Cassini Earth flyby, the world appears to be steadfastly accelerating its pace toward a widening gap of potential catastrophic [man-made] consequences. The path of Cassini was US military-led, and its next step and stated interest was to dominate the heavens to dominate Earth. Joining the campaign was a Congressman who introduced legislation to preserve space for peace, and aimed to reverse the path of the arms race. Since then I have continually been appreciating the heroic, courageous, eloquent, and strategic actions of Dennis Kucinich. He listens, acts, and is of, for, and by the people.
Please respond ASAP to the MoveOn Presidential Primary, register and vote on June 24! MoveOn has been one of the leading grassroots peace organizations in the US. Please respond to their request for your vote and participation and support a peace candidate for US President in 2004. Your involvement can help unite a movement for world peace, security, and balance for the health of our shared ecosystem.
Item 4 is an Op/Ed piece by Jim Culleny on the Bush group's plan to wreck the economy. Check the link, this is well worth your reading and considering, as you take action in the MoveOn vote. This could prove pivotal for Kucinich and most all life on Earth.
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This Thursday, 26 June 2003, is the anniversary date of a shoot-out at Oglala-Lakota nation at the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota that led to Leonard Peltier's incarceration for more than 27 years. For more information on this and other campaigns, actions, and events at http://www.flybynews.com
1) Vote for Dennis - June 24 - MoveOn Presidential PrimaryFrom MoveOn: Just a quick reminder: Voting begins in the MoveOn Presidential Primary on June 24. Keep an eye on your inbox for your special email ballot. Please get others involved -- forward this message to your friends. If they are not already on the MoveOn mailing list, they will have to register to vote in the primary here:
http://moveon.org/pac/regIf you'd like to get to know the candidates more before you cast your vote, we have letters to the MoveOn membership from each of them on our website, as well as their responses to MoveOn members' questions. Here are the links:
Ambassador Carol Moseley Braun: www.moveon.org/pac/cands/braun.html
Governor Howard Dean: www.moveon.org/pac/cands/dean.html
Senator John Edwards: www.moveon.org/pac/cands/edwards.html
Congressman Dick Gephardt: www.moveon.org/pac/cands/gephardt.html
Senator Bob Graham: www.moveon.org/pac/cands/graham.html
Senator John Kerry: www.moveon.org/pac/cands/kerry.html
Congressman Dennis Kucinich: www.moveon.org/pac/cands/kucinich.html
Senator Joe Lieberman: www.moveon.org/pac/cands/lieberman.html
Reverend Al Sharpton: www.moveon.org/pac/cands/sharpton.html
Sincerely,
--Carrie, Eli, Joan, Peter, Wes, and Zack
The MoveOn Team
June 22nd, 2003
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Paid for by MOVEON.ORG PAC, P.O. Box 9218, Berkeley, CA 94709. This communication is not authorized by any candidate or candidate's committee. Website:
http://www.moveonpac.org
2) Demand White House Evidence on Iraq- - Whimper of Mass Destruction
- - Online Petition: "Demand White House Evidence on Iraq"
Congressional Republicans Refuse To Hold Republican President Accountable
Refuse Open Hearings Into Iraq's WMD
Congressman Dennis J. Kucinich (D-OH), the leader of the opposition to the war in Iraq in the House, again took to the House floor today to continue his pressure to demand the truth about the Administration's lead-up to the war in Iraq.
Today, Kucinich stated:
"Protection of the truth and the Constitutional role of Congress as a co-equal branch should not be a partisan matter. Yet, yesterday Republicans in the House International Relations Committee stonewalled an investigation of the Bush Administration's false claims that sent America to war against Iraq.
"The Resolution of Inquiry backed by 40 members of the House sought to protect Congress' role in asking the Administration where is the proof that Iraq has weapons of mass destruction? Where was proof of an imminent threat?
"Unfortunately, as panic sets in over the realization that the Administration misled the American people in the cause of war. Republicans are refusing to hold public hearings. Republicans are refusing serious oversight. Republicans are refusing open oversight. Republicans just won't make Republicans accountably.
"That is the problem with one party rule. Our democracy is endanger if we do not make this Administration accountable. They sent this country into war based on lies and in doing so have damaged the legitimacy of their own government.
"Where are the weapons of mass destruction?
Where was the imminent threat?
Why did America go to war?"
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- - Whimper of Mass DestructionMondo Washington
Whimper of Mass Destruction
by James Ridgeway
What Didn't They Know? When Didn't They Know It?
June 18 - 24, 2003
Mondo Washington this week:
A group of some 36 backbenchers in the House of Representatives is getting set to force the Republican leadership to take a stand on the continuing controversy over whether weapons of mass destruction exist in Iraq.
The House members, led by Democratic presidential long shot Dennis Kucinich, will submit "a resolution of inquiry" to the International Relations Committee, requesting that Bush turn over within 14 days "documents or other materials in the President's possession that provide specific evidence" in 10 instances where Bush, VP Cheney, or Defense Secretary Rumsfeld claimed that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction. These include Cheney's August 2002 assertion that "there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction"—a claim that was reiterated by Bush in September at the UN and in October at a speech in Cincinnati, along with further claims by Cheney and Rumsfeld. The latter said on March 24, with much assurance, "We have seen intelligence over many months that they have chemical and biological weapons, and that they have dispersed them and that they're weaponized and that, in one case at least, the command and control arrangements have been established."
The resolution amounts to a subpoena to the president by Congress. An arcane feature of the House rules, it has been used infrequently, once in 1980 in an attempt to elicit facts relating to President Jimmy Carter's brother Billy and his dealings with the Bolivian government, and once under Clinton in connection with the White House travel-office scandal. It seeks facts and nothing else.
A majority vote by the committee would put the resolution on the House floor. Either in the panel or on the floor, the GOP leadership will without doubt move to quash it. In doing so, the Democrats reason, the Republican leadership will not only be carrying forward the White House cover-up, but will be putting itself on record in backing the cover-up, a step that conceivably could have repercussions in next year's elections.
There are 36 co-sponsors, including seven New York members, led by Charlie Rangel and including Maurice Hinchey, Major Owens, Carolyn Maloney, Jerry Nadler, and Edolphus Towns.
Additional reporting: Phoebe St John and Joanna Khenkine
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- - Online Petition: "Demand White House Evidence on Iraq"[hosted on the web by PetitionOnline.com]
http://www.PetitionOnline.com/affero03/
3) Kucinich - Power Parable for an Unlikely Crusade- - Ben Cohen endorsed Dennis Kucinich for President
- - Kucinich Videos / DVDs available from JusticeVision.org
Washington Post
Power Parable for an Unlikely Crusade
Campaign Pulls Bright Spot From Dark Story
By Juliet Eilperin
Fourth in a series
In 1978, Cleveland was in free fall. The banks were pressuring the city's young and diminutive mayor, Dennis J. Kucinich, to sell the city's municipal electricity system to cover $4.5 million in debt. Kucinich refused, and the city went into default.
The next year he lost his reelection bid, and at 33, he entered what he now calls "the dark night of the soul." He had trouble finding any kind of work. A job at a newspaper fell through, as did one at a local radio station. He couldn't even become a spokesman for a paint and home supply store after one of its major investors objected. His marriage fell apart. He took refuge on the speaking tour circuit and in teaching communications classes at local universities, but Kucinich had become a pariah.
But by 1994 many voters, thankful for their low electricity rates, had forgiven him. He distributed placards in the shape of a light bulb with the slogan "Because He Was Right," and unseated a Republican state senator.
Two years later he won his House seat, defeating GOP Rep. Martin Hoke, this time with the slogan "Light Up Congress."
Kucinich's decision to hold on to the municipal power company is still controversial. John Green, director of the Ray C. Bliss Institute of Applied Politics at the University of Akron, said he suspects most Clevelanders still oppose it. "Everything's colored by the fact that the city went bankrupt," he said. But, for Kucinich, the episode has become a parable in his campaign to win the Democratic nomination for president. "When that story is told, it will be instrumental in getting me elected," he said in an interview. "Where it once was an albatross, now it's a springboard."
The story of Cleveland's municipally owned light plant embodies Kucinich's worldview, the view he hopes voters across the country will embrace: that the United States is in danger of losing its very soul, and that only a crusader such as Kucinich can stand up to the corrupt corporations and their political lackeys who are leading the country down this dangerous path.
Kucinich has a vision of how his administration would dismantle the corporate power structure he sees as destroying America's promise. He wants to repeal the North American Free Trade Agreement so U.S. companies can't take advantage of cheap labor in Mexico. He plans to use antitrust laws to break up monopolies, be they agribusiness or communications. He wants to slash defense spending, defying influential military contractors who extract billions from the nation's budget.
At 56, the four-term congressman sees himself as a bold messenger who is willing to say what others in his party cannot. More than a year ago in Los Angeles he gave a speech, called "A Prayer for America," opposing military action in Iraq. People across the country e-mailed and called him, telling him he should consider a presidential bid. By autumn, he started taking the idea seriously.
But while much of his campaign centers on ideology, it is just as much about his personal experience of defeat and redemption. To have kept trying in the face of defeat and then to finally reemerge as a stronger person is an experience he believes many Americans will relate to.
"It's really not as much about politics as it is about the heart," he said. "It's about seeing there are endless possibilities in life."
At a time of voter unease about the economy and government encroachment on civil liberties, Kucinich seems to have struck a chord with many Democrats. But his candidacy remains a hard sell, in part because of Kucinich himself. Even among liberal Democrats who dominate the party's nominating process, he is just a shade too far to the left. It's one thing for former Vermont governor Howard Dean to oppose the war in Iraq; it's another to propose, as Kucinich does, that the country establish a Department of Peace. Rep. Richard A. Gephardt (Mo.) suggests giving companies a tax break for health care; Kucinich wants a government-run, universal health care system that even former president Bill Clinton rejected in his first term.
But Kucinich remains optimistic. "When you look at the traditional political indices of name recognition, money, looks and all the other stuff, I'm the most unlikely candidate in this race," he said. "I'm used to winning elections people say are un-winnable."
So he hits the road and carries his message to Iowa.
On a recent campaign swing, Kucinich recounted the story of Cleveland's electricity crisis many times. He told it to hog farmers when they asked if he was sincere about standing up to giant farming conglomerates. He told it to labor leaders to underscore his willingness to take on multinationals. He told it to a group of supporters in a private home in Des Moines when he was describing how he envisioned his administration would operate.
Sitting with hog farmers in a local restaurant in Story City, Iowa, Kucinich said he would work to make sure that large-scale agriculture operations did not capture the market entirely. This prompted Kermit Miskell, a retired farmer, to ask, "So is this coming from your heart, or is this coming from a politician?"
"If it was coming from a politician, I would have sold a municipal electricity company and gone on to a career of great fame," Kucinich said. "There is not another candidate in this race who can stand up to corporate America, to the bankers."
Other Democratic candidates, such as Sen. John Edwards (D-N.C.), have touted their humble beginnings. But Kucinich can trump them all. While he was growing up, his family moved 21 times in search of affordable housing; at one point, he lived in the back seat of a 1949 Dodge. The son of a truck driver, Kucinich likes to tell audiences that, as Langston Hughes once wrote, "Life for me ain't been no crystal stair."
"I understand what people go through," he told a group of painters union officials in Ankeny, Iowa. "I can remember my parents counting the pennies to pay the utility bill. I can almost hear the click, click, click of pennies hitting the table."
Although Kucinich lived in poverty as a child, he had serious political ambitions at an early age. As a teenager, he confided to his best friend that he planned to run for mayor. Working as a copy boy at the Cleveland Plain Dealer, he told one of the paper's radio and TV columnists, George E. Condon, that he would be mayor by the time he was 30.
"Needless to say, my father did not put a whole lot of stock in this young-looking guy saying that," said George Condon Jr., who now serves as Washington bureau chief of the Copley News Service.
Eleven years later, Condon's father emceed Kucinich's mayoral inauguration. Kucinich was 31.
On one level, Kucinich is running a conventional campaign, traveling 20,000 miles during a recent campaign swing, complete with a camerawoman trailing him to capture scenes for future television ads, and a Des Moines headquarters opening with red, white and blue balloons. But he lags far behind other Democratic candidates in fundraising.
He raised slightly more than $250,000 on the Internet in the first few months of his campaign; Edwards and Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) collected $7 million each during that same period. The Ohio congressman has two paid staffers in Iowa; although it's two more than Al Sharpton has right now, it pales in comparison to the 14 Dean has in the state.
For the past six years, Kucinich hasn't spent a penny on paid media. He plans to employ a similar approach in Iowa, where he has 3,000 volunteers. "I will have the largest grass-roots campaign that the Democratic Party has ever seen," he said.
If there's one place it will work, it's Iowa -- and perhaps New Mexico, whose caucus Kucinich predicts he will win.
"What matters here is not money," said Gordon R. Fischer, the Iowa Democratic Party chairman, who came to watch Kucinich and several other candidates make their pitch at the state's Polk County dinner. "It's organization and people being fired up about your message."
But it is clear to everyone that money is a problem. "It's kind of like going into a gunfight with a pocketknife," said Mark Smith, the AFL-CIO's president in Iowa.
Without question, Kucinich's message resonates with many Iowa voters, particularly his plan to repeal NAFTA. "He's saying all the things a Democrat ought to say," said Ken Raines, one of three Democratic National Committee officers in Iowa. "I keep telling folks if Democrats run in the middle, sounding like a Republican, what's the point of voting for a Democrat?"
And in an era of blow-dried candidates, Kucinich exudes a unique charm. He's a mix of working-class ethnic and New Age visionary, a vegan who jokes that although he doesn't eat pork, he consumes plenty of corn and soy, two of Iowa's major crops. He actually pauses a few beats before answering reporters' questions, and is just as likely to quote Percy Bysshe Shelley in response as JFK. With a seemingly endless reservoir of energy, he outlasts his own aides, and he rises early and talks late into the night with prospective voters about how he would change the country.
Still, even his natural ideological allies said they would have to think twice before voting for him.
Marybeth Gardner, who organizes the Iowa candidate forum for the Stop the Arms Race political action committee and showed up at a recent Kucinich reception, said she has never met a better peace candidate. But she and all her friends face the same dilemma when choosing between Kucinich and Dean: "[Kucinich is] doing the exact right thing. On the other hand, we definitely want Bush out of the White House."
Kucinich is not deterred. Armed with his stories of taking on corporations and the traditional political power structure, he is moving ahead.
"This is about reclaiming the American dream," Kucinich said. "I'm going to be the only one in this campaign who takes this issue right to the people."
© 2003 The Washington Post Company
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- - Ben Cohen endorsed Dennis Kucinich for PresidentStatement from Ben Cohen
In this endorsement, I am speaking out as an individual -- and not on behalf of any organization, business, government, labor union or armed force. Nor does it imply that there will soon be an ice cream flavor named Kucinich Kreme.
You know me as a Vermonter, an entrepreneur, a Grateful Dead fan, and a longtime advocate for a peace dividend -- for providing money we need to invest in our children, our schools, and our environment by reducing Cold War-era Pentagon expenditures. There is one candidate running for President who supports the values most important to me, and most critical to the country. That candidate is Congressman Dennis Kucinich, the co-chair of the Progressive Caucus, and the leader on Capitol Hill in challenging Bush Administration foreign policies that make Americans less -- not more -- secure.
While others discuss incremental change, only Dennis Kucinich advocates changing the way our government is run in order to reflect the values of America's people. As Granny D says: "We are the people who believe in a world of environmental beauty, of happiness and not exploitation, of justice and not oppression and torture. A world safe for children... We believe in international law and cooperative action."
How we spend our money as a nation reflects our values and beliefs. Look at your personal check book, and it tells you what is important to you. Our nation's checkbook tells us that our priorities are all wrong -- and Kucinich is the one candidate bold enough to say so. He calls for funding human needs such as universal healthcare, education, environmental cleanup and expanded programs for the poor, the cities, the elderly, and he does it at no additional taxpayer expense by shaving up to 15 percent of the billion dollar a day Pentagon budget.
Because of our skewed national priorities, municipal and state governments are in crisis, as are school districts. Other candidates offer compassionate rhetoric about leaving "no child behind," but it's just lip service without putting your money where your mouth is, and getting rid of tax breaks benefitting the wealthy.
So in this election, voters should say: "Show me the money. What will you cut? What programs will you expand?" I like the answers provided by Dennis Kucinich.
On the subject of checkbooks and money, if you donate some cash to the Kucinich campaign, it will help amplify his message that America needs to reverse course -- and head toward peace and economic justice. And it's not like he's going to get a donation from Enron or Halliburton or the big corporate PACs anytime soon. So check out his web site at
http://www.kucinich.us (Donate at
https://www.kucinich.us/contribute.php)
My top priority in November 2004 is defeating George W. Bush, and I will try to make that happen even if Dennis Kucinich does not become the Democratic nominee. Win or lose the nomination, his grassroots presidential campaign is the vehicle for expanding the party, moving it in a progressive direction, bringing in new voters, and reaching out in a serious way to bring back disaffected voters. That's another reason I endorse Kucinich for President.
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For a Yahoo! News Story -
Ben & Jerry's Ben Backs Kucinich, see:
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20030620/ap_on_el_ge/kucinich_endorsement_1 h
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- - Kucinich Videos / DVDs available from JusticeVision.orgA 2 hour and 18 minute Videotape includes Events with Presidential Candidate Dennis Kucinich
Dennis Kucinich's "A Prayer for America" speech (at USC; 2/17/02, 18 mins.); this was the speech that got 25,000 responses when the transcript was circulated on the internet.
Dennis Kucinich at Temple Kol Tikva (Woodland Hills, Ca.; 4/4/03, 1 hour and 43 minutes); Dennis is introduced by actor Elliot Gould.
Dennis Kucinich on the Energy Crisis (6/24/01, :17); Dennis tells about his battles with the power privatizers as mayor of Cleveland, and why we must save public power.
Use this Kucinich video as a fundraiser!
Last Saturday (June 14th) Mary Jacobs sold almost a whole box of these at $5 each outside the Woodland Hills Kucinich event in addition to the Kucinich T-shirts she was also selling.
Per copy pricing, postage included, is as follows:
Suggested requested minimum donation: $5
Quantity prices:
2 copies or more: $2 per copy plus $2 per order to help with postage case of 45: $90 even
Same 3 events on DVD: $5 per copy
Allow about 2 weeks for delivery. Small orders will be sent via US media mail; cases by Fed-Ex 4-day ground.
Because of the very low margin, prepayment is requested on multiple tape orders.
Checks should be made payable to JusticeVision
and sent to:
Ralph Cole,
1425 W. 12th St. #262,
L.A., Ca., 90015, USA
Please write the words "Kucinich Order" on the outside of your envelope.
Sign up to receive future videotapes of Dennis Kucinich!
We will be making and sending out more Kucinich videotapes as the campaign progresses. Say the word and we will mail you copies as soon as they become available, in the quantity you request. See above schedule for requested donation by quantity.
Let's get this guy elected! Just about everybody I talk to that has heard Dennis Kucinich wants to help him get elected. I believe we can, but without mainstream media on our side, it won't be easy. My hope is to help get at least 20,000 videotapes (about 500 cases) of his talks out before the end of the year. Please help us do it! Call with your ideas and suggestions.
Best wishes,
Ralph Cole
website:
http://www.justicevision.orgordering website:
http://members.pdxweb.net/justicevisionemail address: democracyu@aol.com
telephone: (213) 747-6345
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Reminder -- Vote in the MoveOn Presidential Primary June 24.
If not already on the MoveOn mailing list, to vote, please register here:
http://moveon.org/pac/reg
Item 4
Running the Nation into a ‘Fiscal Trainwreck'
Less Beautiful and Noble
by Jim Culleny
is posted at this following Flyby News Archive link:
Running the Nation into a ‘Fiscal Trainwreck'
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