Elections

By David Swanson

I love Dennis Kucinich and think he is far and away the best candidate running for president. He and I are speaking together on a panel in New Hampshire this weekend. But asking his supporters in Iowa to vote for Obama as their second choice makes no sense to me.

First of all, any Iowan willing to take instructions on whom to vote for would not be backing Kucinich. Every television in Iowa tells voters every day not to vote for Dennis. His supporters are not the sort of people who read more

By David Swanson

Congressman Dennis Kucinich has won the Virginia Democratic Party’s online presidential primary straw poll. Candidates in the poll included the six Democrats who have qualified to appear on the primary ballot in Virginia on February 12.

The party’s website said from the start and continues to say that the straw poll voting closed at midnight on December 23rd. In reality, it is still possible to vote and to change the totals. Since the 23rd, the numbers have increased read more

A Short Instructions Manual
By David Swanson

1. Virtually nobody votes in primaries (or caucuses) compared to general elections. Therefore, each individual primary vote is worth many times what it is in the general election. And, it’s more likely to be counted, since there’s typically less fraud and abuse of the system in primaries. So, if you vote in general elections, you pretty much have to vote in primaries in order to not be an idiot. Bring a few friends to vote too, and you’re read more

CLICK HERE.

If you were elected president, what do you think would be the first thing you would do in office?

Cancel NAFTA, get out of the WTO. Bring our troops home. Reintroduce legislation for a not-for-profit health care system and for fully paid two- and four-year college for every American young person. Put in motion legislation to create a full employment economy. I want to create jobs, that’s what I want to do. I want to get people back to work and get them in health care, make sure their children read more

Dennis Kucinich in Charlottesville VA on Friday, December 7th.

Central Virginia, home to Thomas Jefferson, James Monroe, and the father of our Constitution, James Madison, will be the site of a rally for a presidential candidate working to defend that Constitution.

The creators of our government intended the Congress to be the most powerful branch of it, and provided as a defense of that power the impeachment process. Central to their thinking was concern that an unchecked executive could take read more

Cville Podcast has the audio as well as the video here. The audio includes an intro.

PART 1:

PART 2:

We’re headed rapidly toward a disastrous attack on Iran, an acceptance of permanent occupation of Iraq, over 1,000 US military bases in other people’s countries, and the point of no turning back on global warming.

No matter how deeply your television has ingrained into your head the anti-democratic notion that the candidates you like and the candidates you should support are two different things, you can still use the money-soaked corrupt primary system we have to impact Congress immediately read more

CLICK HERE.

By David Swanson

That does it. It’s time for the Democratic Party to stage its own debate, ask its own questions, and offer the video to networks as a completed package. Allowing CNN to not just air a debate but to ask the questions proved on Thursday night (even more dramatically than in the past) to be a soul sickening disaster.

A serious debate would begin by asking each candidate (including Mike Gravel, who was locked out of the room) what he or she would do if elected president. read more

By David Swanson

It sounds silly, but for a long time it just didn’t occur to me what the implications would be. Thus spake a college student who agreed to ask Senator Clinton a planted question. And thus, alas, must I speak as well.

Senator Clinton asked me to impersonate a citizen of the United States, and I was tempted to play along. The assignment she had marked “(citizen)” on the script on her clipboard, read:

“A citizen is a member of an electorate. A citizen’s read more

By David Swanson

When someone whose opinions I respect as much as John Nichols’ joins those who have been saying since 2003 that Democratic presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich should announce that he’s not REALLY running for president, I feel compelled to reply.

Nichols, like most Americans, supports the same policy positions that I do and that Kucinich does. Nichols would end foreign occupations, cancel NAFTA, create single-payer health coverage, invest in education and green read more

By David Swanson

I’m live-blogging an Obama rally here in Charlottesville VA. I just wrote 10′ tall in chalk on the Charlottesville “Freedom of Expression Wall” the following: “Hey, Barack, If you’ll filibuster the spying, why won’t you filibuster the war funding?” I’d love to actually ask him, but I couldn’t afford the $1,000 for the small gathering that is just ending. Instead, I’m at the big outdoor gathering for the masses read more

David Sirota and Jonathan Tasini both have blogs out this morning celebrating John Edwards’ denunciation of corporate trade agreements and opposition to new ones. Both paint Edwards as a ferocious opponent of NAFTA. But neither of these bloggers mentions the fact that Edwards stood on stage in Soldier Field and joined every other candidate except Dennis Kucinich in affirming that he would NOT end NAFTA. He would try to “fix it.” Now, you can try to make an argument for prefering read more

STORY #1

Clinton Bucks Trend, Rakes in Cash From Weapons Industry
By Leonard Doyle, Independent UK

The US arms industry is backing Hillary Clinton for President and has all but abandoned its traditional allies in the Republican party. Mrs Clinton has also emerged as Wall Street’s favourite. Investment bankers have opened their wallets in unprecedented numbers for the New York senator over the past three months and, in the process, dumped their earlier favourite, Barack Obama.
read more

By David Swanson

There are now two types of Democratic presidential candidates, the ones who promise to end the occupation of Iraq, and the ones who say they may very well keep it going for another four years.

MSNBC hosted another Democratic presidential debate Wednesday evening. Due to a technical error, the cable network failed to identify itself as a subsidiary of General Electric, a major weapons maker. Due to another technical shortcoming, viewing the debate streaming live on the MSNBC website read more