Without winning a single state’s primary, Kucinich failed to force Kerry or Edwards to answer a single direct question put to them during any of the televised debates or alter their agenda in any way, shape or form. He failed abysmally at getting even a single one of his progressive planks in the national platform and was largely ignored by the very party he was trying to change
I cannot imagine a bigger waste of a year and one-half.
Historically, how would it differ from the aborted Democratic primary campaigns of Eugene McCarthy, Jesse Jackson, Shirley Chisholm, Jerry Brown and countless others? Candidates who -- whatever their motivations -- wooed the progressive voter with a lot of hopeful talk and delivered them en masse to nominees far less progressive than themselves.
We Greens will have our work cut out for us in the next two years. We’ll have to fight the Democratic machine for access to the ballot in several states. We’ll have to find a dynamic candidate that will run a strong independent run for the White House in all 50 states and weather the insults and denunciations that stem from running outside of the corporate two-party duopoly. We’ll need to raise money and register millions of new voters and fight to promote the Green message of peace justice and sustainability.
And we’ll have to do it with people like Dennis Kucinich actively working against our efforts to reach and convince voters to cast their ballots for a progressive Green alternative.
If you look back at U. S. history, which political parties were most responsible for the abolition of slavery, the right of women to vote, the end of child labor, the Social Security Administration, the 40-hour work week, unemployment insurance and the right to form labor unions?
These victories were only won because of activist members of the Socialist, Progressive, Labor Greenback, Liberty and Equal Rights Parties, not because of quixotic primary exercises and impotent platform battles.
They were won because dedicated women and men, upon whose shoulders we proudly stand today, realized that they had more important things to do than waste 18 months -- and beyond -- on futile efforts like supporting another Kucinich bid. They used their time to forge a movement built on their values rather than on trying to force parties opposed to those same values to adopt them against their will.
They were willing to fight and lose and fight and lose and fight and lose, until their agendas won.
And we will do no better unless we adopt that same philosophy of stubborn independence and long term perseverance on ending the occupation of Iraq, repealing attacks on our civil liberties and creating a system of universal healthcare for all.
The clock is ticking on 2008 and we’ve got real work to do. Let’s not waste a single second on Dennis Kucinich and what amounts to little more than political masturbation.
Mike Gillis is Vice Chair of GPoWS and served as Press Secretary of the Dixon for US Senate Campaign.
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