Kucinich at Wall Street debate

[goodhue]

Excerpts of Dennis at last night's debate . . .

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A433-2003Sep25.html

SEIB: Turning on Iraq to Congressman Kucinich and Reverend Sharpton, you've both been outspoken critics of the war and have said, in fact, you'd bring the troops home. But the fact is that as of now the troops are there, the United States is committed.

Would you vote--will you vote yes or no on the $87 billion? And if the answer is no, what's the message you would send to the troops who are there today?

KUCINICH: The message is no I will not vote for the $87 billion. I think we should support the troops and I think we best support them by bringing them home.

Our troops are at peril there, because of this administration's policy. And I think that the American people deserve to know where every candidate on this stage stands on this issue, because we were each provided with a document--a security document that more or less advised us to stay the course, don't cut and run, commit up to 150,000 troops for five years at a cost of up to $245 billion.

A matter of fact, General Clark was one of the authors of that document that was released in July.

So I think the American people deserve to know that a candidate--and I'm the candidate who led the effort in the House of Representatives challenging the Bush administration's march toward war, I say bring the troops home unequivocally. Bring them home and stop this commitment for $87 billion, which is only going to get us in deeper.

After a while, we're going to be sacrificing our education, our health care, our housing and the future of this nation.

SEIB: Congressman?

KUCINICH: Bring them home.

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WILLIAMS:

Congressman Kucinich, you talk often about your family history in this country and your background in the state of Ohio. How do you define "rich" these days?

KUCINICH: Well, I think it's defined when you consider that the top 272,000 taxpayers are getting as much of a benefit under the Bush tax cut as the bottom 129 million. So I think that what's happening in this society is, there is a maldistribution of the wealth.

And I'm disappointed that my fellow colleagues here haven't continued to make the connection between the rising deficit and the war in Iraq. Because unless we commit ourselves to get out of Iraq--get the U.N. in and get the U.S. out--we're going to see rising deficits.

They're talking about spending hundreds of billions of dollars for this war. And if you look at the maldistribution of wealth, it's going to be accelerated by this war.

Are we going to have tax cuts for the wealthy and then ask people later on to increase their taxes? Are going to have the Pentagon budget go to $550 billion within eight years and ask the people to pay more taxes?

I think we have to reorder our priorities. It begins with getting out of Iraq and putting money again into health care, into education, into job creation.

WILLIAMS: You can set us up nicely, Congressman, for the focus of our next segment.

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INSANA: Congressman Kucinich?

KUCINICH: It think it's important to do some analysis as to why people have lost their homes, because unless we have economic policies that are aimed at savings jobs and stopping the loss of jobs and creating new jobs, you could talk about Fannie Mae and other agencies and it will be for naught.

I'm the only one up here on this stage--and I'm, frankly, surprised at my Democratic colleagues that they won't take a firm stand and recognize that NAFTA and the WTO have hurt this country. I've said very clearly that we need to withdraw from NAFTA and the WTO, and that would be my first act as office.

And it's not a choice between trade or no trade. You return to bilateral trade, conditioned on workers' rights, human rights and the environment, and unless you address that issue--there's a $435 billion trade deficit. Unless you address that issue all of these other issues about creation of new housing won't mean an awful lot, even though it's well intended.

WILLIAMS: Congressman, thank you.

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BORGER: Well, Congressman Kucinich, we'll give you a chance to answer the question on the importation of drugs from Canada.

KUCINICH: Of course, there ought to be reimportation. But that's beside the point.

The pharmaceutical companies and the insurance companies control our health care system. And I'm the only one on this stage who's actually introduced legislation, with Congressman Conyers and McDermott, that provides for a totally new change; that has health care for people, not for profit.

It's called Medicare For All. It's a single-payer program. And it's financed by a 7.7 percent tax paid by employers. And it covers everything. It covers all medically necessary procedures and a wide range of benefits.

And it's kind of surprising to have people on this stage who have plans, including Dr. Dean, that would leave 10 million Americans out. I think it's important that all Americans be covered. And I think that it's important that people receive the ability to have complementary and alternative medicine, to have a prescription drug benefit, to have vision care and dental care and mental health care, to have long-term nursing care all covered under one Medicare For All, single-payer program.

I'm the one who has that plan. I'm the one who's offering it. I'm the only one on this stage who can say that.

And I want say, with the doctor advocating that, I think it's time to get a second opinion.

(LAUGHTER)

WILLIAMS: Congressman, thank you.

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WILLIAMS:
And to Congressman Kucinich on what needs fixing in health care.

KUCINICH: Well, first of all the Social Security money belongs to Main Street, not to Wall Street. It needs to be said very clearly here that privatization is off the table. There will be no privatization when I'm elected president. I'll block any effort.

Furthermore, none of the other candidates has addressed the real issue here, and that is that people are retiring earlier. They're retiring at age 62. And so we ought to take the retirement age back to 65, take the retirement age back to 65. The money is there.

Right now, the Bush administration is using the surplus to finance tax cuts for the wealthy.

And Social Security, as a matter of fact, is a better investment now than the stock market. There's a higher return. There's guaranteed cost-of-living increases. Privatization you have to worry about the value of your account.

I'm saying that Social Security right now, the retirement age ought to go back to age 65. I challenge every one of my Democratic colleagues to look at the record, look at the trust fund, it's solid through the year 2041, get that money back to workers who are retiring earlier.

WILLIAMS: Thank you, Congressman.

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SEIB: Let me also speak clearly here to Congressman Kucinich.

Any discussion of trade and everybody leans fairly quickly to China these days. President Bush as well as Democrats are criticizing China for unfair trading practices, for a big trade surplus with the U.S.

Would you today revoke China's most favorite nation trading status? And what would you say to all those voters in the...

KUCINICH: I was not in favor of it.

SEIB: And what would you say to those voters?

KUCINICH: I voted against most favored nation status for China for a number of reasons.

First of all, we have to keep in mind that there has to be some correspondence in trade. There has to be some relationship between what a country sells in America and what it buys form America. And that's not my idea, it's Lester Thurow who's talked about it and other economists who recognize that there has to be some reciprocity.

China right now--we have $100 billion trade deficit with China, and we have an overall trade deficit approaching $500 billion; the exact total is $435 billion. I raised this issue before. Unless we challenge the underlying structure of our trade, this idea of made in the U.S. and sold abroad, what does it mean? $435 billion deficit. We need to cancel NAFTA, cancel the WTO, which makes any changes in NAFTA--WTO--illegal. My friend Dick Gephardt ought to know that, because his name was on the bill that created the WTO.

And we need to go back to bilateral trade that's conditioned on workers' rights, human rights and the environment.

WILLIAMS: Congressman, thank you.

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WILLIAMS:
Congressman Kucinich?

KUCINICH: Thank you very much. The question of Wall Street and the problems that exist on Wall Street today really go to the center of a debate in this country about wealth and democracy.

We cannot keep our democracy if those who are in charge of handling the engines of our economy are not honest with the American people, are not honest with their shareholders, are not honest with their investors.

That's why there is a role for government here. And that role for government is regulation. That role for government is breaking up the monopolies. That role for government is insisting on public disclosure, insisting on public audits, insisting on restitution whenever someone has been cheated.

You know, when you look at how corporate corruption has cost American workers jobs. I have a card here you'd find interesting. Hewlett Packard laid off 25,700 workers. Its executive's salary went from $1.2 million to $4.1 million. Delta laid off 17,400 workers. The executive salary of the CEO went from $2.1 million to $4.6 million. Tyco went from $11...

WILLIAMS: We'll have to...

KUCINICH: Tyco's executive went from $36 to $71 million. There has to be accountability and there has to be honesty on Wall Street.

WILLIAMS: Have to leave it there, Congressman. We're getting into a little bit of a time crunch as the end of the broadcast nears.

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WILLIAMS:
And finally, Congressman?

KUCINICH: Three things come to mind. First, I would take action to stop the federal death penalty.

Second, I would move to cut the Pentagon budget by 15 percent, which would in no way affect adversely our national defense, and put the money into child care.

Third, I would move to create a Department of Peace which would seek to make nonviolence an organizing principle in our society and to work with the nations of the world to make war itself archaic.

WILLIAMS: Congressman, thank you very much.

[gWbush is Mabus]

1. .

unelectable...yes

I do like his stance on the issues
and his clear-cut striaght answers

[goodhue]

2. media hype

http://www.fluxrostrum.com/MindFlux/DennisKucinich/electable-candidates.htm

This tactic of telling U.S. who is electable and who isn't electable is straight up propaganda in hopes of narrowing the selection in the minds of voters by weeding out candidates that our corporate sponsors deem unacceptable. In other words, if a candidate has the intention of putting people over profit... they are unelectable. If candidates have the intention of really doing something about corporate fraud.. they are unelectable. If candidates will not need to spend 50 million dollars brainwashing the masses with endles lies in the form of commercial advertising... they are unelectable.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

4. DK is no more "radical"

than Reagan was in the other direction. Reagan did not hesitate to push his radical/right agenda, nor does Bushboy, and yet most Dems are pussyfooting around, afraid to do anything that might upset anyone.

DK is the needed corrective to 15 years of hard-right Republicans and 8 years of an overly compromising Dem.

[Padraig18]

5. I don't know about other regions of the country, but...

...it's as simple as this, here in Illinois: "It won't play in Peoria".

*NOT a slam at DK, or his supporters, but an objective statement of political reality in Illinois.

[cosmicdot]

7. what, exactly, won't play in Peoria?

universal healthcare? dealing with the angst millions of us confront daily in the collective form of "corporate America"? investing in our infrastructure?

what is it that can't be packaged and sold like whistle ass and other products?

what is it that Illinois wants our country to do? to be? what do you want, as a resident of Illinois, from and for our country and its people?

what of the following won't play in Peoria?


Dennis Kucinich: The Progressive Vision

It's time for America to resume its glorious journey. Time to reject shrinking jobs and wages, disappearing savings and rights. Time to reject the detour towards fear and greed. Time to look out upon the world for friends, not enemies. Time to counter the control of corporations over our politics, our economy, our resources, and mass media. Time for those who have much to help those who have little by maintaining a progressive tax structure. Time to tell the world that we wish to be their partner in peace, not their leader in war. Most of all, it is time for America to again be the land where dreams come true because the government is on the side of its people.

Unfortunately, America now leads the world in categories we should not be proud of. America is now the world’s leading jailer with an incarceration rate higher than China. We lead the industrialized world in poverty and in the growing gap between rich and poor. And we are the only industrial nation not to provide national health care.

This is what a Kucinich administration would work to deliver for America:

<1> Universal Health Care with a Single Payer Plan
Over 40 million Americans have no health care and 30 million more have only minimal coverage. Those with coverage often pay exorbitant amounts. The current profit-driven system, dominated by private insurance firms and their bureaucracies, has failed.

A Kucinich administration would establish streamlined national health insurance, Enhanced Medicare for All. It would be publicly-financed health care, privately delivered. It would provide affordable prescription drugs, thanks to bulk purchasing. The General Accounting Office of Congress has concluded:

"If the U.S. were to shift to a system of universal coverage and a single payer, as in Canada, the savings in administrative costs would be more than enough to offset the cost."

<2> Full Social Security Benefits at Age 65
Social security is the basic covenant our society has with workers who have built our economy. At a time when CEOs earn 240 times the pay of the average worker, it is unconscionable not to return full retirement benefits to age 65.

A Kucinich administration would make that possible through a progressive tax structure and reordered national priorities. Social Security must not be privatized. Retirement years cannot be dependent on the rise and fall of the stock market.

<3> Withdrawal from NAFTA and WTO
The global trade regime of NAFTA and WTO has enriched multinational corporations. But for workers, family farmers, and the environment, it has meant a global race to the bottom. Companies leave the U.S. in search of low wages, low commodity prices, anti-union climates, and lax environmental laws. NAFTA has been used to whipsaw workers at the negotiation table, forcing wages and benefit concessions under threat of moving jobs overseas. Trade treaties must be conditioned on workers’ rights, human rights, and environmental principles.

Among the first actions of a Kucinich Administration will be withdrawal from NAFTA and the WTO—to be replaced by fair trade agreements.

<4> Repeal of the "Patriot Act"
The "Patriot Act" is not what American patriots have fought and died for. To allow our Bill of Rights to be nullified without judicial supervision invites tyranny. The Attorney General has been handed unfettered power to wiretap, search, jail, and invade our most sacred right to privacy. The government must not be allowed, without probable cause or warrant, to snoop on our communications, medical records, library records, and student records.

<5> Right-to-Choose, Privacy, and Civil Rights
In a Kucinich administration, a woman’s right-to-choose will be protected as essential to personal privacy and gender equality. Only those who agree to uphold Roe v. Wade will be nominated for the Supreme Court. Civil rights (and voting rights) enforcement will be intensified. Lesbians and gays will be afforded complete equality throughout society. Affirmative action will be maintained as a tool for racial and gender equality. Drug policy will emphasize treatment over criminalization, and not a rampaging war that erodes Constitutional freedoms, privacy, and law enforcement resources. An end to capital punishment will be sought.

<6> Balance Between Workers and Corporations
American workers are working longer and harder for less pay than 20 years ago. What’s needed is a resurgence of organized labor, and a Kucinich administration will tenaciously defend the rights of workers to organize and bargain collectively. Since the purchasing power of the minimum wage has dropped 21% in two decades, it’s time for living wages, not minimum wages. And it’s time to reverse tax cuts that benefit the already well-to-do, and retain an estate tax. Investing $500 billion to rebuild schools, roads, bridges, ports, and sewage, water and environmental systems will do more to stimulate our economy than tax breaks for the wealthy.

<7> Guaranteed Quality Education, Pre-K through College
Since education is the only proven way to reduce poverty, it is unacceptable that a child’s education be dependent on where they are born or the financial status of their family. The federal government spends only 2.9% of its budget on education. That will change under a Kucinich administration, because quality education is a core American right and value.

Education must emphasize creative and critical thinking, not just test-taking. Schools need money to decrease class size, increase teachers’ salaries, renovate decaying facilities, and include hands-on job training for those not going to college. Pre-K and after-school programs will get increased funding, and the soaring costs of college will be reversed.

<8> A Renewed Commitment to Peace and Diplomacy
America will return to its role as the most admired—not hated—nation. The doctrine of "pre-emption" will be retired, as will an aggressive, unilateralist foreign policy that makes our homeland less secure, not more. Our security will be enhanced by working with other nations and the U.N. instead of acting like an Empire, arrogantly undermining international agreements such as the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, the Biological and Chemical Weapons Conventions, the Small Arms Treaty, the International Criminal Court, and the Kyoto Climate Treaty. As President, Kucinich will work to implement two measures he sponsored in Congress: the Space Preservation Treaty, which bans space-based weapons, and a cabinet-level Department of Peace, to establish non-violence as an organizing principle in both domestic and international affairs.

A Kucinich administration will cut bloated and unneeded weaponry from a military budget that now almost equals the military spending of all other countries combined. The Kucinich peace dividend will be invested in education, health care, environmental clean-up, urban infrastructure, Social Security, veterans’ benefits, and other pressing domestic needs.

<9> Restored Rural Communities and Family Farms
Agriculture, trade, and economic policies that favor agribusiness conglomerates have devastated family farmers, rural communities, and the environment. While the number of family farmers has plummeted, profits have soared for a handful of agribusiness giants that increas-ingly control everything from seed to shelf.

A Kucinich administration will break up agricultural monopolies and restore a strong, independent family farm system with fair prices for farmers and healthy food for consumers. A Kucinich Administration will monitor and reduce contamination of our air, water, and food from factory farms, with strong USDA enforcement of tough new food safety laws.

<10> Environmental Renewal and Clean Energy
Clean air and water, as well as an intact ozone layer, are not luxuries, but necessities for our children’s future.

A Kucinich administration will toughen environmental enforcement, support the Kyoto Treaty on global climate change, reduce oil dependence, and spur investment in alternative energy sources, including hydrogen, solar, wind, and ocean. Clean energy technologies will produce new jobs. Tax and other incentives will favor sustainable businesses that conserve energy, retrofit pollution prevention technologies, and redesign toxins out of their manufacturing processes. The right to know (for example, when food is genetically engineered) will supercede corporate secrecy. Globally, the U.S. will become a leader in sustainable energy production and a partner with developing nations in providing inexpensive, local, renewable energy technologies.

http://www.kucinich.us

[Mairead]

11. um, that was your *unsupported opinion*, not 'reality'. You should really

learn the difference.

If you look carefully at the people here at DU who don't like Dennis's positions, and look at the other positions they also take, you'll see something. If you then look at the kinds of opinions that people in general --not only at DU, but in the everyday world-- voluntarily pay money to experience (films, novels, etc), and you then combine the two insights, I think you'll come to a particular conclusion. Try it.

[KittyWampus]

16. It's Not Just The Media-IT'S THE ELECTORATE

The only way someone with Dennis's policies and ideas could win is if he/she mananged to package themselves and their ideas in a "moderate" package.

LIKE BUSH FOOLED ENOUGH PEOPLE INTO THINKING THAT HE WAS A MODERATE.

Learning how to package yourself and moderating your "tone" is part of being a viable candidate.

[JohnKleeb]

15. wheres my dollar lol we get a dollar everytime someone says that

We dont know that, I tell you what even if he is unelectable is he right about the issues? if I had lived in the past I would be suggesting civil rights and all the other issues that are now normal issues.

[LWolf]

20. Idea here:

:think:

Let's take back our country.

Let's actually vote for the candidate/s that give us the stance on the issues we want, clear-cut straight answers, and actually act on those stances to create change.

A vote for Dennis is a vote for these things. A vote for a 2nd, 3rd, or lower choice due to fear or doubt loses America for us in the long run. The primary is the time for us to stand up and cast our vote for the issues. For the direction we want our nation to go. If not now, when? Never?

[Desertrose]

3. Concise Dennis post..thanks goodhue

Dennis was spot on with all his answers...thanks for putting this together...I did tend to doze off a bit during the other candidates...(hey I watched the late rerun!)

How can anyone not vote fro DK- he was great in his manner and his words!!!
Go Dennis!!!!

Pece
DR

what is with this unelectable schtick all the dang time?? Hope this will be a tasty word for allwho end up having to eat it...

:evilgrin:

[cosmicdot]

6. I appreciate the Congressman's transcript, too

I tuned in while the panel was in-process, but really only got to catch glimpses ... and, even then, it seemed when I did, they were dinging Dennis and/or telling him his time was up ...

someone asked recently if Dennis would be "leading" if he was taller or spoke like Jack Kennedy ...... hmmmmm .... I wonder if the media gave him half the hoopla, glamorous rally photo ops, on talk shows every other night, etc., as others have been ... would that quell the 'he's not electable' propaganda ...

many people complain about the media; it's unfairness; it's bias; it's faux-polls. etc., yet, when it comes to deciding our next President, there seems to be some disconnect ...

imho - dealing with corporate america, whether it's the military-industrial complex, the environment, healthcare, workers' rights, etc., is the gating issue of the time .... and, if a candidate isn't addressing it in the context and tone it needs to be, we're not going to progress beyond the status quo ...

I want a President (and, we need that person now, not later) who will have an agressive, proactive agenda to help lead us out from under corporate domination which is repressing, suppressing, oppressing our best and potential - which promotes the good ol'boys whether they are true leaders or not - which compromises our standard of living due to it's narrow interests.

I'd rather have Roosevelt in a wheelchair -- and, looks and height are limiting qualifications (and discriminatory) -- we need someone who knows what needs to be done, and will fight for the people and overall common good in an effort to help us get there ... not someone who goes behind closed doors to talk to corporate contributors and such ... taking our country back means much more than just repealing a stolen election from the coup d'etat ...

Push 1 if you're want Dept. A's recording ... message not much different than this one; ergo, you won't get far; Push 2 if you need directions; Push 3 if you want to get another menu, destination unknown; Push 4 if you would like to speak to a real person ...

Dennis Kucinich's time has come.

[hippywife]

8. Big thanx!

I was out yesterday working and then attending a neighboring county's Dem party meeting. Don't have cable either, on a limited budget we opted for DSL instead. So I missed it all. It sounds like he did a wonderful job delivering his message.

If everyone that agreed with his platform but are supporting someone else because of the "unelectable" propoganda would vote for Dennis, we'd see who was really unelectable. With the big dish of crap this administration has fed the people of this nation, Dennis and his stance as a servant of the people would be a perfect foil to the republican agenda.

[diamondsoul]

19. I think this quote says it all-

"Hell, if it came down to a battle of position papers, Dennis Kucinich
might win," laughed Jackson Baker of the Memphis Flyer, incidentally not
a horse-racer and one of the true good guys on the plane.

[dpbrown]

9. Unelectability is a red herring issue

Even the Chair of the DNC said after the debate that "every candidate" is electable.

These people who croak about unelectability, whose apparently inchoate fear over the inviolability of the truly soulless kakistocrats in charge of our government blinds them to the idea that "real" people are thirsty for change, are doing the dirty work of the RNC by baselessly lambasting candidates over something as completely subjective as "electability."

The "objective" evidence is in, and it says that Bush is on his way out.

That's why the Republicans have abandoned the high ground of competing on ideas, and have sunk to the lows of competing by attacking the electoral system. Delay's attacks on redistricting, Diebold's attacks on balloting integrity, Gov. Bush's continued refusal to reinstate nonfelons in Florida - all these are indications that the Republicans know they can't compete in the marketplace of ideas any longer, and that they'll do anything to retain power, to keep draining the US Treasury for their rich corrupt friends, and continue to send soldiers to die for oil.

Dennis Kucinich represents the candidate most lucid on the issues that resonate with average citizens. Of course, election consultants and demagogues don't want us to think about ideas. They don't want us to concern ourselves with decisions that will affect not only our lifetimes but the lifetimes of those yet to come. They want us to succumb to the hypnotism of soundbite politics, the allure of slick corporate advertising America - an America that only tells us it's lying in the tiny fine print flashed on the screen for one scant second at the end of the advertisement to keep itself in "technical" compliance with the law.

It's time to expect more than "technical compliance" - not only from our government, but from our politicians. It's time to expect that a candidate can come right out and tell us that as long as we're paying for the government that it's going to serve our interests. It's time to wean the corporations - fantastical man-made creations that were barred from participation in politics for more than the first century of this nation's history, from their undue, unfair, and unjustified intervention in the political workings of our democracy.

It's time for a visionary to bring us beyond the grayness of low expections forced upon us by decades of corporate deregulation, corporate manipulation, corporate malfeasance, corporate misappropriation, corporate misreporting, and corporate political usurpation of our electoral heritage.

It's time for a pragmatist with a proven national voting record of successes, and a proven winning record of prevailing against well-funded Republican incumbent opponents, to vanquish the unelected fraud from Al Gore's house.

It's time for Dennis Kucinich.

Dan Brown
Saint Paul, Minnesota

[hippywife]

10. Abe Lincoln

It's time to wean the corporations - fantastical man-made creations that were barred from participation in politics for more than the first century of this nation's history, from their undue, unfair, and unjustified intervention in the political workings of our democracy.



"I see in the near future a crisis approaching that unnerves me and causes me to tremble for the safety of my country. ...Corporations have been enthroned and an era of corruption in high places will follow, and the money power of the country will endeavor to prolong its reign by working upon the prejudices of the people until all wealth is aggregated in a few hands and the Republic is destroyed." Abraham Lincoln (1864 letter to Col. Leonard F. Elkins)

[Mairead]

13. um, that 'Lincoln quote' isn't a real one

There's no record of Lincoln ever saying/writing anything like it, though it's something that he might have said (which is why it keeps being attributed to him). It first appeared 20 years after he was murdered, and since then it's been debunked by a number of people. The late reporter extraordinaire George Seldes has a whole passage on it in his book of quotations.

[dpbrown]

17. True, although Lincoln did say...

"To secure to each labourer the whole product of his labour, or as nearly as possible, is a most worthy object of any good government,"

and

"Labor is prior to, and . . . superior to capital"

He also praised the right to strike.

http://www.snopes.com/quotes/lincoln.htm

[Mairead]

18. Yes! Abe was VERY labor-friendly---a proto-socialist

"The strongest bond of human sympathy outside the family relation should be one uniting working people of all nations and tongues and kindreds."

[genius]

12. The Pentagon misplaced 1.3 trillion dollars. Let Halliburton pay .

And Dean wants to give them more to misplace. Halliburton could foot the bill for our troops out of the profits they've gotten.

[genius]

14. I am really proud of Dennis

He was the one candidate who really stood up for the American people at that debate.