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After Dennis spoke at Worldfest and at the rally in Downtown Los Angeles, he came to a barbeque in La Verne. The barbeque was packed with people and children eager to learn more about Dennis. After he arrived, a group of children presented him with hearts that had been filled out by a great many children at the Kucinich booth at the L.A. County Fair. Then Natasha recited her poem, "A Hero For America."
Dennis then spoke to the enthusiastic cheering crowd. Then questions followed and his responses to them were also inspiring. One young boy asked Dennis about his Benjamin Franklin True Patriot Act, which will repeal USA-PATRIOT. Dennis spoke at length about this and demonstrated an incredible understanding of the principles upon which our justice system is founded. I don't think he's been to law school and yet, his presentation was better than any I've ever seen from the most distinguished lawyers at any bar convention or other legal forum. This is a man who genuinely cares about the rights of all people.
Another young boy asked him about the death penalty. He addresed the issues of the racism and the inequities in the system. I don't know how many people reading this know that 98% of those on death row were too poor to afford their own attorney at the time of trial. An overloaded public defender, with almost no time to study the case or funding for an adequate investigation, all too often won't have a chance, even though his client may be innnocent. 112 of those on death row have been exonerated through DNA evidence. However, DNA evidence is only available to help death row inmates in about 5% of the cases.
Another person asked him about the differences between himself and Al Sharpton. He only spoke highly of Al Sharpton and said they were friends. Dennis has worked at all levels of government and this will help him when he becomes President.
He also spoke of the need to go after white collar criminals and to reform the prison system that has contains too many Americans.
He also pointed out the 1.3 trillion dollars the Pentagon has lost and noted that, because of his committee work, he is aware of a lot of money wasted on duplication and programs that don't work that could be cut to provide more funding to what is needed.
One woman spoke of candidates who had made false promises and asked how we knew he wouldn't change when he got elected. He spoke of how he kept his campaign promise to stop the privatization of the power in Cleveland, even though the bank holding loans from before his administration tried to blackmail him into breaking his promise and into privatizing the power. He didn't back down - even though it later cost him an election. Years later, Dennis was in Malibu when a reporter came to him and told him that everyone in Cleveland was talking about him because he had saved the people hundreds of millions of dollars. After that he got back into politics and has has been elected and re-elected by super-majorities.
After the event, he stayed for a while to talk to more people in the crowd before he left. The crowd was very happy to see that there was one candidate whom they could trust and who cared about real people and their issues.
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