The Nation ~Progressives Should Vote Kucinich

[maddezmom]

Progressives Should Vote Kucinich
by Ronnie Dugger

Dennis Kucinich is the one candidate for President whose vision, eloquence and commitments on the issues can lead us to rise to and surmount the worldwide crises precipitated by the Bush Administration.


First and foremost, Kucinich is inviting us to stop being aggressive nationalists and start being brothers and sisters with the entire human race. It's a euphemism to call Bush's war on Iraq "a war of choice"; it was a classic unprovoked war of aggression. Kucinich is the only member of Congress running for President who voted against the resolution authorizing Bush to attack Iraq. Kerry, Edwards, Gephardt and Lieberman all voted for it, while Kucinich led almost two-thirds of the Democrats in the House of Representatives to repudiate their own party leader on it. In the national disgrace of our war on Iraq, the public figure who did the most to uphold American honor is Dennis Kucinich.
~snip~

more: http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20040301&s=dugger

Hope this isn't a dupe. Also, thru the link you can view 2 other articles pro Kerry and pro Edwards. :)

[no name no slogan]

1. Damn that's AWESOME

considering that The Nation has been mostly pro-Dean in the last few months. However, Matt Taibbi's "Who's afraid of Dennis Kucinich" was a great piece, IMHO.

[MaggieSwanson]

2. Thank you for posting! n/t

[maddezmom]

9. you are very welcome

:)

[Desertrose]

3. fantastic!

seems perfectly obvious to me,too!

Peace
DR

[maddezmom]

4. here's another piece I found on OpEdNews

Sending a Message to the Democratic Convention
By Stephen Dinan
OpEdNews.com

For months, I have been sending out articles addressing the psychology of the Democratic campaign, attempting to shift the beliefs that people have around the electability of Dennis Kucinich. Some of these were provocative. Others were intended to inspire. But all were grounded in a fundamental challenge to the notion that Kucinich was not electable.

Today, I will write from the opposite premise, assuming that most people are right for a moment: Kucinich is not electable this year, even if we love him and what he stands for. Where do we go from there?

Let's assume that you are one of the many people who is nervous about the prospect of a second Bush term. You are now faced with a situation in which the race has narrowed to two candidates who are deemed electable: John Kerry or John Edwards. The first question you need to ask yourself is this: is there a fundamental difference in terms of electability between these two candidates?
~snip~

more:
http://www.opednews.com/dinan0204_progressive_message.htm

It's not dated, but hadn't seen it before.

[MuseRider]

29. Stephen Dinan

sends me e mails. I must have gotten on his list after I wrote to him about one of his pieces. I have no idea who he is but I like what he has to say.

[DaisyUCSB]

5. This has nothing to do with Kucinich, but the Nation has gotten really

unreadable to me. My dad was a longtime reader and he thinks it's really bad now too. I blame Katrina Vanden Heuvel. She really comes off as totally incapable of any maverick thought to me. Have you ever seen her on TV? She just uses stalk talking points. Sorry just my take.

[goodhue]

8. Nation has gotten unreadable to me & it has everything to do with DK

I recall reading Studs Terkel "Kucinich is the One" is the Nation many moons ago. I was excited. Others thought Kucinich should be president. I assumed that the Nation would be supportive when Kucinich candidacy emerged. But alas it was not to be. I was shocked and have come close to cancelling my subscription. I know others who actually did cancel over lack of Kucinich support. Rather, they trumpeted Dean and Clark. I blame David Corn and Katha Pollitt among others. John Nichols is only voice of reason in Nation these days and even he carefully remained stuck n the Dean/Kucinich fence. And now they finally print something to suggest progresives should vote for Kucinich. Where have they been for the last year?

[WillyBrandt]

11. I remember the Nation running that nasty hit piece on Clark

And a negative thing by Heuvel on Clark too.

I remember them being pretty anti-Wes overall.

[damnraddem]

6. I've been a Deanie and planning to go to my state's caucuses.

So now I'm thinking of supporting Kucinich there, until my caucus finds he doesn't have enough supporters to get a delegate -- or if lightning strike, help him get a delegate.

Yes, Kerry will likely win the nomination; and I will work for him and vote for him -- or Edwards. And I certainly would for Kucinich, were he a possible winner of the nomination.

[diamondsoul]

7. Please do consider it strongly.

Governor Dean and Dennis Kucinich both stand for one basic thing together- CHANGE. The election system is rigged and they are the only two who seem even remotely concerned about that. When it comes to the situation we now find ourselves facing, Kucinich and Dean stand together, so a vote for Kucinich now is support for the same election reforms Howard Dean has advocated all along.

[Nederland]

21. But change is not what the people want...

...and that is precisely why DK and Howard Dean failed to gather many votes. Fact is, the majority is fairly comfortable and the talk of radical change that candidates like DK and Dean advocate scares them.

[goodhue]

10. kick for friday

[Phelan]

12. Didn't Cleveland go into bankruptcy under him

wasn't it the first time that a city had done that since the great depression and didn't the river catch on fire during his tenure?

I like Dennis, he is a good guy that says what us more moderate democrats are afraid of thinking but I really like at least the semblance of fiscal responsibility in the white house. Especially when there is a huge deficit to clean up...

[LWolf]

13. Dissembling.

By now, anyone who has heard the Cleveland story knows that Dennis comes out of that one a hero.

If we'd had Dennis in CA, we never would have been gutted by Kennyboy and Enron.

Why the pretence?

[goodhue]

14. Cleveland was never bankrupt.

Check your facts.

[Phelan]

16. Well here is my source:

The American Mayor
The Best & The Worst Big-City Leaders
By Melvin G. Holli
The Pennsylvania State University Press

"Only thirty-one years old when elected, Cleveland's "boy mayor" had failings that were not the sins of venality or graft for personal gain, but rather matters of style, temperament, and bad judgment in office. Kucinich earned seventh place the hard way: by his abrasive, intemperate, and chaotic administration. He barely survived a recall vote just ten months in office, then disappeared for five weeks, reportedly recuperating from an ulcer. When he got back into the political fray, his demagogic rhetoric and slash-and-burn political style got him into serious trouble when he stubbornly refused to compromise and led Cleveland into financial default in late 1978 - the first major city to default since the Great Depression. That led also to Kucinich's defeat and exit from executive office. Out of office, he dabbled in a Hollywoodesque spirit world and once believed that he had met Shirley MacLaine in a previous life, seemingly confirming his critics' charges that he was a "nutcake." After that, he experienced downward mobility, losing races for several other offices and finally ending up with a council seat; but more recently, he climbed back up to a seat in Congress. Bad judgment, demagoguery, and default also spelled political failure in the eyes of twenty-five of our experts, who ranked Dennis, whom the press called "Dennis the Menace", as seventh-worst."

so this is just a lie?

(edited to fix shoddy grammar in only sentence that I wrote for this post)

[diamondsoul]

17. Show me the word "bankruptcy" in there.

You can't because Cleveland was never bankrupt.

Yes the City was forced into default. What you don't see in this piece is what that really means Dennis Kucinich did. He ran a city roughly the size of the State of Vermont on a CASH ONLY BASIS for 2 years without ever declaring bankruptcy. Show me one other Mayor of a City that size who could pull that off and still keep the City functioning.

[goodhue]

20. default vs. bankruptcy

Entirely different concepts! Apparently the media is not smart enough to understand. As I said Cleveland was never bankrupt. Rather banks called in loans in retaliation for refusal to sell.

Orange County went bankrupt. Cleveland never ever.
The press gets this wrong all the time.

[no name no slogan]

19. About the river catching fire...

That actually happened in the 1960s, before Dennis was even on the city council.

He got elected to the city council in the 1970s IIRC, and was elected mayor in 1978.

:)

[goodhue]

23. Kucinich elected to council in 1969, and elected mayor in 1977.

And yes the fire was before his tenure.

[no name no slogan]

24. Thanks for correcting me

No coffee yet today and it's snowing to beat hell outside.

Oh well, see you tomorrow @ the Northrup!

[revcarol]

22. A hearty welcome to DU, Phelan., belated though that is.

:toast:

You hit a sore point here that you may be unaware of because you are new. This subject has been hashed out here DOZENS of times, and no, Cleveland did not go bankrupt.

Last year, I think it was, Cleveland COMMENDED Dennis for NOT selling the public utility under the pressure of GOB(good old boys) who wanted to scarf it up. He saved consumers over $200 MILLION!!

So, far from this being a bad thing, Dennis has a feather in his cap for his courage and doing the right thing.

[DemBones DemBones]

28. NO, Cleveland did not go bankrupt & the river did not catch fire

when Dennis was mayor. The river fire was years away from Dennis's term.
When Dennis was mayor, the city was forced into default on loans because Dennis refused to be a crook.

Dennis ran on a promise not to sell the city utility, MunyLight. The banks were in cahoots with the bigger utility company which wanted to swallow up MunyLight . Dennis was pressured to sell. If he'd done it, he'd have profited personally. But he kept his promise to the people, who returned the favor by voting him out instead of giving him a second term. It took years for most people to realize that he'd done the right thing, years when MunyLight saved money for people in Cleveland.

I think it's a good thing to keep a promise. The banks refused to roll over the city's loans because they were pissed that Dennis wouldn't play ball like a good little politician.

[redqueen]

15. Thanks for posting this

Nice to see his leadership abilities acknowledged. :)

[indigo32]

18. I'm going to

eom

[ThirdWheelLegend]

25. I will be voting for Kucinich...

surprised? :P

TWL

[eridani]

26. Go Dennis!

[snoochie]

27. Kick for a real choice

:kick:

[DemBones DemBones]

30. It's nice of them to print this but a bit late, isn't it?

Are other magazines going to wake up and discover Dennis now, too?

Now that Kerry has a big lead?

:eyes:

[dpbrown]

34. Well, the media is looking for "tension" in the race

Tension and drama sell newspapers.

So it's possible that they'll pay a little more attention to Dennis now that the other "important" candidates (like Lieberman - ha!) are out of the race.

I wish they all would wake up to "issues" and quit with the horseracing garbage.

Dan Brown
Saint Paul, Minnesota

[dpbrown]

31. This is what every progressive should be reading right now

Kucinich is the candidate with a plan for a post-W world.

Don't ask the other candidates to "put themselves out too much" to solve all the problems Bush has created.

Kucinich, on the other hand, is ready to fix the problems Reagan created. Now that's a man with insight.

Dan Brown
Saint Paul, Minnesota

[scarletwoman]

32. Wow! That's a GREAT line!

"Kucinich... is ready to fix the problems Reagan created.

Right on!

sw

[dpbrown]

33. Thank you!

I can't tell you how this fighter for the common man inspires me.

DPB

[dpbrown]

35. And if we had Dennis, we wouldn't have to worry about Nader, would we

That's why this teeth-gnashing about Nader is so ironic.

Democrats are making the choice that it's more "electable" to try to take votes from conservtives who might vote for Bush or might vote for the Democrat but can't quite choose, rather than locking up Nader's voters in the bank.

That's what the numbers say.

As long as Dennis is in the race, someone will be representing the best answer to the ills that have visited this nation under Reagan, Bush, and Bush the Stunted.

DK All The Way!

Dan Brown
Saint Paul, Minnesota