News and OpEds:

The following two items ran in the Eureka (CA) Times-Standard today. Not your normal fare, but a quick comment on the intro statements makes it clear that both offer opinions... though in one case it is disguised as "news".

Newsworthy event: Green Party Presidential Candidate Cynthia McKinney is planning to visit Humboldt County.

The OpEd take on this comes from 2004 Green Presidential Candidate David Cobb, who has a regular column in the Times-Standard.

Peace candidate McKinney visits Humboldt
David Cobb
Article Launched: 05/08/2008 01:24:22 AM PDT

In a game of shameful political football, the U.S. House of Representatives (lead by Democrats) is scheduled to vote today to authorize more money to fund the illegal, immoral and unconstitutional occupation of Iraq.

This proposal will authorize an additional $178 billion of taxpayer money to this travesty.

At a time when money is urgently needed in our own communities, this new Democratic Party bill will bring the total cost for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to over $874 billion. These numbers boggle the mind.

For that amount of money we could have universal health care for all, begin to seriously address global warming, invest in schools and infrastructure, and have plenty left over for a tax cut for working Americans. (more...)

And then there is the news version.

Controversial Green candidate visits Humboldt
The Times-Standard
Article Launched: 05/08/2008 01:15:43 AM PDT

If you think the mainstream presidential race has been rife with controversy, wait until you get a load of Cynthia McKinney.

McKinney, who will pass through town today and Friday, campaigning as the presumptive Green Party presidential nominee, is no stranger to standing in the crossfire.

Statements implying the Bush administration was involved with the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center reportedly cost McKinney her campaign for a seventh term representing Georgia in the U.S. House of Representatives. (more...)

And no matter what you think of McKinney, you will surely agree on the fact that there is some truth in the following in the news story....

Campaigning on a platform of ending the war and promoting social justice, McKinney, a long-time Democrat, said she is now a proud member of the Green Party. The Democratic Party, she said in her announcement speech, has become corrupt and now feeds out of the same corporate trough as their Republican counterparts.

Lessons of Feb. 5

I come away from the Green Party Presidential Primary with a whole list of lessons to be learned and hopefully there are some readers who will think a bit, and then act.

To begin with, the turnout for the Green Party, as a percentage of registered Green in California, dropped from 2004. That fact, by itself, would be worrisome. Given the fact that the Democratic primaries and caucuses across the entire country, have been pulling in record numbers of participants, our lack of excitement and growth demonstrates the need for change within the Green Party, but not necessarily the change that some are demanding.

Already, I have read posts from Green Advocates who continue to raise the issue of our apportionment formula being unfair. Well, they are all unfair. Is it fair that the Democratic Party allocates a block of Super Delegates and then gives a substantial number of those to the AFL-CIO? Is it fair that Democratic Party insiders have so much power as to be able to control the outcome of a close contest?

The category includes Democratic governors and members of Congress, former presidents Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter, former vice president Al Gore, retired congressional leaders such as Dick Gephardt, and all Democratic National Committee members, some of whom are appointed by party chairman Howard Dean.

The only truly fair method would be to conduct a national primary and that, with its demand for high level financing through television / radio commercials is a guarantee that you get only the rich as candidates. It is time to stop whining like Mitt Romney. It is costing him votes and it is winning our whiners no new friends.

The second lesson that I take away is that we do not yet have any candidate who has a message that is capable of inspiring this country at this point in time. We do have candidates who will be able to pull in small segments of those who acknowledge the fact that they have been disenfranchised by the duopoly, but none will capture the imagination of a wider electorate with the messages they have used to date.

If Ralph Nader (who captured most of the California Delegates) ends up winning the nomination, I can only hope that he does not repeat his campaigns of 2000 / 2004 because that is not what the majority of American want to hear. It's tone was too angry, too negative and particularly in a year when even the Clinton's are having to bite their normally divisive tongues, it will win few new friends.

If Cynthia McKinney (who out polled Nader stand-in Howie Hawkins in Illinois) puts together enough states without primaries to win, she will also alienate many if her message stays negative. I watched one time Clinton Chief of Staff Leon Panetta on KSBW-Salinas last night. He underscored that Hillary Clinton wins (vs Obama) when she talks about what she will do and loses when she only repeats the experience vs. non-experience (of Obama) mantra.

Greens need to talk about what we will do, not what we won't do.

At this time, in this election, especially with the enthusiasm that Obama generates we have to be talking about making positive change and the creation of a better world. Americans are basically optimistic people. Until we have a candidate that can articulate what it means to be Green in a positive manner, who shows us a vision of tomorrow, we will remain merely footnotes to an otherwise exciting election.

The third lesson I see here is that this party professes to believe in grassroots democracy and yet seems to fail, time and again, at grassroots organizing. That must change. If we were doing what we need to be doing, we would see new groups forming and new faces of activism at the county level. Instead, we see the same faces, hear the same voices repeating the same things that we saw, heard in 2006, in 2004...

There are centers around this country where people are doing things the right way, where the party is growing and coming ever closer to electoral success in partisan races. Illinois is one state where the gubernatorial candidate polled over 10%. What are they doing right that we are not doing? It may pay to figure it out. From what I observe, they don't spend a lot of time fighting internal battles that originated years ago and which still fester.

Nader Exploratory Committee

In yesterday's post, I mentioned the fact that I see a campaign based primarily on a genuine distrust of Corporate Greed, Corporate Power, Corporate Control, the anti-corporate message. Yet, that is exactly what Nader is doing. It would appear from the web site of his Presidential Exploratory Committee that this is his only message.

Yet, if you go back to his 2004 campaign site, which is still up, you can see that he has positions on a wide range of issues. The question I would have of a Nader candidacy is "which Nader will we get?", the anti-corporate crusader or a newly energized Ralph Nader who would offer a future of unlimited promise.

Unfortunately, all I see is a one dimensional candidate when he has the ability to be much more. Sadly, also, even some of the news agency press coverage trivializes his serious intent.

He’s baaaacccckkk….Nader forms presidential exploratory committee

100% Renewable Energy

I have had my disagreements with Gristmill's Dave Roberts from time to time, primarily over his unabashed promotion of everything labeled Democratic Party. However, his blog at Gristmill is a very good source of the latest information / discussion topics on the issues surrounding energy and Global Warming. It is one of three that I read daily. (The others are Chris Mooney's Intersection and Andrew Revkin's Dot Earth.)

Today, Roberts points us all to the University of Kassel in Germany and their discussion of the combined power plant. This is viewed as the first step in being able to deliver 100% if Germany's power from renewables by 2050.

Where the hell is the US?

The State of Massachusetts has just approved a major upgrade to the Coal Fired Somerset plant that will dump even more greenhouse gases into the atmosphere than it currently does. This prompted N.A.S.A.'s Dr. James Hansen to express his opposition in the Boston Globe.

California's Kalmran Alavi has talked about widely distributed power generation. However, the University of Kassel has essentially solved the problem at a much higher level, that of a fully operational power plant system. They even provided a short (7.24 min) film that gives a very clear explanation of how this can work.

Still, if you listened to ABC's Debate Night, every one of the Republicans talked about "clean coal" and "nuclear" solutions. Where is the vaunted American technology that we hear so much about? If the University of Kassel can do it, why can't MIT and Cal Tech? Have we fallen so far behind? Or have we become so inured to the blatherings of free-market ideologues who are afraid to challege the utility industry and the powerful coal state Senators like Byrd of W. VA, that we have just given up trying?

Here is yet another challenge to Green Presidential candidates. Build a new scenario for America's future. Clean, not dirty; growing corn for food, not for transportation; challenging us to be our best, not servile. We can do this. It is only a matter of want to.

Green Party Presidential Debate

The first, and so far only, Green Party Presidential Debate will take place in San Francisco on Sunday, January 13. The announcement has not yet, as far as I know, gone out to press but it has shown up on the Alameda County Green Party web site and has been posted (by someone) to the Third Party Watch site as of very early this AM.

Time: 2 PM

Venue: Herbst Theater/Veterans Memorial Bldg
401 Van Ness (opposite City Hall)
San Francisco

If this announcement is correct, it is mostly good news.

I knew that the effort to organize this debate was underway. The last I had heard was the Nader's participation had not yet been confirmed. I hope that the inclusion of his name on the Alameda County announcement means that he has agreed to participate. His name is on the ballot for the California Primary. It is my understanding that he will be in attendance. What he does here will tell us a lot about what his intentions are.

This debate will take place on Jan 13. Absentee ballots will already be in the mail. Some may already have voted. Personally, I will not vote until after this debate and, if Nader wants me to vote for him, he will have to participate in this debate on an equal bass with other candidates. The risk that one would run is that Nader might choose NOT to actively seek the nomination as a Green and then my vote would have been wasted.

You may note that there are two candidates on the national GP web site whose names are not included in this list. I am assured by the organizers that they were invited and either had conflicts (Kat) or have not yet responded (Jesse).

I cross posted this at Green Commons. Some of the emphasis might change as these posts will be geared toward questions surrounding the California Primary. The one thing that will not change is my belief that a credible Green Party candidate needs to be able to respond to questions on a wide range of issues: Global Warming, Health Care, Economics including tax policies, Iraq War and other foreign policy questions, immigration and trade policy. This must not become only a matter of "electability" or in Green Party terms, of how many new voters they can bring in to the party. We need to recognize that we can only build this party based on what our candidates stand for now, today and what they will do to make this a better America, continent, world.

To that end, I will later today be posting at California Greening, a list of questions that I would like to see be answered by our candidates as well as soliciting questions from others.

Indian Country Today Interview: Kent Mesplay

Since I gave my rationale for supporting Kent Mesplay for President, I should really follow up by calling your attention to an interview that was published today on the Front Page of Indian Country Today.

This will give everyone a very different look at this candidate. His life story is, to say the lease, unique.

'I didn't grow up on the reservation. I grew up in an environment that in many respects is even more primitive than some of our more isolated reservations. My dad picked the least hospitable place on the planet that you could think of: he chose Papua, New Guinea,'' Mesplay said with a laugh.

''So I grew up with Stone Age people in the middle of the rain forest. We didn't have television or even telephones. We captured rainwater for drinking and had a garden. There was a small air strip where we had provisions flown in, but we were largely self-reliant and that's part of who I am as a person.''

Sustainability and self reliance are crucial to security, Mesplay said.

There is much more in the interview that I would like to post, but that would violate their copyright. So, follow the link above and read it there.

League of Conservation Voters

When someone forwarded me the press release through which the League of Conservation Voters announced the availability of their "Primaries Voter's Guide", I was not surprised to see it did not include any but Republicans to find fault with and Democrats to praise.

The Voter Guide, which takes a critical look at candidates’ plans for dealing with global climate change, makes clear that collectively, the Democratic candidates have outlined more comprehensive and aggressive plans than any presidential candidates in history and have made a point of telling primary voters that combating global warming is a top priority. Among Republicans running for president, the guide says, “Sen. McCain holds the distinction of being the only candidate to make global warming a part of his campaign agenda and to regularly address it on the campaign trail.”

There was a missing column on the site... the one headed Green Candidates. That is the one most frequently missing from LCV activity, even though many Greens are members of that organization.

My reaction was to write a response, sent first to the LCV's campaign manager, Kerry Dugan, and then posted at Op Ed News as an Open Letter to the League of Conservation Votes. I challenged them to live up to the words of their own press release, that "No matter who is nominated by each political party, LCV plans to work to elect the candidate best qualified to take on the issue of global warming as president."

There are many reasons that the candidate they seek would be the Green Party Candidate, especially as that candidate would not be beholden to corporate special lobbies.

I also challenged them to support Science Debate 2008, an effort that now has support from thirteen Nobel Laureates and at least two University Presidents (Princeton, Duke). With the challenges of Global Warming as primary, and with many other issues such as stem cell research going to be a factor, we need to have a true debate over questions of science. It would underscore that it is no longer possible to override scientific considerations to achieve partisan political ends in the manner of the Bush / Cheney Administration, as illustrated by this recent report from Rep. Waxman's Government Oversight Committee.

We have to learn better how to win before the LCV and other organizations will begin to even give us a courtesy call. We have to continue challenging these organizations to give full consideration to our policy positions.

Green Debate

I won't copy the entire post here, but I used Green Commons to call for a debate among the Green Party Candidates for President. I mean a real, official debate, with a real moderator like Bill Moyers or Amy Goodman.

I would love to have people weigh in, especially over on Green Commons so that we can possible influence the National Party to do just that.

Climate Change Exchange

I received the following email from a GPCA associate today, posted to a Santa Clara County list.

According to the site in the URL at the end of that video, they did
reach some sort of agreement in the end:

http://unfccc.int/2860.php

This UN release casts the result is about as positive light as is possible. There are many other opinions, and the criticism of nations is spread equitably. My reaction was to send the following reply:
__
Everyone will call this a victory, but if it is, it is a very hollow one. It was an agreement to continue talking for another two year and to reach some sort of actionable plan before 2010,.

• That is two years in which we will have continued to build up the surplus of Green House Gases.
• That is two years in which US Government can swathe it's inaction and play Alphonse / Gaston with China.
• That is two years in which the lack of American Action will increase the enmity that we have engendered throughout the world.
• That is two years in which even a change in Administration, e.g. to a Clinton Compromiser or an Obama Dreamer, will continue to tringulate deals that allow multi-national corporations to continue screwing the planet or to move their operations to countries whose government regulators are more easily bribed.

I would suggest that everyone browse through the blog entries that Andrew Revikin has called for on his Dot Earth blog at the NY Times. Voices on Bali and Beyond is a collection of comments from people who were actually there. Here is a quote from the first responder, Dr. Thomas J. Goreau, the delegate from Jamaica, and representative of a Coalition of Caribbean nations: His target was the EU for its failure to stand up to the US stalling tactics. (Bold emphasis by me.)

This amounts to a real betrayal of all those who counted on the EU to do the right thing, and amounts to a capital crime against the environment, because millions will die as the result of unchecked global warming.

If there is a single issue that the Green Party needs to be very clear about, it is the one of Climate Change. What we do now, not what we begin to do in 2010 will have an effect on:

• agricultural policy a swarming weather makes major changes to what can be grown where and how much food might each country have to import or be able to export as a result.
• trade policies as competition for declining reserves of food and water, the basic essentials of life, make countries increasingly protectionist.
• energy policy unless we take aggressive steps to get off of fossil fuels.
• security as increased frustration with US arrogance sends an increasing flow of people towards Al Qaeda or other organizations.
• health care as diseases once considered tropical become increasingly prevalent in the more highly populated, currently temperate zones.

Have we come so far from our roots as a party that we are not the leaders in speaking out?