Building the Green Party

Surviving — and Thriving in — the Green Future

2009-02-04T13:56:00.005-05:00

Paul Glover, who was the Green Party candidate for mayor of Ithaca in 2005, has a great new article in the Philadelphia City Paper about surviving — and thriving in — the green future. Glover teaches metropolitan ecology and green jobs at Temple University. He is founder of the Philadelphia Orchard Project (POP), Ithaca HOURS local currency, Citizen Planners of Los Angeles and other groups. He is the author of Green Jobs Philly, Health Democracy and Hometown Money. More information about Glover's projects is available at paulglover.org.

Glover says, "Imagine . . . that, 20 years from now, Philadelphia's green economy enables everyone to work a few hours creatively daily, then relax with family and friends to enjoy top-quality local, healthy food. To enjoy clean low-cost warm housing, clean and safe transport, high-quality handcrafted clothes and household goods. To enjoy creating and playing together, growing up and growing old in supportive neighborhoods where everyone is valuable. And to do this while replenishing rather than depleting the planet. Pretty wild, right?"

From "Yes We Can" to "Now We Do"

FOOD: Grow it here

Challenges: Like an army camped far from its sources of supply, Philadelphia trucks food from hundreds and thousands of miles away, especially in winter. Costs of harvest, processing and distribution rise, raising prices. Fertile soils were scraped bare. Thousands are hungry here. Relax, though, we're not riding a spoon to the mouth of doom. An urban food army is marching.

Next steps: Philadelphia has 40,000 vacant lots. Their best use is now for growing fruits, berries and veggies. Same with many of our 700 abandoned factories: These are prime sites for vertical and roof farms, hydroponics, aquaculture, mushrooms. Plant the parks, too. Greenhouses extend seasons. Land breathes again when abandoned parking lots are depaved. Edible landscaping blooms meals. Edible community centers process neighborhood yields. Fallen leaves stay in neighborhoods to become new soil. Feeding kitchen scraps to worms (vermiculture) builds the food of food.

Local heroes: Mill Creek Urban Farm, Greensgrow, Weaver's Way Co-Op Farm, City Harvest, Youth 4 Good, Philadelphia Orchard Project, Neighborhood Gardens Association, Philadelphia Urban Farm Network, Farm to City, edible landscapers, Philadelphia School and Community IPM Partnership, Henry George School, Philadelphia's greenhouses, Community Supported Agriculture.

World champions: Beijing grows all its vegetables within 60 miles. TerraCycle manufactures organic soil. Guerrilla Gardeners throw seed bombs. Sites: cityfarmer.org, urbanagriculture-news.com, spinfarming.com. Books: Food Not Lawns, The Ruth Stout No-Work Garden Book, The Complete Book of Edible Landscaping. Keywords: depaving, urban land reform, solar envelope zoning.

Big picture: Philadelphia can become a giant orchard and year-round garden, housing and reliably feeding more people than live here today.

FUEL: Who lights your fire?

Challenges: Within 20 years Philadelphia businesses, homes and agencies that waste energy will close. Philadelphia Gas Works CEO Thomas Knudson recently declared that natural gas is a "transitional fuel" beyond which this city must evolve. The price of coal tripled last year. PECO rates will leap within two years. Electric shut-offs rise. So we'll rebuild Philadelphia rather than fade.

Next steps: Establish independent neighborhood utilities with wind, passive solar and micro-geothermal. Employ thousands to build and install these. Employ multitudes more to manufacture and install insulation made with newsprint and fly ash (a residue of coal combustion). We'll get free winter warmth from 500,000 solar windowbox heaters. District heating and cogeneration reduce fuel need. Municipal utilities reduce grid costs. Tree shade reduces cooling costs: Plant a million.

Local heroes: Energy Coordinating Agency, Bio-Neighbors Sustainable Homes, Roofscapes, Philadelphia Green, Philly Tree People, Urban Tree Connection, green contractors. Harold Finegan's gym needs no fossil fuel for heating and cooling.

World champions: American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy, Rocky Mountain Institute, Sacramento Municipal Utility District. Book: Toolbox for Sustainable City Living: A Do-It Ourselves Guide.

Big picture: Philadelphia can function even better with one-tenth the fossil fuel. Our lives will be more secure.

HOUSING: Stand your ground

Challenges: Absentee ownership and unemployment discourage repair and foster blight. Gentrification, foreclosure and taxes pressure humble homes. More middle class become homeless daily. Whether rowhouse or condo, homes won't be affordable unless massively insulated. And hey, river wards, both ocean and sewage, are rising. '

Next steps: Renters become homeowners through right-of-first-refusal (landlords offer sale first to renters) and sweat equity credits (renters swap community work for houses). Enforce law requiring absentee owners to have local agents. Shift to Land Value Taxation, which places tax burden on land rather than homes. Equitable development is a legal movement that' prevents gentrification through restraints and incentives. Enforce the Community Reinvestment Act, which requires lending in low-income neighborhoods (not sub-prime) and prohibits racial lending. Cease evictions based on dishonest loans. Evict shady lenders. As heating bills rise we'll move underground, because deep dirt is the best insulation. Not just elites to bunkers (Bill Gates lives inside a hillside), but all of us into pleasant, sunlit ecolonies. Big solar windows catch winter heat. Amend building codes for green innovation.

Local heroes: Hundreds of local organizations fight for and finance affordable neighborhoods. Women's Opportunity Resource Center, Women's Community Revitalization Project, Philadelphia Housing Task Force, Community Land Trust Corp., Project H.O.M.E., People's Emergency Center, African-American Business & Residents Association, Henry George School, Habitat for Humanity, Green Roof Philadelphia, Ray of Hope Project, churches. Major underground buildings in Philadelphia include Franklin Court Museum, Wilma Theater, Penn Center shops.

World champions: Germany requires R70 insulation — three times tighter than the typical U.S. home — in new buildings. National Community Reinvestment Coalition, United for a Fair Economy, Earthships, Boston City Life/Vida Urbana, Equitable Development Toolkit, Shelterforce. Book: The Earth-Sheltered House: An Architect's Sketchbook.

Big picture: Everyone living in Philadelphia in 50 years will be living in earth shelters. Green means we'll all be comfortable. No behind left chill.

HEALTH CARE: Healthy rebellion

Challenges: Corporate insurers raise costs, limit choices, resist paying. They block reform legislation. Premiums rise beyond the reach of millions. ' Taxes rise to cover city employee benefits and indigent care. Thousands of Philadelphians are stuck in jobs they dislike, to keep insurance. ' Philadelphia's 140,000 uninsured avoid care and die earlier, or go bankrupt paying more. Medicaid's waiting list grows. Hospitals close; free clinics lose staff. Toxic air and chemicals, junk food and lack of exercise cause much disease. Grassroots action will heal city and citizens.

Next steps: While pushing for universal health care (less bureaucracy, lower cost, free choice), gaps can be filled by genuinely nonprofit regional self-financing systems. Fraternal benefit societies and member-owned co-op health plans create independent safety nets and preventive care clinics. Medical centers can barter, accept Philadelphia MediCash.

Local heroes: Thousands of holistic and allopathic healers, Health Care for All Philadelphia, Catholic Worker Free Clinic, Esperanza Health Center, Congreso de Latinos Unidos, Planned Parenthood, Philadelphia Urban Solutions, Philadelphia Community Acupuncture, Philadelphia FIGHT, Philadelphia Health Care Center, PhilaHealthia, Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, Shriners Hospital for Children. Dozens more at philllyhealthinfo.org.

World champions: Mutual Health Organizations, Ugandan Health Cooperative, Ithaca Health Alliance, Dr. Patch Adams, Healthcare-NOW!, Book: Health Democracy.

Big picture: When sickness is big business, free healing requires insurrection.
MONEY: Give yourselves credit

► Challenges: Extreme capitalism and extreme socialism trample humanity. Lack of cash and credit kills businesses, jobs and homes. Some folks still have lots of money, but most of us have less. Dollar power dwindles because dollars are backed by less than nothing: rusting industry and $10 trillion debt. So we'll print real money — neighborhood currencies — backed by real people.

Next steps: Mutual enterprise systems (neither Wall Street nor Red Square) celebrate the spirit of regional enterprise when it serves community and nature. They applaud innovations — public and private and personal — that meet real needs. Local trading credits based on local land, skills, time and tools refresh the economy. Poverty is lack of networks more than lack of dollars, and Philadelphia has thousands of networks — business, professional, technical, fraternal, neighborhood, church, union, electoral, senior, youth, racial, sexual, athletic, hobby, family, friends. Woven together they're a powerful base of regional trust, trade and wealth. Take your pick of neighborhood and sector currencies. Cities may not issue them but may accept them for taxes.

Local heroes: Philadelphia's 83 credit unions, Valley Green Bank, e3bank, Equal Dollars, barter exchanges and gift economy, Philadelphia Regional and Independent Stock Exchange, Philadelphia Fund for Ecological Living (PhilaFEL).

World champions: Ithaca HOURS, Berkshares, LETS, Time Banking, National Federation of Community Development Credit Unions, Permaculture Credit Union, Grameen Bank microlending, Kiva, Robin Hood Ventures.

Big picture: Dollars control people; local currency connects people.

WATER: Go with the low flow

Challenges: Millions are spent to sanitize polluted river water and pump it to homes. Then we poop into it. Storm drains carry sewage and garbage back to rivers. Sewage treatment does not remove all pharmaceuticals. Old chemical tanks poison groundwater. Sinkholes undermine houses. Bottled-water scam drains local economy. Climate change brings frequent flood and/or drought. ' But new technologies will protect our liquid assets.

Next steps: Amend code to permit filtered graywater yard use, and waterless compost toilets. Install watersaving devices. Collect rainwater in rooftop tanks, barrels and swales. Plant xeriscapes. Depave driveways and abandoned parking lots. Start Progressive Street Reclamation, converting least-used streets and alleys to playgrounds and gardens.

Local heroes: Philadelphia Water Department taxes pavement, rewards depaving, distributes rain barrels. Friends of the Wissahickon installs compost toilets in the park. These convert turds into clean, sweet-smelling garden soil.

World champions: Swedes collect urine from apartment houses, store it six months, then use as fertilizer (EcoSanRes). Mexicans collect urine from city hall and schools to fertilize fields (TepozEco). Zimbabweans plant fruit trees atop privy muck (ArborLoo). Book: The Humanure Handbook.

Big picture: Clean water is becoming more valuable than gold. Nobody shits on gold.

TRANSPORT: Be here now

Challenges: Philadelphia's rail system was ripped out for cars, which clog streets and slow emergency response. Cars smash, kill, maim. They inhale paychecks and taxes, exhale rotten air. They compel war for oil. We'll become stronger and sexier as pedaling bipeds.

Next steps: To risk your life for your country, ride a bike. Hop on the bus. Revive street rail with ultralight passenger cars. Restore regional freight routes. Raise transit funds with local gasoline tax. Make pathways for bicycles, rollerblades, skateboards, Segways, scooters and wheelchairs. Restore canals. Zone for mixed use, to reduce travel needs. Live near your work. Employ multitudes making mosaic sidewalks. Convert paving to playgrounds.

Local heroes: PhillyCarShare, Bike Share Philadelphia, Bicycle Coalition of Greater Philadelphia, Neighborhood Bike Works and Bike Church, Critical Mass bike rides, bike shops, Delaware Valley Association of Rail Passengers, Pennsylvania Transit Coalition, PenTrans. Even SEPTA: Trains are clunky and late, but they're there.

World champions: Carfree Cities conferences, carfree.com, World Naked Bike Ride, Urban Ecology.

Big picture: The first cities rebuilt for proximity rather than speed will win this race.

JOBS: The full employment economy

Challenges: Philadelphia has lost 400,000 manufacturing jobs in 50 years. Now we import stuff once made here. Today, millions of American jobs depend on servicing bad things rather than good things. Car crashes are 8 percent of the GDP. How many jobs would end if criminals went on strike? What jobs would be lost if people ate healthy fresh food and exercised? What if we were content with what we owned?' We'll advance from jobs managing damage to jobs creating a beautiful city worthy of beautiful children.

Next steps: All skills can rotate greenward. Philadelphia needs at least 100,000 green-collar jobs to rebuild, retrofit, plant, harvest, manufacture and repair the homes and tools of the future. Arts and healing arts are green jobs, too.

Local heroes: Sustainable Business Network of Greater Philadelphia, American Cities Foundation, Penn Future, Ray of Hope Project. Green Jobs Philly, Neighborhood Environmental Action Team, Green Labor Administration, several City Council members.

World champions: Blue Green Alliance (enviros and unions united), Green for All, Apollo Alliance, D.C. Greenworks, Sustainable South Bronx.

Big picture: We'll develop new definitions of career, success; build green safety nets.

BUSINESS & INDUSTRY: Luxuriate in the Necessities

Challenges: America has been outstanding at pouring concrete, going fast and throwing things away. But high costs of raw materials, manufacture and trucking are causing consumers to quit consuming for the sake of consumption. Our Next Great Economy will sell more of durable value. We'll all have enough.

Next steps: Regional manufacture will resume as transport costs grow. Top niches will be basics: housing, energy, clothing, housewares. Orchards and gardens and food processing. Holistic healing will grow. Likewise, handcrafts. Everything energy-efficient.

Local heroes: Sustainable Business Network, Buy Local Philly, White Dog Café, Provenance Architecturals, Re-Store, flea markets, farmers markets, materials exchanges, repair shops, recycling.

World champions: Socially Responsible Investing. 'Magazines: Green Business Journal, Adbusters.

Site: storyofstuff.org.

Big picture: Smart money invests to raise all boats.

GOVERNMENT: The land is the law of the land

Challenges: Many bureaucrats trained in obsolete systems resist change, defend their turf. City's health insurers and pensions drag city down.

Next steps: Government welcomes grassroots innovators by passing laws facilitating greening of economy and neighborhoods: urban land reform, urban agriculture, sanitation and water codes, building codes. When urgent change is resisted, citizens underthrow the government.

Local heroes: Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission, PWD, streets guys who dig on rainy nights.

World champions: City of Curitiba, Brazil, encourages experimentation and welcomes mistakes. Magazines: Governing, Planners Network.

Big picture: Good government takes risks, makes change easy. "Make no little plans" —Daniel Burnham.

PUBLIC SAFETY: Just be sure to let that happen again

Challenges: Whenever people are hungry, cold or fearful due to unemployment, crime rises. Isolated resentment becomes street protest or riot. Racism flares. Taxpayers cannot hire enough police to escape chaos. Public safety is secured by creating safety nets for food, fuel, housing and health care.

Next steps: Jobs fight crime. Decriminalize marijuana locally. Hire ex-offenders. Neighborhood watch instead of neighborhood watch TV.

Local heroes: Block captains, Men United for a Better Philadelphia, Ray of Hope Project, City Harvest, People Against Recidivism.

World champions: Time Dollar Youth Court, Rainbow Police. Book: Defensible Space.

Big picture: People who are respected, loved and secure do not kill. '

EDUCATION: Keep it real

Challenges: Curriculums are less relevant to getting jobs or fixing society. Forty-five percent of Philadelphia high-schoolers drop out. Students are graded like eggs.

Next steps: Respectfully teaching skills of neighborhood management will make learning fun. Teach creativity rather than consumerism.

Local heroes: Thousands of dedicated teachers, Neighborhood Enterprise Schoolteachers, magnet schools, Waldorf School. Newspaper: The Notebook.

World champions: Paolo Freire; free university education in Europe.

Big picture: Loving learning is the first lesson.

CULTURE: Life gets highest ratings

Challenges: Media that's cynical about grassroots power features crime and celebrities.

Next steps: Empower average people to make music, art, dance, theater. Revive street-corner singing. Bring back vaudeville. Parachute clowns into parks.

Local heroes: Mural Arts Program, Raices Culturales Latinoamericanas, Spiral Q Puppet Theater, 373 groups listed at philaculture.org. Locally made homecrafts. Philadelphia's 2,800 murals feature children, heroes, nature.

Whether you're a student, job seeker, employee or retiree, there are thousands of ways to connect to Philadelphia's green movement. You're the one we've been waiting for. Check the ever-growing list of local green-jobs Web sites (start with greenjobsphilly.org/future.html). Visit local green businesses and groups. Time to bring those murals to life.

Rosa Clemente - Building the Green Party

2008-11-04T14:34:00.005-05:00

Rosa Clemente, our Green Party vice presidential candidate, has given a number of great talks about building the Green Party, several of which are available on YouTube thanks to Craig Seeman of Third Planet Video: The Media Whiteout and Building the Green Party. Thanks Rosa and Craig!

Hooray for Cynthia McKinney!

2008-08-10T07:50:00.010-04:00

Cynthia McKinney's acceptance speech at the Green Party Convention in Chicago, her statements in her campaign appearances, her choice of running mate and her campaign website all show that she understands and shares the values of the Green Party and sees the importance of building our party. It is wonderfully affirming to a long-time Green like myself to have a presidential candidate who shares my views about the importance of doing this. Thank you, Cynthia!

John Rensenbrink expresses similiar feelings in a recent article in Green Horizon magazine. Rensenbrink says:

"Allow yourself to think beyond the present power structure. Envision a different situation in which the present power structure has been dismantled. Surely, no power structure is permanent. The present one is dominated by megacorporate predatory giants and their Democrat and Republican minions. It will not last. It is not permanent. Please savor that thought. . . ."

"Cynthia is running full tilt as a Green. For the Green Party. She has stated that her goal is to get at least 5% in November. This will qualify the Green Party candidate for President in 2012 for millions of dollars in public funding. It will make the national Green party a substantial force and lay the basis for greater victories in the future. Now, that’s really thinking! Even if she does not get the 5%, her campaign will strengthen the Green Party and give it greater internal fiber and exposure to the public. This will help all future Green campaigns for all offices, including for president.

"Hooray for Cynthia! She really gets it. She knows that the powers-that-be are a power structure – and a bad one to boot. And that it must be dismantled if the issues people hold dear are to get a chance at being resolved. She puts first things first. Cynthia will not win the White House in November, but she is helping to lay the groundwork for “painting the White House Green” in the future. Thus a vote for her is a vote for our future."

Petitioning to Get McKinney on NY Ballot

2008-08-09T13:52:00.003-04:00

I am out petitioning every day to collect signatures to get Cynthia McKinney, our outstanding Green Party presidential candidate, on the New York state ballot. We need to file at least 15,000 signatures with the New York State Board of Elections on August, 19, 2008, to qualify Cynthia McKinney and Rosa Clemente for the Nov. 4th ballot. I have been getting lots of signatures in Steuben County, where I live, and in Yates County next door.

If you are a registered voter in New York, please join our efforts. You can download a petition and petitioning instructions at http://steubengreens.org. Because the Green Party does not have ballot status in New York, any registered voter (who has not already signed for another presidential candidate) is eligible to witness and to sign the petition.

Read more about McKinney's campaign at http://runcynthiarun.org/
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Women Top Green Party Presidential Ticket

Green Party Challenges Apportionment of Electoral College

2008-08-08T14:24:00.007-04:00

The Green Party filed a lawsuit on July 28, 2008, seeking to democratize the Electoral College by enforcing 14th Amendment voter protections. The action seeks relief against the defendant, Vice President Cheney, who will preside over the tabulation of "unbound electoral states" on January 6, 2009, and challenges the recognition of Electoral College votes that are apportioned by states on a winner-take-all basis.

The civil action seeks enforcement of the 'Mal-Apportionment Penalty' provided in Section 2 of the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution, which mandates a reduction of a state's presidential electors and congressional representatives if "the right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice President of the United States... is denied... or in any way abridged." The action also seeks the issuance of a court order providing proportional apportionment of presidential electors.

"[Our challenge] exposes the hypocrisy and fraud behind charges that the McKinney campaign might 'spoil' the Democratic presidential ticket's chances of winning," said Asa Gordon, chair of the DC Statehood Green Party's Electoral College Task Force and executive director of the Douglass Institute of Government. Mr. Gordon filed the action in the US District Court for the District of Columbia (1:08-cv-01294). Cynthia McKinney was nominated as the Green Party's presidential candidate during the 2008 Green National Convention in Chicago, July 10-13.

"Democratic leaders should have to explain why they choose to ignore 13 additional electors from southern states that they'd gain through the Green Party's presidential electors project. Why is the Green Party fighting to give voice to Democratic voters that the Democratic Party will not fight for? Let me be clear -- we're not doing this to assist Barack Obama, but to foster real democracy and voter participation, and to offer Cynthia McKinney as the truly democratic choice for all the people," said Mr. Gordon.

"By refusing to challenge Electoral College malapportionment in 2000 and 2004, which blocked Democratic electors from voting in those elections, the Democratic Party's leaders abandoned tens of thousands of their own voters, just as they failed to challenge the election irregularities in Florida and Ohio in 2000 and 2004. Will they fail to challenge malapportionment again in 2008, and hand the Republicans another victory? Barack Obama would not be the Democratic nominee if not for the Democratic Party's proportional assignment of primary delegates. The winner-take-all provisions in the general election present the distinct possibility that Mr. Obama in 2008 will win the popular vote by a considerably larger margin than did Gore in 2000, but will repeat the Democratic loss in the Electoral College."

Mr. Gordon said that African American voters in several southern states that were represented by proportional assignment of delegates in the Democratic primary, and who were critical to Barack Obama's success, will be lost to Mr. Obama under the winner-take-all rules of the general election. "If proportional assignment is considered by Democrats to be vital to democracy in their primary elections, why won't they fight for it in the general election?" asked Mr. Gordon, who led workshops for Green presidential electors during the 2008 Green National Convention.

If the relief sought is not granted, "We're in danger of seeing the 2008 election stolen again, as in 2000 and 2004," said Clyde Shabazz, Green candidate for the US House in Michigan (13th District). "In Florida in 2000 and Ohio in 2004, we witnessed the obstruction and manipulation of votes by election officials and possible tampering with computer voting machines. But equally insidious is the malapportionment of Electoral College votes, which disenfranchises whole sections of the voting public."

Mr. Gordon noted that the lawsuit has the potential to "alter the fate of the 2008 presidential election in a manner different from any presidential election in the nation's history."

Read Green Party Press Release: Greens launch effort against Electoral College manipulation of presidential elections

Greens Pay for Own Convention, Dems and the Reps Get Funded by Corporations

2008-07-24T20:11:00.003-04:00

Amy Goodman's article, Who’s Paying for the Conventions?, on Truthdig yesterday, describes huge corporate payments the Democratic and Republican presidential nominating conventions are receiving. These payments are in addition to the taxpayer funding these conventions receive, as I described in a previous post. Amy's article highlights a June 2008 report by the Campaign Finance Institute analyzing donors to the major party conventions.

The CFI report states that both Democrats and Republicans are using local “host committees” in Denver and Minneapolis-St. Paul as vehicles for unlimited soft money contributions to their respective 2008 party conventions. CFI's analysis is based on documents received from freedom of information requests to Governors and Mayors in Colorado and Minnesota which are excerpted in the report and its appendices.

According to the CFI report, the Federal Election Commission and Internal Revenue Service have permitted a vast expansion of host committee fundraising on the grounds that since these organizations are nonpartisan “charities” or “business leagues,” contributing to them does not present an issue of potential political corruption or appearance of corruption. But CFI’s investigation established that Republican federal and other elected officials, their financiers and party operatives, are asking for largely corporate money to fund the Republican convention in Minneapolis-St. Paul. And their Democratic equivalents are doing the same for their convention in Denver.

The CFI report shows that the 107 organizational donors to the convention host committees are drawing directly upon their corporate treasuries to help provide $55 million in private financing to the Democratic convention in Denver and $57 million for the Republican conclave in Minneapolis-St. Paul. CFI reports that among the largest pledges or contributions to host committees are: Qwest Communications ($6 million for each convention), Comcast ($5 million for Democrats), Xcel Energy ($2.25 million for Democrats and $1.2 million for Republicans), United Health Group ($1.5 million for Republicans but undefined for Democrats), Union Pacific ($1 million for Democrats), Molson Coors Brewing ($1 million for Democrats), and St. Jude Medical ($1 million for Republicans).

Voters should watch these numbers and vote Green. Our Green Party convention in Chicago two weeks ago was paid for entirely by individual contributors to our party and by the delegates themselves.

Paying for Our Own Convention

2008-06-18T10:53:00.006-04:00

As I help recruit people to serve as delegates from New York to the 2008 national Green Party Presidential nominating convention in Chicago, I find myself explaining that we have to find people who can afford to pay their own way to attend. Neither our state party nor our national party have sufficient funds to help defray delegate expenses. In contrast, delegates to the Democratic and Republican conventions have their expenses paid by US taxpayers. This is just one of the many ways that third parties are disadvantaged in the US electoral system. The general public sees us struggling, but doesn't know the burdens we are struggling under.

According to the Federal Elections Commission website, each major political party is entitled to $4 million (plus cost-of-living adjustments) under the Federal Election Campaign Act (FECA) to finance its national Presidential nominating convention. FECA was first passed in the 1970s, and the cost of living adjustments are now greatly in excess of $4 million. A minor party is eligible for a partial convention subsidy if its candidate received more than five percent of the vote in the previous presidential election.

The disadvantages of our public funding system to third parties are well-stated in the book Two Parties--or More? The American Party System, by John F. Bibby and Louis Sandy Maisel (Westview, 2002), pages 64-65:

"Advocates of a multiparty system are certainly correct in asserting that the Federal Election Campaign Act functions in a manner that benefits the two major parties at the expense of minor parties. Under the FECA, a party is eligible for public funding of its candidate's presidential campaign, provided that the party's nominee in the previous presidential election received the requisite percentage of the popular vote. Major parties—defined under the law as those that received at least 25 percent of the vote in the last presidential election—are entitled to full funding ($67.6 million in 2000) of their candidates' general election campaigns. Minor parties can receive a much smaller allocation of federal funds if they meet the minimum requirement of 5 percent of the vote in the previous election.

"Since it is difficult to imagine a set of circumstances in which the Republican and Democratic presidential candidates do not receive at least one-fourth of the vote, the FECA in effect, seems to guarantee the two major parties a government-subsidized existence in perpetuity. By contrast, even third parties that qualify for public funding do so at a much lower level than the major parties. Thus, the Democratic and Republican nominees in 2000 received a public subsidy of $67.6 million, whereas Pat Buchanan (the Reform party nominee) got $12.6 million. FECA also assists the major parties by funding their national conventions with public funds and providing matching money to their candidates during the pre-convention presidential primaries and state party caucuses to select national convention delegates."

Mike Gravel Supports Jesse Johnson’s Bid for President

2008-03-11T17:12:00.005-04:00

The Green Party of the United States announced today that former Senator Mike Gravel has endorsed Jesse Johnson’s Green Party presidential campaign. After a meeting between the two in Washington DC on Friday, Gravel stated, “I’m supporting Jesse because he began his political career with the determination that the environmental plundering must stop." Gravel said that Johnson is challenging "the corporations that destroy our national resources and then harvest from this practice a toxic energy source; coal. The mountain top mining practices devastate the landscape by blowing apart mountains and then carbon belching plants burn the coal creating a form of energy that serves as one of the major contributors for global climate change.”

“We must have a voice in the political realm speaking earnestly and intelligently about all of our environmental needs. Johnson and the Green Party have that environmental credibility that we Democrats have lost,” Gravel said.

Johnson, former chair of the West Virginia Mountain Party and two time candidate for statewide office, said that this sort of cross party support “was just the kind of non-traditional, selfless act that we have come to know Senator Mike Gravel to make. When he read the Pentagon Papers into the Congressional record, or filibustered to end the draft he had his eye – at all times – on the big picture and the needs of others. I am not surprised that a true patriot and advocate of the citizen as leader of our country would take such an unprecedented and bold stand. And I am honored and humbled that he has selected my campaign and the Green Party as his allies in this very important race to save our environment from the actions of humans.”

Gravel explained why he is not supporting a Democratic Party candidate. “We’ve seen the havoc the two parties can wreak, on a global scale, by locking out the voices of reason – by eliminating the third party voices. I want to amplify those voices to save our country from our own shortsighted and greedy actions. If we want to end the war in Iraq, provide health care to all citizens, educate our young people, we’re going to have to start not only working together with these alternate parties: but literally working to support them. That’s why I’m supporting Jesse Johnson’s campaign for President.”

“My political party long ago walked away from taking the necessary steps that will safe guard our nation’s and our children’s futures. I worked dedicatedly throughout my career as a U.S. Senator to protect the precious resources our country had within it’s boundaries as well as to mitigate the negative impact our businesses and individuals were having on the planet. I have watched the ever important job of stewarding these gifts vanish from the political landscape and I hold the Democratic Party leadership responsible for giving up that fight,” Gravel said.

Gravel will campaign with Johnson as his schedule allows.

Nader Campaign is about Ballot Access

2008-03-06T20:54:00.003-05:00

Excellent piece today in Delaware Online by David McCorquodale:

"The News Journal chose to print a cartoon and an editorial critical of Ralph Nader's decision to run for president as an independent. A man who has spent his life defending the rights of consumers was trashed in the cartoon as a "bottom-feeder," as if he were somehow profiting from this decision. The editorial said he was "ruining his reputation."

"If it's a reputation for challenging the status quo, then Nader is adding to it. The editorial referred to the myth that Nader's campaign in 2000 gave George W. Bush the presidency. Al Gore actually did win that election, but Bush took the presidency by 537 votes. The Democratic Party allowed itself to be steamrolled.

"Here's the larger point about 2000. Isn't it possible that of the 95,000 votes Nader got in Florida, some people wouldn't have voted at all if Nader had not been on the ballot?

"One of the issues the Nader campaign will concentrate on is ballot access. His campaign in 2004 was hindered by the Democratic Party. In Pennsylvania, ballot petition signatures of the Nader campaign were challenged. When a court ruled in favor of the Democratic Party and denied Nader ballot status, it also charged the Nader campaign more than $100,000 in court costs, even though usually costs are only levied against frivolous lawsuits. It turns out most of the judges involved in this ruling had ties to the Democratic law firm that filed suit.

"In 2006, the Green Party of Pennsylvania saw a similar effort to deny ballot access when U.S. Senate candidate Carl Romanelli had most his petition signatures ruled invalid by Democratic judges and was fined $80,000. He faces the possibility of jail because of his inability to pay this fine, levied because he sought to run for political office.

"Is this country fated to choose only between Republican and Democratic candidates? Those parties and the media certainly seem to be conspiring to limit choices.

"There is a better way. Instant run-off voting would allow voters to rank their choices when more than two candidates are on the ballot. The candidate with the least number of votes would be eliminated and the second choices of voters would be assigned votes. This process would continue until someone won a majority.

"This reform is being adapted in other countries as well as some municipalities here. Minor Libertarian, Green and Reform parties would be able to show their true strength. The issues that concern them and many independents could not be ignored by major party candidates.

"The major parties would benefit because candidates would have to win a majority.

"The Green Party presidential candidate, most likely former six-term congresswoman from Georgia Cynthia McKinney, will have to compete with Ralph Nader for many of the same voters. Nader will hurt the Green Party more than any other party. But a democracy is about choices and we welcome the challenge."

David McCorquodale, of Wilmington, is treasurer of the Green Party of Delaware.

Nader Shows Up a Spoiled System, Helps McKinney

2008-02-26T11:41:00.001-05:00

Ralph Nader entered the 2008 presidential campaign this week asking tough questions that none of the major party candidates have taken up. No wonder they denounce him as a spoiler. Nader, McKinney and the other third party candidates do spoil the insider game that seeks to limit American voters to the two choices of the two corporate parties. All voters benefit from their efforts.

Nader’s independent campaign helps all third parties and third party presidential candidates. His campaign particularly helps the Green Party and the campaign of Cynthia McKinney.

The fight to open up the US electoral system in which the Green Party is engaged benefits greatly from the presence on the ballot of as many highly qualified independent and third party candidates as possible. The more well-qualified candidates the better because they can debate each other and draw attention to each other’s campaigns in ways that would not be possible if each were the only third party candidate in the race.

Re-Thinking the Foundations of Green Politics

2008-02-23T08:17:00.004-05:00

Inspiring article by Steve Welzer in the new issue of Green Horizon Quarterly. Here are some excerpts:

Transcending Marxism, Freudianism, and Environmentalism

"The leftist movement for social liberation focused narrowly on sociopathological issues. As the critique of modernity broadened, two alternative, but also narrowly-focused, liberatory movements arose during the 20th century: a movement focusing on the psychopathological aspects of modernity (vide Freud's Civilization and Its Discontents) and the environmental movement, which focuses on the ecopathological aspects.

"The importance of the Green movement is that it holds the promise of synthesizing the narrowly-focused social, psychological, and ecological critiques. Emergent Green theory recognizes that our most serious problems flow from the aberrant direction we’ve been going in for millennia—away from sanity, toward lifeways that are unmoored from the community/nature matrix.

"This implies that human liberation won't result from changing ownership of the means of production or from psychotherapy/pharmacology or from simple environmentalism. Beyond notions of political revolution or personal liberation, what is required will be a Deep Green transformation of lifeways—renewal of appreciation for limits and balances, revaluation of community, re-establishment of our relation to nature and place. The problems of the epoch of development—imperialism, war, inequality, ecological crisis, mass forms of neurosis, preoccupation with technology—are all symptoms of the fact that we’ve lost our bearings in a headlong rush toward hyper-modernity. Our challenge now is to recover our grounding and find our way home."

Kent Mesplay on Breaking the Stranglehold of the Two-Party System

2008-02-23T07:55:00.011-05:00

Green Party presidential candidate Kent Mesplay was recently interviewed by Lisa Karpova in Pravda, the Russian daily, on his presidential campaign. He was asked a number of good questions about the operation of the US political system.

Interview with Green Party Presidential Candidate Kent Mesplay

1. As we can see, the system presently is heavily weighted against 3rd parties.What steps do you think need to be taken to break the stranglehold of the 2 party system?

The first step will be to allow candidates equal time and access to media coverage. Right now, most coverage is purchased by the wealthier candidates. Running for office is a money-grab, with back-up provided by committees in the two parties that accept funding and direction from corporations (e.g. debates are not regulated as "in kind" expensive contributions and are corporate-driven in content and appearance). So, getting the money out of polics is important, such as by publicly funded campaigns. Still, rather than just have taxpayers subsidize advertizing agencies it would be better to reinstitute equal access laws. Also, having proportional representation and, as a step to this, preferential voting such as I.R.V. will help improve representation and alternative party access

2. Why do you think American voters are unwilling to vote for candidates who are neither Republican or Democrat, (according to the Green site "corporate" parties)?

People who are disgusted with politics in this country do not vote (a silent, invisible vote against the system). The way forward is to have a rapidly moving campaign that begins to look like it can succeed. It is possible, even for higher-ticket races, for Greens to be elected (although generally improbable). Currently, there are over 200 elected Greens to office. These tend to be local positions, including mayor-ships. Voters will vote for an "underdog" but only if it does not look like the underdog is moments away from being steam-rolled flat. So, there is a chance of electing a Green president or senator, but it is slight under the current system. A full-out, organized "protest" vote engaging celebrity support and the youth is a good way forward. It's not that the voting public tend to like the candidates of the two main parties: they tend to enact "lesser evilism" voting in which they vote for the least offensive candidate. Changing the system through preferential voting, in which one ranks candidates, will go a long way toward improving this process.

3. The media makes exposure difficult for 3rd party candidates. Don't you think this situation should be legally challenged?

Yes. Nader and others have law suits taking place, such as around the blocking of a candidate in Pennsylvania and in the illegal blocking of Nader's campaign by Democratic-party operatives in 2004. It is practically illegal to participate in politics in this country outside the rigid two-party structure (that behaves as one party on key issues).

4. The problems with the US election system leave much to be desired when preaching to other nations about democracy. Please comment about the current fixation of the administration to "spread freedom and democracy" which frankly has people worldwide rather cynical regarding US motivations.

The "freedom and democracy" rhetoric used by the U.S. government is only a cheap selling point used to buy the support of supposed patriots who are really the ones, through their lack of critical thinking, selling out this country. Our country invades and then proclaims itself the "good guy." It's not just "worldwide": we are getting sick of this within the U.S. as well.

5. What would be your first order of business were you to be the President of the United States regarding how the US would tackle global warming and its dependence on oil? What about US use of depleted and enriched uranium, is this not an ecological disaster of horrendous proportions?

The United States needs to declare a state of emergency and use all available resources to improve our energy efficiency and move entirely toward sustainable, renewable energy. It is for lack of separation of big-business and state that we do not have this. Our government is run by corporations. Nader recently said every branch of our government is run by business: even the labor department. Our government is border-line fascist, and I mean this in the loose, lay-man sense of the term denoting a dangerous confluence of business and government, especially regarding the business of war. Yes, I fully agree regarding the release of depleted uranium: another "verboten" subject in the U.S. . . .

8. How would you propose conducting relations with Cuba and your other southern neighbors such as Venezuela, Nicaragua and Bolivia? What about Iran?

I believe in normalizing relations with Cuba and creating better diplomatic ties to the other southern neighbors mentioned. Especially with Fidel Castro stepping down there may be an opportunity for thawing the chill between our countries. Cuba has invested resources in living sustainably and now has much "green" experience that may be valuable for other countries such as the United States that need to cut their waste and live more within their means. Foreign leaders critical of the Bush regime are immediately villified in our press.

Hugo Chavez is not the villian he is made out to be. Iran is not the threat that our government would like us to believe it is. Especially after our invasion of Iraq, I am extremely critical of our presidential administration's grasp of reality.

9. Re ending the occupation of Iraq:

The policy concerning Iraq needs to be a presidential-level apology to the people of Iraq, apology to U.S. service personnel and their families, apology to other U.S. citizens and world citizens. The stated goal needs to be unconditional, immediate withdrawal (which may take six months to fully implement) together with a parallel "surge" in diplomatic efforts. Politically, an international body such as the U.N. is needed to help with transitioning toward a more peaceful society.

Informants and others friendly to "coalition" efforts need expedited VISAs so that they can leave the country. U.S. high-level diplomats need to work tirelessly in the countries surrounding Iraq to form a coalition of politicians, celebrities (authors, musicians, sports personalities, etc), tribal leaders, religious leaders and a cross-section of the youth who can help lead the region toward becoming stable. At the very least, such a coalition would have a visible advisory role, but more appropriately would have a strong role to counter the business-driven policies of the U.S. government and would act in a manner representing the needs of the Iraqi people, not our war investors. Finally, a U.S.-sponsored clean-up needs to be conducted to address environmental damage and war reparations need to be offered in an effort at real justice.

10. There are many possible methods of implementing universal health care. The Green Party advocates single-payer health care in which the government is responsible for insuring and ensuring that ALL citizens within the United States are covered.

I would like the policy extended toward non-nationals who are here visiting or working illegally. If rare illnesses are brought into the country by people seeking work, it is important that they, too, receive adequate health coverage to stem the spread of disease. We are a wealthy enough country to provide health care for all. Forms of "universal" health coverage that allow competition and depend on private insurers, such as the plans I have seen offered by Democratic Party candidates, tend to leave people uncovered.

The Republican Party is opposed to anything but free-market health coverage, which leaves over 40 million people without coverage for some time of the year in the U.S. Health care in the U.S. is sporadic, expensive and exclusionary. We can change this. A feature that I would like would be for allowance of regional specialization with clinics scattered about for ready access, rather than the current model of fewer, larger, more distant hospitals.

For security purposes, it is important to have strong regional health care. Also, I would be friendly toward policies recognizing and encouraging complementary or alternative health care, such as by recognizing the importance of working with healing plants and ancient "energy" practices. Western medicine has much to learn. Because of corporate influence (pharmaceutical companies, insurance companies, advertising companies) the trend has been toward abolishing health care that is rooted in community wisdom and practice. I would like a blend of "old and new" with our medical practices, with a balance of standardization and respect for diversity. I study with Native healers and others who do "energy" healing.

11. Why did the Clintons experience difficulties in implementing their health care plan?

The difficulty experienced by the Clintons in producing a reasonable health care plan in the United States came from the business sector, which treats health care as a business from which short-term profits are to be derived. Our elected representatives first and foremost represent business interests. There is no separation of business and state in the United States, which gets in the way of representatives being able to actually solve problems in various sectors, including that which ought to be considered a basic human right: health care.

12. What are your chances of being the nominee?

Someone once told me to always run as though I am winning. At present, other Green Party candidates have more votes and nominating delegates than I have. I have not done a strict delegate count, in part because there are so many "fluid" parameters in the Green Party race, but I think it would be safe to say that by the time of the July convention I will be in third place or better. At present I am somewhere in the middle. The two most famous candidates are currently in the lead, but our most famous one (Nader) has not declared himself a candidate as of this writing. My strategy is to pick up my campaign and be a solid third or better and to be the second-choice pick of most of the delegates.

In 2004 I was told, after the nominating convention, that if our rounds based upon preferential voting had lasted longer I would have been the nominee since I had so much "second place" support. Depending on what happens in between rounds of caucusing and voting at the nominating convention I could win if one of our two front-runners drops out of the race and I attract their delegates. This is not as unlikely as it sounds. In 2003 Nader requested that his name be taken off the primary ballot in my state of California prior to the primary race. It is not at all clear what the man is doing this time around, but it is creating dissention within the party.

13. Anything else?

Yes, thank you for the interview. The Green Party is a truly international party. The reader is encouraged to read about our key values and be advocates for their favorite ones: be it decentralization, post-patriarchical values, peace and nonviolence, social justice or environmental health. In the United States we are at a critical time in that our government is sliding toward totalitarianism in a way that is invisible to many people. Because of the fear promulgated by our "leaders" another 9/11-type event could be used as an excuse to impose martial law and cancel the presidential election. Many people here do not realize how many of our rights as citizens have disappeared under the current Bush regime. We need perestroika and glasnost, American-style, here in the US: restructuring and openness.

Green Party Ignored to Death on Stupor Tuesday

2008-02-06T14:30:00.000-05:00

Bill Meyers, a California Green, has an interesting post on his blog about yesterday's California primary. Here are some of Bill's points:

"Ralph Nader won, which I'll get back to in a second. The most obvious point is that only about 25,000 Green votes were cast in all of California, excepting I think there were a lot of write-ins for Barack Obama. This is a dismal turnout, and if you are not depressed enough by American politics already, I'm going to go into why.

"For statewide offices in California Green Party candidates have polled far higher. For instance, in the 2002 race for Governor, Peter Camejo received 393,036 votes.

"Before declaring an end to the Green Party, consider what people in Mendocino County were saying about how they wanted to vote in the primary. There were two common themes among greenish voters here: people could not vote in the Green Primary because they had switched to Democrat, usually back in 2004, to vote for Dennis Kucinich. And people who were mad they were registered Green because they wanted to vote for Barack Obama.

"Let's take the Barack Obama greens first. A secondary comment was that the Green Party primary was not exciting because they had not heard of any of the candidates except Ralph Nader, who no longer excited them. Since there was close to zero press coverage of the Green Party candidates, of course they had not heard of them. If the corporate press that they say they hate and distrust had not whipped up Barack's campaign he'd be as obscure as any other black person in Congress.

"The Kucinich greens are a sad lot. Consciously or not, Dennis Kucinich had a mission in 2004: to destroy the Green Party. He did great at that. He claimed he was going to move the Democrats to the left, but instead he made a joke of the left within the party. So he killed two birds with one stone. The dope-addled Kucinich Democrats of Mendocino County mostly fell into the we-love-Obama camp. After all, they had trained themselves for over a decade to hate the kind of Democratic Party that the Clintons represent. And Obama is not Clinton.

"Anyone who thinks that because they are now what passes for the far left in the United States, people registered in the Green Party must be particularly astute or even news-aware don't know the Greens of Mendocino County, or of California. Green Party members, as a whole, hardly ever vote. They pay little attention to the news, and get most of their knowledge of the world from the corporate media. When focused they are as smart as anyone and may remember some of the lessons they have learned about corporate control of the media, the candidates, and the two party system, but they drift away from that pretty easily.

"Cynthia McKinney is a far better choice to lead the Green Party ticket in 2008 than Ralph Nader, but she was smashed in the primary. Interestingly, there was only one city where the press covered the Green Party primary at all: San Francisco. There was a Green Party Presidential debate there, and while there was no TV coverage, the daily paper wrote a short article and enough people attended to create a buzz. Cynthia edged out Ralph there, 46% to 44%. If there had been statewide televised debates I think the statewide electoral results would have been similar.

"Why? Because Greens, like other voters, mostly vote based solely on name recognition. Ralph Nader has way better name recognition than Ms. McKinney, an African-American who has served several terms in the House of Representatives for her Georgia district."

Green Party Presidential Primary Results

2008-02-06T14:23:00.000-05:00

Richard Winger reports today in Ballot Access News the results of yesterday's Green Party presidential primaries.

"Four states held Green Party presidential primaries on February 5. Arkansas and California state elections officials have incomplete, unofficial results, but Illinois and Massachusetts elections officials do not provide that service.

"Arkansas: With only three-fourths of the counties reporting so far, the results are: uncommitted 273; Cynthia McKinney 116; Jared Ball 54; Kent Mesplay 48; Kat Swift 26. Ralph Nader was unable to have his name on this ballot since he hasn’t declared his candidacy. Arkansas Greens have severely criticized Pulaski County (the most populous county in the state) election administrators, for not making Green Party ballots available in many precincts.

"California: with 96% of the precincts reporting (but many uncounted absentee and provisional ballots), the results are: Ralph Nader 16,835; Cynthia McKinney 7,124; Elaine Brown 1,259; Kat Swift 843; Kent Mesplay 564; Jesse Johnson 506; Jared Ball 444.

"Illinois: check back for better results. The Chicago Tribune reports 1,446 for Cynthia McKinney, 438 for Howie Hawkins, 369 for Kent Mesplay, and 302 for Jared Ball. Thanks to Brian (commenter below) for these returns. As in Arkansas, Green Party activists are making a determined effort to alert the press in Illinois of election day problems. In Cook County and certain other counties, there were many precincts in which elections officials told voters that there is no Green Party primary ballot.

"Massachusetts: check back for better results. Fragmentary returns suggest that the race between Ralph Nader and Cynthia McKinney is extremely close."

The reason we had no Green Party primary in New York yesterday is because the Green Party does not have ballot status in New York. Only parties who have ballot status are permitted to participate in the official primaries. The Green Party of New York participated in 2002 when we had ballot status. We have not had ballot status since that time because our candidate for governor has not gotten at least 50,000 votes. People have a right to register in the Green Party in New York because we won a lawsuit in 2003 giving us that right as long as we are successful in placing a candidate for governor on the ballot. In 2006 we placed Malachy McCourt on the ballot by collecting almost 30,000 signatures.

The Green Party of New York will decide how to choose our presidential delegates at the state committee meeting on Feb. 23.

Court Overrules BOE and Allows DREs

2008-02-06T14:15:00.000-05:00

To the disappointment of many, on Monday, Justice Kimberly O'Connor, Acting Justice of the New York State Supreme Court, overruled the decision of the Board of Elections and determined that LibertyVote’s DRE could be purchased by New York counties. Read Bo Lipari’s blog for the details http://www.nyvv.org/boblog/

Paper Ballots for New York

2008-01-25T11:35:00.000-05:00

Excellent news this morning from Bo Lipari, the Director of New Yorkers for Verified Voting. "I'm pleased to announce that after five years of hard work on the part of voting integrity advocates, New York State has rejected DREs and approved only the Automark and the Sequoia ImageCast scanner/marker for use in 2008 polling places. This momentous decision by the State Board of Elections virtually guarantees that New York State will vote on paper ballots and ballot scanners when it finally replaces lever machines in 2009." Many thanks to Bo and his wife Susanne, and to the many other activists across the state such as Susan and Gray Multer, for their five years of hard work to address the deficiencies of DRE's and encourage our election commissioners to choose paper ballot voting systems.

Who Decides Who’ll Be Allowed on TV Debates?

2008-01-25T11:25:00.000-05:00

Yesterday's San Francisco Chronicle highlights the significance of the Nevada Supreme Court's very troubling ruling allowing a cable network to exclude Dennis Kucinich from a Democratic presidential debate, Who Decides Who’ll Be Allowed on TV Debates? by Bob Egelko.

The article notes that the ruling "constituted the strongest judicial statement yet of news organizations’ near-absolute power to control participation in pre-election forums - including the debates scheduled in California next week in advance of the state’s Feb. 5 primary. Broadcasters’ right to exclude candidates they consider marginal has been established at least since a U.S. Supreme Court ruling in a 1998 case involving a state-owned television station in Arkansas that had excluded a congressional candidate from a debate." Click here for the rest of the article.

My Letter to Steuben County Board of Elections

2008-01-16T13:24:00.000-05:00

Dear Steuben County Election Commissioners,

I am writing to urge you to choose ballot marking devices that are
compatible with paper ballot optical scan voting systems. Please do not
choose devices compatible with Direct Recording Electronic (DRE) systems.

As you know, the New York State Board of Elections requires county
election commissioners to select the ballot marking devices they will
use by February 8, 2008. Your choice in this matter will decide the
long-term future for how votes are counted in Steuben County. Please
protect election integrity in Steuben County by choosing devices that
are compatible with paper ballot optical scan voting systems.

Kucinich Refused to Debate Opponent in 2006

2008-01-16T12:08:00.000-05:00

I am disappointed to see on the web that Dennis Kucinich refused to debate his opponent in the Democratic primary in 2006, Opponent Interrupts Summit After Kucinich Skips Debate. In order to have free and fair elections, candidates need to participate in debates with their opponents.

Who is Looking Out for the Voters?

2008-01-16T10:53:00.000-05:00

The New York Times reports, NBC Wins Battle Over Debate, that the Nevada Supreme Court overruled the district court judge and decided that MSNBC was not required to include candidate Dennis Kucinich in its Democratic presidential debate last night. The Times report says that the victory "will likely be described as a First Amendment victory by [MSNBC], as lawyers for NBC had argued that it had a right, as a privately owned network, to determine whom to invite to the debate. " If so, it is an odd interpretation of the First Amendment. It is an interpretation that allows gigantic news corporations using the public airways to restrict the public's access to information about candidates. The network was explicit in claiming the right to determine who is a viable candidate. But it is the voters who must be allowed this right, not the network corporations.

As John Nichols noted in his ironic article in the Nation, NBC Battles To Keep Kucinich Out of Las Vegas Debate, NBC went court to fight for "the cherished right of television networks to decide who is and who is not a legitimate candidate for president. . . . [M]ajor media conglomerates have traditionally been able to police the parameters of presidential politics. Any affront to this order of affairs is a threat to the ability of corporations to define the American discourse." Nichols concludes that Kucinich’s lawyers " have fewer resources, but are possessed of one commodity that the broadcast and cable network seem to lack: an understanding that democracy is best served by free and open debate." We agree.

Nevada Judge Rules Kucinich Must Be Allowed to Participate in Debate, NBC Appeals

2008-01-15T00:48:00.000-05:00

Huffington Post reports that NBC News said Monday it will appeal a judge's ruling rather than include Democratic presidential hopeful Dennis Kucinich in a candidates' debate in Nevada.

Hours earlier, Senior Clark County District Court Judge Charles Thompson ruled that Kucinich, an Ohio congressman, must be allowed to participate. If he is excluded, Thompson said he would issue an injunction to stop the televised debate. Thompson called it a matter of fairness and said Nevada voters will benefit by hearing from more than just top contenders Hillary Rodham Clinton, Barack Obama and John Edwards.

Ironically, the network and the Democratic Party have promoted the debate as a chance for the candidates to be questioned about issues from Nevada's minority communities.

Green Presidential Debate Videos

2008-01-14T19:24:00.000-05:00

Opening statements from the Green Party presidential debate on Jan. 13 are on YouTube at http://youtube.com/watch?v=NNGtJ_0vTgk. Coverage of the debates by KTVU in San Francisco is at http://www.ktvu.com/video/15040480/index.html

800 Attend Green Party Presidential Debate Jan. 13 in San Francisco

2008-01-14T14:40:00.002-05:00

The San Francisco Chronicle reported that 800 people attended the first Green Party presidential debate of 2008 held in San Francisco on Jan. 13. Candidates Cynthia McKinney, Jared Ball, Kent Mesplay, Kat Swift and Jesse Johnson participated in a debate moderated by Cindy Sheehan and KPFA radio host Aimee Allison. Bay Area elected officials who are Green Party members - including Richmond Mayor Gayle McLaughlin, San Francisco Supervisor Ross Mirkarimi and San Francisco Board of Education member Mark Sanchez - also spoke. Ralph Nader, the 2000 Green Party presidential nominee who has yet to announce his intentions for 2008, was scheduled to participate in the debate, but he did not. Instead, he addressed the crowd after the debate concluded. Two segments of the debate are now on YouTube, one features Cynthia McKinney, the other features Jesse Johnson and Jared Ball. It is to be hoped that other segments of the debate will be posted soon.

Green Party Sues to Overturn Mich Law that Allows only GOP and Dems to See Voter Lists

2008-01-14T13:40:00.000-05:00

There is no justification in a democracy for a law like this.

ACLU sues over voter lists from primary
Law lets only GOP, Democratic Party see names

January 11, 2008, by David Ashenfelter, Detroit Free Press

The ACLU of Michigan filed a federal lawsuit in Detroit today on behalf of three political parties to overturn a new law that enables the Democratic and Republican parties – but no one else – from obtaining lists of people who will vote on Tuesday’s presidential primary.

“It’s not our intention to stop the primary,” Michigan ACLU director Kary Moss said Friday after the suit was filed in U.S. District Court. “Instead, it is our contention that the state cannot lawfully limit access to this information to the two major political parties. The consequence of this law is to exclude individuals and parties from meaningful participation in the process.”

The ACLU filed the lawsuit on behalf of the Green, Libertarian and Reform parties of Michigan, the Metro Times and Winning Strategies, a political consulting firm. The new law, passed last August, doesn’t require Michigan voters to register by party, so the party in which residents will cast votes on Tuesday is valuable to political parties, candidates, journalists and citizen groups that support or oppose ballot proposals, the ACLU said. The law says anyone other than the two parties who uses a “secret” record could be issued a 93-day, $1,000 misdemeanor.

Moss said the statute gives the major political parties an unfair advantage and violates the Equal Protection Clause and 14th Amendment to the Constitution. The case is assigned to U.S. District Judge Nancy Edmunds. No hearings have been scheduled. The suit asks Edmunds to declare the law unconstitutional and prohibit the Michigan Secretary of State from carrying out the law’s provisions.

Exclusion of Candidates from Democratic and Republican Primary Debates is Undemocratic

2008-01-09T12:14:00.000-05:00

Greens have watched with sympathy and frustration the exclusion of major party candidates expressing anti-war views from the primary debates sponsored by national news media. Their exclusion highlights the narrowness of the political dialogue allowed by the national media, and raises extremely significant issues regarding the democracy of elections in this country. GP-US has issued a press release protesting the exclusion of Kucinich, Gravel, and Paul from the primary debates.

The release notes that the first Green presidential candidates' debate is set for San Francisco on Sunday, January 13. All announced Green presidential candidates will participate in the debate, and unannounced candidate Ralph Nader will be a special guest. The debate will be moderated by Cindy Sheehan.

Greens Protest the Exclusion of Antiwar Candidates from Democratic and Republican Primary Debates

GREEN PARTY OF THE UNITED STATES
For Immediate Release: Tuesday, January 8, 2008

WASHINGTON, DC -- Green Party leaders and candidates protested the exclusion of Dennis Kucinich, Mike Gravel, and Ron Paul from primary presidential debates sponsored by major news organizations.

Greens noted that Mr. Kucinich, Mr. Gravel, and Mr. Paul hold strong positions against the Iraq war and other Bush policies, in agreement with most Americans but contrary to the positions of other Democrats and Republicans running for the White House.

Mr. Kucinich, like the Green Party, favors single-payer national health care, unlike his fellow Democratic presidential candidates and the major media, which rely on corporate campaign contributions and advertising dollars from insurance firms, HMOs, and pharmaceutical manufacturers. Mr. Kucinich was excluded from an ABC TV debate on January 5.

The six candidates for the Green Party's presidential nomination, all of whom oppose the war, will be featured in upcoming Green debates. The first debate will take place in San Francisco on January 13. The nomination will be decided at the Green Party's 2008 national convention, July 10-13 in Chicago.

Jody Grage, treasurer of the Green Party of the United States: "In democratic elections, voters have a right to be informed about all the candidates whose names they'll see on the ballot. Fox and ABC TV have violated the public interest and their licenses to use the publicly owned airwaves. They're acting like the official news bureaus of dictatorships."

Jason Wallace, peace activist, Iraq War veteran, and Green candidate for Congress in Illinois (11th district): "It's no accident that Kucinich, Gravel, and Paul -- the most vocal opponents of the Iraq invasion -- are getting shut out of the debates. While the Democratic and Republican parties and big media conglomerates try to close down serious public discussion over the Iraq war, the Green Party's 'Peace Slate' will continue to represent the opinion of most Americans, whom poll after poll have shown oppose the war. On Election Day 2008, the only truly antiwar candidates on the ballot will be from the Green Party or another third party or will be independent."

Rodger Jennings, Green candidate for Congress in Illinois (12th District): "The Democratic and Republican parties and media companies like Fox and ABC have censored the opinions of the majority of Americans, who want to see a quick end to the Iraq War. It's revealing that Barack Obama and Mike Huckabee won in Iowa. Among the frontrunners within their respective parties, they've been the most critical of President Bush's foreign policies. But Mr. Huckabee has only criticized the Bush Administration's strategic blunders in Iraq, rather the war itself. While Mr. Obama has opposed the war, he only favors a vague and delayed timetable for partial withdrawal of troops, which suggests that the occupation will continue in some form regardless of which Democratic frontrunner might be elected in November. Mr. Obama has also added his voice to the military threat against Iran, and says nothing about holding the Bush Administration and war profiteers accountable for their crimes. Unfortunately, voters are being denied the chance to hear the real antiwar candidates and are being told that Dennis Kucinich, Mike Gravel, and Ron Paul shouldn't be taken seriously."

John Walsh, Massachusetts Green-Rainbow Party delegate to the Green Party's National Committee: "In recent elections, the Commission on Presidential Debates, the corporate-owned body controlled by the two established parties, has only allowed Democratic and Republican presidential candidates and has barred Green, independent, and other candidates from participating. We urge all Americans -- especially those who oppose bipartisan warhawk policies on Iraq, Afghanistan, and Iran -- to speak out in demand of fair elections and election coverage, and inclusion of all qualified candidates in the debates, regardless of their positions or party memberships."

Kucinich Protests Outside NH Democratic Debate That Excluded Him

2008-01-07T13:34:00.000-05:00

This video from the Alternet website shows footage of Kucinich outside the ABC debates in New Hampshire. The narrator of the video and Kucinich each make excellent points about why ABC and Facebook, the sponsors of the debate, would exclude a candidate who met their test for inclusion (Kucinich scored over 5% in Facebook's own presidential poll).

Third party candidates are not the only candidates being excluded from debates. The recent exclusion of Dennis Kucinich from the ABC debates and of Ron Paul from the Fox debates shows that candidates seeking to operate within the dominant parties are being excluded when they seek to offer alternative ideas to the electorate. Kucinich and Paul are each presenting an anti-war platform.

Greens Support Nader and Romanelli Lawsuits Challenging Abuse of Election Processes by Democratic Party

2007-12-20T11:55:00.001-05:00

GP-US has issued a press release in support of recent lawsuits undertaken by Ralph Nader and US Senate candidate Carl Romanelli. These lawsuits present evidence of Democratic Party abuse of the legal system, intimidation, and rigging of elections.

Greens Urge Public Support for Nader and Romanelli Lawsuits Alleging Legal Abuse of Elections by Democrats

GREEN PARTY OF THE UNITED STATES
For Immediate Release: Friday, December 14, 2007

WASHINGTON, DC -- Green Party leaders urged national attention and support for legal efforts by Ralph Nader and Carl Romanelli to ensure fair elections in the face of patently unfair election rules and underhanded tactics by Democratic Party operatives to block Green, other third party, and independent candidates.

"The vicious tactics used by Democrats against Greens and independents in Pennsylvania and other states are comparable to the Republican manipulation of national elections that we witnessed in 2000 and 2004," said Liz Arnone, co-chair of the Green Party of the United States. "In all these cases, Democrats and Republicans alike have betrayed an exclusive sense of entitlement that led them to rig the vote."

"If the courts don't side with Ralph Nader and Carl Romanelli, it'll be taken as a license for both Democrats and Republicans to engage in similar underhanded and outrageous actions to obstruct candidates they don't want to face publicly in a fair election. The American people deserve to know that the future of our elections is at stake," Ms. Arnone added.

Ralph Nader has filed a lawsuit accusing the Democratic Party of "groundless and abusive litigation" to bankrupt the Nader campaign and force him off the ballot in 18 states.

The lawsuit, filed in October on behalf of Mr. Nader, running mate Peter Miguel Camejo, and voters from several states, names as co-defendants the Kerry-Edwards campaign, the Service Employees International Union, private law firms, and several organizations, and claims the latter used underhanded and malicious legal tactics against the Nader campaign. A cadre of Democratic Party lawyers led by Toby Moffett and Elizabeth Holtzman filed 24 lawsuits and five FEC complaints to block the Nader-Camejo independent ticket from state ballots, using legal maneuvers to disrupt bankrupt the campaign.

"The fact that Ralph Nader won the vast majority of these lawsuits and that the FEC dismissed the complaints proved that the lawsuits were an abuse of the legal and election system by Democratic Party lawyers for political purposes," said Mark Dunlea, an attorney active with the Green Party of New York State.

The Nader lawsuit also presents extensive evidence of a conspiracy to harass and intimidate Nader-Camejo petitioners in Ohio, Oregon and Pennsylvania. In Ohio, Democratic lawyers called petitioners and warned them that if they didn't verify signatures they collected they would be guilty of a felony. In Oregon, Democratic operatives urged volunteers to use illegal tactics that would result in having Mr. Nader's ballot petitions voided.

Carl Romanelli has filed an appeal against a court order levying enormous fees and costs against him -- to be paid to Democratic lawyers -- because of disqualified signatures on his 2004 petition to have his name on the Pennsylvania ballot in the 2006 race for the US Senate. Ralph Nader is battling a similar court decision in the wake of a Democratic challenge in Pennsylvania to his petitions to run as an independent candidate for President in 2004.

"The Romanelli and Nader cases don't just expose Pennsylvania's grossly antidemocratic ballot access rules. They show that if you even try to run on a third-party or independent ticket, you're not only in danger of getting tossed off the Pennsylvania ballot, you also risk personal financial ruin," said Phil Huckelberry, co-chair of the national Green Party and Illinois Green, who helped lead his state party's successful ballot access effort in 2006 after Gov. Rod Blagojevich (D) used $800,000 in taxpayers' money attempting to keep Greens off the ballot.

Pennsylvania requires that third party and independent candidates for major office submit over 67,000 signatures, while only requiring 2,000 signatures for Democratic and Republican candidates. After Mr. Romanelli submitted nearly 95,000 petition signatures (more than any candidate in the state's history), lawyers acting on behalf of the Democratic Party undertook a line-by-line challenge of the petitions.

Despite Mr. Romanelli's attempt (with the help of volunteers) to defend the signatures he collected, the court sided with the Democratic Party lawyers and invalidated enough of Mr. Romanelli's signatures to have his name removed from the ballot.

"The judge never looked at our signatures. They just took the word of Democratic Party lawyers," said Mr. Romanelli. "When we were able to show the validity of a large portion of the signatures the Democratic lawyers claimed were invalid, we were not allowed to enter the evidence in court."

The Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court also honored a request from Democratic lawyers to impose punitive expenses on Carl Romanelli because of the disqualified signatures. The court ordered Mr. Romanelli to pay more than $80,000. In Mr. Nader's case, the fine neared $89,000.

"The fees imposed were an attempt to bankrupt me personally. The court also ordered my lawyer to pay expenses for the disqualified signatures, which is like sentencing a defendant's lawyer to prison along with the convicted defendant -- and which intimidates lawyers from representing third party candidates in future disputes," added Mr. Romanelli.

Carl Romanelli is now appealing to the state Supreme Court to reconsider its November 20 decision upholding the lower court ruling. Mr. Romanelli intends to file a federal lawsuit, claiming violation of his First and Fourteenth Amendment rights because his political speech was limited and he was denied due process in his appeals.

MORE INFORMATION

Green Party of the United States
Green Party News Center
Green Party Speakers Bureau
Green candidate database for 2007 and other campaign information
Ain't Easy Being Green, 2007 documentary on Carl Romanelli's ballot access fight by Morse-Levin Productions
Romanelli keeps fighting, Citizen's Voice, Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania December 8, 2007
Ralph Nader Files Lawsuit Accusing Democratic Party of Conspiring to Block Presidential Run, Interview with Nader attorney Carl Mayer, Democracy Now!, October 31, 2007
The Wild Wild West of Ballot Access, Polidoc Productions, September 25, 2007
Video clips of July 15 press conference at the Green Party's 2007 national meeting in Reading, Pennsylvania with Ralph Nader, Nader 2004 ballot access attorney Bruce Safran , and Carl Romanelli

Kucinich Excluded from Iowa Debate

2007-12-13T11:17:00.000-05:00

The Hill reported yesterday that Ohio Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D) is being excluded from this week’s Iowa presidential debate because he has not rented office space in Iowa. The Des Moines Register informed the Kucinich campaign that Kucinich is not invited because the newspaper determined “that a person working out of his home did not meet our criteria for a campaign office and full-time paid staff in Iowa.”

The campaign said of the exclusion, “[I]f the Register has decided to use hair-splitting technicalities to exclude the leading voice of the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party, then the entire process is suspect.” The campaign claims that Kucinich has also been barred from public appearances by the Iowa Democratic Party and Iowa Public Television.

Excluding Kucinich from the Iowa debates expands the disturbing trend of excluding important voices from political debates. Third party candidates are frequently excluded, as Ralph Nader found in 2000 and 2004, and as I found in 2006. These exclusions are done against the wishes of most voters. History shows that debate participation by third-party candidates raises debate viewership and voter turnout. The 1992 presidential debates, which included third party candidate Ross Perot, were watched by record-breaking TV audiences, averaging 90 million viewers, with a larger audience for each successive debate. Presidential voter turnout went up in 1992, reversing a 20-year downward trend. In 1996, with Perot excluded, the presidential debates averaged only 41 million viewers -- and voter turnout nosedived. In 1998, participation by third-party candidate Jesse Ventura in the gubernatorial debates in Minnesota generated massive voter turnout.

I hope the Kucinich campaign will commission a poll to find out how Iowa voters feel about his exclusion from the debates.

Exxon's Brooklyn Oil Spill Timeline

2007-10-24T15:20:00.000-04:00

The September issue of Mother Jones magazine contains a a good article and great timeline of the spill.

EPA Releases Study of Exxon Spill in Brooklyn

2007-10-24T15:18:00.000-04:00

On September 12, 2007, the EPA released a study of Exxon's Brooklyn oil spill. The report says the spill may be as large as 30 million gallons and also that the surrounding air contains high levels of methane vapors.

New York AG Sues ExxonMobil to Force Cleanup of Brooklyn oil spill

2007-07-18T13:51:00.000-04:00

New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo announced yesterday that he has filed suit against the ExxonMobil Corporation and ExxonMobil Refining and Supply Company to force the cleanup of a huge oil spill in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, and to restore Newtown Creek. Clean up of the spill was one of the featured issues of my 2006 Green Party campaign for AG. The video Craig Seeman took of my June 24, 2006, press conference on the spill is on Google Video.

Bring the Troops Home Contingent at Wellsville Balloon Rally

2007-07-15T15:32:00.000-04:00

I joined Greens and other peace activists marching Saturday, July 14, 2007, in the Wellsville Balloon Rally parade. Thanks to Gudrun Scott for helping to organize our efforts and taking our photo.

NY Green Fest

2007-07-07T15:34:00.000-04:00

I am helping to organize NY Green Fest, which will take place Friday-Sunday, August 10-12, 2007, in Ithaca and Cayutaville. For more information, visit http://nygreenfest.blogspot.com

Fri. , Aug. 10, 6:30-9:00 pm at the Community School, 330 E. State St., Ithaca
Sat., Aug. 11, all day at Cayuta Sun, 2962 Swamp Rd., Cayutaville
Sun., Aug. 12, 10:00 am-4:00 pm at Bernie Milton Pavilion, Ithaca Commons, Ithaca

The festival is a benefit for the Green Party of New York and is open to all who are interested in sustainable living and sustainable politics.

NY Green Fest kicks off Friday evening, August 10, with a program on the politics of sustainability at the Community School auditorium, 330 E. State St., Ithaca from 6:30 to 9:00 pm. The speakers are Art Weaver from Renovus Energy in Ithaca who will speak on social change and its connection to renewable energy, Virginia Rasmussen, a founder of the Program on Corporations, Law and Democracy from Alfred, who will speak on the politics of sustainability, and Dan Hill, the Cayuga Nation representative to the Haudenosaunee Environmental Task Force, who will speak on sustainability for the long term.

Saturday’s programs take place at Cayuta Sun, an off-the-grid permaculture homestead in Cayutaville, 15 miles southwest of Ithaca. Saturday starts with a bread baking workshop in the earth oven at Cayuta Sun lead by Lois Hilton from Tickletown Trust & Trade in Humphrey, New York. Lois will also participate in Saturday’s panel on building a local food network, along with Matthew Glenn from Muddy Fingers Farm in Hector, editor of Southern Tier Farm to You Local Food Directory and Gwen Quigley from Keuka Cookin’ in Bath.

Michael Burns and Steve Gabriel from the Finger Lakes Permaculture Institute will lead an introduction to permaculture workshop. A discussion on grass roots organizing for sustainability will be lead by Gay Nicholson who has led Sustainable Tompkins since 2003, Mike Sellars, the Mayor of Cobleskill and a founder of Sustainable Cobleskill, and Tony and Mary Lipnicki, the founders of a monthly discussion group on sustainability issues in Andover, NY. Two off-grid pioneers, Steve Nicholson from Ithaca and Tony Moretti from Hammondsport will offer advice on living off-the-grid.

Saturday afternoon Barry Miller from Hinsdale, New York will show how to build a small wind turbine. Barry is a mechanical engineer and has spent 20 years in the wind energy business. For nine years he operated a wind farm in Altamont Pass west of San Franciso. Barry recently taught a class at Olean BOCES on how to build your own small wind turbine. Three experienced cable access TV producers will discuss getting media access for alternative viewpoints, Bill Huston from Binghamton, Carl Lawrence from Brooklyn and Deborah Magone from Greece, NY.

Rafter Sass will speak Saturday evening on Liberation Ecology: Refusing to Choose between Social Justice and Sustainability. Rafter lives and works at the Germantown Community Farm, a collectively-run community food security project in the Hudson River Valley.

A Cob for Kids workshop will run throughout the day on Saturday. Lunch and dinner prepared from local foods will be served on Saturday. Sunrise yoga begins the day. Exhibitors on Saturday include renewable energy suppliers, booksellers, farmers with local produce, local craftspeople, grassroots organizations and non-profit groups.

On Sunday, August 12, Green Fest moves to the Ithaca Commons with a series of speakers and musicians at the Bernie Milton Pavilion in the center of the Commons. Peacesmiths from New York City will perform political songs. Lexie Hain from Motherplants will show how to make a green roof. Ilonka Wloch, the editor of Positive News in Ithaca, Craig Seeman from Third Planet Video in Brooklyn, and Cyril Mychalejko from Upside Down World in Vermont will discuss building new media outlets that address sustainability issues.

Howie Hawkins, SKCM Curry, Tony Gronowicz, and Jason Nabewaniec will discuss how third party electoral activism is essential in fostering social change and challenging the underpinnings of corporate power. Howie was the 2006 Green Party candidate for US Senate from New York and a current candidate for Syracuse Common Council. Tony Gronowicz, the 2005 Green Party candidate for Mayor of New York City, teaches at the City University of New York. His most recent book is Grand Illusion: American Democracy from its Roots to the Present. Jason Nabewaniec from Batavia is a Co-Chair of the Green Party US. Sedinam Kinamo Christin Moyowasifza-Curry from Los Angeles is a Green Party candidate for Vice President of the US.

Sunday’s program concludes with a discussion on campus organizing for sustainability led by Peter LaVenia from the Albany University Campus Greens, and Krista Carlson from the Alfred University Campus Greens.

$35 admission for Friday and Saturday, includes Saturday lunch and dinner, Sunday free. Camping available for an additional charge. Green Fest is a benefit for the Green Party of New York. No fees for those who help during the festival or in advance. For a detailed schedule, directions, registration forms and more information, visit nygreenfest.blogspot.com or call 607-569-2114

My Article in Spring Sierra Atlantic

2007-04-02T15:23:00.000-04:00

Cuomo Sues Exxon to Clean Up Nation's Largest Oil Spill--After Brooklyn Endures 50 Years of Delay

Article by Rachel Treichler in Spring 2007 Sierra Atlantic

The waters contaminated by the largest oil spill in the US are not pristine beaches. The waters contaminated by this spill are mostly invisible because they are mostly underground, floating on the aquifer under the homes and businesses, schools and churches of Brooklyn. But the toxic effects of the spill on the health of the people who live and work above it, and the damage it has done to soils in large areas of Brooklyn and to the potability of the Brooklyn aquifer are far from invisible. The millions of gallons of oil floating on the Brooklyn aquifer also present a continuing threat to the New York harbor, should the geological barriers holding the oil on the aquifer be breached.

The people of Brooklyn have suffered more than 50 years of delay and obstruction in cleaning up the spill by Exxon Mobil. Its predecessor corporation, Standard Oil, owned the petroleum storage tanks near Newtown Creek in Greenpoint, Brooklyn that were breached by a gas explosion in 1950. The full size of the spill is not known. If proper studies are done, it may turn out the spill is even larger than the 17,000,000 to 40,000,000 gallons currently estimated and extends under a large area of Brooklyn.

Given the many years of delay, the announcement by Attorney General Andrew Cuomo in February this year that he has filed intent to sue letters against Exxon Mobil and four other companies to force them to clean up the spill and repair environmental damage is extremely welcome news. The lawsuits will seek scientific testing and investigations to determine the full scope of the contamination, increased recovery of underground oil, cleanup of contaminated groundwater and soil, restoration of Newtown Creek, damages for the injuries to the affected natural resources, and unspecified financial penalties. Intent to sue letters are required as a precursor to suit under the Federal Clean Water Act and the Federal Resource Conservation and Recovery Act. The attorney general’s office has announced that when suit is brought, the State will also likely assert legal claims under the federal Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA, also known as Superfund), the federal Oil Pollution Act, the State’s Navigation Law, and the State’s Environmental Conservation Law, and assert claims of public nuisance .

Conducting further studies may be valuable, but they should not be used as a tactic to delay implementing an all-out clean up of the spill. It was obvious to Exxon Mobil in 1950 when the explosion occurred that millions of gallons of its petroleum products had sunk onto the Brooklyn aquifer, but the company did not clean up or disclose the spill. If the spill had been cleaned up as soon as it occurred, the damage would have been far less extensive.

Even after the spill was discovered leaking into Newtown Creek in 1978 by the US Coast Guard, the company denied liability for years. So far, Exxon Mobil has cleaned up only what is easiest to do, siphoning oil from thick layers of free floating petroleum nearest the original site of the spill. The company’s profits from selling this oil on the market substantially exceed its clean-up expenditures.

It is outrageous for Exxon Mobil, the largest corporation in the world, with profits of $36 billion, to continue delaying an all-out clean up of the spill. Had the spill been cleaned up in a timely fashion, much of the damage caused by the petroleum over the last 57 years would have been avoided. Three generations of people in Brooklyn would not have had to live with toxic petroleum vapors seeping into their homes and businesses and damaging their health. The aquifer might have been restored and available to the city as a source of water. Until 1947 the Brooklyn municipal water system depended on ground water. Pumping stopped in 1947 because the depression in the water table caused by extensive pumping was causing sea water to flow into the aquifer. Once the aquifer replenished itself, as it did by 1978, pumping could have resumed if the petroleum contamination from the spill had not contaminated the water.

The dangerous health effects of benzene and other chemicals identified in the spill are well known. The all-out effort to clean-up the spill needs to begin now. If it does not, criminal charges should be brought. New York needs to show that large corporations are not above the law.

New York Moves Toward Suit Over a 50-Year-Old Oil Spill

2007-02-09T14:09:00.000-05:00

The announcement in today's New York Times that newly elected New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo has moved to sue Exxon Mobil and four other companies on February 8, 2007, to force them clean up millions of gallons of oil lying under the Greenpoint neighborhood in Brooklyn and to repair environmental damage inflicted on nearby Newtown Creek is very gratifying because I made clean up of the spill one of the featured issues of my campaign for AG. This development shows that our third party campaigns can have significant results, even if we don't win. Click here for the video of my June 24, 2006, press conference on the spill.

More pols join suit against ExxonMobil

2007-01-26T09:44:00.000-05:00

Two articles today about New York City politicians getting involved at long last in the Exxon oil spill. Green Party campaigns do have effects!

New York Daily News, January 26, 2007, More pols join suit against ExxonMobil: Rep. Weiner also urges congressional hearings

New York Sun, January 26, 2007, Solons Attack Exxon Mobil Over 1950 Spill

Black Mayonnaise in Greenpoint

2007-01-24T11:09:00.000-05:00

Today's Scienceline has a good article about the Exxon oil spill in Brooklyn.

http://scienceline.org/2007/01/24/liebach_env_greenpointe/

Black Mayonnaise

For nearly 30 years, New York State agencies have known about a 17 million gallon oil spill under the Greenpoint section of Brooklyn. Now they’re finally starting to do something about it.

By Julie Leibach, posted January 24th, 2007.

The Greenpoint Manufacturing and Design Center slumbers on the southwest bank of Newtown Creek, a brick behemoth in a dusty concrete bed. The sun casts long shadows behind the building, where weeds clump around the weathered skeleton of a wooden boat.
Along the creek’s edge, two quiet figures navigate the cracked cement ledge, surveying the murky water below where several yards of fishing line cut through the surface. Any minute now…. and then it happens: an almost imperceptible tug on the line triggers a choreographed dance as the two figures painstakingly draw their prize—a blue crab—from the depths below.
Manuel Bodón has been crabbing along the banks of Newtown Creek for ten years; his friend, Edwin Rosa, for five. On this brisk October afternoon, they’ve already caught nearly a dozen. In a few hours, most will meet a boiled demise, when Bodón makes a seafood stew.

“I put all kinds of seasoning in there,” he says. “It’s nice and tasty.”

Never mind that his dinner was just taken from a waterway that once coursed with petroleum. While the surface appears cleaner than it’s been in the past, a mile up from Bodón and Rosa, oil continues to seep into the creek, though far less than just a few years ago. But it’s still a glaring sign of a much bigger problem.

For over 50 years, the Greenpoint section of northern Brooklyn has been sitting atop a staggering 17 million gallons of spilled oil—almost 50 percent more oil than was spilled in the 1989 wreck of the Exxon Valdez supertanker in Alaska—and almost nothing has been done to clean it up.

But now, the oily tide seems to be turning. Over the last few years, the spill—which likely originated from several tanks that leaked over the course of nearly a century—has been drawing closer scrutiny, particularly from environmental watch dog groups, law firms, and concerned citizens who all want the cleanup to begin in earnest. And just this past summer, the state Attorney General’s office agreed to investigate the spill. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has announced a thorough study of the site as well.

While uncertainties and mistrust remain, state agencies that once seemed only passively concerned—and sometimes, even protective of the oil companies responsible—are now striving for a more comprehensive clean-up of the oil that has been plaguing not just the creek, but also a middle class neighborhood whose best interests haven’t always seemed to be a priority.

“This is really a ‘tale of two cities.’ One is the community of Greenpoint…[the other is] the story of Newtown Creek, which is a story marked by the largest environmental disaster in the history of New York City, followed by a generation of cover up by the companies that did it, followed by nearly a generation of delay in taking responsibility for what needs to be done,” said Congressman Anthony Weiner, during an October press conference announcing the EPA study. “We’re finally at a point where we can take some action.”

A walk through Greenpoint reveals a town with a split personality. Blocks of row houses interlace commercial streets dotted with Dunkin’ Donuts, T-Mobiles, and ubiquitous Polish bakeries and pharmacies. And glaring at it all is the sooty face of industry: warehouses, factories, and the Newtown Creek Sewage Treatment Plant rising like an alien spaceship, its giant silver “digester eggs”—which break down sludge—shining in the sun.

Greenpoint has been an industrial center for over 140 years. Petroleum refining began in about 1866, and by 1892 most of those refineries—there were more than 50 on the banks of Newtown Creek—had been consolidated into John D. Rockefeller’s Standard Oil Trust. After the break-up of the trust in 1911, some of the refineries fell under the ownership of the Standard Oil Company of New York (later Mobil Oil Corporation) and became known as the Brooklyn Refinery.

In 1966, the Brooklyn Refinery shut down and was demolished. Mobil Oil sold some of its lots to companies like Amoco (now British Petroleum, which currently owns a bulk fuel storage unit on a ten-acre plot) and used the remaining lots for petroleum bulk storage until 1993, when they closed. Most of the tanks and buildings of the former Brooklyn Terminal have since been torn down.

The Paragon Oil Company—a subsidiary of Texaco (now Chevron Corporation)—also owned property along the creek and operated a storage facility for a decade until 1968, when Peerless Importers, a liquor distributor, purchased the land to build a warehouse.

Those early refineries were careless in their operations, and it’s likely that they started spilling almost as soon as they began operating. Unhampered by environmental laws, few refineries had containment systems to catch spills, so what was released could seep into whatever was around to soak it up.

“It was a very messy industry,” says Basil Seggos, chief investigator of Riverkeeper, an environmental watchdog organization.

The biggest spill of all wasn’t revealed until 12 years after the Brooklyn Refinery shut down. During a helicopter patrol over Newtown Creek in early September of 1978, the Coast Guard noticed an oil slick on the surface of the water near Meeker Avenue, by the Peerless Importers site.

An investigation by Coast Guard-hired contractors Geraghty & Miller, Inc. found that the seep was part of a much larger spill—17 million gallons of oil that had saturated the soil underneath nearly 55 acres in Greenpoint.

The Coast Guard stopped the seep by installing recovery sumps—or basins—to collect the oil, but until 1989, little was done to address what lay beneath the surface. That was the year Exxon Mobil accepted responsibility for the oil under the ground.

In 1990, the company agreed to begin cleaning up the spill, which existed not only under its own former property, but also under Peerless Importers’ land and an adjacent residential area as well. But those agreements, which were supervised by the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, were fairly simple and “just really [required] them to take free product out of the ground,” says Bob Hernan, an environmental lawyer with the state Attorney General’s office who is studying the spill.

Nor were the agreements strictly enforced—at least, so it seemed to Greenport residents. In fact, there were times during community meetings when oil representatives wouldn’t even let the state agency representatives talk, according to Christine Holowacz, a member of the Greenpoint Waterpark Association for Parks and Planning. “It was a terrible blow for the community to come into a meeting where you thought you had the agencies that were supposed to protect [you],” says Holowacz.

But over the past few years, high-profile lawsuits and public outcry have spotlighted the spill, and the agencies seem to be doing a turnaround. They’re considering new technologies such as vacuum enhanced recovery—which sucks up oil that’s hard to reach—and they’re also beginning to address an issue that community members charge the state has long ignored: the relationship between the plume and residents’ health.

Humans Living Far Beyond Planet's Means

2006-10-24T14:40:00.001-04:00

by Ben Blanchard, Tuesday, October 24, 2006 by Reuters

BEIJING - Humans are stripping nature at an unprecedented rate and will need two planets' worth of natural resources every year by 2050 on current trends, the World Wildlife Fund said on Tuesday. Populations of many species, from fish to mammals, had fallen by about a third from 1970 to 2003 largely because of human threats such as pollution, clearing of forests and overfishing, the group also said in a two-yearly report.

"For more than 20 years we have exceeded the earth's ability to support a consumptive lifestyle that is unsustainable and we cannot afford to continue down this path," WWF Director-General James Leape said, launching the WWF's 2006 Living Planet Report. "If everyone around the world lived as those in America, we would need five planets to support us," Leape, an American, said in Beijing.

The report said humans' "ecological footprint" -- the demand people place on the natural world -- was 25 percent greater than the planet's annual ability to provide everything from food to energy and recycle all human waste in 2003. In the previous report, the 2001 overshoot was 21 percent.

"On current projections humanity, will be using two planets' worth of natural resources by 2050 -- if those resources have not run out by then," the latest report said. "People are turning resources into waste faster than nature can turn waste back into resources."

"Humanity's footprint has more than tripled between 1961 and 2003," the report said. Consumption has outpaced a surge in the world's population, to 6.5 billion from 3 billion in 1960. U.N. projections show a surge to 9 billion people around 2050. It said that the footprint from use of fossil fuels, whose heat-trapping emissions are widely blamed for pushing up world temperatures, was the fastest-growing cause of strain.

Leape said China, home to a fifth of the world's population and whose economy is booming, was making the right move in pledging to reduce its energy consumption by 20 percent over the next five years. "Much will depend on the decisions made by China, India and other rapidly developing countries," he added.

The WWF report also said that an index tracking 1,300 vetebrate species -- birds, fish, amphibians, reptiles and mammals -- showed that populations had fallen for most by about 30 percent because of factors including a loss of habitats to farms.

Metroland Article about AG Candidates and My Exclusion from Debates

2006-10-19T23:46:00.000-04:00

Chet Hardin's October 19 article about the AG race in the Albany-area weekly, Metroland, discusses my exclusion from the AG debates.

Commercial During Debate Exposes Left Out Candidates

2006-10-19T16:00:00.000-04:00

University of Connecticut Daily Campus
By Steven Durel Posted: 10/19/06

Viewers that watched last night's gubernatorial debate between Republican Governor Jodi Rell and Democratic challenger John DeStefano on television, might have been a little surprised to see the event accompanied by an unlikely television ad from Clifford Thornton, the Green Party nominee for governor. Many voters had not previously heard of Thornton, nor the Concerned Citizens Party nominee Joe Zdonczyk, probably in part because these men were both shut out from debating Rell and DeStefano in this year's live televised procedures.

The purpose of last night's advertisement was to send a message to viewers at home - money and power have corrupted the electoral process.

The Green Party's commercial opened with a graphic reading, "Only 2 podiums?? Cliff Thornton excluded from debates."

The ad then showed a crowd of Green party supporters protesting outside New London's Garde Arts Center during the first debate on Oct. 9. The camera moves around the group as two voiceovers can be heard.

"We want to have freedom of speech," the first voice said.

"I'm here to protest the fact that Cliff Thornton is being left out of the debates," another said.

The viewer then sees Thornton's campaign manager, Tim McKee, who said, "We want to talk about issues that these candidates are not going to talk about."

Thornton himself finally appeared on the screen.

"In many respects, being Green is like being black because you're being excluded left and right on many issues," Thornton said. "I'm Cliff Thornton and I approve this message."

At the end of the commercial there is another graphic reading, "CT 4 CT Let all voices be heard. Let Cliff in the debates," while the crowd can be heard chanting, "This is not democracy!"

According to Thornton's field manager, Ken Krayeske, the commercial cost $400 to produce and $3,300 to air.

Krayeske noted that, running by that same average of $110 per second, the major party candidates each got almost $396,000 of free airtime during the two debates. He questioned why the small parties with no money are forced to pay for short spots on television while the rich ones are given sustained periods at no cost.

"They have their boots firmly entrenched on our windpipes," Krayeske said.

Neither Rell nor DeStefano seemed to walk away from the first debate as a clear winner.

According to polls done by UConn's Center for Survey Research and Analysis for the Hartford Courant, before the debate 56 percent of voters said that they would vote for Rell and 28 percent for DeStefano.

Afterwards, however, Rell's support fell to 50 percent while DeStefano's showing stayed the same. At the same time, the portion of those polled who chose "no choice" rose from 15 percent to 21 percent.

Both major party nominees blame each other for the exclusion of minor party candidates. While the DeStefano campaign demanded that third parties be absent from two of the debates, suggesting that they would only be a distraction, Gov. Rell had simultaneously refused to meet more than twice for what Rell spokesman Richard Harris called "an extended series of debates."

Still, Thornton himself blames both parties equally for his banishment.

"They're both complicit in this," Thornton said, adding, "Why are they so afraid of us?"

Ultimately, the third-party candidate hypothesizes that it is probably because of his overall progressive message that he is being shut out. He suggests that Canadian-style healthcare, free college tuition and an end to the War on Drugs are concepts that have all been deemed far too radical by local ruling elites.

Despite the risk that the Connecticut Green Party is taking by devoting all of its funds and effort into making an impact in this one election, Thornton nevertheless remains confident that they are doing the right thing.

"The most important thing is getting the ideas out to the people," Thornton said.
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© Copyright 2006 The Daily Campus

Let more candidates join the debates

2006-10-17T23:39:00.000-04:00

October 17, 2006

To the Editors of the New York Times:

In your Oct. 16 editorial "Great Candidates? That’s Debatable," you say that you would like to see more debates. We also need more candidates in the debates. I was approved by the League of Women Voters for inclusion in three attorney general debates planned by the League, but two of those debates took place without me. WABC refused to include me in its attorney general debate this past Sunday, Oct. 15, and WXXI in Rochester refused to include me in its attorney general debate today, Tuesday, Oct. 17. Because of these refusals, the League withdrew its sponsorship of the two debates in a press release issued last Friday, October 13. WCNY in Syracuse has canceled a debate it previously agreed to host tomorrow, Oct. 18, between Jeanine Pirro and myself.

Excluding third party candidates from candidate debates is counter to the wishes of many voters. History shows that debate participation by third-party candidates raises debate viewership and voter turnout. The 1992 presidential debates, which included third party candidate Ross Perot, were watched by record-breaking TV audiences, averaging 90 million viewers, with a larger audience for each successive debate. Presidential voter turnout went up in 1992, reversing a 20-year downward trend. In 1996, with Perot excluded, the presidential debates averaged only 41 million viewers -- and voter turnout nosedived. In 1998, participation by third-party candidate Jesse Ventura in the gubernatorial debates in Minnesota generated massive voter turnout.

Many voters are frustrated by the closed nature of our current electoral system. A poll last spring by Princeton Survey Research Associates found that 73% of Americans agree it would be a good idea for this country to have more choices than just Republican and Democratic candidates in the 2008 presidential elections. Polls also show that many Americans do not identify as Republicans or Democrats. In a survey conducted of 15,000 voters during April 2006, Rasmussen Reports found that just 32.7% of Americans identified themselves as Republicans, 36.3% identified as Democrats and 30.9% identified themselves as unaffiliated with either major party. Policies that exclude all candidates from candidate debates except Republicans and Democrats are not reflective of voter opinions and desires.

A voter survey by Rasmussen Reports reported in August 2006, found that voters in New York are more likely than voters in any other state to express a concern about voter suppression. Thirty-four percent (34%) of the New York voters surveyed hold this view. This result is not surprising to those of us working to build viable third parties in New York and encountering the many barriers raised against us.

Let more candidates join the debates, the voters want to hear us.

Rachel Treichler
Green Party candidate for Attorney General
http://www.voterachel.org

LWV Withdraws Sponsorship from Candidate Debates

2006-10-16T14:36:00.000-04:00

http://lwvny.org/press_news/ Withdrawl_Sponsorship_Debates101306.pdf
October 13, 2006

"The voters of New York State deserve better," stated Marcia Merrins, President of the League of Women Voters of New York State (League), in announcing the League's withdrawal of sponsorship from a debate between candidates for the office of Attorney General to be hosted and broadcast by WXXI in Rochester on October 17, 2006. Similarly, the League withdrew sponsorship from two debates to be hosted by WABC in New York City. The first is an Attorney General debate scheduled for October 15. The second is a debate between candidates for the United States Senate scheduled for October 22. All withdrawals were necessitated by League policy, which requires an invitation be extended to each candidate whom the League has determined to be a bona fide contestant. In the case of the US Senate race, the League Board of Directors determined incumbent Senator Hillary Clinton, Republican nominee John Spencer, and Green Party nominee Howie Hawkins to be bona fide contestants. Similarly, the League determined Democratic nominee Andrew Cuomo, Republican nominee Jeanine Pirro, and Green Party nominee Rachael Treichler to be bona fide contestants in the Attorney General's race.

Merrins explained that the League adopted its policy for candidate inclusion in League-sponsored debates prior to commencement of the electoral season to keep debates free from the vagaries of the political process. Merrins noted that the League is committed to maximization of public debate by all candidates for public office. Once a candidate has complied with the League's criteria for inclusion in a debate, the League cannot sponsor a debate from which that candidate is excluded. To act otherwise would violate the League's fundamental belief in the public's right to know.

Green Candidates Cleared for LWV Debates

2006-10-16T14:09:00.000-04:00

I was called by the League of Women Voters last week and told that Howie and I had been cleared by the League to participate in the candidate debates they are sponsoring, and that Jeanine Pirro had agreed to debate me in a debate sponsored by WCNY to be taped in Syracuse this Wed., Oct. 18. I was also told that the League was withdrawing its sponsorship of two AG debates because their media partners refused to include me: WABC on Oct. 15 in New York City, and WXXI on Oct. 17 in Rochester. I was asked to wait to release this information until I received a copy of the League's press release. I received the League's press release, issued last Friday, today. I have filed a complaint with the Monroe County Fair Elections Practices Committee to protest WXXI's actions in excluding me from the Rochester debate scheduled for tomorrow.

This morning I called Kris Hansen, the executive director of the state league and she told me that she had just received word that WCNY had withdrawn its sponsorship of the debate on Oct. 18, and that there would be no debate sponsored by WCNY.

Green Party Candidates Do Well in New Zogby Poll

2006-10-11T14:30:00.000-04:00

The Green Party's candidates for governor, attorney general and US senate did very well in the new poll released yesterday by Zogby, http://www.zogby.com/news/ReadNews.dbm?ID=1180 . The poll of likely New York voters, conducted Oct. 5-9, included 761 respondents and is part of a joint project between Zogby International and the League of Women Voters of New York State.The poll shows the Green Party gubernatorial candidate Malachy McCourt at 5% among all voters and at 14% among independent voters. The numbers for attorney general candidate Rachel Treichler and US senate candidate Howie Hawkins among all voters were not released. Among independent voters Treichler received 17% and Hawkins received 21%.

Be A Pollwatcher for Democracy

2006-10-04T12:24:00.000-04:00

My campaign is working with Pollworkers for Democracy to provide pollwatching opportunities in New York State to voters who are registered Green, independent or in another third party. In NYS, only registered Democrats or Republicans approved by their local party chairs can be hired as poll workers.

I encourage all registered voters to sign up with Pollworkers for Democracy as either pollworkers or pollwatchers. After you have signed up on the website, you will be contacted with pollwatching opportunities in your county, including opportunities to be a pollwatcher for my campaign.

Having a flood of informed citizens take part in running and watching elections locally will help us recover a more transparent and accountable democracy.

Pollworkers for Democracy will provide guidelines for observing the polling process, questionnaires to assist watchers in collecting key information, and a web page watchers can use to enter the data that they collect. The data gathered by watchers will be pooled so that voters can learn more about how elections are administered in various parts of New York State and in the other states of the US.

We New Yorkers are lucky that electronic voting machines are not yet widely installed in the state. But each county will have electronic voting machines in at least one polling site for disabled and other voters to use. It is particularly important to watch how these machines function. The data we collect will help counties decide what type of voting machines to purchase, and may encourage them to follow my recommendation and adopt handcounted paper ballots.

As a candidate for statewide office, I am entitled to appoint up to three pollwatchers in each polling place. Because of my concern about how the votes for the Green Party's candidates will be counted this election, I am eager to appoint enough pollwatchers to monitor as many polling places for as much of election day as possible.

It is important that the Green Party's votes are counted accurately on November 7. If Malachy McCourt, our GPNY gubernatorial candidate receives 50,000 or more votes, the Green Party will gain ballot status for the next four years. In 1998, the last time the Green Party gained ballot status, the preliminary vote count for the Green Party was only about 48,000 votes, but after Greens recounted voting machines in New York City and elsewhere around the state, that total rose to about 52,000 votes—more than enough to qualify the Green Party for ballot status.

AG Debate in Hempstead on Oct. 16

2006-10-04T12:19:00.000-04:00

At least two attorney general candidates, Libertarian candidate Chris Garvey and I, have accepted an invitation from the Five Towns Forum to participate in an attorney general debate at Bestsellers Bookstore in Hempstead, Long Island at 7:00 pm. The bookstore is located at 43A Main Street in Hempstead. It is 35 min. on the LIRR from Penn Station to Hempstead. For more information, call Booksellers Bookstore at 516-564-1180.

True Environmental Justice Requires Nontoxic Methods of Production

2006-09-26T10:29:00.000-04:00

I spoke to the press yesterday at the Environmental Justice for All Tour at Union High School in Endicott, New York. In Endicott, we learned about the work of local activists to get toxic spills of TCE and other chemicals at the IBM facility in Endicott cleaned up. 440 buildings in the village of Endicott have vapor intrusion remediation technologies installed to reduce exposure to volatile chemicals in the soil underneath the village.

I talked about the need for better and more just enforcement of our environmental laws to ensure better and faster clean ups of groundwater and soil contamination from chemical spills across the state, but said that won't be enough to stop the damaging health effects of using toxic chemicals to produce everyday products. What we have to do, is use nontoxic methods of industrial production so that no one is exposed to the damaging effects of toxic chemicals.

The environmental justice movement highlights a fundamental contradiction in our society. The products we use everyday--cars, home appliances, computers, almost every item we use, even clothes--are produced by processes that release toxic chemicals into our soil, our air and our water. When these products are disposed of, their waste is toxic, and the toxic chemicals in the waste leach into our soil, our air and our water. We want a clean environment, but we can't have a clean environment as long as these products continue to be produced and we continue to use them.

We absolutely need stop locating industrial production facilities and waste disposal facilities almost exclusively in minority and low-income neighborhoods, but a more just distribution of the toxic chemicals isn't the solution. How is it fair, how is it justice for anyone to be exposed to these toxic chemicals?

We have learned enough about the damaging health effects of these chemicals that we have to stop using them. We have to develop new means of production that are completely nontoxic. People are working on this and companies are showing that it can be done. The Interface Carpet Company, this country's largest carpet manufacturer, produces no toxic emissions and its products degrade in a completely nontoxic manner. People call this ecological design. It can be done and we need to do it now.

For more information about ecological design and the next industrial revolution, visit http://www.mbdc.com/c2c_home.htm. For more information about the Environmental Justice for All tour, visit http://www.ej4all.org/.

NY Green Party Candidates included in Zogby Poll

2006-09-21T15:09:00.000-04:00

Malachy McCourt, Howie Hawkins and Rachel Treichler are included in the online Zogby poll on the upcoming statewide elections in New York. You can sign up here to participate in Zogby's online polls.

We Need Real Debates with Dissenting Voices Included

2006-09-21T12:17:00.000-04:00

I have just invited the other New York Attorney General candidates: Andrew Cuomo, the Democratic Party candidate, Christopher Garvey, the Libertarian Party candidate, Martin Koppel, the Socialist Workers Party candidate and Jeanine Pirro, the Republican Party candidate, to join me in a series of debates this fall.

Including all the candidates on the ballot in the attorney general debates will increase voter interest in the election, and will raise voter turnout in November. It is well documented that wider debates generate wider enthusiasm among voters. In 1992, when Ross Perot was included in the presidential debates, they were viewed by 90 million people, with the audience growing in each successive debate. In 1996, with Mr. Perot excluded, viewership collapsed, averaging only 41 million people. Voter turnout that November nosedived, too. In 1998 in Minnesota, participation by Reform Party candidate Jesse Ventura in the gubernatorial debates stirred interest in the campaign and generated massive voter turnout.

It is particularly important that voters learn about all the candidates in New York's attorney general race this fall. This election is the last election New York will conduct on its lever voting machines. The next Attorney General needs to take legal action to block the use of unconstitutional voting equipment and make sure that the right of each New York voter to vote and to have his or her vote counted is protected. A poll reported in late August 2006 by Rasmussen Reports found that voters in New York are more likely than voters in any other state to express a concern about voter suppression. Thirty-four percent (34%) of the New York voters surveyed hold this view. We need an attorney general who will make protecting our right to free and fair elections his or her top priority. Neither Cuomo or Pirro has addressed this issue. New Yorkers need to hear the candidates' views on this issue.

We need dissenting voices to create real debate. When third party candidates are excluded from debates, the major party candidates are shielded from addressing issues the public wants debated. Many of the issues New Yorkers care most about -- the war in Iraq, the expanding prison/industrial complex, the poisoning of our environment, and corporate domination of our elections -- have been ignored by both Cuomo and Pirro. To a growing number of New Yorkers, it is not coincidental that the larger campaign contributors to both candidates benefit from ignoring such issues. With third party candidates excluded, the debates become glorified bipartisan news conferences, in which the candidates exchange memorized soundbites. Genuine debates provide a rare opportunity to hear candidates' ideas unedited and in context.

Polls show that many Americans do not identify as Republicans or Democrats. In a survey conducted of 15,000 voters during April 2006, Rasmussen Reports found that just 32.7% of Americans identified themselves as Republicans, 36.3% identified as Democrats and 30.9% identified themselves as unaffiliated with either major party. Policies that exclude all candidates from candidate debates except Republicans and Democrats are not reflective of voter opinions and desires.

I have spoken with people around the state eager to have more voices in the Attorney General debates this fall. Various civic and media groups have told me of their interest in sponsoring debates in which all the candidates are included. The League of Women Voters has not invited third party candidates to join their debates for the general election this fall. The League claims to be nonpartisan and acting in the interests of voter education, but those claims don't seem to mean anything when it comes to organizing debates.

Owego Coverage

2006-09-19T14:34:00.000-04:00

My press conference in Owego, Sept. 15, 2006, with the Tioga County Green Party was covered by Fox 40 News at 10, Green Party Candidate Campaigns in Owego.

Tioga Greens Meeting in Owego

2006-09-15T15:18:00.000-04:00

I look forward to meeting the public and members of the Tioga County Green Party this evening at the Methodist Church in Owego to discuss my campaign and the use of participatory democracy to address the energy challenges ahead. In conjunction with our discussion, we will show the film the End of Suburbia. TCGP is a newly forming Green local being organized by John Doscher.

Full, Independent Investigation of 9/11 Needed

2006-09-08T15:12:00.000-04:00

One of my first acts if elected attorney general will be to conduct a full investigation of 9/11. It is surprising that Eliot Spitzer has not already done so. A lot of evidence has been presented to him over the last five years showing that our understanding of what happened on September 11, 2001 is incorrect. Evidence has been presented showing that the twin towers were brought down by a controlled demolition, not by burning jet fuel. If this is true, it radically alters our conception of what happened that day and in the days that followed. The Attorney General of New York needs to investigate what really happened on 9/11. There is no more important task the Attorney General can perform in protecting the people of this state.

Request for Inclusion in LWV Debates

2006-09-05T11:06:00.000-04:00

My letter to the League of Women Voters asking to be included in their attorney general debates this fall is posted on my website at http://www.voterachel.org/debates.html. Let the League's Board of Directors know you would like the Green Party candidates included in the debates. Contact information for the Board members is posted on their website at http://lwvny.org/League_BOD.htm. Here is what I said in my letter about the criteria LWVNY uses on being included in polls:

"Your guidelines state that one of the criteria you look at is receipt of support in non-partisan polls. As you are no doubt aware, there are major barriers to the inclusion of the name of a particular third party candidate in polls in New York. Because the Green Party currently does not have ballot status in New York, our statewide Green Party candidates this year had to file independent nominating petitions to get on the ballot. We were not allowed to begin collecting signatures until July 11, 2006. Our last day for filing was August 22, 2006. In contrast, the period for collecting signatures on designating petitions for candidates of ballot status parties began on May 6, 2006, and ended on July 13, 2006. When LWVNY announced your 2006 candidate debates on July 25, 2006, the names of the Democratic and Republican candidates were on the ballot, but we still had almost a month of petitioning to do. Even after we filed on August 22, 2006, it was not certain that our names would be on the ballot. Objections to our petition had to be postmarked by August 25, 2006. It was not until this past Friday, September 1, 2006, that we could breathe more easily and figure that our petitions were not going to be challenged. This delayed timetable for independent candidates in New York militates against the inclusion of our names in any polls up to this date. The fact that our names have not been included in the polls being conducted and reported all summer is a major barrier to our getting publicity for our campaigns, and makes it less likely that our names will be included in future polls.

"Our success in obtaining 30,000 signatures of registered voters on our independent nominating petition reflects widespread voter interest in seeing third party candidates on the ballot. I personally collected about 600 signatures and most of the voters I talked with were pleased by the idea of having additional candidates to choose from on the ballot. Many people expressed frustration with the closed nature of our current electoral system.

" The responses we received from voters during petitioning are consistent with results obtained by polling firms when they ask questions about having third parties candidates on the ballot. A poll last spring by Princeton Survey Research Associates found that 73% of Americans agree it would be a good idea for this country to have more choices than just Republican and Democratic candidates in the 2008 presidential elections. Polls also show that many Americans do not identify as Republicans or Democrats. In a survey conducted of 15,000 voters during April 2006, Rasmussen Reports found that just 32.7% of Americans identified themselves as Republicans, 36.3% identified as Democrats and 30.9% identified themselves as unaffiliated with either major party. Policies that exclude all candidates from candidate debates except Republicans and Democrats are not reflective of voter opinions and desires.

"In a poll reported last week by Rasmussen Reports, a plurality of voters in 32 states including New York agree that the political system in the U.S. is "badly broken." The survey found that voters in New York are more likely than voters in any other state to express a concern about voter suppression. Thirty-four percent (34%) of the New York voters surveyed hold this view. This result is not surprising to those of us working to build viable third parties in New York and encountering the many barriers arrayed against us.

"If your criterion regarding support in polls is to be applied in a truly non-partisan fashion, and if you have not included this criteria in your guidelines simply to exclude all third party candidates, you will consider the results of these polls and not confine yourself to the narrow question of whether my name has been included in a particular poll when you decide whether or not to invite me to participate in your debates."

Sustainability Requires Political Action

2006-09-04T14:42:00.000-04:00

Despite the rain, the cob was stamped and the earth oven was built at the Tickletown Sustainability Festival in Great Valley, Sat., Sept 2 and Sun., Sept 3. About 40 people attended the event, including a number of Green Party members from Cattaraugus County. On Saturday, we had an excellent discussion about sustainability. There was general consensus that the assaults on our health and civil liberties require political action if we are to be able to live sustainably.

The sourdough bread was baked indoors instead of in the new oven, because the new oven was still wet. Lois Hilton will be hosting community baking days at the new oven. Email tickletown@gmail.com if you want to try the oven or join the Tickletown Sustainability Network.

Bring Home NY's National Guard

2006-09-01T11:58:00.000-04:00

My thanks to John David Baldwin for his research and help in drafting this position statement.

The Governor of New York is Commander-in-Chief of New York's Army and Air National Guard and has the power to bring New York's National Guard troops home fom Iraq. As Attorney General, I will support use of the Gubernatorial Veto Power to bring New York's National Guard troops home fom Iraq.

The Governor of New York State, not the President, is the commander-in-chief of the New York's Army and Air National Guard. The governor is also commander of the New York Guard, which serves only in the state, not overseas. With this status as commander comes the right to veto the use of State National Guard units by the federal government if the causes for which the guard is called up do not meet constitutional requirements.

Under the Supreme Court's decision in Perpich v. Department of Defense, there are four grounds upon which the governor of New York can veto the president’s continued deployment of New York's National Guard units:

!. The war was not legally declared. Congress has not issued a formal declaration of war as it is required to do by the Constitution. Furthermore, the invasion was not approved by the United Nations, which is a violation of the U.N. Charter. The Constitution says that all treaties the U.S. signs (which includes the Charter) automatically become part of the Constitution.

2. The President declared the war over. On May 1, 2003, President Bush, standing on the deck of the U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln, announced that “major combat operations in Iraq have ended.” If “major” combat operations had ended, that logically left only “minor” combat operations to be taken care of. So if the New York State National Guard troops deployed in Iraq were not to be sent home right away, surely they should have been within the next few weeks or months after Bush’s speech. More than three years have passed since that battleship declaration of peace.

3. An “endless war” violates states’ rights.The failure of the Bush administration to set a timetable for withdrawal of the National Guard units, and references administration officials have made to "endless wars" and wars that will not end "in our lifetimes," are illegal attempts to turn the National Guard units into federal forces. As the wording of Judge Stevens’ decision in Perpich makes clear, this is a violation of f the Constitution.

4. Too many of New York's National Guard units have been deployed to Iraq. In Perpich, Justice Stevens writes, “The Minnesota unit, which includes about 13,000 members, is affected only slightly when a few dozen, or at most a few hundred, soldiers are ordered into active service for brief periods of time. Neither the State's basic training responsibility, nor its ability to rely on its own Guard in state emergency situations, is significantly affected.” In contrast, the number of National Guard units sent abroad in the Iraq invasion is significant. This has caused hardship for New York which does not have the Guard units to depend on in “state emergency situations.” The present possibility of natural and manmade disasters requires the presence of our National Guard units in New York.

New York has a clear and present need for our National Guard units to return.

The governor should immediately veto their deployment to Iraq.

Affordable Housing Candidate Survey

2006-09-01T11:54:00.000-04:00

I have just completed the candidate survey of the Tick Tock Campaign. The survey asks how to better promote affordable housing for low and middle income people in New York, particularly in New York City. Read my responses here. It is my position that New York's affordable housing crisis will not be solved until New York State and New York City empower local governmental units to make housing decisions. The vast powers wielded by huge, centralized agencies will always be magnets for corruption, and such agencies will continue to serve primarily the interests of large developers and ignore the interests of local communities as long as they exist. Not until housing laws and decisions are made locally, will the interests of local communities be adequately taken into consideration. To allow local decision making within New York City, community boards need to be made elected bodies and given the powers of municipal home rule.

Voters Everywhere Agree Political System "Badly Broken"

2006-08-31T19:40:00.000-04:00

According to a recent survey conducted by the Rasmussen Reports , a plurality of voters in each of 32 states agree that the political system in the U.S. is "badly broken." Percentages range from a high of 63% in Vermont to 47% in Nebraska. An earlier Rasmussen national survey found that just 48% of American adults believe that elections are generally fair to voters. Voters in New York are more likely than in any other state to express a concern about voter suppression. Thirty-four percent (34%) of Empire State voters hold this view.

Learn How to Build an Earth Oven

2006-08-30T19:49:00.000-04:00

I am going to learn how to build an earth oven this weekend at the Tickletown Sustainable Living Festival in Great Valley. I will also be exhibiting natural building and environmental books. The festival, this Saturday and Sunday, Sept. 2 and 3, has been organized by Lois Hilton, a member of the Cattaraugus Greens. "I want this to be a community creation where everyone has input in the design. We'll have fun," Lois said in an interview in the Olean Times Herald. "Everyone is going to be encouraged to take part. We'll mix the cob with our feet on a tarp." Cob is the old English word for "lump." The dome part of the outdoor radiant-heat earth oven is constructed by forming lumps of clay dirt, sand, straw and water over a base of wet sand that is later removed.

The weekend begins at 10 a.m. Saturday with a potluck meal and discussion on sustainable local living. Participants will spend all afternoon building the oven and receive a sourdough bread-making lesson before an evening potluck, camping and acoustic jam. On Sunday morning, the oven builders will pull out the inner sand formation and fire up some wood on its brick floor. Then the coals will be pulled out and the 27-inch-wide, 22-inch-high oven will remain hot enough on the inside for another three to four hours to bake breads, roasts, pizzas, cookies and the like. The downdraft system will take cool air through the bottom part of the door, circle it up through the dome and send the hot air through the top part of the door. To protect the oven from the elements, Mark of Excellence landscaping and carpentry company is designing a living roof, growing a canopy of vine leaves attached to nearby locust trees.

Location: Tickletown Trust and Trade, 4484 Humphyrey Road, Great Valley, NY 14741 (near Olean). All ages welcome! For information, call 716-945-5460 or email tickletown@gmail.com

Organic Consumers Fund Candidate Survey

2006-08-28T19:41:00.000-04:00

I have completed the Organic Consumers Fund's candidate survey. Read my responses here. I enthusiastically endorse the health benefits of eating locally-grown, organic food and of growing food organically.

I grew up on a small organic family farm eating homegrown vegetables, fruits, meat and dairy, and I returned several years ago to live on my parents' small organically-run farm in Hammondsport. I am a member of the Northeast Organic Farming Association of New York. In 2005, I helped organize Southern Tier Farm to You, and helped the group produce a directory of locally-grown food producers in Allegany, Chemung, Schuyler and Steuben counties.

I wish the survey had addressed what we can do about the fact that large industrial agricultural corporations with interlocking ownership have acquired control of the production of food labelled 'organic'. Many of the small farmers I know can't afford to pay the annual fees for organic certification.

I favor empowering local communities to make laws regarding food production within their communities. As attorney general, I will not support an interpretation of New York's right to farm law that permits it to override the right to municipal home rule granted by the New York constitution. The right to farm law as currently interpreted by the NY Agriculture and Markets Department prevents communities from regulating large industrial agricultural operations in their midst, such as confined animal feedlots that violate animal welfare laws and release toxics into the air and water, or farms using genetically modified organisms. This interpretation is incorrect and invalidly nullifies the right to municipal home rule.

Petition Filed Today

2006-08-22T22:04:00.000-04:00

I am just returned from Albany where the state candidates filed our independent nominating petition with the state board of elections at 11:00 am today. The exact number of signatures was not counted, but it is about 30,000, double the 15,000 required. 7,195 pages of signatures were filed.

A team of Greens from around the state worked in Albany all weekend to get the petitions ready for filing. Judy Einach (the state petition coordinator from Buffalo), Ian Wilder (state co-chair from Babylon), Eric Jones (a state executive committee member from Buffalo) and Jerry Kann (a state committee member from Queens and a member of Howie Hawkins campaign staff) worked all night, finishing the two sets of copies at Kinko's at 7:00 am this morning.

Many thanks to everyone who collected and cleaned signatures! The top petitioners statewide were Jerry Kann and Howie Hawkins with about 3,000 signatures each.

Several reporters, including Associated Press, came to our press conference at the BOE, and then we went to the press room in the capitol building to visit with other reporters. All the reporters are interested to know if we will be in the debates. Now that we have submitted our petitions and presumably will be on the ballot, we are pressing to be included in the debates. General objections to our petitions have to be filed by Friday.

Compassionate Consumers Picnic, July 30

2006-07-30T18:51:00.000-04:00

Today I attended a picnic and fundraiser in Rochester for Adam Durand of Compassionate Consumers. The event was co-sponsored by Green Party of Monroe County. The fundraiser was to help with Adam's appeal of his conviction for trespassing. In 2004 Adam and two others entered New York State's largest egg farm to document animal cruelty. Since that time his organization, Compassionate Consumers, has worked to educate the public about this cruelty and convince the Wegmans corporation, the farm's owner, to improve the conditions there. I circulated my position paper on the illegality of battery cages under the New York Agriculture and Markets Law.

Process for Brooklyn Development an Insult to Democracy

2006-07-18T18:46:00.000-04:00

Speech at the Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn rally at Grand Army Plaza in Brooklyn, July 16, 2006

The number of people here on this hot Sunday afternoon, demonstrates the frustration people feel at the lack of opportunity for democratic participation in the project planning process for the development at the Atlantic Yards by the Forest City Ratner Corporation.

It is more than a LACK of democracy. The subversion of state and city law by the two authorities overseeing this development is an INSULT to democracy.

The city's land use laws, the state's eminent domain laws, the state's budgeting process, the city's budgeting process, and the state's new reform laws for public benefit corporations are all are being subverted to serve the interests of the largest publicly traded real estate development corporation in the United States. Forest City Enterprises, Inc., an $8 billion company and the parent corporation of the Forest City Ratner Corporation.

But the biggest insult to democracy is that all this is proceeding with the most minimal participation by the city's elected representatives.

The very first sentence of the New York Constitution says 'no member of this state shall be disenfranchised.' The people of Brooklyn have been disenfranchised by the process we witness here.

Furthermore, Article 9 of the New York constitution relating to municipal home rule states that, 'effective local self-government [is a purpose] of the people of the state.' There is no way that the process by which this development is proceeding constitutes effective local self-government.

Two unelected bodies, the Empire State Development Authority and the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, whose members have been appointed by the governor of New York are rubber-stamping whatever the Forest City Ratner Corporation asks for. No one is representing the interests of the public.

As attorney general, I will enforce the laws that are being subverted here.

Exxon's Oil Spill in Brooklyn

2006-06-26T17:18:00.000-04:00

Press conference in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, June 24, 2006. Video of Press Conference Hi Res, Dial-Up, Third Planet Video, June 24, 2006, 10 min.

I have called this press conference to commend the DEC's announcement, reported on Thursday, that it has requested the attorney general to take legal action against Exxon for its failure to clean up millions of gallons of petroleum pollution in the Brooklyn aquifer and surrounding soils. I have been working as a Sierra Club activist since 1996 trying to get the spill cleaned up. I look forward to prosecuting the case when I am elected.

This oil spill is a huge and long-standing crime. It is the largest urban oil spill in the United States, two to four times as large as the Exxon Valdez spill in Alaska. It was obvious to the company in 1954 when a large gas explosion occurred in the Socony-Vacuum petroleum storage facilities that millions of gallons of its petroleum products had sunk onto the Brooklyn acquifer, but the company did not clean up or disclose the spill. Even after the spill was discovered leaking into Newtown Creek in 1978 by the US Coast Guard, the company denied liability for years.

It is important to make Exxon live up to its obligations under New York and federal law to clean up the spill and pay for damages. We need to show that large corporate criminals are not above the law.

Had the spill been cleaned up as soon as it occurred, much of the damage caused by the petroleum over the last 52 years would have been avoided. Two generations of people in Brooklyn would not have lived with the damaging effects of petroleum vapors seeping through their soil, into their houses and into their bodies.

The aquifer might have been restored and available to the city as a source of water. Until 1947 the Brooklyn municipal water system depended on ground water. Pumping had stopped at the time of the spill because the depression in the water table caused by extensive pumping was causing sea water to flow into the aquifer, but as the aquifer replenished itself, pumping could have resumed if the petroleum contamination from the spill had been cleaned up.

As long as the oil remains on the aquifer next to Newtown Creek, there is the possibility of tremendous damage from large flows of oil into the creek and New York harbor. At any time natural or human forces may cause the oil to breach the barriers that have so far confined it underground.

I took my first tour of this area ten years ago with Concerned Citizens of Greenpoint and the Greenpoint Watchperson's office. Our Sierra Club Eco Restoration Committee studied the spill extensively. One of the things we looked at was the Geraghty and Miller report on the spill prepared for the US Coast Guard in 1979.

I would like to show you one of the pages of that report. This map shows the contours on the water table in Brooklyn in 1936 and it shows something very interesting. See this cone of depression in the water table of 35 feet below sea level in the Fort Greene area?

Contours on water table in Brooklyn in 1936. Figure 4 of the Geraghty and Miller Report, Investigation of Underground Accumulation of Hydrocarbons along Newtown Creek, Brooklyn, New York, prepared for the U.S. Coast Guard, July 1979. Altitudes are in feet below mean sea level.

Compare this now to this graphic from the DEC's January 2005 community presentation on the spill showing how the hydrocarbon product floating on top of the water table flows into a cone of depression created by ground water pumping.

The Cone of Depression. Illustration by the DEC showing how the petroleum recovery system is using the cone of depression created by pumping the groundwater to recover the petroleum product. From http://www.dec.state.ny.us/ website/der/projects/reg2/greenpoint/s224087e.pdf

You can see there is a strong possibility that the petroleum products from the Socony-Vacuum spill traveled south into the cone of depression caused by the pumping, and that as ground water levels rose in the years following the spill because the groundwater pumping was never restarted, petroleum contamination may have spread broadly over large areas of the Brooklyn aquifer. There is good reason to think that the damage is more extensive than is generally assumed.

For more information about the spill, visit: http://www.greenpointvexxon.com/
and http://www.dec.state.ny.us/website/der/ projects/reg2/greenpoint/. See State Plans to Sue Exxon Over Underground Oil Spill in Brooklyn, NY Times, June 22, 2006.

That Was Quick!!

2006-06-22T09:53:00.000-04:00

Just one day after Rachel issued a media advisory on June 21, 2006, stating that she would hold a press conference in Greenpoint, Brooklyn on June 24, 2006, to announce her plan, if elected, to sue ExxonMobil for natural resource damage to the aquifer under Brooklyn from a hydrocarbon spill occurring in 1950 and continuing to the present day, the New York Times reports on June 22, 2006, that State Plans to Sue Exxon Over Underground Oil Spill in Brooklyn. According to the article, "The Department of Environmental Conservation said yesterday that it has joined the fray, and asked New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer to initiate legal action against Exxon 'to ensure that the company fulfills its obligation to clean up petroleum contamination' in Greenpoint."

CNN Survey 84% Against Electronic Voting

2006-06-16T11:07:00.000-04:00

http://www.cnn.com/CNN/Programs/lou.dobbs.tonight/

I just voted and the votes are now:

Do you believe the United States should abandon electronic voting?
Yes, 84%, 9876 votes
No,16%,1913 votes
Total: 11789 votes

Original Message:
Subject: Vote Now CNN Survey on EVoting
Date: Thu, 15 Jun 2006 23:32:34 -0400
From: "Bo Lipari"
Organization: New Yorkers for Verified Voting

Go vote online now. Top item on the left.
http://www.cnn.com/CNN/Programs/lou.dobbs.tonight/

Do you believe the United States should abandon electronic voting?
Yes, 84%, 952 votes
No, 16%,183 votes
Total: 1135 votes

Comments on proposed Cohocton Local Wind Law

2006-06-15T10:52:00.000-04:00

To the Cohocton Town Board and Cohocton Town Planning Board, Cohocton, New York
Comments filed June 14, 2006

As a resident of Steuben County and a candidate for Attorney General, I have studied the proposals for industrial wind farms being made to towns in our county. Like almost everyone, I am strongly in favor of clean energy. We need to reduce our energy consumption and generate the energy we do use from non-toxic sources, such as wind. But we cannot be blinded by our desire for clean energy into failing to properly evaluate the wind farm schemes being proposed for our county.

First of all we need to know how much effective electric capacity the proposed wind farms will actually produce. The haste with which large industrial wind farms are being pushed for construction in all the top wind resource areas of our county precludes adequate consideration of this issue. We need to slow down and begin with construction of just a few turbines so residents and officials can find out how much electric energy can actually be generated in this area and get actual experience in the amount of noise, flicker, ice throw, harm to wildlife and harm to property values that will be generated by turbines of the huge size being proposed.

The large federal and state subsidies and tax benefits being granted to wind energy production do not guarantee that it is economic to produce electricity from wind in this area, and if it is not, the projects will fail. Nor will these subsidies and tax benefits prevent property values in our area from declining due to the presence of industrial wind farms.

For these reasons, I recommend that the town of Cohocton take time to adequately study the effects of having industrial wind farms in Cohocton, and that the proposed Cohocton wind law be amended to:

1. Limit the number of industrial size turbines that can be constructed in 2006 and 2007 to one
2. Require the public recording of wind energy leases in order to be enforceable
3. Establish adequate setbacks to take into account the rights of adjacent landowners to the wind energy flowing across their properties.
4. Require the owners of large wind turbines to make quarterly public disclosures of the electric energy produced by each turbine
5. Require the owners of large wind turbines to post bonds for road repair
6. Set up procedures by which property value decline can be measured and require the owners of large wind turbines to post bonds for harm to property values.

Adding these requirements will give the residents of Cohocton the time and information necessary to more adequately evaluate the proposed project.

The proposed Cohocton local law is posted on the Cohocton Wind Watch website at http://batr.net/cohoctonwindwatch/WindmillLaw5-8-06.pdf

Local Groups Oppose Corporate Water Mining

2006-06-11T11:27:00.000-04:00

Articles about this event appeared in the Ithaca Times, the Corning Leader, the Elmira Star-Gazette, the Watkins Express and the Dundee Observer and on Laura Hand's show on WSTM in Syracuse. Participants decided to form a regional water protection network.

Community Water Rights Protection Workshop
Date: June 9-10, 2006
Location: Rural-Urban Center, 208 Broadway, Montour Falls

Alarmed that water resources in the Finger Lakes will be targeted by large corporate water companies for privatization of municipal water services and for mining bottled water, the Finger Lakes Progressive Coalition and the Finger Lakes Group of the Sierra Club sponsored a Water Rights Protection Workshop June 9 and 10, 2006, at the Rural-Urban Center in Montour Falls. The workshop was for members of the public to learn how to prevent corporate control of water resources and services in our Finger Lakes and Southern Tier communities.

"Here in the Finger Lakes we take for granted ample supplies of fresh water, but as fresh water becomes an increasingly valuable commodity, large corporations are setting their sights on the giant reservoirs of fresh water in our lakes and aquifers for distribution and profit," said Rachel Treichler of Hammondsport, a member of the Sierra Club, and one of the organizers of the program.

"Members of the Finger Lakes Progressives are watching water privatization efforts in surrounding states; including Pennsylvania and N. H., with alarm," Jack Ossont of Yates county, coordinator of the Progressive Coalition, remarked. "Folks in the Finger Lakes have always regarded water as a resource for the use of all and we organized this workshop to help us keep it that way."

The workshop was led by two nationally known experts on community water issues: Victoria Kaplan, national organizer of the Water for All Campaign with Food and Water Watch in Washington, DC, and Ruth Caplan, national coordinator of the Alliance for Democracy's Defending Water for Life campaign and chair of Sierra Club's national Water Privatization Task Force.

Their presentations showed what communities can do when municipal water and sewer services are targeted for corporate takeover and when local water resources are targeted by bottling companies. The workshop featured discussion of who has the rights to make decisions about water usage in a community.

"From Mt. Shasta, California to Bigelow Mountain in Maine, Nestle and other giant corporations are pursuing big profits pumping pristine water from America's gems of nature to put in little plastic bottles", warns Ruth Caplan. "Now is the time to act, if you don't want this to happen to the Finger Lakes."

"Communities around the country and around the world have experienced major problems when a corporation gets control of their water--from rate increases to declining customer service," said Victoria Kaplan. "Luckily, residents of the Finger Lakes region have a great opportunity right now to protect their water for future generations."

Friday evening's program featured a showing of the prize-winning 62-minute documentary Thirst and a discussion of the issues it raises: Is water part of a shared commons, a human right for all people? Or is it a commodity to be bought, sold, and traded in a global marketplace?

In Saturday's program, Victoria Kaplan addressed municipal privatization issues and Ruth Caplan talked about how water bottling companies are taking local water supplies and what communities are doing about it.

The workshop schedule is at: http://www.ecobooks.com/fingerlakeswaterworkshop.html.

Learn more about Food and Water Watch at http://www.foodandwaterwatch.org/water/waterprivatization
Learn more about the Alliance for Democracy Defending Water for Life Campaign at http://www.thealliancefordemocracy.org/water
Learn more about the Sierra Club Water Privatization Task Force at http://www.sierraclub.org/cac/water/
Learn more about the Finger Lakes Group of the Sierra Club at http://newyork.sierraclub.org/fingerlakes/
Learn more about New York Democracy Schools at http://www.ecobooks.com/FLdemocracyschool.htm

Cohocton Wind Hearing

2006-05-26T22:55:00.000-04:00

Last evening I attended the hearing on the draft environmental impact statement for the Cohocton Wind project at the Cohocton Elementary School. Many speakers called for the town to have a referendum on the project.

The Cohocton DEIS, like the Prattsburgh EIS, (both projects are under the control of the same company and several speakers asked why segmentation of the EIS was allowed) fails to address the economic benefits of the project except in the most cursory way.

The New York State Environmental Quality Review Act requires weighing the economic benefit of a project against its environmental impact. The Cohocton DEIS describes the economic benefit as follows:

" The purpose of the proposed action is to create a wind-powered electrical-generating facility that will provide a significant source of renewable energy to the New York State power grid. . . . These objectives include stimulating economic growth, increasing energy diversity, and promoting a cleaner and healthier environment. The benefits of the proposed action include positive impacts on socioeconomics (e.g., increased payment-in-lieu of tax [PILOT] revenues to local municipalities and lease revenues to participating landowners), air quality (through reduction of emissions from fossil-fuel-burning power plants), and climate (reduction of greenhouse gases that contribute to global warming)."

That is it. Three conclusory sentences out of hundreds of pages in the DEIS and appendices.

Iraq War Against Voter Wishes

2006-05-22T08:00:00.000-04:00

We are at war in Iraq against the wishes of most voters. This is possible because illegal barriers to voting and ballot access have allowed money to trump democracy in our electoral system.

As Attorney General, I will protect our rights to vote and our rights to free and fair elections. We can't continue to let the short-term economic interests of a few override the long-term life, liberty and happiness of all.

The democratic principles upon which this country was founded require that each person have an equal voice in decision making.

Nominated by Green Party of New York

2006-05-22T07:57:00.000-04:00

I have been selected as the nominee for Attorney General by the Green Party of New York at its convention in Albany on May 20, 2006.

I am honored to be a member of the Green Party's Peace Slate consisting of author Malachy McCourt for governor, Green Party co-founder Howie Hawkins for US Senate, labor activist Alison Duncan for Lt. Governor, and former NYC mayoral candidate Julia Willebrand for Comptroller.

Western New York Green Party Convention

2006-05-03T17:12:00.000-04:00

This Saturday afternoon I will be in Rochester with other state Green Party candidates attending the Western New York Green Party Convention. We are expecting a good turnout of Greens from across the region. We hope you will join us!

Seven candidates are confirmed to attend the convention, and others are sending video statements. The candidates who will be attending are Lt. Governor candidate Kimberly Wilder, US Senate candidates Steve Greenfield, Howie Hawkins and Sander Hicks, and Attorney General candidates Carl Person and Rachel Treichler. Malachy McCourt, a candidate for governor, Steve Krulick, a candidate for US Senate and Alison Duncan, a candidate for Lt. Governor are sending video statements and other candidates may also.

The statewide nominees of the Green Party of New York will be chosen at the state convention May 20 in Albany. It is great that so many statewide candidates are coming to western New York to meet with Greens in our area before the convention. Many thanks to the Monroe County Green Party for hosting the convention and to our Region 6 national representative, Jason Nabewaniec, for organizing it.

Western New York Green Party Convention
Saturday May 6th, 2006
2:00 to 4:00 pm
Rochester Institute of Technology
Building 1 Room 2000, Rochester
Free and open to the public
Light refreshments will be served

All are invited to go out to dinner with the candidates after the convention.

For information about the candidates, visit the websites listed below:
Malachy McCourt, www.malachyforgovernor.com
Jeff Peress, no website
Alison Duncan, no website
Kimberly Wilder, www.votewilder.org
Steve Greenfield, www.greenfieldforsenate.org
Howie Hawkins, www.syracusegreens.org/hawkins.html
Sander Hicks, www.hicksforsenate.com
Steve Krulick, http://kryo.com/Krulick/index.htm
Carl Person, www.carlperson4NYAG.com
Rachel Treichler, www.voterachel.org
Anne Eagan, no website
Gloria Mattera, www.electgloria.org
Julia Willebrand, no website
Betty Wood, no website
Green Party of New York, www.gpnys.org

Remarks about Immigrant Voting Rights

2006-05-01T16:12:00.000-04:00

I spoke briefly about the need for immigrant voting rights in local, state and national elections at the immigrants rights rally in Ithaca today. If we are truly to protect immigrant rights, immigrants must be given the right to vote. Almost 400 people gathered in the Ithaca Commons for the rally. Excellent information about immigrant voting rights is at http://www.immigrantvoting.org, the website of the Immigrant Voting Project.

Justice Requires Immigrant Voting Rights

2006-04-30T20:41:00.000-04:00

Ron Hayduk, the author of "Democracy for All: Restoring Immigrant Voting Rights in the United States" (2006), and co-director of the Immigrant Voting Project explains the reasons for allowing immigrant voting on Alternet. Here are a few excerpts:

"Although it's not widely known, noncitizen voting is as old as the Republic itself and as American as apple pie and baseball. Noncitizens voted from 1776 until 1926 in forty states and federal territories in local, state and even federal elections. Noncitizens also held public office. In a country where "no taxation without representation" was a rallying cry for revolution, such a proposition was not far-fetched. It was common sense that government should rest on the consent of the governed. The idea that noncitizens should have the vote is older, was practiced longer, and is more consistent with democratic ideals than the idea that they should not."

"Discriminatory public policy and private practices -- in employment, housing, education, healthcare, welfare and criminal justice -- are the inevitable by-products of immigrant political exclusion, not to mention racial profiling, xenophobic hate crimes and arbitrary detention and deportation. Non-citizens suffer social and economic inequities, in part because policy-makers can ignore their interests. Denying immigrants local voting rights makes government officials less accountable and undermines the legitimacy of public policies. Immigrant voting rights would help reverse inequities and make the American political system more democratic. Most immigrants want to become U.S. citizens, but the naturalization process can take eight to ten years. That's more than the cycle for two-term mayors, governors and state and local representatives. Moreover, not all immigrants are eligible to become U.S. citizens, unlike earlier times when nearly every immigrant could naturalize.

"Advocates of noncitizen voting support opening up the naturalization process and creating new pathways to citizenship. Noncitizen voting would facilitate civic education and participation and better prepare incipient Americans for eventual citizenship. This burgeoning movement to create a truly universal suffrage calls forth America's past and future as an immigrant nation.

"The right to vote ensures that American democracy is inclusive and fair. Extending the right to vote to noncitizens would help keep government representative, responsive and accountable to all. It would not only restore a tried and true American practice but would also update our democracy for these global times. The immigrant rights movement is today's civil rights movement and noncitizen voting is the suffrage movement of our time."

Immigrant Rights Rally in Ithaca, May 1

2006-04-30T10:45:00.000-04:00

I will be attending the Immigrant Rights Rally in Ithaca tomorrow and hope to speak. From the press release:

On May 1st, 2006, a broad coalition of 42 immigrant, community, labor, and student groups will join together, in coordination with millions around the nation, for a rally on The Commons (Bernie Milton Pavilion) in Ithaca to declare that “no human is illegal”. Students from Cornell University and Ithaca College will be marching from their respective campuses to join with the rally at approximately 12:15.

Some current immigration proposals in Congress threaten to criminalize millions of immigrants. We recognize that all immigrants are an integral part of the U.S. society and economy, and continue to be an important force. Latino Civic Association President, Carlos Gutierrez says, "The Tompkins County immigrant population, both documented and undocumented, fill key roles in our local economy, enrich the local cultural landscape, and they are productive members of our community who pay taxes, raise families, and contribute to our schools, churches, neighborhoods, and communities."

The United States has always been, and will always be, a nation of immigrants who have traveled from around the world to seek a better life. “As the debate around immigrants goes forward in our Federal government, we believe that any reform of the system must involve a path to citizenship for hardworking immigrants, as well as reunification of families and a safe and orderly process for enabling willing immigrant workers to fill essential jobs in our economy and ensure full labor rights”, says Larry Shinagawa of the Ithaca Asian American Association.

Remarks on Eminent Domain Abuse

2006-04-28T09:35:00.000-04:00

My remarks at the eminent domain rally in Albany today:

I welcome this opportunity to speak to you on an issue of common concern to Libertarians and Greens--the use of eminent domain for the benefit of private developers.

This is a fitting location for our topic. Not only are we here on the steps of New York's capitol, behind us is Empire State Plaza, which is often described as one of the most ambitious urban renewal projects in America. In the late sixties and early seventies, thousands of low income homes and small businesses were destroyed, 98 acres of historic downtown Albany destroyed to make room for these empty stretches of concrete.

After many years of authorizing eminent domain for so-called urban renewal projects undertaken by governmental agencies, on June 23rd of last year the United States Supreme Court issued its decision in Kelo vs. the City of New London, Connecticut allowing a city to use eminent domain for the benefit of private developers based upon the promise of increased tax revenue to the city.

Exactly two months after the Kelo decision was issued, on August 23, 2005, a huge hurricane formed in the Atlantic. The hurricane came ashore in southeastern Louisiana on August 29 and created devastation all along the coast. The city of New Orleans is now facing urban renewal on a far vaster scale than Empire State Plaza.

Who is going to make the decisions about how New Orleans is rebuilt——the hundreds of thousands of small homeowners, who were evacuated from the city, many of whom do not have enough money to return, most of whom were black——or private developers?

What we are facing here is legalized theft. It is theft from the poor for the rich. Working class and low income homeowners are the primary targets of almost all development schemes. Justice Thomas noted in his dissent to the Kelo decision that the decision encourages victimization of the weak. Justice Thomas further noted that urban renewal projects have long been associated with the displacement of blacks; and that in cities across the country, urban renewal was known as ‘Negro removal'.

Greens in New York have been fighting predatory development plans in which residents and small businesses in minority neighborhoods face mass removal under these new strengthened powers of eminent domain. In Brooklyn, the Park Slope Greens are working with other local activists in the Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn Coalition to head off an attempt by billionaire developer Bruce Ratner to seize homes and businesses in Fort Greene and Prospect Heights.

We need legislation that would require local referendums before eminent domain can be used. We need democratic decision making by the communities that will be affected by the development. Senate Bill 5938 currently pending in the New York Senate would require eminent domain decisions to be subject to approval by a vote of an elected legislative body, but we need to go further than that. We need to allow the residents of the community to make the decision. We need to require a referendum of the voters in the legislative district.

The Kelo decision shows that liberals are as likely as conservatives to side with wealthy and corporate interests. Republican and Democratic officials — including many liberal and progressive Democrats — accept huge gifts from real estate interests that want to clear out neighborhoods for new development. Greens refuse all corporate contributions.

We in the Green Party look forward to working with Libertarian Party members and candidates to protect the rights of ordinary people. We need to form a new spectrum of parties dedicated to protecting the rights of ordinary people and the health of the environment against the parties dedicated to protecting corporate power.

I would like to leave the last word to Jane Jacobs, who died earlier this week. Jacobs worked in New York City to stop the urban renewal projects that threatened Greenwich Village. She strenuously objected to bulldozing low-rise housing in poor neighborhoods and building tall apartment buildings surrounded by open space to replace them.

"There is a quality even meaner than outright ugliness or disorder," Jacobs wrote in The Death and Life of Great American Cities, "and this meaner quality is the dishonest mask of pretended order, achieved by ignoring or suppressing the real order that is struggling to exist and to be served."

Two Rallies in Albany

2006-04-27T14:28:00.000-04:00

I will speak at two rallies tomorrow in Albany: an Eminent Domain Abuse Rally starting at 12 noon on the steps of the New York State Capitol and a Peace Rally starting at 4 PM at Townsend Park.

Coverage in Elmira Star-Gazette

2006-04-20T09:41:00.000-04:00

Thanks to the Elmira Star-Gazette for quoting the heart of my statement about voting rights and why I am running.

Hammondsport woman announces bid for attorney general
Star-Gazette
April 20, 2006

ROCHESTER — Rachel Treichler, 54, a Hammondsport lawyer, formally announced her candidacy for the Green Party nomination for attorney general Wednesday in Susan B. Anthony Park in Rochester.

“I am running for attorney general to address the ways our laws allow the short-term economic interests of a few to override the long-term life, liberty and happiness of all,” Treichler said.

Treichler, who practiced law with two large New York City law firms for eight years, and then ran an environmental book store in Brooklyn, now has a part-time law practice in Hammondsport. She sells environmental books online at www.ecobooks.com.

She ran as the Green Party candidate for Congress in the 29th Congressional District in 2002.

Treichler could face Elmira native and former Westchester County district attorney Jeanine Pirro, who is running as a Republican, and face one of six Democrats — who are seeking their party's nomination.

“I am announcing my candidacy at this historic location,” Treichler said in a prepared statement, “to draw attention to the voting rights issues still faced by the people of this state.”

She said some Americans face major impediments in exercising their right to vote.

“What does it mean when many people can't vote, when we don't have candidates representing our views on the ballot, when candidates with money are allowed to dominate the forums of debate, when election districts are gerrymandered to favor incumbents, and when we have a winner take all voting system?” Treichler said.

“It means that important issues are never debated — that crucial decisions are made without input from and contrary to the interests of the majority of the people in this country,” she said. “We need elected officials who are not beholden to the two major parties and the interests they represent. We need to make sure that our rights to vote and our rights to free and fair elections are protected.”

For more information about her campaign, visit her Web site, www.voterachel.org.

Candidate for NY Attorney General Addresses Voting Rights

2006-04-19T07:06:00.000-04:00

Rachel Treichler, 54, an attorney from Hammondsport, formally announced her candidacy for the Green Party nomination for Attorney General of New York this morning in front of the Susan B. Anthony House on Madison St. in Rochester. The statewide nominees of the Green Party will be chosen at a nominating convention in Albany on May 20, 2006.

"This is the house where Susan B. Anthony was arrested for voting in 1872, where she served as founder and president of the National Women's Suffrage Association, and where she died 100 years ago last month without having seen women obtain the right to vote. That right was not granted to women in New York until 1917, and was not granted throughout the United States until the passage of the nineteenth amendment in 1920.

"I am announcing my candidacy at this historic location," Treichler said, "to draw attention to the voting rights issues still faced by the people of this state. Although our country made great strides during the past century enfranchising classes of citizens who formerly were denied the right to vote, such as women, blacks, native Americans, poor people and young people, numerous barriers to voting limit our franchise.

"There are six major barriers we face today in exercising our rights to vote.

"First are barriers to actually voting through voter ID requirements, not allowing same day voter registration, having election day be a work day, citizenship requirements, and prohibitions on felons voting. All these impediments should be removed and all residents of our state should have a say in electing the lawmakers of our state.

"Second are techniques and devices used to keep our votes from being counted after they have been cast. We need to use hand counted paper ballots like they do in Canada. This is the safest method of counting votes, and the cheapest!

"Third, restrictive ballot access laws reduce the number of candidates allowed on the ballot. Voters have fewer candidates to choose among for almost all public offices today than voters did a hundred years ago. We need to remove these restrictions and give voters more choices.

"Fourth, money is allowed to dominate the forums of debate, so that the vast majority of the voices people hear speaking on issues are the voices of money. We don't have free and fair elections if voters don't get to hear the voices of candidates without money. We need public forums where all candidates have equal opportunities to speak.

"Fifth, we have the gerrymandering of election districts to favor individual candidates of the two major parties. Multi-candidate districts with proportional voting would reduce the significance of individual districts and allow more segments our society to be represented in our governmental bodies.

"Finally, we need to switch to methods of voting like instant run-off voting that allow everyone's choices to be counted.

"What does it mean when many people can't vote, when we don't have candidates representing our views on the ballot, when candidates with money are allowed to dominate the forums of debate, when election districts are gerrymandered to favor incumbents, and when we have a winner take all voting system?

"It means that important issues are never debated—that crucial decisions are made without input from and contrary to the interests of the majority of the people in this state. We need elected officials who are not beholden to the two major parties and the interests they represent. We need to make sure that our rights to vote and our rights to free and fair elections are protected."

Treichler, who practiced law with two large New York City law firms for eight years, and then ran an environmental book store in Brooklyn, now has a part-time law practice in Hammondsport and sells environmental books online at www.ecobooks.com. She ran as the Green Party candidate for Congress in the 29th Congressional District in 2002.

My Candidacy Announced Tomorrow

2006-04-18T07:55:00.000-04:00

I will be announcing my candidacy for the Green Party nomination for attorney general of New York tomorrow, Wednesday, April 19, 2006, at 10:30 am in Susan B. Anthony Park on Madison St. in Rochester. The statewide nominees of the Green Party will be chosen at a nominating convention in Albany on May 20, 2006. I will speak briefly about the voting rights issues we face today, and call for giving immigrants (resident aliens) the right to vote. For more information about my campaign, visit my website, www.voterachel.org.

Hand Counted Paper Ballots in 2008

2006-04-18T07:47:00.000-04:00

I have long-supported hand counted paper ballots and will be speaking in support of them in my press conference tomorrow, so am delighted to see the excellent article Hand Counted Paper Ballots in 2008 by Sheila Parks now on Tikkun's Magazine's website. As Parks says, "HCPB are an alternative to the current widespread and increasing use of electronic voting machines. An HCPB system of voting has the following major advantages over electronic voting machines: (1) Counting of ballots is publicly done, observed and filmed by everyday citizens who are registered voters in the precinct where the counting takes place. (2) Security safeguards are much more easily built in to protect against tampering. (3) The cost is far less. " She reports that, "There have been two recent efforts to promote an HCPB system in the United States, and a third will take place later in 2006. In 2004, voting rights activists Sharona Merel, Kaen Renick, Ellen Theisen, and Kathleen Wynne proposed federal legislation for federal offices. In 2005, four voting rights activists (this writer and three members of CASE Ohio – John Burik, Phil Fry, and Dorri Steinhoff) began work on a protocol for HCPB. Some of this writing has been modified and is included in this paper in the specifics for HCPB. In November 2006, voting rights activist Joanne Karasak plans to promote a state constitutional amendment for HCPB in Ohio. " The full article is well worth your time.

The New Politics of Voter Suppression

2006-04-12T12:36:00.000-04:00

Came across publicity for an excellent new book this morning while I was researching voter rights. The book is Stealing Democracy: The New Politics of Voter Suppression
by Spencer Overton. The book is being published by W.W. Norton and will be available in June. Prof. Overton's website describes the book as follows:

"While politicians spew shallow sound bites that describe a 'free' American people who govern themselves by selecting their representatives, in reality politicians from both parties maintain control by selecting particular voters. Incumbent politicians maintain thousands of election practices and bureaucratic hurdles that determine who votes and how votes are counted--such as the location of election district boundaries, long lines at urban polling places, and English-only ballots. Spencer Overton uses real-life stories to show how these seemingly insignificant practices channel political power and determine policies on war, schools, clean air, and other issues that shape our lives. He also exposes the pressure points in this Orwellian system and provides strategies toward restoring self-government, such as making voting easier for all Americans, removing redistricting power from self-interested partisans, and renewing parts of the Voting Rights Act that expire in 2007. Overton's insights are vital to the future of our democracy."

Democracy School April 28-30, Binghamton

2006-04-10T08:22:00.000-04:00

When Corporations Wield Constitutional Rights to Deny People's Rights... Democratic Self-Governance is Impossible

Some of you have heard me speak about Democracy School. We have a wonderful opportunity in Binghamton at the end of this month to learn from the two founders of Democracy School--Thomas Linzey and Richard Grossman. This is the only school this year at which both are presenting!

Democracy School April 28-30, Binghamton
Dates: Friday to Sunday,April 28-30, 2006
Place: The Spiritual Center, Windsor, NY
Cost: Commuting: $225, Live In: $300

Many say Democracy School is a life changing experience. If you can't make Binghampton, there are five other schools in New York this year. Click here for the schedule.

Green Party Campaign School April 22-23, New Paltz

2006-04-10T07:19:00.000-04:00

I will be attending what looks like a great weekend organized by the New Paltz Green Party for volunteers and candidates. Anyone interested in traveling together from our area, let me know.

SEEDS FOR SUCCESS CAMPAIGN SCHOOL
Village Hall, 25 Plattekill Ave, New Paltz, NY 12561
April 22-23, 2006

They will have national and state campaign and election
specialists teaching us how to plan and manage campaigns,
how to fundraise and keep proper account of the campaign
contributions and budget for successful campaigns. There
will be workshops for those potential candidates who would
like to or are interested in running for elected office.
We will be introduced to new campaign internet and database technologies which will help us be more efficient and effective.

The school will train campaign volunteers and leaders to increase their effectiveness in voter registration, get out the vote efforts and overall campaign management and help develop an infrastructure for Green candidates to win more elections.

The school will offer workshops on campaign management, treasury and finance, public speaking and speech writing, internet and campaign technologies, and canvassing.

Costs: The two day campaign training is free to attend,
however we will be asking for donations for the food which
will be available throughout the weekend. One day of
training is possible but we highly encourage planning to
attend for the two days if at all possible.

Space is limited so send your registration request as soon as possible to: Margaret Human at mlcufbtswihe at yahoo dot com or call it in to Edgar Rodriguez at (845) 255-9652.

The Two-Party Oligarchy

2006-04-04T22:10:00.000-04:00

Excellent article today on Antiwar.com by Ivan Eland, Wanted: A Freer Market in U.S. Politics. He says:

"Although globalization has opened markets around the world, the U.S. political system remains closed to true competition. Curiously, Americans are equally proud that they have one of the freest and most vibrant economies in the world and a two-party oligarchy that restricts competition among political parties. If greater competition is better in economics, why not in politics?

"Although no specific constitutional or legal requirement limits the number of major political parties, the United States has had only two dominant parties throughout most of its history because of the way the Constitution is written. The “winner take all” nature of the political system provides powerful disincentives for two stodgy, fairly broad political parties to break up into smaller, more competitive parties that would actually stand for something. Direct election of the president by the people, the presidential electoral college, and representation in Congress based on geographical areas all mean that only one person can win each election—giving political groups incentives to maximize their strength by hanging together in two disparate coalitions.

"In contrast, a parliamentary system—in which parties earn the number of seats they have in parliament based on their percentage of the vote (proportional representation) and choose a prime minister based upon a party leader’s ability to form a coalition of parties that commands a majority in the legislature—is more competitive. Governing coalitions formed after a rough and tumble election campaign that give voters a wider choice among multiple parties are much different from the electoral coalitions of the two-party system, which cause political groupings to mute their differences in an attempt to allow their coalition to win. Some decry the instability of multiple party systems, but it isn’t easy living free. “Freedom” is just a politician’s fancy word for choice, and multiple party systems offer greater choice and less behind-the-scenes collusion between the parties. In a multi-party system, the collusion among the parties occurs only after the voters have spoken—not before—and is out in the open."

A Response to Scott Ritter

2006-04-04T11:28:00.000-04:00

Much as I admire Scott Ritter's work to end the war in Iraq, I could not disagree more with his recent post, The Art of War for the anti-war movement . It sure goes to show that you can take the man out of the army, but you can't take the army out of the man.

As an active Green Party member and student of nonviolence, I question many of his assertions and premises. It does not dilute the anti-war message to tie it to other messages--it IS tied to other messages. The centralized, hierarchical approach to planning is what the global war machine is all about. It will not work to oppose it with a centralized, hierarchical approach.

It will not work because a centralized, hierarchical structure is the core of the system we are opposing. It is the structure that put us into war. It is the philosophical antithesis of what we are working for. As a practical strategy, it would be the easiest type of structure to co-opt. All that needs to be done is to corrupt the people at the top of the hierarchy. This has happened to alternative movements in the past that were organized hierarchically.

In his book The Politics of Nonviolent Action, Gene Sharp says, "Nonviolent action tends to turn the opponent's violence and repression against his own power position, weakening it and at the same time strengthening the nonviolent group. Because violent action and nonviolent action possess quite different mechanisms, and induce differing forces of change in the society, the opponent's repression. . . can never really come to grips with the kind of power wielded by the nonviolent actionists." ( Part II. Pp. 111-113). Sharp compares this approach to the martial art of jiu-jitsu--in which the violent party loses its balance when confronted with nonviolent opposition.

First Meeting of Alfred Campus Greens

2006-04-02T20:26:00.000-04:00

We had a beaufiful warm, sunny day for the organizational meeting of the Alfred Chapter of the Campus Greens this afternoon at Pollywood Holler in Belmont. The meeting was organized by Krista Carlson, a graduate student at Alfred University. Six students attended, one from Alfred State, along with faculty advisor Bill Carlson, Dave Fagan from the Allegany Greens and myself. The students planned a public meeting at the Terra Cotta coffee house in Alfred on Thursday, April 6 at 7:00 pm.

Ralph Nader at Alfred

2006-03-25T09:39:00.000-05:00

Several of us from the Steuben Greens presented a table of Green Party literature at the Ralph Nader speaking event at Alfred last night. We had a poster about the Campus Greens, a large "Ralph We Love You" sign, a poster for Sander Hicks Green campaign for US Senate and a lot of Green Party materials and got a very good response. Among the people who stopped by our table was the owner of the Crawford Peace House in Crawford, Texas. Ralph's speech was inspiring. He called on young people to work for justice and spend their twenties, which he said were the most creative time in their lives, working for what they believed in and not just to earn money. The last part of his speech was about politics. Ralph referred to the difficulties he faced as a Green Party candidate for president. After the speech, more people came and signed up on our list. Altogether, fifteen students and people from the area signed up to form an Alfred Chapter of the Campus Greens. We also invited people to the next meeting of the Steuben Greens on Monday, April 17 at 7:00 pm at 198 Main St. in Hornell.

First Meeting of the Genesee County Green Party

2006-03-04T13:50:00.000-05:00

Last night was the first meeting of the Genesee County Green Party. Craig Taylor, the new state committee member for Genesee County, organized an excellent program. Jason Nabewaniec as the GPNY Region 6 national representative and I as the GPNY Region 6 executive commitee representative attended.

Monroe County Green Party Meeting

2006-02-14T12:35:00.000-05:00

On Monday I attended the February meeting of the Monroe County Green Party. They had an excellent guest speaker, Elizabeth Henderson of NOFA-NY speaking about her CSA and about genetic engineering issues. I spoke about our statewide races this year. The Monroe Greens have an impressive number of activities going on.

Erie County Green Party Meeting

2006-02-11T12:31:00.000-05:00

This past Thursday, February 9, I attended a meeting of the executive committee of the Erie County Green Party in my capacity as Region 6 EC rep, and on Friday I met with Green mayoral candidate Judy Einach and several of her supporters. Greens in Erie County are eager to work to help the state party regain ballot status this year.