She's Got A Point

Cindy Sheehan: "Let's get away from usual party politics"

I've always liked Cindy Sheehan better in print than on television interviews. On television, media personalities (I hesitate calling them journalists) use their time with her to try to make headlines for themselves as "tough questioners," "fair and balanced," by putting words in her mouth and being contentious, to try to get a rise out of her.

In print, Sheehan is thoughtful and voices many of the same thoughts and ideas shared by mainstream America. She certainly speaks for me in this op-ed.

From the San Francisco Chronicle:

The feedback I have been receiving since I announced that I would challenge U.S. Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-San Francisco, for her House seat -- unless she gives impeachment the go-ahead -- has been running about 3-to-1 positive.

Some people have offered to quit their jobs to move to California's Eighth Congressional District to help my possible campaign. People are lining up to donate and help, and I am again very grateful and touched beyond belief by the generosity and energy of my fellow Americans.

I truly understand the not-so-supportive people, though, because I have been in their shoes. Here in the United States, most of us put our faith in a two-party system that has failed peace and justice repeatedly. The Republicans do not have a monopoly on the culture of corruption (although BushCo has elevated it to policy status), and the way we do politics in this country needs a serious shakeup, when all we the people are getting is a shakedown.

I was frightened out of ever voting for a third party, or an independent candidate, but voting out of fear is one of the things that bestowed us with the Bush crime mob and may give us the Republican, if not in party affiliation, Hillary Clinton.

I was a lifelong Democrat only because the choices were limited. The Democrats are the party of slavery and were the party that started every war in the 20th century, except the other Bush debacle. The Federal Reserve, permanent federal income taxes, not one but two World Wars, Japanese concentration camps, and not one but two atom bombs dropped on the innocent citizens of Japan -- all brought to us via the Democrats.

Don't tell me the Democrats are our "saviors" because I am not buying it -- especially after they bought more caskets and more devastating pain when they financed and co-facilitated more of President Bush's abysmal occupation. The Democrats also are allowing a meltdown of our republic by allowing the evils of the executive branch to continue unrestrained by their silent complicity.

Good change has happened during Democratic regimes, but as in the civil rights and union movements, the positive changes occurred because of the people, not the politicians. I will run as an independent because I find the corruption in both parties unhealthy, and I believe we need to have more allegiance to humans than to a political party.

I have nothing personally against Pelosi and have found our previous interactions very pleasant. However, being "against" the occupation of Iraq means ending it by ending the funding, preventing future illegal wars of aggression and holding BushCo accountable. Words have to be backed up by action, and if they aren't, they are as empty as Vice President Dick Cheney's conscience.

If Pelosi does her constitutional and moral duty by Monday, then I believe some balance will be restored to the universe, and my organization, People for Humanity, can carry on with its humanitarian projects. If she doesn't, we will carry on anyway, with a political campaign to boot.

I hope this challenges other people who desire healthy political change and not temporary Band-Aids to replace other Democrats and Republicans who do not conform to the beatitudes of peace, sustainability and the rule of law for everybody, not just poor or marginalized people.

Being a born and raised Californian and being a Bay Area resident for the past 14 years have given me great insight into the people and concerns of San Francisco.

I am concerned with many of the same things: same-sex partnership laws, the environment, health care, affordable post-secondary education, better schools, counter-military recruitment, poverty, AIDS research and cures, decriminalization of marijuana, and especially stopping war and ensuring real peace.

I think I agree with Pelosi on many of these issues, but the difference is, I don't live in a mansion on the hill. Many of these issues have affected me and my family personally, and I am committed to fighting for the people, not the corporate interests.

I wouldn't put myself through this if I weren't dead serious and committed to making America a better country than we have now, and holding people to a much higher standard than politics as usual. I am rested, restored to health and ready to rumble. I realize that if ever there was a time for politics as unusual, it is now.

In the same edition of the SF Chronicle, on a trip back to her home district, "Pelosi reiterates impeachment is not on her agenda."

Cindy Sheehan Planning To Run Against Pelosi

And if she does, I will seriously consider moving to San Francisco so that I can vote for Sheehan.



The AP reports:

Cindy Sheehan, the soldier's mother who galvanized the anti-war movement, said Sunday that she plans to run against House Speaker Nancy Pelosi unless Pelosi introduces articles of impeachment against President Bush in the next two weeks.

Sheehan said she will run against the San Francisco Democrat in 2008 as an independent if Pelosi does not seek by July 23 to impeach Bush. That's when Sheehan and her supporters are to arrive in Washington after a 13-day caravan and walking tour starting next week from the group's war protest site near Bush's Crawford ranch.

"Democrats and Americans feel betrayed by the Democratic leadership," Sheehan told The Associated Press. "We hired them to bring an end to the war."

Pelosi spokesman Brendan Daly said the congresswoman has said repeatedly that her focus is on ending the war in Iraq.

"She believes that the best way to support our troops in Iraq is to bring them home safely and soon," Daly said in an e-mail to The Associated Press. "July will be a month of action in Congress to end the war, including a vote to redeploy our troops by next spring."

The White House declined to comment on Sheehan's plans.

Sheehan plans her official candidacy announcement Tuesday.

Sunday wrapped up what is expected to be her final weekend at the Crawford lot that she sold to California radio talk show host Bree Walker, who plans to keep it open to protesters.

Sheehan first came to Crawford in August 2005 during a Bush vacation, demanding to talk to him about the war that killed her son Casey in 2004.

Sheehan, who will turn 50 on Tuesday, said she believes Bush should be impeached because he misled the public about the reasons for going to war, violated the Geneva Convention by torturing detainees, and crossed the line by commuting the prison sentence of former vice presidential aide Lewis "Scooter" Libby.

She said other grounds for impeachment are the domestic spying program and the "inadequate and tragic" response to Hurricane Katrina.

I live close enough to Pelosi's district now that moving there wouldn't be a great effort. But neither would staying where I am, writing her a fat check and volunteering to work for her instead. Not for me and millions of others who are disgusted by what professional politicians are doing, in our names, to this country and to others around the world.

Sheehan could become a very rich candidate, amassing a war chest of contributions and a volunteer base from around the country. A Sheehan congressional run has the power to launch other populist campaigns and galvanize Americans who are starving for change and new leadership to become active and challenge the status quo. To retire politicians like Patrick Leahy, who, earlier today on Meet The Press, said that calling Scooter Libby to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee was useless. "It would do no good to call Scooter Libby. His silence has been bought and paid for," he said, referring to Bush’s commutation, "and he would just take the fifth."

Maybe Libby would, maybe he wouldn't, but Leahy and Democrats have let Republicans spin every single situation without offering an alternative explanation for Americans, and it's something that the American people need to see and hear for themselves. Democrats on the committee need to frame questions to Libby that tell the story to the American people of what this administration has done and ask, "What are they hiding?"

For the last 6 years (longer if you count Al Gore's half-hearted effort to win against Bush in the Florida post-election debaucle), the Democrats in Congress have rolled over, played dead, and failed to put up any resistance to the Bush-Cheney-Republican blitzkrieg. Every anti-populist, pro-corporate, 'against the poor and middle class and for the richest .2%'-legislation has been steamrolled through Congress without the slightest resistance by Democrats. Between the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the Patriot Act, the Bankruptcy Reform bill, Medicare Reform Act, Democrats have aided Republicans in signing away our civil rights and driving us into debt for generations. They have reminded me of Marcia Clarke and Christopher Darden, the prosecutors in the O.J. Simpson case, out of their depths and intimidated by "the Dream Team."

So this news (welcome and overdue) about Cindy Sheehan stepping up to challenge the most powerful Democrat in office today, the woman who "took impeachment off the table" in order to become Speaker of the House, is a shot across the bow of all Democrats in Congress.