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deal (to get Dean out--too anti-Iraq war). Anyway, our primaries are all now run by Diebold and ES&S, two rightwing corporations who are "counting" all our votes with TRADE SECRET, PROPRIETARY programming code. So who knows what the primaries mean? Will of the people? Doubtful. I think the last primary that was truly pivotal as an expression of the will of the people was California '68, which Bobby Kennedy won, on an anti-Vietnam war platform.
Bang-bang, shoot-shoot. That very night.
I don't mind a brokered deal. You've got a crowd of grass roots Democrats and state pols at the Convention. Can't be all bad. Can't be any worse than Diebold and ES&S. Say, Hillary emerges as Diebold/ES&S's choice, but enough people vote in the primaries to overwhelm the machines and deny her a clear victory. And Obama is a close second. And you have one or two others dividing up the first round Convention vote. And, say the real majority of the party, if not the country (grass roots leftists) revolt against Hillary on the war --keeping in mind that 70%! of the American people want the war ended, and are taking no crap from anybody about it. No LBJ's pretending to be the "peace candidate." (I go way back.) Nobody believes them. We want a REAL candidate who will REALLY end the war--and furthermore will inspire the country to create a more positive vision of itself. And figure some instability by that time--economic, war-related. Jittery country. Enter Al Gore. Eight years of experience in the executive. Many years prior to that in the Senate. Against the war from day one--actually before day one. GREAT speeches on the Bush Junta over the last four years. Has turned into an excellent speaker. On top of the most important issue of the 21st century: global warming. Has a positive new focus for national policy: Say a 5- or 10-year juggernaut push to non-polluting alternative energy. He's been outside the DC hogpen for 7 years, observing, thinking, developing policy. Everybody thinks he should have been president in 2000. He won. He was unfairly denied the office.
And, say, too, that Hillary, Obama and others have undergone a bruising fight, and there is a lot of squabbling. Who could bring them all together? Gore has steadiness and stature. He is a known quantity--to Dems and to the country. He could do that--unite the party. He is furthermore not just tried and true--he's turned into a visionary. He has done the analysis of what's wrong with everything--the economy is resting on the wrong basis: oil, and it's the fundamental cause of war and pollution--and he has a plan.
I could see it happening--easily. A draft of Gore at the Convention. But it's rather a long shot, to get to that point. Too many if's. I think there needs to be a "draft Gore" movement BEFORE the primaries, with people willing to get his name on the ballots of a sufficient number of primaries to make him viable. I do think he wants to do it, by the way. He has not been developing national policy in major speeches, for more than three years now, to go back to being a professor. But he's in a tricky spot--as to a conventional campaign. He is not just anybody--he is the party standard-bearer, which is a strength overall, but his using that strength in the primaries might create the kind of divisions that we would want to prevent. Other candidates might withdraw, or feel resentful. There might not be the kind of debate that we need.
Well, that's as far as my thinking goes. If Gore wants it--and I think he does--he no doubt has a plan. I don't see us achieving any kind of consensus candidate at the moment. It's a bit early, though. The other consensus candidate might be Dean. Wouldn't that be lovely? Obama is an outside possibility as a consensus candidate--but we have such a need for experience and stability, given the Bushite ruination of our country, and I don't know if Obama can really convey that, or IS that. When JFK ran, in 1960, the youngest president ever, the country was extraordinarily stable and prosperous. We had weathered WW II and the Korean War and the McCarthy commie witch-hunting period. All was optimism and the baby boomer future--despite the cloud of the Cold War. This is a very different time--the Bushites have squandered our fortune, and put us in great danger. They have assaulted the Constitution, and let global corporate predators run wild through our government. Congress has been relegated to presidential lapdog--unprecedented in our history. I'm not sure they have the power to impeach Bush-Cheney, despite egregious crimes. That may be why Pelosi put if off the table. And THAT is scary! Anyway, that's why steady, proven people come to mind--Gore, Dean--and why Obama doesn't seem quite adequate. Can you imagine him dealing with the evil rats Bush-Cheney have planted in our secret government--or those the rightwing plant in his campaign? And he hasn't been "swift-boated" yet. Both Gore and Dean have been. They know what they're dealing with. And I don't think Obama does, really. Didn't mean to get off on him. Just trying to explain why I think Gore more fully answers both the party's and the country's needs--with an emphasis on the country's.
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