Just add the votes of the Democrats and the Greens to show how many people actually vote AGAINST the Republicans. If the Supreme Court tells you that is not how our democracy works, tell them that that is how we want to make it work. Don't budge for these fascists any more. Just give them hell.

Vote Green, but don't let the Republicans win. If the Republicans win again, it means they cheated (again) and it will mean civil war. In some countries, you know, politicians are actually afraid of the people.

Little Brother -
Don't let your brilliance go to waste from the sidelines. The empire is on it's last leg - it's about to collapse - as did Rome - despite all contradictory appearances.

You progressive pessimists might enjoy and benefit from watching this 3 min of talk on YouTube...

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1fiubmOqH4

Excerpt of Paul Hawken's speech at the bioneers conference on the worlds largest movement, the hundreds of thousands of grassroots organizations that are working for social and environmental justice.

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Power to the People!

Little Brother -
Don't let your brilliance go to waste from the sidelines. The empire is on it's last leg - it's about to collapse - as did Rome - despite all contradictory appearances.

You progressive pessimists might enjoy and benefit from watching this 3 min of talk on YouTube...

===========
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1fiubmOqH4

Excerpt of Paul Hawken's speech at the bioneers conference on the worlds largest movement, the hundreds of thousands of grassroots organizations that are working for social and environmental justice.

Little Brother,

You speak for me. I really appreciate the passion and intelligence you bring to this conversation. You're right about Conyers et al's "soapy" evasions.

What do you suggest we do? In Allan Nairn's extraordinary interview at Democracy Now on January 3 regarding how all of the presidential candidates' advisers are war criminals, he said that if one policy results in 1 million deaths, and another policy 990,000 and if the latter is our only choice, then we should choose the latter because 10,000 lives will be saved.

http://www.democracynow.org/shows/2008/1/3

So I send $ to Kucinich, $ to the Green Party at national and local levels, and who knows, maybe Ron Paul, and I will vote for Kucinich or Edwards in CA primaries (to send a message to the corporate Obama and Clinton camps), then what? Green in the general election, thus causing a Republican win? Or vote for the lesser "winnable" evil, thus ensuring the continued slide into fascism?

IMO, Nader and Moore have made their real politik call, siding at this time with Edwards. Edwards is better than many of the other candidates, though not enough for the Green Party purist in me. It's an effin' razor walk.

Even if the DLC is right (and they're not) in its placing blame on Nader for the loss in 2004, their point of view lost all credibility with me when they set about excoriating Nader and everything he stood for (challenging corporate power, more fair distribution of wealth, etc.). That is, the Democrats did not embrace the Nader/Green platform so as to avoid a future election fiasco of lost votes -- rather they arrogantly sought to delegitimize the populists as they moved farther to the right.

IMO, any vote for the Dems is complicit in this process of attempting to coopt and destroy the progressive movement in the US. Nevertheless, I return to Nairn's point, and the tacit endorsement (at this point) of Edwards by Moore and Nader.

At this time I intend to vote for Edwards (and in the general election the Green McKinney if she looks like she's got a chance), and continue to build progressive momentum elsewhere via third parties and NGO protest activity. As well, to send a strong message to the DLC, we must run candidates like Sheehan to unseat the most despicable of Democrat power managers.

What do you think, Little Brother? The sky or bust? Or are you willing to slog in the mud a bit more?

Does one really have the option of joining others in urging anyone in Washington to do anything? Letters, phone calls, e-mails and petition signing are all failures. No one listens to their constituents. Congress is dead in the water and may just as well go home for the duration. So little has been accomplished in the last few sessions that I wonder just what it is that these people do to earn their keep. We are paying them to do an important job. An employee of any other company in this country would have been fired after their first evaluation (which of course the government doesn't offer their employees.) Perhaps it is time to clean house and start over. At least vote in a few people with integrity, honesty and determination to do what is right for this country, not what is right for the greedy corporations and their own deep pockets.

Oh, cynical indeed, Maxhemust. And as an unregenerate cynic, I am confined to the sidelines of politics, which is as faith-based as any religion.

I did my bit in 2006 to support Democratic candidates seemingly eager to take office and aggressively confront and challenge the Bush Crime Family and associated criminal malfeasors, including opposing its reprehensible imperialist occupation of Iraq.

After the newly-elected Dem leadership promptly presented their "gotcha"-- impeachment off the table, total funding for Iraq "war"-- I waded through hundreds of blog discussions in which skeptics and cynics were either cajoled or ripped by True Believers.

Nancy and Harry were just "rope-a-doping" until they could give the newly-empowered Congressional chairpersons time to get settled and build a record of the maladministration's prolific wrongdoing, etc. When that rationalization didn't pan out, the defenders of the faith had a series of backup explanations. They don't have the 60 votes, so really, the Dems' hands are tied, etc.

And there have been no end of furious Dem supporters here who are too pissed off to appreciate, much less validate, criticisms of Democratic pols. Unlike the late Tug McGraw's cheerful, if mindless, "Ya gotta believe!", these writers simply stomp their big flat feet and excoriate us for not being "realists"; in their view, conscientious objection to experiencing politics as a game in which mendacity and manipulation are virtues is simply asinine.

All this to say that my cynicism has only intensified.

Ironically, until recently I was in the odd position of being less cynical about Kucinich than some, who repudiated DK as a Judas goat whose "candidacy" was merely a strategy to charm progressives into remaining in the Democratic fold. They almost invariably pointed to Kucinich's willingness to support the Dem candidate in previous election years despite the nominee's corporate centrist stance which would seem incompatible with progressive ideas.

I thought it was at least possible that DK would take a No More Mister Nice Guy approach this year. So I resisted the criticism that Kucinich wasn't "seriously" running a campaign with the intention to compete and win, but was staging his usual meta-campaign to "influence the discussion" before he predictably pulled the plug and got behind Obama or Hillary.

Now I see that the critics were right, and that Dennis isn't the maverick to challenge the entrenched duopoly of conjoined twin parties ruling the nation.

It's fine with me if you are acclimated to a Through the Looking Glass political world in which one invests sufficient trust in politicians to believe what they say-- except when, like Conyers, what they say is 180° different than what they were saying, or strongly suggesting, before the 2006 elections. "Inside politics" devotees, I notice, frequently insist that one must study politicians' pronouncements or positions instead of just childishly and superficially blowing them off if they don't sit well. But in the next breath, they'll insist with equal certainty that one can ignore or discount what the pols are seemingly saying or doing, since they're obviously "running to the right" or somesuch, i.e. practicing the time-honored mendacious strategies and tactics that are an inextricable part of "political reality".

You're quite correct to suggest that I lack the "inside politics" perspective to better appreciate the efforts of DK and Conyers. In fact, like Howard Zinn, I believe that political participation has been pathologically skewed or distorted by politically-conscious people buying into an "inside politics" perspective in which they identify with the politician or candidate instead of observing the difference. (See: http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/03/24/65/)

"When a social movement adopts the compromises of legislators, it has forgotten its role, which is to push and challenge the politicians, not to fall in meekly behind them." But in the blog exchanges I've seen over the months, the loyal partisans preach like amateur political scientists, explaining "what's really going on" to the ignorant or cynical who insist on believing their lying ears instead of Lesser-Evilist dogma and bromides about "baby steps" and "the art of the possible".

So you understand me correctly. I can't view a John Conyers as a tormented and frustrated victim of political realities. I see him sitting there reeling off soapy and evasive excuses for taking direct action against a corrupt and lethal Executive Branch which boil down to "trust me, and trust the Democratic Party". Continue supporting them, and the Dems will finally set things to rights when they have absolute control of the Presidency and Congress.

I'm happy to hear that men like Conyers and Kuchinch are somehow functioning as subversives who will (with unconditional support from constituents) derail the corporatist, militarist, imperialist Democrats running the party and running for office. I hope someday I'll be able to cheerfully admit what an ass I was for myopically discrediting them. We'll see.

Little Brother
Suggesting that Kucinich and Conyers are "playing on the hope and despair of an abused citizenery" very cynical & myopic. The view from the sidelines enables you to see only a small fragment of what's going on. I think all progressives, including K & C would very much love to see some radical changes in the U.S. - but even small steps forward are very difficult at this time. Kucinich threw his hat in the ring - not knowing how it would turn out. He made the effort and who can ask for more?

I didn't even bother checking out this article when I saw Conyers' photo.

I watched Conyers on "Democracy Now" last week, and Amy Goodman questioned him on the matter of impeachment(s). Sadly, and as expected, Conyers affirmed point-blank that he was not supporting persistent or renewed efforts by Congressmen to move impeachment proceedings forward.

He tapdanced expertly, as veteran politicians will, about "other priorities", the logistical barriers to attempting impeachment, etc.

I believe that Conyers, like Dennis Kucinich, may have once been viable and authentic supporters of progressive positions. But the Bush Crime Family and its simpatico oligarchs (including Pelosi, Reid, and the DLC contingent) have indeed eviscerated any real "opposition".

The likes of Conyers and even Kucinich, in my view, have been reduced to Party shills who play on the hope and despair of an abused citizenry, with the canard that supporting their positions will "influence" the corrupt and reactionary party leadership and policy.

What did that Bush guy say about fooling him once?

Conyers' about face on impeachment shows him up for the uncle Tom he really is--marching to Nancy Pelosi's ignorant orders.

All this talk about a CIA tape is nonsense the evidence is overwhelming in Iraq, and Gitmo, "soldiers " raping and murdering people they're supposed to protect isn't that enough for startes.

yes, thank you, let's have some. impeachment is the cure for what ails the united states government.

Let's stop the bickering and nonsense talk! What we must do is constantly hound for IMPEACHMENT! If we let these unscrupulous, corporate paid, without conscious inhuman beings stay in office, then we are also guilty of destroying our heritage. So, let's hear more rhetoric!!!!!!!

I heard some clown on C-Spam this morning who voted for Bush twice then wondered where it all went wrong. What went wrong is the sheeple respond to certain phrases or messages just as if they're hypnotised because they were conditioned at these institutions called schools. I saw how the sheeple reacted to the false flag on 9/11, exactly as the neo-cons expected, flags came out and everybody shouting for blood.

Very few actually sat down and studied the 9/11 fiasco, very few wondered how a 757 could hit the Pentagon then disappear, very few wondered how 2 aircraft can knock down 3 massive buildings. Very few will vote this year for the candidate they want but for a candidate the corporations can live with until they can get back full power.

My first choice would be Kucinich and second Edwards, if Clinton or Obahma get the nomination I would vote for Nader.

Impeachment is not the answer, Cheney and his fellow henchmen should be arrested and charged just like any criminal.

Both wrong! It's Rahm Emanuel. No doubt what his religion ...or ethnicity, depending on the discussion at hand, is.

And he no doubt makes a few calls to Israel before he allocates any party money to a candidate.

There is representative democracy that represents the money-power and there is direct democracy from We the People.

i know you all know this, but just in case...

WEXLERWANTSHEARINGS.COM

sign the petition to begin impeachment hearings for CHENEY

Hey, COMarc, it's Raum Emanuel out, Chris Van Hollen in. He gets a 65% progressive voting record, and a 0% conservative voting record. Unlike Emanuel, he's working with instead of against Howard Dean to bring more progressives into the races and to unify local races with Dean's party strategy. We'll see.

kathyodat

I don't know this six person race, but its a pretty fair bet that these two are going to be competing with some pro-war, pro-corporate candidate that Raul Emanual has selected, back by lots of corporate money and corporate media. Good luck to them. But they are likely playing against a rigged game.

What I really want to see is someone running a primary challenge against Conyers. Send the message that since he's failed to pursue impeachment, we are going to kick his sorry rear out of the Congress and replace him with someone who can do the job.

Jaded Prole January 5th, 2008 2:20 pm .Don't get your hopes up, my friend...Conyers is not on board as yet...and you can believe he'll be under ALL SORTS of pressure!

Personally, I wish Conyers was running for President. Just as He teamed up with Kucinich in the effort to get a Single Payer Bill through Congress, they would make a great team as candidates.

Go Chairman Potatohead.

Impeach the sniveling bastard they call Cheney. The Cardinal de Richelieu of our day without the arts. And simpleton is his puppet. Impeach the vice-president and move on to war crimes, treason etc. Ain't we got fun?

Two candidates are applauding the urging of a representative for Conyers to impeach.

Ooooo, feel the power of the dems Dick!!!!!

Lovely to see the I word more and more

what?!?

a representative democracy?

in america?

'Representative democracy' is an oxymoron.