some of you might be curious as to what it looks like to be right the first time on matters of life & death & national integrity.
Vote "NO'' On Iraq War Resolution US, Statement by Representative Dennis Kucinich (D-OH), October 3, 2002 here you will find representative kucinich's point by point refutation of the iraq war resolution that has resulted in the deaths of hundreds of thousands, tarnished our national reputation & will likely cost you & your progeny trillions of dollars.
a couple of highlights:
But the key issue here that the American people need to know is that U.N. inspection teams identified and destroyed nearly all such weapons. A lead inspector, Scott Ritter, said that he believes that nearly all other weapons not found were destroyed in the Gulf War. Furthermore, according to a published report in The Washington Post, the Central Intelligence Agency, yes, the Central Intelligence Agency, has no up-to-date accurate report on Iraq's capabilities of weapons of mass destruction.
interesting, he actually considered contrar.y evidence
The American people deserve to know that the key issue here is that there is no proof that Iraq represents an imminent or immediate threat to the United States of America. I will repeat: there is no proof that Iraq represents an imminent or immediate threat to the United States. A continuing threat does not constitute a sufficient cause for war. The administration has refused to provide the Congress with credible evidence that proves that Iraq is a serious threat to the United States and that it is continuing to possess and develop chemical and biological and nuclear weapons.
Furthermore, there is no credible evidence connecting Iraq to al Qaeda and 9-11, and yet there are people who want to bomb Iraq in reprisal for 9-11. Imagine, if you will, as Cleveland columnist Dick Feagler wrote last week, if after this country was attacked by Japan at Pearl Harbor in 1941, if instead of retaliating by bombing Japan, we would have retaliated by bombing Peru. Iraq is not connected by any credible evidence to 9-11, nor is it connected by any credible evidence to the activities of al Qaeda on 9-11.
strangely enough, he doesn't believe in attacking foreign nations that pose no threat to us & does not find any credible link between saddam hussein & the 9-11 attacks.
The counterpoint, and what the American people deserve to know, the key issue here, is that this language is so broad that it would allow the President to order an attack against Iraq even though there is no material threat to the United States. Since this resolution authorizes the use of force for all Iraq-related violations of U.N. Security Council directives, and since the resolution cites Iraq's imprisonment of non-Iraqi prisoners, this resolution could be seen by some to authorize the President to attack Iraq in order to liberate Kuwaiti citizens, who may or may not be in Iraqi prisons, even if Iraq met compliance with all requests to destroy any weapons of mass destruction.
many legislators who signed on to the resolution now say they didn't think bush would actually use it to attack. the funny looking little guy with the big ears did.
the key issue here, is that the Iraqi regime has never attacked, nor does it have the capability to attack, the United States.
kind of important, no? &
Well, the American people need to know there is no credible evidence that connects Iraq to the events of 9-11 or to participation in those events by assisting al Qaeda.
aw hell, read the whole thing, if you'd like a glimmer of what being right the first time looks like.
other policy differences between the "unelectable" mr kucinich & include:
he supports not for profit universal single payer health care, their plans are government subsidies of insurance companies.
he is for allowing gay marriage, the other "leaders" don't think you are ready for that & would allow civil unions.
he is for scrapping nafta & the wto, the other, "electables" would tinker with it, maybe.
he has consistently voted against funding the occupation in iraq, the others have voted to fund it.
he would like to reduce our military footprint on the planet & the others think we need to "strengthen our military." (which makes sense because we only outspend the rest of the world in this regard)
he has more legislative experience (6 terms in congress) than the big ticket candidates & is the only one with executive experience, having been the mayor of cleveland. in cleveland he actually showed the courage to put his political life on the line against the banks & newspapers & do the right thing.
perhaps none of this is important. perhaps the real thing that matters is he is not too tall & has funny ears, or that he is a vegan, or that he admits to having seen something flying around which he could not identify. perhaps, after all, we get the candidates & the government we deserve.
thanks for your consideration, now back to the food fight, already in progress, peace.