I know everyone dislikes Harold Ford, and I don't blame you since he is very right wing, but the fact that he is right wing doesn't make Gillibrand a progressive.
Read this article in the nation. She is no prize either.
In 2007, Gillibrand was the only member of the New York delegation in the House to back the Bush administration's request for te extension of Iraq War funding. Though she served on the advisory board of the Brennan Center for Justice, she backed the Bush administration's rewrite of legislation to permit spying in telephone calls. Gillibrand has said she backs proposals to renew Bush's tax cuts for the wealthy. And she sparred with former New York Governor Eliot Spitzer on the issue of immigration, whipping up opposition to his plan to allow them to obtain New York drivers licenses.
Gillibrand's allegiance to the National Rifle Association is such that one of her Democratic colleagues, Carolyn McCarthy, a Long Island Democrat, says she is prepared to mount a 2010 primary challenge to the appointee on the issue of gun control. (Congresswoman McCarthy's husband was killed when a gunman opened fire on a Long Island Rail Road line in 1993 and she entered politics in order to battle the NRA and its anti-gun control line.)
No wonder veteran union activist Jonathan Tasini, who has been organizing a push to fill Clinton's seat with a progressive, says, "David Paterson's choice to fill the U.S. Senate in New York is an affront to the people of New York. New Yorkers do not deserve a caretaker Senator who is anti-immigrant, anti-gay rights, and proudly carries the endorsement of the National Rifle Association, an organization that is uniquely responsible for the death and injury by gun violence of hundreds of thousands of Americans."
I think kossacks have a tendency to take kneejerk positions because they are primarily motivated by personalities. So for instance everyone falsely assumed Obama was progressives just because Hillary fought him so hard, but it didn't turn out to be the case. I think you will be dissappointed by Gillibrand too.
Meanwhile there is a true progressive in this primary and his name is Jonathan Tasini. Let's support him instead of Gillibrand or Ford.
He supports gay rights.
He believes in medicare for all and would kill mandates.
He would get us out of Iraq and Afghanistan
He would support and evenhanded policy between the Israelis and Palestinians.
He would have put strings on the bailouts.
He is for fair trade not corporate trade.
He supports a women's right to choose.
and he supports Labor Rights.