My wife and I just got home from an amazing speech by Bobby Kennedy, Jr. at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. Many of you have probably heard him give a similar talk, which was based largely on his Crimes Against Nature, but he was on fire tonight, and it was his answer to a question after the talk that really had the room buzzing (more on that below). Kennedy was introduced by Mayor (and former US rep, D-WI) Tom Barrett, who joked that this was the most exciting night for him in the UWM Union's Wisconsin Room, second only to his wedding reception, and he was only saying that so he could go home tonight.
Kennedy immediately ripped into the media for not covering important stories, explaining the demise of the fairness doctrine, and how much of a threat to democracy the media conglomerates are. In the context of talking about our broken corporate media, he said that the Colbert speech at the WHPC dinner was the funniest thing he'd seen in a long time and that you could tell it was spot on based on the reaction of the crowd. [the standing room only crowd cheered when Colbert was mentioned]
My favorite line of the night was in the context of a citizenry that is fed distorted news: "80% of republicans are democrats who don't know what's going on."
He gave many examples of how the `worst of the worst of the worst' of industrial shills have been appointed to run the agencies that are supposed to be protecting the environment from industrial pollution. These are detailed in his book. He drove home the point that we need to keep corporations out of making government policy.
His position is that free market capitalism works, but unless you consider pollution as a cost of production that has to be dealt with by the corporation, it's not a free market. It's certainly not a free market when these costs are unwittingly subsidized by taxpayers.
He framed contamination of fish and pollution as privatization of natural resources that are owned by the public, and that corporations doing this should be treated as criminals. He pointed out that we have some of the best environmental laws in the world, but what is lacking completely is enforcement.
The first question from the audience was whether he'd consider running for public office. He said that although there aren't any offices in New York for him to run for, he thinks at this point, that holding public office may be the best way for him to have an impact. Alas, there was no follow up to that one. Soooooo.... could he be thinking about running for something outside of New York? Gore-Kennedy in 08?