Sacramento article:"McKinney Goes Green"
An article last week in the Sacramento News & Review gives press to Cynthia McKinney, who is campaigning in Northern California:
McKinney has been campaigning throughout Northern California, in the Bay Area and Humboldt and Sonoma counties, where Green Party support is strong. In Sacramento, she noted that politicians of both stripes, Republican and Democrats, are fiddling while Rome burns, expending treasure on an elective war even as health-care and social-service programs face deep spending cuts. The Democrat and GOP presidential candidates, as well as Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, are not having this discussion, but should be, she said.
The reason they are not, in her view, is that they embody the failed “two-party paradigm” that supports the corporate status quo and strengthens the political power wielded by the financier class.
Such candor has come crashing down upon McKinney in the past. In 2006, after heavily criticizing the war on terror and the illegal surveillance of American citizens, Republicans targeted her for elimination, urging the rank and file in Georgia to cross party lines during the Democratic primary and vote for McKinney’s opponent. She lost, and now the same tactic is being employed against Democrats via Rush Limbaugh’s “Operation Chaos” to disrupt this summer’s Democratic Convention.
There has been a lot of prognosticating about how the Green Party might do on election night with McKinney on the top of the ticket, especially given Ralph Nader’s decision to launch an Independent campaign. The article touches on that as well:
McKinney hopes to reach Americans not typically involved with the Green Party. She may find its message has become more palatable now than ever. The party’s key values, ratified eight years ago, are not out of sync with the current beliefs of many Americans: promoting peace, improving the environment and health care, reducing poverty and inequality across color and gender lines.
…
Not coincidentally, since they share many of the same views, Nader is McKinney’s strongest opponent in the race to gain the Green Party nomination. As of mid-May, McKinney led the race with 167 national delegates from 17 state primaries. Nader trailed her with 113 delegates. The primaries allot delegates to the national Green Party convention in Chicago, July 11 to 13. McKinney must garner a majority of the 836 delegates to be nominated.
Who might she choose as vice president? “I’m involved in the hunt for delegates now, and it’s not the time to discuss a running mate,” McKinney said.
Read the entire article here.
