Dennis Kucinich message.... very nice and hopefully helpful...

[tlcandie]

Hi everyone, Dennis here. Welcome to part of my library. I've been doing a lot of reading and thinking in these past 24 hours since we have seen the outcome of the election - so different than what we had hoped for.

I have to admit, myself, to being surprised that John Kerry lost the election. I did everything I could to try to make it possible for America to take a new direction - even to the point of beginning my own presidential candidacy almost two years ago.

All of us in the Kucinich campaign poured ourselves into John Kerry's campaign so that America could make a new beginning - and I've heard from so many of you around the country expressing great concern about this outcome, and asking, "Where do we go from here?"

This is a critical moment, where everything we believe in is being tested, and everything we stand for and hope for remains on the line. George Bush will have another four years in the White House. We can predict the direction he'll take this country and the world.

But what we also need to be able to predict is what we shall do. What our intention is for this country, the world, the role that we hope to play. Because, certainly, the feelings of anger and even depression which abound in so many of the circles that so many of us move in - despite that anger and depression we have to see things as they are and move beyond this moment to create some new possibilities in America.

Because, while George Bush is certainly going to have a lot to say about what happens in the next four years, he's not the only one.

You, I and those with whom we've worked over the last few years have the opportunity to participate in creating a whole new dialog in America and the world. We may not have the kind of momentum we had hoped for, which we hoped a Kerry victory would bring, but we do have our own courage - and our own quality of heart - which will hold us in good stead in what will surely be some very challenging times ahead.

I think we need to go through this period of grieving over the election, and then we have to get ready to bring some closure and move on, and go to a place of real action again, of real heart-centered action, of willingness to take on the challenges which this administration is bringing to our nation and the world.

We need to rededicate ourselves to working for peace. Not just further empowering the anti-war movement, but to look at peace as a creative endeavor, where we bring ourselves into working for peace in our relationships, in our communities.

The Department of Peace becomes ever more imperative. And the eleven states whose Democratic delegations took a strong stand in favor of a Department of Peace will be focal points of all our efforts to get congressional delegations to begin to sign on in support of this concept, which is aimed at making non-violence an organizing principle in our society. If there was ever a time when we needed that approach, it's now.

On health care: in many states across this country, new iniatives are being aimed at the state level to help develop a kind of a universal health care approach within a state. People in Oregon tried it a few years ago and I think they're going to come back. There's a burgeoning effort in the state of Ohio. We need to look and see what we can do to promote health care in this country, and to get people organized around it.

The environment: we know this administration is not going to be good for the environment - but we also know that we have the opportunity to push forward, at every level, development of alternative energies.

You know, we're looking at soaring natural gas prices in the next few months. This gives us some leverage to get popular support for an effort to develop energy alternatives. (As if we didn't need that - get that - with the higher gas prices.) But we know with the oil companies having a resurgence in political power with the re-election of George Bush, it gives us also the ability to galvanize public support for the development of alternative energy.

There'll be so many things that we can talk about in the days ahead. But I just wanted to take a few moments of your time to remind you that, while it would appear that so much was lost on election night, so much remains for us to do. We have to be firm in our resolve. We have to remember the commitments that brought us into this contest. That it wasn't just about John Kerry - it was about us. It was about our hopes, our dreams, our intentions to create a better nation and a better world. Those commitments remain. They help to empower us daily.

So, let's grieve over the loss of this election, but let's come together and realize that it's the unity that we have expressed over these last few years which gives us real power to bring forth creative change. That, even in this moment of seeming political darkness, we can find some light - and that light is within each of us.

This isn't the first time in our nation's history that we've seen bitter divisiveness - it was in 1865 in March that Abraham Lincoln faced a nation that was horribly divided in a civil war with massive casualties. And in his second inaugural address, Lincoln said these words: "With malice toward none, with charity for all." He gave us a lesson that's valid in our times - not to get pulled into the bitterness and the divisiveness - to still be heartfelt in our communications - to at some point separate ourselves from the anger which we all feel and to move past it, to try and connect with each other once again - through the heart.

This campaign, for us, began with an understanding of the world being interconnected and interdependent. It is our connection to all people that causes us to achieve a higher level of compassion.

So let's remember Lincoln's words - and let's remember our own resolve. And let's make sure that when we begin a new chapter in the politics of this nation, we come forward with ever more resolve, ever more courage, ever more heart, ever more of a spiritual approach - that will enable us to be better-prepared to help create this new world that we know is just waiting to be called forward.

So, thank you - thank you for participating in this election. Thank you for your efforts on behalf of John Kerry and thank you for still believing that we can come together through a collective effort to achieve a transformation of our social and political structures.

We must never yield to disappointment and to discouragement, because we build our victories for tomorrow from today's defeats.

So, I look forward to continuing our ongoing discussions. You'll be able to watch a lot of activity at kucinich.us - there are going to be a lot of exciting things happening on this Web site.

I hope to speak with you soon - and if I don't talk to you before Thanksgiving, I hope that you and your families have much to be thankful for in your own lives and loves, notwithstanding this unfortunate result of the election.

Thank you, and thanks to John Kerry, Teresa Heinz Kerry, John Edwards, Elizabeth Edwards and their families for giving this nation an opportunity for hope again, and for showing us a level of decency that reflects well on the potential that all of us have to touch our fellow citizens.

Thanks, and good day.

[cheezus]

1. bigotry as always divided this nation, and always failed

we are ONE nation with no slave states
we are ONE nation with no colored drinking fountains

right now we are two nations, and part of it hates gays

how long is that one going to last?

[johnny37h3r]

2. "Hatred" towards gays will not last very long...

Trends with the younger citizens do not have the bigotry older generations have...at least not as much.

[eridani]

3. My email response

Voter fraud in this election really needs to be looked into, even if the results don't change in the end. It must not be allowed to stand, period. At all costs, we MUST have auditable voting procedures in place by 2006. We need your leadership on this issue, or nothing else matters, not universal health care, not a Department of Peace, nothing.

If you choose not to try to overturn the election on the grounds that a possible narrow win (not guaranteed in any case) in a deeply divided country won't have any positive results, I understand that. But you cannot continue to be a major leader of the progressive movement unless you help insure that the voting process (at least in the future) is secure, public and auditable. If we can't get bipartisan consensus on that, then bipartisanship has to go straight to hell until we can get such consensus.

Exit polling evidence is there already. See for instance
. Bev Harris is now collecting hard evidence. Please lend your support to her and others working on this issue.

[Sara Beverley]

4. Do you have an e-mail address for DK?

If so, please post. Thanks :hi:

[tlcandie]

6. Kucinich's e-mail address

[e-mail]

[BayStateBoy]

5. More B.S. & Pabulum from our leaders.

We need real men that can lead instead of these spineless Democrats.

[DemBones DemBones]

8. Excuse me? Dennis has shown his spine and

owes you nothing. I wish he'd been our nominee.

[Sugarbleus]

7. I supported DK in primaries... I think he is a gentle soul

a concerned human being, honest and compassionate, NOT weak kneed at all.

I may go back now and reconnect with his group. My immediate concern after this election fiasco.......is what about the poor? We/they are still in deep shit. The rest of the party, many of whom are highly educated and securely employed, can hold out for FOUR MORE YEARS...WE CAN'T.

I joined with Kerry because he was the nominee. I thought/think he is a wonderful person...HOWEVER, early on I said to others, why isn't he talking about the UNDERCLASS??!! Why does he continue to back NAFTA and why does he shrug about outsourcing...What happened to the war on poverty?

Well, he's gone now and my family is still on a dangerous cliff. And for all of those that complain that the poor don't get out and vote, I say STFU. My family did, uncounted numbers of others did...including folks I ENCOURAGED to get up and go vote!

Let me reiterate the problem with many poor...they are often working too hard to spend time researching candidates--and NONE GO to THEM. They may be feable and sick with no support. They may be living in cars..can't vote without and address, they may be touring the countryside desperately looking for work, they may be having to stand in lines at the food stamp office, they may be OLD AND LONELY and depressed beyond all understanding, they may be ex convicts with families to support but aren't allowed to vote in some states---STOOPID idea that one. They may be in any number of insideous situations; it is imperative that Liberals who are in better shape NOT FORGET THEM.

[merh]

9. Would you let him know that the weed that would be king did not

win the election, they stole it from Kerry. Maybe he will look at the fraud and get the damned DNC and Kerry involved in pursuing the truth.

[shelley806]

10. Thank you so much for a wonderful, thoughtful, inspiring letter...

I'm relatively new to DU, but I've learned so much. I almost wish that I'd never found the site because for one, I've become addicted to it(!), and the second reason is because it has opened my eyes to a lot of truths that I either didn't want to believe or lacked the evidence for, but harbored suspicions. All of the bitter knowledge about PNAC, the neocons, the power of the Dominionist Evangelicals, the role oil has in this war, Halliburton, the non-liberal media, and on and on. But truth, even if bitter is always preferable. Four more years of being fed lies is clearly not what I want.

I too, would wish that someone with the capacity to do something would pay attention to the concerns of fraud in this election. I have spent hours studying and compiling what data I could access on the internet just on Florida. There are several excellent posts that correlate the system of voting (paper ballot, electronic including Diebold and ES&S) with and without paper receipts, and the exit polls, and the final votes. In Florida, when Kerry led in the exit polls, in the counties which had no receipts, he would lose in the final tally. Also, it is of interest that Bush won in some strongly Democratic counties. It is strange that right before the election we heard media spin about the increased Black and Hispanic vote for Republicans, but maybe this was hype so people would be less suspicious with the final results. I really wish that Zogby would do a post election poll in Florida and Ohio.

Thanks again for your inspiring letter. I'm interested in the Healthcare system and in alternative energy. Maybe you could give me some links where I could share ideas or offer aid.