RFK,Jr. says 95% of reps and 75% of dems are corrupt

[NoMoreMrNiceGuy]

Isn't it time to join a 3rd party or start our own party? We've been used and they will continue to use us because we keep believing in them and re-electing them. I was shocked to find out Sen. Feinstein was profitting off this war....dump 'em....time to look for another solution. We've been played for the fool long enough. Listen to what the son of the last true liberal to run for president out of the democratic party has to say.


01/23/05 -- Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. wants to run for Attorney General of New York State.

He might announce his candidacy within the next two weeks.

He's the son of Robert F. Kennedy, the former Attorney General under his brother, John F. Kennedy.

In 2001, President Bush named the Justice Department building after RFK.

The young Kennedy attended the ceremony.

We asked him what he thought of President Bush naming the building after his dad.

He said he wouldn't comment on the record.

But he did call President Bush "the most corrupt and immoral President that we have had in American history."

Not that he was enamored with Senator John Kerry.

Early in the campaign, Kennedy endorsed Senator John Kerry for President, but last month he expressed disappointment in Kerry's campaign and in the Democratic Party.

"The Republicans are 95 percent corrupt and the Democrats are 75 percent corrupt," Kennedy. "They are accepting money from the same corporations. And of course, that is going to corrupt you."

He has spent the last 18 years as a sort of private attorney general -- suing polluters to clean up the Hudson River.

Kennedy says that in the late 1960s, the Hudson River was "a national joke."

"It was dead water for 20-mile stretches north of New York City and south of Albany. It caught fire. It changed colors," he said. "Today, it is the richest water body in the North Atlantic. It produces more pounds of fish per acre and more biomass per gallon than any other waterway in the Atlantic north of the equator. It is the last major river system left in the North Atlantic, on both sides, that still has strong spawning stocks of all of its historical species of migratory fish."

He is seeking to close down the Indian Point nuclear power plant 22 miles north of New York City.

"After Chernobyl, 1,000 miles around the plant were uninhabitable. One hundred miles around the plant are permanently uninhabitable," he said. "One hundred miles around Indian Point would be all of New York City. So, imagine a world without New York City. Well, the terrorists already have. According to the 9/11 Commission, Mohammed Atta cased Indian Point before deciding to bomb the World Trade Center. But he believed, erroneously as it turned out, that the plant must be so heavily guarded, that it would be impossible to crash an airliner into it."

Kennedy charges that his appearance on MSNBC's Charles Grodin show in November 1996 got Grodin fired.

Kennedy was invited on the show to talk about his book and group by the same name -- Riverkeepers.

On the show, Kennedy ripped into GE, an owner of the network, for polluting the Hudson with PCBs.

On the show, Kennedy claimed that "every woman between Oswego and Albany has elevated levels of PCBs in her milk because of GE."

Grodin was soon thereafter fired.

Kennedy wrote a book last year that he hoped would change the direction of the country.

It didn't.

But it's a great book, nonetheless.

It's called Crimes Against Nature: How George W. Bush and his Corporate Pals Are Plundering the Country and Hijacking Our Democracy (HarperCollins, 2004).

For the past couple of years, he's been giving 40 or so speeches a year, mostly in the red zone, mostly to conservative groups.

He speaks about the corporate attack on the country.

"There is no difference between the reaction I get from Republicans and Democrats, because Americans share the same values," Kennedy told us. "If you talk about these issues in terms of our national values, everybody understands it."

In the book, Kennedy implies that we live in a fascist country and that the Bush White House has learned key lessons from the Nazis.

"While communism is the control of business by government, fascism is the control of government by business," he writes. "My American Heritage Dictionary defines fascism as 'a system of government that exercises a dictatorship of the extreme right, typically through the merging of state and business leadership together with belligerent nationalism.' Sound familiar?"

He quotes Hitler's propaganda chief Herman Goerring: "It is always simply a matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. The people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the peacemakers for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country."

Kennedy then adds: "The White House has clearly grasped the lesson."

Kennedy also quotes Benito Mussolini's insight that "fascism should more appropriately be called corporatism because it is the merger of state and corporate power."

"The biggest threat to American democracy is corporate power," Kennedy told us. "There is vogue in the White House to talk about the threat of big government. But since the beginning of our national history, our most visionary political leaders have warned the American public against the domination of government by corporate power. That warning is missing in the national debate right now. Because so much corporate money is going into politics, the Democratic Party itself has dropped the ball. They just quash discussion about the corrosive impact of excessive corporate power on American democracy."

Russell Mokhiber is editor of the Washington, D.C.-based Corporate Crime Reporter, http://www.corporatecrimereporter.com. Robert Weissman is editor of the Washington, D.C.-based Multinational Monitor, http://www.multinationalmonitor.org. They are co-authors of the forthcoming On the Rampage: Corporate Predators and the Destruction of Democracy (Monroe, Maine: Common Courage Press; http://www.corporatepredators.org).

© 2004 Russell Mokhiber and Robert Weissman

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. Information Clearing House has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is Information Clearing House endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)

[ClassicDem]

1. Numbers seem a little low to me.

I would say it's more like 100% of Republicans and 99.9% of Democrats, God Bless our 1 party system.

[AgadorSparticus]

35. LOL. that's pretty funny.

:)

[WI_DEM]

2. Is RFK, Jr. running as a democrat or a third party candidate?

if it is as a democrat then obviously he thinks it is worth trying to fix from the inside.

[rigel99]

8. RFK an honest democrat..

the only way to change a system is from within (the progressive democrats are beginning a huge change inside the dem. party), because until we change how we handle 'ballot access' in states, third parties will have far too many hoops to go thru to get fair access to elections.

but RFK is running for offices where he can make everyday changes. it's honorable. He has my vote for whatever office he runs for... and his family is keeping him low profile no doubt to protect him.... I heard him speak and almost cried, he was so much the spitting image of his father. Great / honest democrat lineage may be the only thing to save us from the Bush menace.. and a Kennedy name holds much more equity than a Bush name!

Let's all support RFK and watch him closely.....

[MadHound]

12. I agree with you, but feel that you're overlooking something

The very profound effect that third parties have and can have on the reformation of the Democratic party. You need no further proof of this than the tremedous effect the Socialist party had on all of us during the thirties. By agitating loud and long for change during FDR's first re-election, they forced him to take up two of the Socialists pet causes, and make them the Democrats' own. The first was unemployment insurance, and the second was Social Security. If it hadn't been for the large outpouring of support for the Socialists, the Democrats wouldn't have adapted these positions. Outside forces can force enormous changes upon the Democratic party.

[rigel99]

34. You're right madhound

yes... and so I think we should continue with 3rd parties, actually make it much easier for 3rd parties to participate in all levels of government without huge barriers, and finally that eventually we should have more choices than 2 parties.. but for getting there from here.. we must first start leveraging the dem. party to do our bidding, otherwise we get nothing but 2% fringe that messes up a democrat from taking office.......

[Starlight]

15. Me too. I'll vote for him any time he chooses to run.

Unfortunately I'm not living in NY right now....

[K-W]

9. Democrat I am sure.

The democrats we have in office are the survivors of the right wing assualt on the liberal dems put in office during the political fallout of the justice movements of several decades ago.

So we have an entire party of political survivors deathly afraid of being purged like so many on the left have in the past now that it doesnt seem that liberal populism is strong enough to fight back. We are still in the political mold of the reagan revolution, gingrich revolution and Clinton presidency. Republicans have the money and the message with growing popular support while the democrats who have survived and even succeeded have been moderates.

The answer is simple. We need to put into office a new generation of democrats who we can then shield from the dirty tricks that have always been used to keep true populism out of our government.

We need to define the next American political war, just as the right has defined this one.

[Peace Patriot]

47. I don't agree that Republicans have popular support.

"Republicans have the money and the message with growing popular support..." --K-W

Bush lost the 2004 election by a significant margin--if the truth were known. BushCon companies own and contol the election machinery, including holding secret source code that counts all our votes as proprietary information. The evidence is very strong that they used this access to change the result, and that Kerry actually won--which means that the majority of Americans repudiated Bush and all his works. Further, nearly 60% of Americans oppose the Iraq war, now, today. And Bush's approval rating is hovering at 50% or lower--unprecedented lack of support for a newly "elected" second term president--further confirming that he didn't win.

I think it's wrong to base any course of action of Repubicans having "growing popular support." I don't think it's true.

As for their having the money, we matched them nearly dollar for dollar during the campaign to unseat Bush--most of it small donations.

I think BushCon power is very fragile, and very much in the minority. That's why they have to shore it up constantly with fraudulent elections, lies and propaganda.

This is very important to know when strategizing.

First priority: We have to removed the election system from BushCon control, which I think can only be done state by state, through state power over election rules. This secret sourc code thing is fricking unbelievable.

Do you think Republicans would be quiet if George Soros owned the secret source code by which all our votes are counted?

[oldtime dfl_er]

3. Oh man I wish he'd run for president.

a plain speaker, a committed environmentalist, a presumably unbuyable idealist, a pragmatist, a Kennedy. Makes me want to cry.


www.cafepress.com/showtheworld

[DerekG]

4. Great thread, but I'd add one thing

Bobby was the *second* last true liberal to run for president--George McGovern takes the prize as the last.

[Placebo]

5. Wasn't he found to be in possession of drugs, when he was younger?

I love the man, but best of luck with that.

[Senior citizen]

16. Isn't that a prerequisite for President these days?

No more double standard.

If he's running, we're all going to start referring to him as Teflon immediately, and assume that anything charges against him, true or false, will bounce off the same way they bounce off pukes.

We've got a former cokehead drunk in the the White House, and it is just hunky-dory with the morality folks. So they can shut their filthy yaps if somebody with a conscience gets in for a change, who can speak two sentences in a row without lying.

Isn't it true that Bush* used coke when he was younger?

Isn't it true that Bush* was an alcoholic when he was younger?

Isn't it true that the right-wing morality folks voted for him?

Don't worry. The Lord will forgive them, even if I wont.

[K-W]

6. No its time to replace corrupt dems with ethical dems.

If we cant win democratic primaries, how on earth are we going to create a significant third party?

[prolesunited]

7. Quit being so logical and rational.

You know that's not allowed.

[ClassicDem]

10. One theory is that by creating a splinter group

the Democrats will not win another election until they adopt the policies of the splinter group. It may take 8 years to achieve the goal but it sure beats being a sheap and falling in line just because the leaders of our party put a little d in front of their name.

[K-W]

14. The real result of such an action

would be creating a one party Republican state.

All you need here is simple math.

If the progressive movement has popular support, we can start a new party, takeover the democratic party, hell we could take over the republican party.

Anyone can register in a party and run for office. If we have the numbers we can use them to take over any political organization or starting a new one.

So this discussion is pointless speculation really. Once we have a grassroots movement that can battle the right we can choose the best option.

If that day were today, the best option would be retaking the democratic party. Only if they used dirty tricks to close the doors to us (outside of normal political dirty tricks) wouuld we be justified in the massively larger and less predictable effort of creating a new party.

The democratic party is historically weak right now. If we cant take it over, we cant really do anything.

[eg101]

18. yes, exactly. Starve Them. Humiliate them.

Run the bastards out of town.

[K-W]

21. If this is about revenge, count me out.

I am only interested in the path of least resistance (but within ethical constraints) between where we are now and a government accountable to people of concience.

That path, with what we know now, lies in building up our movement and making a large impact in the next democratic primaries.

I cant even begin to comprehend the evil empire view of the democratic party. The democratic party is ideologically wandering and incredibally weak. It is not some confident corporate outpost. It is a party with no clear direction full of people who are barely clinging to the power they have.

The party is ripe to be taken over by a new generation of democrats. It should be easy as pie really. Certainly much easier than forming a third party for keeps or for show.

If and only If, at the point that we have the numbers, the party powers begin to close the party to us, then it would be time to take more drastic measures, but that day is certainly not today.

[ClassicDem]

24. Right now choosing Democrats over Republicans

is like choosing the lesser of two evils. But in the end your still electing to go with evil.

[K-W]

41. The glass is half full, the glass if half empty.

Unless you think a perfect political party can exist, we will ALWAYS be voting for the lesser of evils if you choose to phrase it that way.

The problem is that leftists have been purged from positions of authority and our culture has been poisened against them. We need to fight and work to get them in office, we dont need to rampage against the democratic party because weve been stuck with candidates that dont represent us because of a war on the left.

[eg101]

27. Past Humiliation is a touchstone for the future

Marie Antoinette, King George. We need to put our "public servants" in their places so that future public servants have that touchstone guiding them in the actions.

[K-W]

42. Thos methods are not sound, and are born of emotion, not reason.

I stand for justice, not revenge. Those who stand for revenge stand for nothing.

[The Doctor.]

11. Don't let this man anywhere NEAR an airplane,

Or for that matter, High power lines,
Penthouse windows,
Ski trips,
Boat trips,
oh hell, just wait for it.

[DrZeeLit]

33. Exactly. No small planes, ever! n/t

[Nothing Without Hope]

13. He's daring to speak the truth. His father would be proud.

The blivet** cartel isn't going to like this. If they think he is gaining a wide enough audience or enough support, they will take steps to silence him. Terrible, but true. They don't want the compliant "sheep" of the country to hear things like:

(snip)
But he did call President Bush "the most corrupt and immoral President that we have had in American history."
(snip)
"The Republicans are 95 percent corrupt and the Democrats are 75 percent corrupt," Kennedy. "They are accepting money from the same corporations. And of course, that is going to corrupt you."
(snip)
"While communism is the control of business by government, fascism is the control of government by business," he writes. "My American Heritage Dictionary defines fascism as 'a system of government that exercises a dictatorship of the extreme right, typically through the merging of state and business leadership together with belligerent nationalism.' Sound familiar?"
(snip)

Thanks for the story.

[PROGRESSIVE1]

17. I'd say 99% of Republicans are corupt and 60% of Democrats.

That means that 1% of Republicans MAY NOT be corrupt and that 40% of Democrats are NOT corrupt.

[Senior citizen]

20. You're dreaming.

1% of pukes may not be corrupt, but look how many Democrats voted "aye" with Conyers, Boxer, and the Congressional Black Caucus to investigate the Ohio fraud.

If they're not adamantly and openly opposed to election fraud, they ARE CORRUPT. All of them. They had a chance to stand up, and they didn't--not in 2000, and not in 2004. Barely 1% of Democrats are not corrupt.

There were what, 32 votes to investigate Ohio? And what, 525 or so members of Congress? Less than half are Democrats. Do the math.

[K-W]

23. It depends on how you are using the term corrupt.

In some sense every human being is corrupt. None of us are isolated from outside influences.

The question is at exactly what level you put the word corruption.

I dont think alot of those democrats are currupt. Some of them are corrupted but not corrupt.

[Senior citizen]

26. Well, if you want my vote,

you had damned well better stand up when they ask who cares whether or not my vote is counted.

If you don't really care whether or not my vote is counted, then please don't bother asking me for my vote. Or my money.

[Walt Starr]

19. RFK Jr. is a good man

and sadly, this means he will have no future in politics as the Democratic Party would decimate him.

[Cha]

53. I hear rumor RFK Jr. is going to

run for Attorney General of New York when Spitzer leaves to run for Gov.

[mpendragon]

22. money is the root of all evil

They have to whore themselves for campaign money and influence. If they don't, they can't get anything accomplished. The system promotes the foul.

I'm fairly pleased with my senator (Feingold) and congresswoman (T. Baldwin) for being a lot better than most.

[cthrumatrix]

25. notice he is not on many MSM shows....c'mon Tweety are you afraid?

[txaslftist]

28. Put me down in the 25% who aren't corrupt...

...as well as every democrat I know.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

29. With his background, he'd make a great Green candidate.

One I would happily vote for. And, it would shake the Dems out of their romance with the DLC(R)'s.

[housewolf]

30. I must admit....

The idea of him running for anything scares the livin' bejeezus out of me! Not because I don't like him - I do, in fact, have a huge amount of respect and admiration for him and what he's done with his life. His speech at the Democratic Convention was one of the highlights, for me.

It just brings back the memories of what happened to his father and his uncle. It just scares me to pieces, him putting himself up for electoral politics.

I know... I know... it's a NY state position, not a national position. And his Uncle Ted has not had any attempts made on his life (that I know of), and it's a different era with different politics.... and there's probably nothing to worry about...

But it scares me for him and his family. I lived through the assassinations. I don't want another Kennedy tragedy!

[Rapcw]

31. I'd vote for him n/t

[David Zephyr]

32. I Agree With Him and It's Nice to Have Someone Saying So.

Look at Tom Daschle and his replacement H. Reid.

Nuff said.

[geniph]

36. I will vote for third party candidates

as soon as they start winning local elections. Until I see them winning at the local level, I won't vote for them for national or statewide offices. It doesn't make sense to start at the top; politics works best at the local level. You get name recognition there, then work your way up from there.

The best way to get corruption out of politics is public financing of all campaigns, public airtime for all political advertisement, and elimination of ALL private financing. That takes the big-money corporate interests out of the picture immediately. So long as politicians take money from corporations and other big donors, they are beholden to them. Ya gotta dance with them whut brung ya.

[GreenPartyVoter]

37. Does this mean you are voting for them at the local level, at least?

It's easier to win when people vote for ya. :)

http://www.greens.org/elections/

------------------------------------
Would Jesus love a liberal? You bet!
http://timeforachange.bluelemur.com/

[geniph]

39. They've only run for statewide offices in my state

(Washington). There haven't been any running for Precinct Committee Officer, which is where those from the other parties start (the Libertarians are running PCO candidates in most precincts). There haven't been any running for local school boards, city councils, stuff like that. You have to start at the REAL grassroots level. Trying to run for Governor if you haven't got recognition enough to win a city council race is futile.

And you bet I'll vote for them once they start winning those grassroots elections. But in Washington state, EVERYTHING starts at the precinct and legislative district level. Third parties need to start forming LD organizations to elect PCOs. That's where the rubber meets the road. Until they do, running for Congress is futile.

[K-W]

43. Unless we develop an alternative to the corporate media.

A non profit grassroots network that can get votes as or more effectively than corporate money spent in the corporate media or on private faux-grassroots organizers.

Money only runs politics when money=winning elections.

If we can change that equation like the labor movement did, we can dramatically change our nations econonomic politics, just like the labor movement did.

[eg101]

38. this sounds great--but where is he on ECONOMICS?

Environmentalism is great, but it don't feed the bulldog. Will he talk this tough on progressive taxation? On universal healthcare? On fair trade?
This boy is out for publicity right now, and he almost certainly has his eye on a BIG position, probably president.

Is he leftist or neoliberal on economics?

[ldf]

50. This boy is out for publicity right now???

bull.

this "boy" is a kennedy. and i yes, i say that like it means something, because it does.

if he is willing to address the issues as he does, then it's obvious he knows what the hell is going on.

and he can get the publicity anytime he wants. as i said, he is a KENNEDY.

that is something the bush cabal will never be able to claim, even though they keep repeating how much they want to be the anti-kennedys.

yeah, riiiiiiiiiigghhhtttt.

[earth mom]

40. It's obvious that we've got mostly a bunch of crooks in office in D.C.

otherwise more of them-especially the dems-would have voted with Boxer on Jan 6th and more of them would be saying "Hell No!" and kicking Condi and Gonzolez to the curb and would no doubt be standing up to * and the corporate powers that be. My dad used to say they're ALL a bunch of crooks, but I like Kennedys' view, because it's better than nothing to have at least 25% who are still fighting the good fight.

What saddens me is that the people of this country let this happen by not demanding and expecting more of their elected officials and turning a blind eye to so much that's been going on-for years and years. The extremes that the * administration have and will continue to take things is about the only thing that's gonna wake people up-especially once there's a draft and their own children will be directly in harms way.

IMO-This country went to hell in a handbasket so quickly because we were almost already there to begin with.

[Tinoire]

44. That man ROCKS!

"The Republicans are 95 percent corrupt and the Democrats are 75 percent corrupt," Kennedy. "They are accepting money from the same corporations. And of course, that is going to corrupt you."

Because so much corporate money is going into politics, the Democratic Party itself has dropped the ball. They just quash discussion about the corrosive impact of excessive corporate power on American democracy."

Uh oh.. he's sounding like a "fringe" Leftist ;)

[Duncan Grant]

45. Want another reason to love him?

Q: Guess what RFK, Jr. calls the reich-wing, evangelical fundies?

A: Heretics.

If there was any justice in the world, that would catch on.

[semillama]

46. well, let's make it catch on.

from now on, that's what I'm calling the right wing.

I saw RFK Jr. speak once. Great experience. he's a truly great man and an outstanding patriot.

[mark414]

48. i saw him speak last fall

he was losing his voice but it was still one of the most powerful speeches i'd ever seen

[Cha]

52. On saw RFK Jr. on Tavis Smiley

and he spoke so eloquently for the environment. But, I wonder what's wrong with his voice because it was hurting then, too?

[Peace Patriot]

49. RFK is right on!

Every time I've heard RFK on the radio (Sunday morning Air America show), I've ended up saying to myself, "Wow, is that fellow right on!"

He really knows what he's talking about. Chapter and verse. Extremely intelligent and articulate, and heart in the right place.

A couple of things have bothered me, though.

1) At times, he seemed to be pushing cooperation with environment-destroying corporations, of the kind that always co-opts real activism, and public control of the "commons" (the resources on which we all depend--air, water, trees, etc.); and

2) He's associated with the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) which has colluded with the Forest Stewardship Council in California to DEPRIVE the public of a say in forestry use, by PRIVATIZING the review of corporate logging plans (in violation of the California Environmental Quality Act), and also the NRDC is strongly supported by the Fisher family of the Gap clothing store chain, who are destroying redwood forests in northern California, using private Forest Stewardship Council review.

Like I said, though, he SOUNDS absolutely terrific. What a mind! And maybe he doesn't realize what other parts of the NRDC are doing--and maybe has engaged in cooperation with Corp Inc. in strictly strategic ways.

From what he SAYS, generally, I would guess that the latter two things are true--and that he really is right on.

[Cha]

51. At least some see it as it really is..not

just how they(the corrupted ones) would have us see it.

I hope RFK Jr. stays out of small airplanes, too.

I can only imagine what Wellstone would be saying these days!