Is Dennis Kucinich pro-war?

[Feanorcurufinwe]

[no name no slogan]

1. I don't think ANYBODY is "pro-war"

Dennis is a Democrat, and he continues to hold the same views he's held all through the primary campaign. He won't abandon those anytime soon.

And neither will we.

[WI_DEM]

5. I agree. Dennis pro-peace

He also realizes that Kerry is the only real vehicle there is towards ridding this country of Bush.

[mzmolly]

2. You have to qualify that statement. He supported wars in the past

and did not support others.

Which war are we talking about?

[JI7]

8. which wars did he support in the past ?

[Zorra]

10. Got a link? n/t

[Zorra]

3. In his own words:

The Bloodstained Path
by Dennis Kucinich

Unilateral military action by the United States against Iraq is unjustified, unwarranted, and illegal. The Administration has failed to make the case that Iraq poses an imminent threat to the United States. There is no credible evidence linking Iraq to 9/11. There is no credible evidence linking Iraq to Al Qaeda. Nor is there any credible evidence that Iraq possesses deliverable weapons of mass destruction, or that it intends to deliver them against the United States.
snip---------
The only weapon that can save the world is nonviolence, said Gandhi. We can begin this practice today by calling upon the Administration in Washington to stop the talk of war, and stop the planning for war.

In their heart of hearts, the American people do not want war on Iraq. The American people want peace.
snip---------
We have the power to do this. We must have the will to do this. It must be the will of the American people expressed through the direct action of peaceful insistence.

http://www.progressive.org/nov02/kuc1102.html

Kooch knows.

[cyclezealot]

4. Watch him in the House next term.

He will not fail us.

[NNadir]

6. On what planet will he be running for the House?

[Feanorcurufinwe]

7. Well, what planet are you on?

That should answer your question.

[cyclezealot]

12. I am sick of Democrats being influenced by Fox News slander.

Listening to DK is a learning experience...There is nothing wacky about the man...he can talk issues for hours off the cuff with the insight of a current affairs scholar. If he were not a politician, he should be a history professor.
Nadir makes his judgments based on news media hearsay and not real life experiences.

[NNadir]

15. Actually, I don't do that at all.

I read Kucinich's bills and websites linking to Kucinich.

HR2877 is the work of a kook, OK? There is no such things as "Chemtrails."

Nor does the nation need a "Department of Peace." The last thing we need to achieve peace is yet another bureaucracy devoted to shuffling papers. The "Department of Peace" is and should remain (in a sane administration) an institution that has been with the Republic since its birth. In case you and Dennis Kooksinitch aren't aware of this institution, it's called the "Department of State."
When you have divided responsibility, things fall through the cracks. I regard the entire concept, rather like the Ridge occupied "Department of Homeland Security" and completely stupid and beneath contempt. The solution is not to make new high sounding window dressing labels, but to make the existing framework do it's job.

Also I am an atheist and I am sick of Presidents and politicians in general who feel it is their right to shove their damned religion down our throats. Before Dennis Kooksinitch became a New Ager devoted to plaguerizing 1970 Joni Mitchell songs into "political philosophy," he was trying to shove his catholicism down or throats, or, more properly, into an orifice associated with the female gender.
In Kooksinitch's entire House career he has not introduced one single bill that became law, and some of the bills that he voted for, including Repuke bills to defund reproductive services for poor women because they included access to abortion services. As late as 2000 Kucinich was getting a zero rating from NARAL (National Abortion Rights League.) Now, if John Kerry had been voting for most of his congressional career with Tom Delay and the other members of the Coat Hanger Squad, our "progressives" would be screaming bloody murder and "Same as Bush! Same as Bush! Same as Bush!" Why Kooksinitch is excluded from this treatment, I'll leave our "progressive" friends to describe.

Here is a website http://www.denniskucinich.com/regressiveprogressive.htm reprinting Katha Pollit's Nation commentary on Kooksinitch's record on the matter of shoving crucifixes where they don't belong:

"One thing you won't find on Kucinich's website, though, is any mention of his opposition to abortion rights. In his two terms in Congress, he has quietly amassed an anti-choice voting record of Henry Hyde-like proportions. He supported Bush's reinstatement of the gag rule for recipients of US family planning funds abroad. He supported the Child Custody Protection Act, which prohibits anyone but a parent from taking a teenage girl across state lines for an abortion. He voted for the Unborn Victims of Violence Act, which makes it a crime, distinct from assault on a pregnant woman, to cause the injury or death of a fetus. He voted against funding research on RU-486. He voted for a ban on dilation and extraction (so-called partial-birth) abortions without a maternal health exception. He even voted against contraception coverage in health insurance plans for federal workers--a huge work force of some 2.6 million people (and yes, for many of them, Viagra is covered). Where reasonable constitutional objections could be raised--the lack of a health exception in partial-birth bans clearly violates Roe v. Wade, as the Supreme Court ruled in Stenberg v. Carhart--Kucinich did not raise them; where competing principles could be invoked--freedom of speech for foreign health organizations--he did not bring them up. He was a co-sponsor of the House bill outlawing all forms of human cloning, even for research purposes, and he opposes embryonic stem cell research. His anti-choice dedication has earned him a 95 percent position rating from the National Right to Life Committee, versus 10 percent from Planned Parenthood and 0 percent from NARAL."


I also note that articles written in the Cleveland Plain Dealer dating to long before the creation of Fox News detail Kooksinitch's history as a "race baiting" politician, in the days of the busing/integration scandals.

Kooksinitch's history of misadministration and high handedness (almost Bushian) in the government of Cleveland is also a matter of public record. He fired people our of complete spite and petulance and bewildered and alienated his friends.


Finally, I note that Kooksinitch was one of only 31 democrats in the House of Representatives to vote for the Repuke inspired Articles of Impeachment against Bill Clinton. That sucks, and is in no way representative of a man that I think should even be even remotely considered as the Democratic nominee for President of the United States. The 1998 impeachment fiasco was very clearly a hatchet job of a belabored and deliberate attempt to undermine democracy that continues unabated until the present day. That Kooksinitch was a participant on the side of the forces of usurpers, especially in light of subsequent events, measures Kooksinitch as a man of poor judgement.

I am happy to note that 98% of Democratic voters offered the choice of whether Kooksinitch or a real Democrat should be nominee of the party agreed with me that Kooksinitch was unqualified or had a very poor record, or that he offered no practical approach to our nations serious ills. Over 92% of Democratic Presidential candidates in the nomination battle of 2004 (which was good for the party) endorsed John Kerry as soon as it became clear that John Kerry would win the nomination.

I vote Democratic because I want responsible and thoughtful government, government that responds in meaningful and reactive ways to real world problems with real world solutions. If I wanted to vote for glib doublespeaking ideologues with cutesy but meaningless window dressing I could equally well vote for either Kooksinitch or Bush or Nader.


I would submit that if any one here is engaging in rote thinking, as opposed to critical thinking, and News media hearsay, it is not me. Some people, and many of them support Bush, elevate high sounding words over real life actions. I, for one, am not among them.

[Colin Ex]

18. A little tip on making people see things your way --

Do not refer to the object of your disagreement via demeaning play on words (Kooksinitch).

All it does is make you look like a douchebag.

-C

[no name no slogan]

19. quoting "kucinich.com" is like quoting freeperville

You've just destroyed any shred of credibility you possibly have.

"kucinich.com" is run by a very bitter little Republican from Cleveland who has some personal issues with Dennis Kucinich (hmmm, sounds familiar...). It is nothing but a hate-filled vitriol by an unimportant little man who is in desperate need of some better hobbies.

Furthermore, the Pollitt article you cite has been around for a while, and doesn't shed any light on the issue at all. In fact, many progressives saw it as a hatchet job on Kucinich, done during the primary campaign by a vehemently pro-Dean columnist in a rag whose publishers are all to happy to kowtow to the "establishment liberal" party line instead of really advocating the progressive cause.

Quoting "kucinich.com" for ANYTHING just goes to show how low you'll stoop on your personal vendettas about candidates you don't agree with. You'd have more credibility quoting the Freepers.

[Desertrose]

22. that poster lost any credibility eons ago with his hate vendetta

against Kucinich. I stopped listening to his uninformed blather last year about this time.

kucinich.com? get real, NNadir.......

:hi:no name no slogan

:loveya:
DR

[WillyT]

20. RRalph... Is That YOU !!!

:shrug:

[fujiyama]

9. Neither Kucinich

nor even Kerry for that matter were necessarily pro war, in a Lieberman sense.

It's especially idiotic to think Kucinich is pro war. The guy marched against it for God's sake.

Those who no longer like Kucinich because of him endorsing Kerry, are especially idiotic. These self righteous fools can vote for Nader and feel superior.

Kucinich actually wants PROGRESS. Kerry in office is some progress. It may not be as much progress as some of us want, but it will be a hell of a lot better than going backward.

Kucinich said one thing that is especially poignant -- Kerry can be trusted with power. It's very important. Kucinich understands this. I hope most of his supporters realize this as well.

[cyclezealot]

11. I will unfortunately again have to vote for someone

I mostly disagree with.. I do not necessarily, agree with Dennis that Kerry can be trusted with power. The accounts of Kerry in Davos, Switzerland and his views on the WTO... His change of opinion is suspect..He went to Davos as a proponent of world trade in the WTO sense...My source is a favorite columnist...William Greider..
I do not trust overnight conversions. Maybe his visits to Akron or Flint can cause him to take pause. But I doubt it.
I do consider Kerry pro war. He does not show enough indignation about the role of Halliburton, the deceit over WMD, Niger, Bush's war lies.
Unless Kerry changes, I will have to have a stiff drink before I can vote for him..

[IndianaGreen]

13. Let's look at what the antiwar German Greens did for comparison

I supported Dennis Kucinich and Howard Dean. I voted for Dennis in the Indiana primary. My only quarrel with Dennis is that he chose to not make a stand on the platform like he had promised, instead we got a strategic retreat from Dennis to Sandy Berger no less.

BTW, Dennis gets kudos for not doing what Zell Miller is doing. Zell is actively campaigning for Bush because he is not happy about Kerry. Anyone to the left of Hitler is too liberal for Zell.

Now, let's look at what the antiwar German Greens did for comparison. The German Greens were opposed to the war. The German Greens were asked to join the ruling coalition. The German Greens accepted the invitation and their Chair became Germany's foreign minister. The Greens then voted for the war.

Why does a party that calls itself peace-loving turn around and support a war? Perhaps it is because at its core the party lacks a principled bedrock. Perhaps it is because the German Greens are simply another bourgeois party with their own set of band aid solutions to problems requiring a radical departure from business-as-usual.

The following article illustrates what happens when a core issue is compromised by situational ethics.

German Greens vote to support the war in Afghanistan
By Peter Schwarz
30 November 2001

At its national conference November 24/25, the Green Party voted by a large majority to support the participation of German troops in the “war against terrorism”. More than two-thirds of the 700 conference delegates voted in favour of a resolution proposed by the party executive, ratifying the decision made by the German parliament on November 16.

The conference vote was regarded as a demonstration of confidence in German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer, who had previously made unmistakably clear that a rejection of the motion would mean the end of the Social Democrat-Green Party coalition government in Berlin. The only choice open for the Greens, he said, was to decide between the alternative of taking responsibility for this necessary intervention as a party of government, or “to leave” altogether.

Two and a half years ago at its Bielefeld conference, the Greens voted by a clear majority in favour of German participation in the war against Yugoslavia. After the latest decision in favour of the Afghan war there can be no doubt where the party stands on the issue. The party that originally described one of its main tasks as being the prevention of war, now sees “one of its hardest challenges being to formulate Green conditions in a war”, as Fischer said.

Once again the pacifist wing of the party proved its complete inability to oppose this development. On the contrary, the pacifists in the Greens played an important role in integrating critical voices into the mainstream of the party and so act to counter opposition in the German population as a whole.

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2001/nov2001/gree-n30.shtml

[Feanorcurufinwe]

14. Interesting, but do you have different source besides World Socialist?

I'd be interested in reading about this without all the editorializing and bias.


BTW, why do you make it sound in your post like the German Greens opposed the Afghan war and then supported when the article clearly states they opposed the Yugoslavia war and then supported the Afghan war? Why attempt to give this false impression?

[JohnLocke]

16. Give us a better source.

[IndianaGreen]

17. What? The New York Times? The Washington Post?

The same damned papers that told us Saddam had WMDs, that Chalabi was great, and that now are telling us that Iran was really a bigger threat than Iraq.

Pitiful!

[genius]

21. Do you live to attack Dennis with nonsense?

[notbush]

23. 3 words. HE SOLD OUT

as did a lot of democrats, so we could put on a "HAPPY FACE" at the convention.