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Will write more about my experience at the Green Party Nominating Convention in Baltimore, MD, but for now, you can watch it live:
Watch live streaming video from greenpartyus at livestream.com
You can also catch it on C-SPAN, and I’m very excited that Democracy NOW! has based their show out of Baltimore to cover the Green Party convention in depth.
Continue reading Green Party nominating convention live streamingThe Green Party’s presumptive nominee for President, Dr. Jill Stein, met a groundbreaking threshold over the weekend by securing enough financial support in 22 states to qualify for the Federal Election Commission’s primary matching funds.
With taxpayers (voluntarily) doling out funds to two third party candidates in this election (Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson ironically qualified in May), the issue of whether the bipartisan (Democrat-and-Republican-controlled) Commission on Presidential Debates can justify its exclusive, anti-democratic charade will itself become a topic for debate.
Watch Stein’s brief message about this breakthrough, and read her full statement below the jump:
Continue reading Stein campaign makes Green Party history, qualifies for federal matching funds3 days left to change the presidential health care debate
Posted by Jill Stein for President, June 27, 2012
Five leading advocates for Medicare for All today released a letter urging financial and other support for Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein. The letters writers were Dr. Andy Coates, Katie Robbins, Dr. Margaret Flowers, Mark Dunlea, and Gloria Mattera.
The advocates released their support letter as candidate Stein, a physician from Massachusetts who first became nationally known as an environmental health advocate, enters the final days of a push to qualify for federal matching funds. Stein has won 29 state primaries and has been declared the “presumptive nominee” of the Green Party by virtue of having won more than half the delegates to the Green Party convention. In the next few days she must reach fundraising goals in 7 additional states in order to qualify for federal matching funds.
Read the full text of the letter at jillstein.org.
Continue reading Five leading advocates for Medicare for All announce support for Jill Stein{Interesting summary of the Green Party and its platform. Not sure this gets to the essence of what the Green Party is all about, but that’s probably because the Green Party itself doesn’t really get to the essence of what it’s all about. -ed.}
By Joshua Fisher, OpEdNews.com
If you are like me, you were raised believing that the Green Party was a party of Socialists and Communists; and if you were taught in school like I was taught in school, then you were taught to believe that if the Green Party was a party of Socialists and Communists, then, by default, they were a party of Fascists and Dictators. I have just finished doing extensive research on them (including reading their entire 65-page platform), and I can assure you that you probably aren’t getting the full Green Party story.
History
Started in New Zealand and brought to prominence in Europe, the Green Party came to the United States in the 1980s. Then, it was known as the Green Committees of Correspondence, a decentralized network of green organizations formed by members of the North American Bioregional Congress. In 1984, the electoral branch of the Green Party was founded by 60 people at the Macalaster College in St. Paul, Minn. In 1991, the name Greens/Green Party USA was adopted after the electoral and non-electoral wings of the organizations merged. In American electoral politics, the Green Party gained prominence in 1996 and 2000, when they ran Ralph Nader for President. As of 2005, the Green Party had 305,000 registered members in states allowing party registration, and tens of thousands of members and contributors nationwide. Currently, there are 133 elected Greens across the United States, and in the 2008 Presidential election, they were on 31 state ballots, plus the District of Columbia, which translates to 70 percent of voters and 68 percent of Electoral College votes.
Continue reading A Brief Introduction to the Green PartySeven of the most prominent leaders of the American peace community today released a letter urging financial and other support for Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein. The letters writers were David Swanson, Medea Benjamin, Leah Bolger, Bruce Gagnon, Chris Hedges, George Martin, and Kevin Zeese. After noting a series of failures of President Barack Obama to curtail military spending and reduce military violence worldwide, their letter states that only Dr. Stein will have the ability to stimulate a serious debate on the nation’s approach to foreign policy.
The peace leaders released their support letter as candidate Stein, a physician from Massachusetts who first became nationally known as an environmental health advocate, enters the final days of a push to qualify for federal matching funds. Stein has won 29 state primaries and has been declared the “presumptive nominee” of the Green Party by virtue of having won more than half the delegates to the Green Party convention. In the next few days she must reach fundraising goals in 9 additional states in order to qualify for federal matching funds.
Read the full text of the letter at jillstein.org.
Continue reading National peace leaders urge support for SteinIn case there was any lingering doubt, the Supreme Court today just destroyed any pretense that our current form of government is a democracy or even representative government. Voting against their own supposed states’ rights judicial philosophy, the conservative justices just told the state of Montana that it has no right to limit corporate spending on elections. Since corporations are chartered into existence by the state in the first place, and can have their charters removed, it’s laughable that the Supreme Court would extend personhood and First Amendment protections to these non-human psychopathic entities.
This disturbing trend foreshadows a looming battle between the haves and the have-nots. I’m convinced it’s going to get uglier before it gets better, and that incrementalism is a failed strategy.
Below the jump is the full summary of this latest Supreme Court opinion by SCOTUSblog.
Continue reading Watch your back – you no longer live in a democracyDear proponents of 350ppm and climate justice:
You are invited to officially launch people-powered 350 Massachusetts!
You and/or your organization will have an opportunity to help shape emerging campaigns and the structure of the network. 350MA will be joining other existing 350 state networks that carry out state and regional campaigns. It will also aim to be a powerful part of the regional, national and international climate movement that gets us back to 350ppm.
350.org US Campaign Director, Phil Aroneanu will join us at this meeting to share communications strategy and campaign organizing expertise.
Thursday, June 28th
Potluck: 6-7pm
Meeting: 7-9pm
First Church Cambridge
11 Garden Street, Cambridge, MA
(Harvard Square T stop on the red line).
By Matthew Rothschild, The Progressive
June 7, 2012
Spare me the spin. This was a whupping.
After sixteen months of the most historic and exciting citizens’ uprising that I’ve ever been a part of in my thirty-five years of progressive activism and journalism, we’re left with this disaster.
Scott Walker is governor for another two and a half years.
He claims vindication for his rightist onslaught.
The national rightwing media is carrying him around on their shoulders.
And the Koch Brothers are popping the expensive champagne.
Meanwhile, the movement-a real giant grassroots movement, which flooded the capitol square with more than 100,000 people and which gathered a million recall signatures-is disintegrating.
From Jill Stein for President, June 06, 2012:
The Green Party’s Jill Stein has clinched her party’s presidential nomination after celebrating a major victory in yesterday’s California primary, winning 49% of the vote against her chief contenders, television comedienne Roseanne Barr and public servant Kent Mesplay. The California win followed other recent Stein victories in Michigan, Florida, and Iowa.
With 182 delegates required to win the nomination, and 194 delegates now in hand, Stein will go into the Green Party convention in Baltimore, July 12-15, with a clear majority of delegates. She has won over 66% of all delegates allocated, and 27 of 29 Green Party primaries, with the next nearest candidate, Roseanne Barr, at 22%.
Continue reading Stein clinches nomination with big wins in California, Michigan, Florida, Iowa