Why I’d Like to See Barbara Boxer as the Democratic VP Nominee

[Time for change]

First I’d like to thank my daughter, bkscribe, for suggesting that I write this post. It’s great to have a child who thinks so much along similar lines as I do.

I also want to say that my writing this does not mean that I don’t trust Obama to make the right choice. But the choice of Democratic nominee for VP is just as much or more the choice of the American people as it is the choice of the Democratic nominee for President. After all, we will have to vote for the whole ticket or for none of it, and there will undoubtedly be a minority (hopefully small) of Obama supporters who will choose not to vote for the ticket, depending upon whom he chooses (I will vote for him no matter what Democrat he chooses). And we the people will also have to bear the consequences of whomever he chooses. In any event, any American citizen has every right to express his/her views on this.

Like most people, I believe that the choice should be made mostly on who would make the best President, but almost equally on who would make the ticket the most electable. After all, even if the potentially greatest president our country has ever known is nominated for VP, s/he won’t do us a damn bit of good if John McCain is elected President.

Lastly, given Dennis Kucinich’s recent contribution to the cause of restoring democracy to our country, I feel the need to explain why he isn’t my first choice for VP. Kucinich was my first choice for President among all of the declared candidates. After listening to his long speech yesterday I have more admiration for him than ever. I believe that if impeachment and removal from office is successful, and maybe even if it’s not, he will eventually be remembered as one of the greatest heroes our country has ever had. But after two unsuccessful presidential bids, he has not shown himself to be especially good at getting votes on a nation-wide scale. That is not a criticism of him. No great man or woman is great or even good at everything.

That said, I recently posted an article on DU on what I considered to be the top 10 priorities for our country when a new President and Congress take over in 2009. I will deal with three of them here, though I think that Barbara Boxer would be especially good with respect to all of them.


Restore our Constitution and the rule of law

I’ve said many times that there are few things that are more important than holding our current President and VP accountable for the many crimes that they’ve committed against the U.S. Constitution, the American people, and international law. When Constitutions and laws aren’t enforced, a terrible precedent is set that leads eventually to those laws becoming worthless. Our Constitution is a very large part of what make our country worth living in and being a part of. Without it we are quite vulnerable to tyranny. After 7 years of George Bush and Dick Cheney, our Constitution is now just about on its deathbed. Our failure to remove Bush and Cheney from office could very well be the lethal blow. Restoring our Constitution to health and respectability will be very difficult indeed if that happens.

Barbara Boxer is, as best I can determine, the only U.S. Senator to have publicly called for the impeachment of George Bush. Given the unfathomable reluctance of Democratic Party leaders to proceed with impeachment, that is a very courageous act. This is what she said about the subject during a radio interview (scroll up to top):

I've always said that you need to keep it (impeachment) on the table, and you need to look at these things, because now people are dying because of this administration. That's the truth. And they won't change course. They are ignoring the Congress. They keep signing these signing statements which mean that he's decided not to enforce the law. This is as close as we've ever come to a dictatorship. When you have a situation where Congress is stepped on, that means the American people are stepped on. So I don't think you can take anything off the table. Because in fact the Constitution doesn't permit us to take these things off the table.

Those are very strong words, stronger than those used by any other U.S. Senator during the course of the many crimes of the Bush/Cheney administration.

And Senator Boxer was not only one of 34 U.S. Senators to vote against the criminal and unconstitutional Military Commissions Act of 2006, but she also was one of four co-sponsors of the “Restoring the Constitution Act” of 2007, which would have reversed the Military Commissions Act had enough other Congresspersons had the guts to support it.

I have little doubt that as VP Senator Boxer will use whatever influence she has to hold the criminals of the Bush administration accountable for their actions and restore the rule of law in our country.


Restore transparency in our election process

When George W. Bush’s handlers stole the 2000 election, that was one of the darkest days of our nation’s history (except that it caused the DU to come into being ). Yet there was an almost total blackout of news on that tragedy. In order for Congress to begin a debate on the subject a single Senator was needed to officially object to the results of that election. Yet, in the interest of “national unity”, not a single U.S. Senator came forward to object.

In 2004, George W. Bush and Dick Cheney stole yet another Presidential election – this time mostly by suppressing voters in Ohio. Prior to the inauguration of Bush and Cheney for their second term, John Conyers led an investigation into election fraud in Ohio and produced a great report, titled “Preserving Democracy: What Went Wrong in Ohio”, which described in great detail much of the election fraud that had been uncovered in the brief span of time following Election Day 2004. Again, one U.S. Senator was needed to officially object to the election, in order to trigger several hours of Congressional debate on the subject. I remember this well because I went to D.C. with a small group of people to lobby U.S. Senators to step up to the plate on this issue (We were able to meet with the staffs of Senators Kennedy, Nelson (Bill), Stabenow, and Obama).

This time, one Senator stepped up to officially object to the 2004 election. Barbara Boxer’s official opposition to the results of the 2004 Presidential election triggered several hours of debate in the U.S. Senate and the U.S. House. The final vote was a landslide in both houses of Congress against overturning the election results, with Boxer being the only U.S. Senator to object. She was joined by 30 House members, including Dennis Kucinich and John Conyers, but no U.S. Senators. But the several hours of debate in the House and Senate may have sown some of the seeds for the later surfacing of much more evidence for the election fraud of 2004. Here are some excerpts of Senator Boxer’s 2005 explanation of her decision to challenge the 2004 election, for which she was duly pilloried by Republicans in the U.S. Senate and House:

For most of us in the Senate and the House, we have spent our lives fighting for things we believe in – always fighting to make our nation better. We have fought for social justice. We have fought for economic justice. We have fought for environmental justice. We have fought for criminal justice. Now we must add a new fight – the fight for electoral justice.

Our democracy is the centerpiece of who we are as a nation. And it is the fondest hope of all Americans that we can help bring democracy to every corner of the world. As we try to do that, and as we are shedding the blood of our military to this end, we must realize that we lose so much credibility when our own electoral system needs so much improvement.

Following that election, Senator Boxer was one of our few Congresspersons to fight against the electronic machines that count our votes in secret with no recourse to ensure their accuracy, as she co-sponsored the “Count Every Vote Act”. She also addressed that issue in her explanation for her objection to the 2004 election:

Yet, in the past four years, this Congress has not done everything it should to give confidence to all of our people their votes matter… A year ago, Senators. Graham, Clinton and I introduced legislation that would have required that electronic voting systems provide a paper record to verify a vote. That paper trail would be stored in a secure ballot box and invaluable in case of a recount.

The Iraq War

Senator Boxer has been a consistent opponent of the Iraq War. She was one of 20 U.S. Senators to vote against the Iraq War Resolution of 2002. She was one of 8 U.S. Senators voting against the blank check for $86 billion in war funding in 2003. She was one of 8 U.S. Senators to vote for the withdrawal of all U.S. troops from Iraq by July 2007. And she was one of 16 U.S. Senators to vote against giving George Bush an excuse for yet another war by designating Iran’s Revolutionary National Guard as terrorists.

She has been outspoken in her opposition to the Iraq War. And to her great credit, she is one of the only U.S. politicians I have ever heard speak against the Iraq War from the point of the Iraqi people, whose lives we have destroyed in the millions. Here are some recent excerpts from Senator Boxer, challenging General Patraeus’ statements on the Iraq War:

It's time for President Bush and General Petraeus to take off their rose-colored glasses. Once again, they tell us that everything is going well, but a recent BBC/ABC News poll showed that 79% of Iraqis oppose the presence of American troops in Iraq, and 70% of Iraqis think that President Bush's "surge" has made them less secure.

As General Petraeus told the Boston Globe in November 2003, "We want to be seen as an army of liberation and not an army of occupation...There is a half-life on our role here, you wear out your welcome at some point. It doesn't matter how helpful you are. We aren't here to stay."

It's time for President Bush, Congress, and General Petraeus to heed those wise words.

We are sending our troops into a country where they're not wanted, into the middle of a civil war, into the middle of the mother of all foreign policy mistakes, with no end in sight.

A woman for VP

I have to admit that I have for a long time wanted to see a woman U.S. President, though I am not a woman. I believe misuse of the current U.S. military poses one of the greatest threats to world peace, prosperity, and justice that the world has ever encountered. I think that a woman President is more likely to do something to rectify that problem than is a man. In short, I believe that, on average, women are less violent, macho, and warlike than men (although I’m not sure that that applies to the average woman politician.) If that makes me sexist, then that’s what I am – I find it impossible to support the idea that men and women are equivalent in personality traits.

Anyhow, I also believe that there are many women in our country, mostly Democratic women, who are bitterly disappointed that the Democratic Party did not nominate a woman for President this year. Some of those women unfortunately will not vote for Barack Obama because of their disappointment. Though I very much regret that some women will take that course, I believe that I can at least partially understand how they feel. Many women in our country have lived through much sexist discrimination in their life, and they probably feel that having a woman President would give them hope that that discrimination will be more seriously addressed than it previously has been. Having been greatly disappointed in the dashing of their hopes for a woman President this year, nominating a woman VP may cushion the blow, give many women hope for a brighter future, and also regain many of their votes.

Barbara Boxer is not only a woman, but a very tough woman, as anyone who has heard her grill witnesses in Senate hearings can attest. Because of that, she may be able to win more votes than she would lose from men who are afraid of the possibility of having a woman President.

I don’t really feel comfortable advocating gender or race based voting, but I have less reluctance to include those things as one of many factors. And I hope it is obvious from this post that I believe there are a great many reasons for nominating Senator Boxer for VP.


Some other possibilities that I would be happy to see as Democratic VP nominee

I’ll end this post by noting some other possibilities that I believe have a lot to recommend them:

John Edwards: Edwards was my choice for President after it became obvious that Kucinich had no chance. My main reason for supporting him was that he has been one of the very few major party Presidential candidates over the last several decades to strongly advocate for the poor. I have also discussed several other reasons to support Edwards’ candidacy.

Russ Feingold: The only U.S. Senator to have the courage to vote against the USA PATRIOT Act.

Wes Clark: As a four star general who was commander of allied forces during the Kosovo War, Clark would add military balance to a ticket that might otherwise be considered by some to be lacking in military experience – notwithstanding Obama’s demonstrated excellent judgment in critical military matters. Clark also was a strong advocate for the humanitarian but politically risky strategy of reducing civilian casualties in that war by relying more on U.S. ground troops and less on aerial bombing.

Dennis Kucinich: No explanation needed

Al Gore: The man whose stolen Presidency led to 7 years and counting of one of our nation’s worst nightmares; world leader on the fight against global warming

Howard Dean: Early and outspoken advocate against the Iraq War; excellent job as DNC Chairman

Jim Webb: Long term aggressive advocate for pulling out of the Iraq War; Military experience; Virginia is a swing state that is very close now, and could be the final nail in McCain’s coffin

Ted Strickland: Ohio – No Republican has ever won the U.S. Presidency without Ohio’s electoral votes. McCain would be very unlikely to be an exception to that trend if he loses Ohio, and Ohio is very close right now. Strickland won the Ohio Governor’s race in 2006 by a landslide over the man who played the major role in the theft of the 2004 Presidential election in Ohio.


Is Barbara Boxer too liberal to run as VP?

Some may claim that Barbara Boxer is too liberal, based largely on the issues that I’ve discussed in this post. I would disagree with that. These issues should not be considered liberal vs. conservative issues. Is fighting for the preservation of our Constitution and the rule of law in our country considered too liberal? Is fighting to restore integrity to our election system considered too liberal? Is fighting to disengage from an immoral and illegal war that is busting our national treasury, killing our young men and women, making us more vulnerable to terrorism, and ruining our international standing considered too liberal? If the Republicans want to say that all these things make Barbara Boxer too liberal, then let them go ahead and try to explain that.