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League of Women Voters Withdraws Senate Debate Sponsorship to Protest
Media Release
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For immediate release: October 18, 2006
For more information: Howie Hawkins, (315) 425-1019
Sally Kim, (518) 364-2968
The League of Women Voters has withdrawn its sponsorship from a planned US Senate debate on October 22nd because Green Party candidate Howie Hawkins is not being allowed to participate. Democrats Hillary Clinton and Republican John Spencer are the only candidates invited by WABC.
The League said that Hawkins, who has pulled surprisingly well in recent polls as an anti-war candidate, met their definition of a legitimate candidate who should be included.
“The voters of New York State deserve better,” stated Marcia Merrins, President of the League of Women Voters of New York State, in announcing the League’s withdrawal of sponsorship.
“Clinton first ducked Jonathan Tasini in the Democratic primary, and now she is ducking me in the general election,” noted Hawkins.
“On most of the key issues — the occupation of Iraq, promoting corporate welfare and power, opposing universal health care — Spencer and Clinton have the same general positions and argue over the details. Clinton doesn’t want the voters to hear from a candidate in the race committed to bringing the troops home now, a national health insurance plan for all Americans, and a new energy infrastructure based on clean renewables in order to create good jobs, build world peace, and stop global warming,” added Hawkins.
“Hundreds of thousands of Iraqis and thousands of American soldiers have been killed as a result of Hillary Clinton’s support for an illegal invasion. Clinton supports Bush’s wars to overthrow governments and occupy their countries in the name of building democracy. Clinton’s position is self-contradictory. Her anti-democratic politics are further demonstrated by her support for suppressing democratic rights at home through her support of the Patriot Act and her refusal to debate an opponent like me who opposes the war and the Patriot Act. There is no real democracy if there is no real debate about issues in an election,” noted Hawkins.
“Senator Clinton is behaving as if she was engaging in a coronation instead of an election where the voters are respected with ongoing debates,” noted consumer advocate Ralph Nader recently in endorsing Hawkins. “Senator Hillary Clinton has become a corporate Democrat who chooses to ignore the many interfaces between corporate power and the economic, health, safety and political freedoms of the American people.”
“The unelected corporate elites so thoroughly own the major parties in America that is matters little to them which one controls the government,” added Hawkins. “Hillary and Bill have mastered the art of selling themselves and their party to the highest bidder, making Hillary Clinton the politician with the most corporate funding in America today. As Boss Tweed used to boast, ‘You may elect whichever candidate you please to office, if you allow me to select the candidates.’ Corporations now select the candidates through the legalized bribery known as private campaign financing. They control the debates through giant media corporations. And, increasingly, they control the very counting of the votes through electronic voting machines where election officials can’t even look at the software because it is proprietary,” noted Hawkins.
The League also withdrew its sponsorship from the attorney general debates because they excluded the Green candidate, Rachel Treichler.
“The League of Women Voters deserves praise for sticking to its principles and refusing to sponsor debates that exclude a legitimate candidates,” said Hawkins. “I hope the League’s example inspires more resistance to corporate domination of the political process. It’s time for a pro-democracy movement in the United States to replace corporate rule with real democracy.” |
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 *Website by David Doonan, Labor Donated to Hawkins for Senate Campaign* |
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