An Ideal Candidate

I've already noted in the article below that the current crop of Democratic Primary candidates and I don't see eye to eye on illegal immigration. That is not to say that no major player Democrats don't, Sen. Jim Webb of VA seems to have an understanding of the issue, but there's little chance this will get traction. No Democrat can expect to see eye to eye with candidates on all issues, we're much too diverse a group for such a thing to happen. There are some things we should be able to expect given the last dozen years of Republican domination.

We should have candidates with an absolute commitment to our civil liberties, it should be easy enough to see the damage that is wrought by ignoring them. The body of the Constitution sets out some pretty serious limits on government and the Bill of Rights followed by the rest of the Amendments amp up the limits. If you do not see this as a primary focus of a candidate's campaign issues - you've got a loser. An absolute disaster in the making, that candidate is a replay of BushCo. It is imperative to understand that no major player is ignorant of the thrust of GeorgeII's infringements, and that silence is approval. The Administration of the last 6 years deserves a full frontal attack on this issue.

Economic and social justice are part and parcel of the Democratic Party agenda and if these messages are missing, assume that you are listening to a corporate tool and plutocrat. You had better believe such exist within the Democratic Party, money and power are large motivators in co-opting the opposition. Social justice is virtually meaningless without economic justice in the forefront, while they travel hand in hand recognition of social conditions is useless without addressing the prime social condition which is inequity in the economy and rigged poverty. The market driven capitalists will howl at this notion, even though they know better. (excluding the ignorant yea sayers) You cannot study capitalism with an outlook to improving your position in the system without finding how to do so and thus recognizing the barriers implicit in the system. There are barriers which are inherent and there are barriers which are manufactured, obviously the manufactured barriers are most addressable. The corporate control of media and wealth financing of politics creates both ignorance and indebtedness in politicians and citizenry. A huge warning sign should be posted in your mind to find that a Democratic candidate is campaign wealthy and a media favorite. In a skewed and imbalanced economic model you will not find social justice, you will find further repression and injustice.


The Iraq war gets huge attention, what seems to be forgotten is that it is a symptom of the above issues, it is a direct outgrowth of the arrogance of power and economic advantage seeking. It is both a symptom of shrinking civil liberties and a cause of that shrinkage. Finding a candidate who is pure on this issue will be difficult. Those in a position to have effect were under different constraints than those who were not and I have yet to see public statements that were to the point on the issue from those outside a position of power. By to the point I mean specific statements that the intelligence was cherry picked, that another agenda was in play, and that the security of the US was at risk by pursuing such a course.

Any candidate for any office means that there will be compromises on positions for voters, that is the nature of the game, but it does not mean that straight talk is out, it does not mean that the principles I set out above are not clear and compelling and qualifiers for high office. There is no compromise on rights, you have them, they are not the government's to issue or deny, when the government does so it acts outside its purview and is subject to forcible correction, no Democratic candidate should hold a position which encourages such reaction. In a nation of the wealth of the US and the diversity of population there is no excuse for a lack of economic and social justice, any candidate outside that range is an outcast and pariah to our Party. Find out who these people running are, what they stand for, and use critical thinking in evaluating the compromises you inevitably must make.