[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cMwdrzWP-7A]Dennis Kucinich on Democracy Now February 9, 2010
Category: Dennis Kucinich
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1S3s6G-AcGc]Dennis Kucinich on MSNBC “Countdown” with Keith Olbermann March 8 2010
From: Commondreams
Kucinich: The War Is a Threat to Our National Security
WASHINGTON – December 3 – Following a speech on the Floor of the House of Representative, Congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) today made the following statement:
“America is in the fight of its life and that fight is not in Afghanistan — its here. We are deeply in debt. Our GDP is down. Our manufacturing is down. Our savings are down. The value of the dollar is down. Our trade deficit is up. Business failures are up. Bankruptcies are up.
“The war is a threat to our national security. We’ll spend over one $100 billion next year to bomb a nation of poor people while we reenergize the Taliban, destabilize Pakistan, deplete our army and put more of our soldiers’ lives on the line. Meanwhile, back here in the USA, 15 million people are out of work. People are losing their jobs, their health care, their savings, their investments, and their retirement security. $13 trillion in bailouts for Wall Street, trillions for war; when are we going to start taking care of things here at home?”
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Tuesday, 21 July 2009
U.S. Congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio, 10th District) questions Neil M. Barofsky, the Special Inspector General for the Troubled Asset Relief Program (SIGTARP), testifying before the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, about interest payments made to banks that keep their TARP funds and other government (taxpayer) bailout money with the Federal Reserve, instead of making loans to struggling Americans (the original intent of the TARP, remember?) The Fed makes generous interest payments to the banks for “parking” their “excess reserves” at the Fed.
And guess who will end up paying for this “interest” given to the banks, and everything else? That’s right, you and me, John and Jane Q. Suckers!! The dumb, fat sheep!
By the way, Neil M. Barofsky is a good guy here — don’t beat up on him. He’s in immediate danger of losing his job (if not his life) becauses he’s revealing too many of the Temple’s dark secrets. Barofsky deserves our full support.
You can download Special Inspector General for the Troubled Asset Relief Program (SIGTARP) reports,testimonies and audits at sigtarp.gov. The July 20th, 2009 report, “SIGTARP Survey Demonstrates That Banks Can Provide Meaningful Information On Their Use Of TARP Funds,” is esecially interesting and can be downloaded at
http://sigtarp.gov/reports/audit/2009…
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Encourage your representitive to support HR 1207 – the Federal Reserve Transparency Act. The Fed is a private institution and is therefore not subject to normal Governmental Freedom of Information requests, as Bloomberg recently found out.
HR 1207 will help to reveal where the Fed is funnelling trillions of dollars of taxpayer’s money.
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How many newspapers and TV networks will run this? Zero?
From: Congressman Dennis Kucinich
Washington D.C. (January 26, 2009) – Congressman Kucinich (D-OH) today made the following statement addressing news reports that President Obama and advisors are considering nationalizing parts of the U.S. banking system. In the statement, Kucinich urges Congress not to nationalize banks, but to place the Federal Reserve under the Treasury Department.
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“At a time when millions of Americans are losing jobs, homes, and pensions, our government is prepared to give another trillion to the banks. We are ready to compound the moral hazard by nationalizing banks, which are allegedly profit-making entities.
“This is anti-democratic. Instead of nationalizing banks, we should nationalize the money system by placing the Federal Reserve under the U.S. Treasury, end the fractional reserve system and stop banks from lending credit into circulation. Then instead of borrowing money from the banks and creating debt, government can spend the money into circulation to rebuild and restore America with money for jobs housing, healthcare and education I will soon be introducing legislation to accomplish this.
“Banking is not a proper function of the government, but oversight is. The Treasury Department should not be outsourcing to the Fed its oversight responsibilities. The Fed, which failed miserably to oversee the banks, should be put under Treasury instead.
“Its time for the government to operate in the public interest, not in the interest of private banks. Its time to stop bailing out banks and begin building up America.”
No, I’m not talking about abortion (by how I worded this title). That was bad enough—sick enough!
We’ve moved to the next level, risen to the next disgrace, ascended to a far worse sickness—justifying, thinking, saying this is okay. And this is from the same people who cry “abortion is murder!”
Now we kill people who think deeply, who talk, who run and play—who, unlike the unborn, are accountable as to where they’ll spend eternity.
Even one homicide, one remote-controlled, joystick killing in the name of ‘self-defense,’ is too many—and we watch our President’s smugness as he leaves office. What a disgrace—laughing—having led US into impending doom.
What have we become—so high on our horse? Instead of reaching out to our ‘enemies,’ admitting the many ways we have been wrong, how we’ve bullied and spread filth around the world, we just kill them. We drive them away—into hating US.
And “America the Dysfunctional,” the big bully on the block, now sanctions and enables others to do likewise—leading by example.
America is sick, her heart has grown cold, having succumbed to the delusion The Moody Blues proclaimed in 1967:
Cold hearted orb
That rules the night
Removes the colours
From our sight
Red is gray and
Yellow white
But we decide
Which is right
And
Which is an Illusion
Our end is near, because Dennis’ words go unheard, speaking to an empty House, while America amuses herself to death.
______________
From: Congressman Dennis Kucinich
Washington, Jan 15 –
Congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) today made the following statement about the ongoing humanitarian crisis in Gaza on the House Floor:
“The attack on the United Nations headquarters in Gaza is further proof that a post-legal era in world affairs has taken shape; where law and moral principles are irrelevant, where might makes right, where retribution and vengeance, even against innocent children, fails to shake us from moral lethargy or political paralysis.
“Collective punishment, disproportionate use of force, using U.S. planes, helicopters and munitions to attack a wounded, starved and thirsty civilian population of mostly children trapped in a box called Gaza has become acceptable, perhaps because we have already accepted the deaths of over one million innocent civilians in Iraq in a war based on lies.
“There is a way out. We must ask those who were given our armaments for defense to stop the aggression, end the blockade, end the occupation, and reconnect with the high sentiments that rallied their own suffering, wounded people to nationhood generations ago. When we recognize the humanitarian disaster in Gaza, when we come to grips with the reality of suffering on both sides, we may yet find a way to save ourselves.
Related:
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“The banks have shown that they can’t be trusted with the American economy. That’s generally been the case, but now it’s out in the open, 350 billion dollars later.
In 1913, the money power of the country was taken away from the people — by Constitutional privilege it belongs with the Congress — but it was given up in the Federal Reserve Act.
The Federal Reserve is no more federal than Federal Express, but yet it has the power to determine the direction and use of money in our economy. If we could take that power back and put the Federal Reserve under Treasury, we start to be in a position of being able to control monetary policy on behalf of the United States people.
We also have to address the issue of the fractional reserve system, which is how banks create money out of thin air. And then, as they do that, they’ve created the conditions where we’ve had this kind of ponzi scheme collapsing — banks and the hedge funds working together.
So we have to halt the banks’ privilege to create money by ending the fractional reserve system. Past monetized credit would be converted into U.S. government money, and banks would act as intermediaries, accepting deposits and loaning them out to borrowers.”
Transcribed by Jeff Fenske
Related: Kucinich Rocks! “Instead of nationalizing banks, we should nationalize the money system”
From: Minnesota Independent
Yesterday, Rep. Dennis Kucinich sent a letter to Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice arguing that Israel is in violation of the Arms Export Control Act of 1976 (AECA), which says U.S. military exports may not be used to escalate violence. In a statement on his Web site, Kucinich says, the “disproportionate and collective punishment nature of the attacks on Gaza assure an escalation of conflict in violation of the AECA.”
The Ohio Democrat took up the issue again in a floor speech this morning….
Rep. Dennis Kucinich, floor speech on Gaza conflict, Jan. 7, 2009, 1:52[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dy-60zSKiGE]
Text of Kucinich floor speech:
“We cannot truly celebrate a New Year, a new Congress and a new administration if all we see is the same old destruction in the Middle East with U.S. weapons being illegally used to kill children.
I oppose Hamas’ rocket attacks on Israel. The rocket attacks, even to try to end the blockade, have no moral justification, are illegal and must stop.
But how can Israel claim self-defense when it bombs Gaza which has no army, no air force, no navy and has been under a constant blockade? How can Israel claim self-defense when its bombs destroy UN schools, killing children?
The children of Palestinians and the children of Israel both deserve life. But the lives of the children of Gaza are cynically discounted as “human shields.” Massacres are being rationalized. Israel’s “moral high ground” in Gaza, a growing pile of small bones in a graveyard.
The Administration knows Israel is using U.S. weapons, paid for by U.S. taxpayers, with disproportionate force creating a collective punishment of Gazans, assuring an escalation of conflict, clear violations of the Arms Export Control Act.
Israel was given U.S. weapons on condition they would not be used for aggression or escalation. The outgoing Administration must finally stand for the rule of law, not the rule of force.”
From: Raw Story
Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) called for an independent investigation to be led by the United Nations into the recent eruption of violence between Israel and Hamas along the Gaza strip that has killed scores of innocent civilians.
Monday brought a third day of Israeli bombing Gaza in what the state is calling its “all-out” war on Hamas. So far, 345 people have been killed by the bombs. At least 57 of the dead are civilians, including 21 children, according to the UN.
Kucinich said he wrote to UN General Secretary Ban ki-Moon urging an “independent inquiry of Israel’s war against Gaza.” The Democratic lawmaker said Israel’s attacks are an example of “collective punishment,” which violates the Geneva Conventions.
“The perpetrators of attacks against Israel must also be brought to justice, but Israel cannot create a war against an entire people in order to attempt to bring to justice the few who are responsible. The Israeli leaders know better,” Kucinich said in a news release Monday. “The world community, which has been very supportive of Israel’s right to security and its right to survive, also has a right to expect Israel to conduct itself in adherence to the very laws which support the survival of Israel and every other nation.”
Kucinich compared the latest bombing campaign to Isreal’s earlier strikes at southern Lebanon targeted at Hezbollah. Then too, he said, civilians were killed, infrastructure was destroyed and lawlessness took hold in the country.
“All this was, and is, disproportionate, indiscriminate mass violence in violation of international law. Israel is not exempt from international law and must be held accountable,” he said. “It is time for the UN to not just call for a cease-fire, but for an inquiry as to Israel’s actions.”
President Bush, on the other hand, has signaled a continuation of his firm support for Israel.
Related: Slaughter in Gaza: Another Chapter in the Global Elite Master Plan
Assistant Treasury Secretary Neel Kashkari (from Goldman Sachs—as is Secretary Paulson) testifying before Dennis Kucinich’s Domestic Policy Subcommittee, 11/14/08.
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No one questions that you are working hard.
Our question is who are you working for?
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From: Democracy Now! 7/28/08
The House Judiciary Committee held historic hearings on Friday about whether the White House overstepped its constitutional authority during the presidency of George W. Bush and whether or not such abuses would justify his impeachment. The hearing was billed as one on “Executive Power and Its Constitutional Limitations.” Although the title expressly did not include the word “impeachment,” several Democratic Congress members and witnesses used the opportunity to begin impeachment proceedings against the President and Vice President. We play highlights.
[…]
REP. TAMMY BALDWIN: The American public expects no less. We, the people, conferred upon the branches of government limited and defined power and provided for meaningful checks and balances. Over the past several years, serious questions have been raised about the conduct of high-ranking administration officials in relation to some of the most basic elements of our democracy: respect for the rule of law, the principle of checks and balances, and the fundamental freedoms enshrined in the Bill of Rights. In other words, the American people are in doubt as to whether administration officials have fulfilled their oaths of office to preserve, protect and defend our Constitution.
And their concerns are not insignificant. Americans want to know whether our nation’s highest-ranking officials broke the law to justify the invasion of Iraq. Many in our nation and around the world wonder whether today the Bush White House is planning to illegally attack Iran. They wonder, too, whether their private conversations are being listened to by government officials unconcerned about restraints placed upon them by the Constitution; whether our nation is holding individuals in secret prisons, denying them even the right to appear before a judge or to be represented by an attorney or to confront their accusers. They wonder who authorized torture and rendition. They wonder whether this administration will forever change what it means to be an American.
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TRANSCRIPT: I want to thank you for the support which you have given to my efforts to hold this administration accountable for taking us into a war based on lies and for the destruction of the rule of law and the destruction of cherished constitutional principles.
Because of your support, this Friday in Washington, DC, I will make a presentation before the Judiciary Committee of the House of Representatives at which time I will make the case that this president has violated his oath of office, violated United States law and international law, has separated our nation from our constitution, and has taken us on a course that has been so profoundly anti-democratic that it has threatened the core of our nation.
From: Los Angeles Times
Rep. Ron Paul, the 72-year-old libertarian-like, 10-term Texas congressman who’s also running for the Republican presidential nomination, easily won his 14th District primary Tuesday and is set for easy re-election in November.
With about half the precincts counted (what’s the rush — it’s Texas) Paul was thumping Friendswood City Councilman Chris Peden by two-to-one.
The Supreme Court on Friday allowed Texas to print presidential primary ballots without Democratic candidate Dennis Kucinich’s name.
The court refused to step into a dispute between Kucinich and the Texas Democratic Party over a loyalty oath all candidates must sign to make the ballot.
Kucinich and singer-supporter Willie Nelson objected to the party oath that a presidential candidate must “fully support” the party’s eventual nominee. Kucinich crossed out the oath when he filed for a spot on the primary ballot.
Congressman Dennis Kucinich, a Democratic candidate for President, is asking for a full recount in the New Hampshire primary election to ensure that all ballots were counted. Kucinich cited “serious and credible reports, allegations and rumors” about the integrity of the results.
Clearly, this isn’t going to happen unless Dennis makes a 3rd party run. But I think it’s great to see the appreciation these two pro-peace candidates have for each other—how they even vote together—standing up for what is right.
Ron has also said kind things about Dennis on many occasions.
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From: DemocracyNow.org
AMY GOODMAN: … I wanted to ask you about the issue of exclusion of presidential candidates from various debates, most recently Mike Gravel, the former Alaska senator. You weren’t invited to the Democratic Party’s Jefferson Jackson dinner in Des Moines, that the six other Democratic contenders are; your response?
REP. DENNIS KUCINICH: …the New York Times has yet to discover that I’m a candidate. I could — if I suddenly catch fire in New Hampshire, where we’re running fourth and closing in on third place, I would imagine that I could even win the election, and the New York Times would have a big story about second, third, and fourth place and fail to mention that I won. There is an attempt by the media to manage this election, to try to determine the outcome of the election prior to the people casting votes. It’s just another way to try to defeat the public interest and to make of the election a kind of a farce. …
I realize I’m a long shot. I don’t have any delusions about that. But I also know that right now democracy is a long shot in America, and I realize that our constitutional protections are kind of a long shot.