Howard Zinn talks about the uses of history

Democracy Now broadcast a thoughtful lecture by the historian Howard Zinn on "The Uses of History and the War on Terrorism." Prof. Zinn wrote the classic "A People's History of the United States," required reading for any person who wishes to understand America.

Among other things, Zinn argues that, "If the American people really knew history, if they learned history, if the educational institutions did their job, if the press did its job in giving people historical perspective," then they would understand when they are being lied to by their government and, presumably, do something about it.

This pretty much lets us off the hook. The American failure is institutional. Blame the schools. Blame the press. It's not our fault.

What is our responsibility -- yours and mine -- for the carnage in Iraq and Afghanistan? Whether or not the New York Times, the Washington Post, CNN, Time mag, et al, fell down on the job, there were plenty of sources, even at the earliest stage of the "War on Terror," from which to learn the truth. The blinkered "I didn't know" defense quite rightly didn't work for the Germans, and it doesn't justify the complacency or explain away the ignorance of Americans.

You can't really blame the schools, whose reading lists have helped to make "A People's History of the United States" a publishing phenomenon. And if Hermann Goering, the proto-Republican operative, was right, all the blame can't be laid at the feet of the press, either; it has to be shared by the better than eighty percent of Americans who raised a mighty cheer when it was proposed to payback the incineration of innocent Americans at the World Trade Center by blowing to smithereens superior numbers of innocent Afghanis.

If the "I didn't know" excuse won't fly on Afghanistan, think how many fewer grounds there are for clinging to it on Iraq. We knew -- you knew -- where we were headed in the aftermath of 911. The people's representatives who cravenly voted for war -- and who will now advance the cause of peace by legislating huge increases in military spending -- knew. And many in the criminal enterprise that is our current government also knew, even as they cynically retailed the WMDs.

The first worthies interviewed on 60 Minutes the Sunday after the recent election were not Harry Reid or Nancy Pelosi or Charles Schumer or Rahm Emanuel or Howard Dean. Not Sherrod Brown or John Tester or Amy Klobuchar or Jim Webb or Bob Casey or Ben Cardin or Sheldon Whitehouse.

No, the first politicians to come before NBC's mics were John McCain and Joseph Lieberman, the two strongest proponents of peace through war. If that doesn't give you some idea that the fix is in, your obtuseness is willful; you don't want to know.

But a year from now, when the troops are still dying and Iraq is mired deeper in civil war, or two years from now when Hilary Clinton or some other Democrat holds out bloody hands in a plea for your vote, you will not be able claim you didn't know.

It was already clear, before the dust kicked up by 2006 election had time to settle, that the corporate elite is not prepared to give up the empire.

You know what is coming.

More war.

More bloodshed.

In our name.

If we do nothing, let's at least be honest, and admit that we knew.

-------------

Howard Zinn
Democracy Now
A People's History of the United States

Can of Worms: Outdoor Smoking Ban

As you already know, Santa Monica has passed an outside smoking ban. Turns out, it may not be the first, plus Belmont's is even more extreme:

"Belmont is set to make history by becoming the first city in the nation to ban smoking on its streets and almost everywhere else. The Belmont City Council voted unanimously last night to pursue a strict law that will prohibit smoking anywhere in the city except for single-family detached residences. Smoking on the street, in a park and even in one’s car will become illegal and police would have the option of handing out tickets if they catch someone." (Dana Yates, "Belmont to be first U.S. city to ban all smoking", San Mateo County Daily Journal, Nov. 15).

The Plan: McGovern to meet with Congress on war

This week, 60 members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, a 62-member group led by Reps. Lynn Woolsey and Barbara Lee, will listen to former Democratic senator and presidential nominee George McGovern outline his strategy for extracting U.S. troops from Iraq by June (see Iraq, McGovern and Me: Now It's Your Move by Gary Gordon, ImpracticalProposals 2006-11-06).

If Democrats don't take steps to end the war in Iraq soon, they won't be in power very long, McGovern told reporters before a speech at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, according to the Associated Press.

"I think the Democratic leadership is wise enough to know that if they're going to follow the message that election sent, they're going to have to take steps to bring the war to a conclusion," he said.

McGovern's plan — outlined in a new book, "Out of Iraq: A Practical Plan for Withdrawal Now" by McGovern and scholar William Polk — calls for the United States to remove hired mercenaries from the region, push for the removal of British troops and establish a temporary transitional force, similar to police, made up of Muslims from the region.

"Never let the new class of Democrats forget that they're there in considerable part because of the war the American public has now turned against," McGovern said. "That's going to have to be something that they have to explore with Republicans and with the White House." An excerpt from McGovern's book is here.

Joe Lieberman for Secretary of Defense

It's not over 'til it's over.

Maybe majority leader Harry Reid shouldn't measure the curtains in his new office just yet.

Whether he knows it or not, if he decides not to go ahead with the plan to name former CIA director Robert Gates to the job of defense secretary, the president has one more rabbit in his hat. In one move, Bush can take back the Senate and put the Democrats in a box on the war. How? Appoint Joe Lieberman.

Would Lieberman do it? Sure he would. In a house full of egos, Lieberman's is the one that sucks the air out of the room. "Senator," Bush says, "you're the only man in the world who can bring everyone together on Iraq. Peace with Honor, Joe. Only you can do it."

With Joe at the DOD, a nominal Democrat is now responsible for the war. And the appointment can be cited as proof that Bush was serious when, with as straight a face as he can manage, he announced at his press conference yesterday that a new era of bipartisanship has arrived.

Best of all from the White House point of view, Connecticut's Republican governor M. Jodi Rell gets to appoint his replacement until a special election can be held, up to two years from now.

Welcome to Republican control of the Senate.

Resource: FedSpending.org

This "free, searchable database of federal government spending" from OMB Watch, "a nonprofit research and advocacy organization dedicated to promoting government accountability," is drawn "largely from two sources: the Federal Procurement Data System, which contains information about federal contracts; and the Federal Assistance Award Data System, which contains information about federal financial assistance such as grants, loans, insurance, and direct subsidies like Social Security." Includes a handy glossary. <http://www.fedspending.org/>

Iraq, McGovern, and Me: Now It’s Your Move

By Gary Gordon

Last Sunday I watched the most moral, sensible, reasonable hour and forty-five minutes of TV I’ve seen in, well, maybe decades.

So what?

The thing is, it was former Senator George McGovern and a guy named William Polk talking about their plan to get the U.S. out of Iraq while at the same time doing the right thing for the Iraqi people.

I’m not sure that I’ve heard anything as sensible since I heard McGovern in front of the California delegation in Chicago in 1968 declare that he supported withdrawal from Vietnam — a position Hubert Humphrey and the majority of establishment Democrats could not bring themselves to embrace.

The TV show was on BookTV, on a fairly civilized network called C-SPAN2. It’s 48 hours of programming about non-fiction books every weekend. Imagine, as John Lennon might sing, 48 hours of programming every weekend featuring authors; authors interviewed, speaking at bookstores, universities, book festivals, on panels conversing with and debating other authors — all very civil, no wrestlers, shouting heads, sans O’Reilly. And, get this, no commercial interruptions. So, last Sunday, McGovern & Polk, moderated by the distinguished John Brademas, for 105 minutes.

As a disclaimer, before I proceed with an endorsement of McGovern’s & Polk’s plan and urge you to support it and use it as litmus test by which to measure Democrats and others who vie for your vote and support in 2008, I should mention two things: I gave my political heart to McGovern in 1971 as I worked for him in Georgia and Illinois, and I have been an opponent of Bush, his military misadventures, and his wholesale destruction of the American revolution and the American way of life since 1999. It boggles my mind (as it may yours) that so many people are only beginning to grasp that elections are referendums as well as contests for power and that so many people are finally coming around to the notion that 2006 ought to be a referendum on the wars as if 2002 and 2004 were too early to really frame the discussion. In the words of my people, “Oy!”

Be that as it may, 2006 is certainly shaping up as that referendum, even though my friend John, whom I agree with, declares flatly that the war is a side-show.

Side-show?

Yes.

The problems in this country are so great as to require the economic equivalent of the Marshall Plan, the philosophical and legislative muscle of the New Deal, and the vision of many of the founding fathers, Paine, and the unsung revolutionaries combined with Lincoln, Frederick Douglass, the trust-busting inclinations of Teddy R., the visions of Debs, FDR and JFK (jawboning the steel industry, ignoring his generals and top intelligence and military advisers in the Cuban Missile Crisis) and LBJ’s Great Society, plus a dash of early Nader (the Highway 61 Revisited years), MLK and the other great souls who found that by mixing the small c christian values with the Enlightenment with American values, attitudes and resources you could work to create a society that would define greatness not by size or world domination but by a legal and judicial system and political system that was inclusive, democratic, oriented to justice, the dignity of the individual and the clear concept of society, especially anti-European, with its royalty and vulgar, brutal class systems, and especially anti-theocratic.

Note: I have few illusions about American ideals and the American revolution, realize almost everyone and everything mentioned in the paragraph above has it flaws, hypocrisies, buts and “did you knows?” — for further insight, read Gary Nash’s “The Unknown American Revolution” — but I still think justice, democracy, inclusiveness, and individual dignity are pretty good ideas.

Now, short of some as-yet uninvented Star Trek technology, how do we get there from here? How do we heal? How do we roll back the Reagan-Bush-Clinton-Bush years and get back (and forward) to a vision that can incorporate the best of Debs, FDR, LBJ and McGovern? How do we get on a path that picks up where Frank Church et al left off, reining in the CIA and the multinational corporations? How do we end what Marvin Harris called the Permanent War Economy and implement what was politely known a couple of decades ago as Conversion. And how do we do this in time so that the religious fanatics and warmongers in our own leadership and those around the world, and the impacts of Global Warming don’t succeed in irrevocably dooming civilization?

We start with the side-show.

The side-show must be ended so full attention to re-building America can begin.

And how do we end the side-show?

McGovern and Polk have a simple, eloquent, cost-effective, moral and diplomatically ideal plan, published in their book Out of Iraq and summarized in a recent issue of Harper’s <read an excerpt>.

The highpoints of the plan are these:

* Withdraw American military forces and private mercenaries within 6 months, beginning in December
* Terminate all post-war oil contracts and return the Iraqi oil industry to Iraqis
* Adopt and implement an economic plan that would:

1. Rebuild Iraqi infrastructure,
2. Build hospitals and schools,
3. Close U.S. prisons in Iraq and release P.O.W.s,
4. Eliminate U.S. bases,
5. Provide financial assistance to create a national reconstruction corps,
6. Provide for an independent audit of all funds spent on the war,
7. Fund reparations to Iraqi civilians,
8. Fully fund veterans’ services in the U.S.,
9. Rebuild Babylon, and
10. Finance the creation of a national Iraqi police force (instead of an Army).

Additionally, they insist the United States must offer condolences to Iraq. This significant gesture is non- negotiable.

The cost of this plan? Around $12 billion… or, at the current $250 million-a-day cost of the war, about seven weeks cost.

A further note: both Polk and McGovern readily acknowledge that this will be difficult and bloody. It is a plan for what America should do. It is not a plan for what Iraqis should do. There will be violence. People will kill each other. Their plan does not make every Iraqi nice. It does not require everyone behave. It does explicitly state that the major cause of the insurgency, the presence of the American military, will be removed and that over time this will lead to a decrease in violence. As both McGovern and Polk (who has studied the history of insurgency and guerilla warfare) said, bloodbaths predicted rarely occur; historically the withdrawal of the occupiers is the beginning of a return to order.

Now, as to criticisms that will be made, left, right and center, of this plan. Well, the right-wing criticisms are as predictable as they are self-righteous, ignorant, wrong-headed, pathetic, evil and dangerous. ‘Nuff said. As for centrists (Hillary Clinton, Joe Lieberman etc.), they will argue timetable, they will argue details—they will study and argue and bluster and recount their own self-serving histories -- such are the actions of American Tories. As for the left, they might argue that this plan doesn’t address the larger issues (as they see it) of the American war machine, troops in over 140 countries, Israel & Hamas, capitalism, and a host of other worthwhile issues that this plan is not designed to address.

So, what is our plan? You and me? The ones who are against the war, want us out of Iraq, but also believe there is a moral obligation to unbreak some of what was broken.

My humble proposal is this: we, you and me, should endorse this plan. Unequivocally. Without hesitation. Entirely. Not piecemeal. Not qualified. Not “I kind of like it but…” To use the flip of Bush’s line in the sand, with the Ken Kesey spin, “you’re either on the bus or you’re off the bus.”

Further.

We should start insisting that every single Democrat in congress, all the representatives and all the senators, propose this plan as legislation and pass it.

Let’s imagine, for a moment, that the Democrats take the House and Senate. Let’s imagine they endorse and pass into law the McGovern-Polk plan. Let’s suppose Bush doesn’t sign it, or flails about, or tortures syntax, or flails about some more. I like the scenario.

Of course the reality is that this plan won’t satisfy some readers. Some Democrats, even if they take the House and/or Senate, won’t support this.

Then what do we do? Well, then it becomes the litmus test. That is, if you really care about the war, either as the number one issue, or as the side-show that must be dealt with before we can move forward.

See, it’s not enough to be against Bush. It’s not enough to declare a war immoral. It’s not enough to support Democrats (and as we will learn, boys and girls, someday the notion that they are the solution will have to go the way of Santa Claus—but that’s another column) — it’s not enough. You have to have a plan.

Now there is one.

The McGovern-Polk Plan.

Moral, reasonable, sensible.

And timely.

And you have to get the plan implemented.

Your move.

Visit Gary Gordon: <http://www.garygordonproductions.com/>
Get Out of Iraq: A Practical Plan for Withdrawal Now by George McGovern, William R. Polk
Read an excerpt of the book.

When you vote...: Iraq

When you vote, please keep in mind the 103 American soldiers who died in Iraq in October, the bloodiest month in a year and a half, and the third worst casualty count of the war, three and a half years after Bush declared, "Mission accomplished."

2006: Santa Monica city council candidates and ballot measures

The Santa Monica City Council needs fresh blood -- badly. Bullet voting for Terry O'Day introduces the possibility that, if the tallies of the three incumbents seeking reelection are not increased by the voters who select him, he will overcome the advantage of incumbency and come in ahead of one of them. “I will use my experience as a Planning Commissioner, environmental leader and independent small business owner to find workable and sustainable solutions to traffic congestion, crime and homelessness,” O’Day wrote in his candidate statement. A seasoned progressive, O’Day considered running on the SMRR slate, but decided he'd have a better chance of working with the city's warring factions if he stayed independent.

If you want to fully exercise your franchise, two other independent challengers meriting support are Jonathan Mann, a Green Party member and perennial candidate for council, and Linda Armstrong, who ran last time on a “women and children first” platform and wants to require businesses citywide making more than $5 million to pay a living wage.

Measure W - No
Measure is the right name for this. It's a measure of the depth of cynicism among Santa Monica's political class. Placed on the ballot by current Santa Monica city council members, it's an effort to undermine a stronger anti-corruption law passed by the voters six years ago that the politicos have been unable to undo in the courts.

Measure Y - Yes
Measure Y will make personal marijuana use by adults the lowest law enforcement priority for the Santa Monica Police Department, so the cops can focus their time and resources on fighting violent crime, instead of wasting effort arresting and locking up nonviolent pot smokers. Under Measure Y, public use, sale and use by minors remain illegal, as does driving under the influence of pot. If the initiative passes, Santa Monica will join cities such as Oakland and Seattle in taking an important step toward ending the costly, dangerous and useless national "War On Drugs."

2006: Protect Your Vote

YES!, a "national, non-profit, ad-free magazine that supports people's active engagement in building a just and sustainable world," has published "12 ways you can protect your own vote ­and the fairness of the system."

Also, True Majority has prepared an "Election Preparedness Kit," a 3-step plan aimed specifically at election fraud.

2006: In California, it's the year to vote third party

Tuesday's election gives progressives a unique opportunity to give a boost to third parties, especially Peace & Freedom and the Greens.

Perhaps because she is neither as smug nor as arrogant in her affect as Joe Lieberman, Diane Feinstein doesn't inspire the same degree of liberal loathing as the odiferous Connecticut senator, even though California's senior senator has supported the war, is as insensitive to civil liberties as George Bush's favorite Democrat, and, if anything, is more reliably pro-business. Since Feinstein is no danger of defeat at the hands of the GOP's sacrificial lamb, Democrats are freed to cast a vote for Peace and Freedom's Marsha Feinland and help the venerable party of the left stay on the ballot.

The Green and Peace & Freedom candidates are as qualified as their opponents, in many cases considerably more so, so there is no reason not to give them support. Feinland, for example, is not simply an anti-war candidate. She has outlined progressive positions on issues as varied the minimum wage, universal health care, labor laws, the death penalty, the "war" on drugs, education, the environment, electoral reform, among other topics. The bottom line, however, is that a vote for Feinland is a vote for keeping the Peace and Freedom Party on future ballots where it may be needed (the Green Party doesn't face the same risk, because a sufficient number of voters have registered Green).

Phil Angelides, who as the state's treasurer shifted California's pension dollars from the stock market to community investments and who is a strong proponent shareholder activism, would normally be a natural choice for voters who favor universal health care, public campaign financing, and strong environmental laws. The Governator, on the other hand, vetoed universal health care and almost every environmental bill that he could lay his hands on, the good press he's been getting on Global Warming notwithstanding. He also helped defend the unjust, counter-productive and expensive "three strikes" law when it looked like the voters might reform it in the last round of ballot measures two years ago, and has no compunctions against executing people. Arnold has raised more money from special interests than any governor in history; even his allies don't trust him to have a solid position on anything: he is the very model of the packaged candidate -- when the new "conservative" Schwartzenegger was a political disaster in 2004, he reached into the wardrobe department for the "moderate" costume he wore originally to win his office from Gray Davis. It seemed for a while that the real Schwartzenegger had emerged in 2003-4, but it's become clear since he has no principles whatsoever.

However, with the polls showing that Angelides is about to be crushed like a Dixie Cup at Gold's Gym, progressives should consider giving their vote for governor to Peace & Freedom's Janice Jordan. Angelides has run such a disastrous campaign against the incumbent -- for most of it, his principal argument was that he should get your vote because the Republican governor had been seen from time to time in the company of the Republican president -- that you were left to wonder how smart his decisions as chief executive would be. Too bad, because there was a case to be made against Schwartzenegger and Angelides had a strong record from which to make it.

Although, like most reasonable people, Janice Jordan opposes the war, as a candidate for state office she has sensibly not made foreign policy a focus of her campaign. Instead, she has outlined programs to advance health care, public safety, small business, wages, low cost housing, public ownership of utilities, and the arts, among others. Take a look at her website for more details.

Also worth considering is the Green's Peter Camejo, whose biannual runs for office on a sensible reform platform is turning him into the Norman Thomas of the 21st Century (okay, I admit that comparison is a wee bit over the top). Someday, perhaps in the lifetime of someone not yet born, Camejo's calls for reigning in the corporations, for labor rights and a living wage, for fair elections, campaign finance reform and run-offs in state-wide elections, for a just criminal justice system and an end to "three strikes" and the death penalty, for women's rights and reproductive freedom, for a guaranteed quality education for everyone (including equal access to resources such as books, school facilities that work, and great teachers who are paid enough to stay in the profession), for a more rational approach to drug addiction, for universal health care, and so on, will be as commonplace as Thomas' once-radical call for Social Security.

The race for State Treasurer is another chance to boost the third parties. As Attorney General, the Democrat aspirant, Bill Lockyer, scurried to the head of the lynch mob that descended on the capital, faggots ablaze, to execute Stanley "Tookie" Williams, which is enough for me, but in his role as AG, he also actively failed to take on predatory lending, a big problem in California; and he accepted contributions from companies that, as the state's top cop, he was supposed to regulate. By contrast, long-time Oakland community activist Gerald Sanders (Peace & Freedom) and Mehul Thakker (Green) have each put forward thoughtful, progressive ideas on how the state should handle its finances, including tax reform, moving the state's deposits away from corporate banks, investing in renewable energy and otherwise using the state's cache of cash to benefit the environment, the schools, and the state's low-income communities, although Sanders, especially, has a little trouble staying focused on the issues at hand. (You can see and hear Thakker in a video on YouTube.)

Cruz Bustamante's political career would have been more fun to watch if we hadn't also had to endure it. Termed out of the Lt. Governor's chair, where fecklessness is a job qualification, he is running for Insurance Commissioner as the candidate from Weight Watchers. While it's clear he's taking a lot of pride in having slimmed down, the other sources of his self-esteem are a mystery. You'd have thought that his pathetic run for governor in the election that rewarded us der Ahnold would have put a capper on his career in Sacramento, but now he wants a job where, ethically challenged and lazy, he can really do some harm.

In this race, at first he accepted contributions from the insurance industry he is promising to oversee, then turned them back when it looked like enough voters might be offended by this lapse in judgment to force upon him the need to look for real work. Plus, there is no evidence he has -- you should pardon the expression -- the stomach for the job. His Republican opponent, businessman Steve Poizner, will be even less inclined than the feeble Cruz to fight for consumers, leaving voters with a choice between the Green's Larry Cafiero (who earned the coveted endorsement of the San Francisco League of Young Voters' aptly titled "Pissed Off Voter Guide") and Peace & Freedom's Tom Condit, either of whom is preferable to the hacks served up by the major parties.

In a few congressional districts, Green and Peace & Freedom candidates would be the best choices by far.

In the far west's 36th CD, Peace & Freedom's Jim Smith, a labor activist, is waging strong but, alas, futile campaign in the Beach Cities against militarist Jane Harman. Although the right-wing Democrat is wildly out of sync with her district -- she supports every iteration of war and all restrictions on civil liberties (she backed Bush on torture, for pete's sake), as the richest member of Congress (her wealth comes from military contracts, natch), the steely Harman is nearly impossible to challenge. Still, any vote against her will be rewarded in heaven.

Meanwhile, in the 30th, on the west side of L.A. County where I live, Peace & Freedom's Adele Cannon, a veteran campaigner for radical causes, is running against Henry Waxman, outraged at the Democratic congressman for voting for the war and the Patriot Act. Waxman is not nearly as liberal as his reputation, or the politics of his constituents, would lead you to believe. He gets good marks for standing up to the Republicans on the easy issue of corruption, but he has been terrible on the mysteriously difficult-for-Dems matter of U.S. predatoriness in Iraq and (soon) Iran. Send Waxman a message: Give your vote to the feisty Cannon.

The only reason to consider Harman a bigger problem than Howard Berman is that she is infinitely more powerful inside the House (although Nancy Pelosi has promised to depose her from her seat on the intelligence committee should the minority leader become Speaker). The race against Berman is more important than either the Harman or Waxman races, however, because the challenger, Byron De Lear, could actually win! Berman also represents a liberal district -- the 28th covers San Fernando, Pacoima, Arleta, Panorama City, Van Nuys, and North Hollywood. The Valley congressman is the only California Democrat who still supports the war, but if he were as dovish as Ghandi he still should be kicked out for being anti civil liberties, anti corporate accountability, and anti anything that gets in the way of an imperialist foreign policy. De Lear...Now! De Lear...Now! De Lear...Now! Consult the list of towns in the 28th, call your friends who live there and tell them to vote.

In the 29th, covering Glendale and vicinity, another dedicated peace activist, Peace & Freedom's Linda Llamas, and the Green Party's Bill Paparian , a progressive lawyer and former mayor of Pasadena, are spotlighting the dismal record of Democratic incumbent Adam Schiff (no similarity to his namesake on early episodes of Law and Order) rivaling Berman's on civil liberties, foreign policy and the war. Give Schiff a passadena and vote for Llamas or Paparian.

On the Assembly level, Green Ricardo Costa, in the sprawling 44th, centered on Pasadena but extending from La Canada to Duarte, and, in the 53rd running along the beach from Venice to Torrance, Peace & Freedom's Karl Abrams are seasoned activists who would bolster the progressive agenda in Sacramento.

Historically, third parties have been mechanisms for advancing new or initially unpopular political ideas, provided a brake on the excesses of the major parties, and held out the possibility of political change. Rather than vote for defective Democrats because the Republicans have offered someone who may be even worse, this year liberals get a chance to cast votes for third party candidates with clear consciences. The Dems have managed to come up with candidates in some races that are so bad it literally doesn't matter who is victorious. In no contest mentioned here will a third party vote throw the election to a Republican. Nor will any harm come from voting third party in the rare instances where a Green or Peace & Freedom candidate might win: De Lear, for example, has promised to vote with the Democrats to organize the House should the party gain a majority; besides, control of the legislature will be useless anyway, if it is dependent on the likes of Howard Berman.

The Green's Camejo has a TV ad budget of about $7,000, barely coffee money for his bigger rivals, to get a little cable time in Sacramento, the Bay Area and L.A. The gubernatorial hopeful suggests that many Democrats would like to vote Green, but don't want to waste their vote. "This time," Camejo says, "the Democratic candidate is not going to win, so you're free to vote for whoever you want. In fact, a vote for the Democrat will send no message. But a vote for the Green Party...this would be a powerful message." The same argument could be made by the Peace & Freedom Party, if it had $7,000, and a vote for Peace & Freedom for governor and senator is more than a vote against the war; it's also a vote for the long-term viability of alternative politics.