'I have always had a relationship with Greens...' - Cynthia McKinney

(Blogger's host was down most of the morning, otherwise I'd have got this post up earlier! Oops!)

Cynthia McKinney comes to Burlington on Thursday - 7 PM, Contois Auditorium, City Hall - and will be in Montpelier on Friday - 9 AM in the State House cafeteria.

In anticipation of her visit to Vermont, McKinney was interviewed this week by Seven Days. (I could have done without 7D's headline, though.) Honestly, the fixation - no, obsession - that Democrats and the MSM have with Nader + Greens = Spoiler, and now extending that to McKinney, is getting tiresome. A Cynthia McKinney candidacy wouldn't spoil anything. (The Dems and Repubs have already done that.) She would offer the American voter a choice. The paper's readership - some would say eclectic - is basically Democratic Party members, with a few Progs thrown in. My hope is that they will want to come to all the Vermont events and listen to Cynthia! There are enough disgruntled Dems (and Progs) in our state who might just like what she has to say.

SD: Considering your growing association with the Green Party, what has attracted you to it?

CM: I have always had a relationship with Greens: from my very first campaign for the Georgia Legislature, to the campaign anticipated by many people in 2008. After I spoke out against George Herbert Walker Bush’s decision to bomb Baghdad in 1991, I spoke on the floor of the Georgia House against that decision. My colleagues got up and walked out on me and I was vilified all over the state. My patriotism was questioned and I was compared to Julian Bond. Honestly, that was the beginning of real outreach to me by peace groups all over the country, and women’s groups who felt my position was right.

SD: How would you describe the state of the Democratic Party today?

CM: The Democratic Party has left many of its voters behind.

SD: The Republican Party?

CM: The Republican Party has left many of its voters behind.

SD: What is your view on the role of third-party politics?

CM: I’m given the example of the Abolitionist Party that didn’t win a single election but was right on the issue of slavery and affected the course of American politics for the better. Not many people at the time would have associated themselves with such a movement; of course that doesn’t mean that the abolitionist movement wasn’t necessary, and it certainly was right.

SD: Many Americans were angered when Ralph Nader ran for president on the Green Party ticket in 2000, and blame him for President Bush’s being elected. What would you say to those voters?

CM: The assertion is made only by those who don’t know what happened in the 2000 election, or by those who want to dissuade people from looking for alternatives to the lack of representation they have now. First of all, nearly 100 percent of blacks who were registered to vote in Florida actually showed up and voted on Election Day to send a message to Jeb Bush. The mobilization was massive. Thousands of their votes were not counted. Democrats had only to defend their right to vote and demand that their votes be counted. That did not happen.

Read it all here