Fighting Bob Fest - Speech by Doris Granny D Haddock

September 6, 2008

We do not know what the future holds for our dear nation or for the world. Certainly the challenges are like no other time. If you think of the physical challenges before us: the earth's climate, its food supply, its fresh water resources, its energy resources, we might as well be in some science fiction disaster movie. But so be it. We will move ahead and do what we can do to survive.

We americans will be coming at the future with a new president and perhaps a new kind of politics. This may give us some enthusiasm and hope, regardless of which candidate we are supporting. They are both decent men and strong leaders. I am an old democrat, so i indeed will be voting for mr. Obama with great joy, but mr. Mccain is someone i have had some dealings with, and i will not disparaDge my friends who choose to vote for him. I walked some 3,200 miles for his bill and he ga ve me a pair of sneakers.

Whoever our next president may be, that person will face a fact more difficult than all the other difficult facts, and here it is: congress is so deadlocked by special interests that real reform on any front--environmentaal, health, education or the general welfare of the people - will be difficult to impossible.

The next president wll have to go directly to the american people and make the case for needed action, and this must be done with such moral force that the people will nearly rise up to demand action by their elected leaders in congress and locally. Mr. Obama seems particularly suited to this high task, and that is the reason many people think he is a man of history. But mr. Mccain may rise to that moment also, if he is given the chance and if he will disentngle himself from the special interests that he rails against yet embraces.

This election will be crucial to our future, a fact we do not argue - any of us. Those of us who keep an eye over our shoulder for the darker intrigues of politics must keep working to assure that voting systems are open and not corrupted and that the right of the people to elect people who represent their dreams is not overthrown--this right is our primary freedom. When there are big shakeups at the pentagon, as there have been recently, we who see shadows look carefully indeed. We have lost too many of our greatest leaders already.

The stranglehold that the k street

Lobbying culture has on our government, which is a cancer on our democracy, must be ended. I would urge the new president to lead the charge to outlaw lobbying by defense contractors, and by industries that rely heavily on public money, such as the pharmaceutical and health insurance industries. Let their executives be heard in congress, but let them do so in open hearings. Let them speak when they are spoken to. Let them answer questions when they are asked for their answers. But most of us will agree that their power has grown too great. Eisenhower, only three years before john kennedy's death, warned us against the military-industrial complex. It is time to marginalize this dangerous and undemocratic force in our lives.

Clearly, we must tread crefully when we dare limit any person's free speech. But there is a vital difference between a defense executive making a presentation at the pentagon or before a congressional committee and that same executive hosting parties and providing jets and companions to those same generals and elected leaders. We need to draw a very careful line, but draw a line we mtust.

Who would not stand behind any candidate or newly-elected president who proposed such a new law? We would camp in every street of washington until it passed !

Further, we must draw another line. When an elected leader accepts money from some special interest whose issues are subject to that official's actions and votes, there is a conflict of interest. The present laws, local and federal, limit conflict of interest to the acceptance of private benefits, but a campaign donations or campaign assistance is less than a half step from a private gain for such officials. We must expand our confli ct of interest laws so that no public official may vote on an issue that affcts his or her major financial donors. If this law would encourage the otherwise slow advance of the new reforms that publicly finance election campaigns, all the better.

Until we free our elected leaders of the cancer of K Street and widespread conflict of interests among our elected leaders, no serious reforms will be possible.

As we move into the general election campaign, let us push these ideas with our candidates. The future of nature is at stake. The future of weather is at stake. The futures of our children and grandchildren are at stake. Let us not simply hope that a new leader, a better leader, will solve all our problems. America's closet is very old now and needs a big cleaning. Let's do it.

We have been running america for many decades with negative visualizations. What we think, and what we dream, and what we say can have an effect in the world. We have to make room in the world for what we dream by actually dreaming it, by making space for it, by making it imaginable to others through our own creative leadership in our own families and neighborhoods

Let's not be tired. Let's not be old. Let's make a new beginning by getting together with our neighbors more often. How about next week? Let's plant some more vegetable gardens, let's make some funiture or art. Let's fix up some bicycles. Let's get the whole neighborrhood to go down to visit the local office of our elected people and get them on board if we have a problem or scare the hell out of them.

This is our democracy if we can keep it. This is a grand planet if we can save it.

It really is up to us; each person is the hero of the world and in saying that, i do not joke or exaggerate. Every one of you has the power to do this, to start something big and necessary and beautiful.

i have travelled these last four years to states where work is being done on public funding of elections.

I have been asked: "when is new hampshire going to go for public funding of elections, granny d?" as you know, we now have three states with citizen-owned elections : maine, arizona by citizen's initiative and connecticut by legislation. I am proud to announce that this past month our governor, johnlynch, has signed an amendment to our bill hb794. A seven person commission has now been chosen to find a means of funding this bill. The commission will reporrt to the house and senate on december 1, 2008.

During those intervening months our intention is to educate our constituents the how and why of public funding. Our goal is to acquaint the people so that they will become a force to convince our legislature to follow connecticut’s example and become the #4 state to have citizen-owned elections. We will help our commission to find a way to fund public funding, without asking for money from the general fund.

New Hampshire, and Maine, Arizona and Connecticcut could become models for othe states who are eager to have the system but have not found a way to fund it. When sufficient states have accepted the system, a critical mass will form and it will go federal.

We are making history ladies and

Gentlemen please help us by changing your state to public funding of elections . You will be helpng to change your state, our country and the world. Do not think i exaggerate. It can be done. Here is how pblic funding would work. First it would be voluntary, so there would be no constitutional problems about anyone’s rights. The candidate who wants to participate has to personally collect a certain number of qualifying signatures and small contributions, usually in the $5 range, from people who live in his district. By the time he or she has collected the signatures he/she would know pretty well what was going on in the neighborhood: who was in trouble, who was alone and lonely, what teacher in the local district high school was liked, and what one was not, how the churches were doing, etc. You would be the friend and they would be your supporters. Today we do not see our representative, until election time, and then, perhaps only by telephone when your vote is needed.

When the candidate meets the required number of signatures and agrees not to use other money than is given him by the government, the candidate will be responsible to those who elected him and has no obligation to any corporation or special interest money. The candidate does not need to spend time on the phone asking for money for his campaign.

And when you are as old as i am, you will sit back and smile, satisfied that you did the right thing when you had your brief moment to make things better. The other thirty states who are at different stages of clean elections will follow our lead, and that critical mass will form and it will go federal as many of our good laws have been accomplished. We will be a different state, a different county, for we will have changed the world.