Why we support B.J. Lawson
This is a community of Democrats in and
around the 4th District of North Carolina, and indeed from around the
entire state and the entire country, who support the campaign of
William "B.J." Lawson for House of Representatives. You may ask why we
support B.J. when there is an 11-term and well-known Democratic
incumbent, David Price, currently representing the 4th District. Well,
for starters:
1) B.J. is a passionate advocate for protection of
civil liberties, staunchly opposing measures such as the Patriot Act,
the Real ID, the Military Comissions Act, the Violent Radicalization
and Homegrown Terrorism Act, warrantless wiretaps, torture, and other
measures fundamentally violating the Bill of Rights. He has come out in
favor of the American Freedom Agenda Act, a bill that will go to great
lengths to preserve the Bill of Rights and Constitutional checks and
balances that has been praised by Naomi Wolff, liberal author of The
End of America and champion of civil liberties.
While David
Price has supported the recent FISA Bill and has spoken out against
many of the transgressions of the Bush Administration, he demonstrated
wholly irresponsible leadership in voting for the Patriot Act when it
first came up in 2001, even though 62 of his fellow Democrats had the
foresight and courage to vote against it at the time amid great
awareness among the civil libertarian community of its flatly
unconstitutional provisions. His vote to institute the Real ID, an
alarming step toward a National ID Card and the rise of the "database
state," is also shameful. Granted, the Real ID was just one item that
was stuffed into a much larger emergency appropriations bill, but he
nonetheless should have shown the courage to oppose the bill based on
its clear violation of the freedom and privacy rights of Americans.
Congressman Price also voted in favor of the scantly covered Violent
Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act of 2007, a bill
eerily reminiscent of the McCarthyism of the 1950s.
With the
assault on our basic freedoms that the Bush Administration and others
have waged this decade, we need leadership in Washington that doesn't
just uphold the Bill of Rights only part of the time, or when issues
related to it are in the public limelight; we need leadership that will
always conduct a deeply principled, vigilant, and tireless fight to
defend our liberty. B.J. Lawson will bring this leadership.
2)
B.J. will oppose any attempt by the Bush Administration and Department
of Homeland Security to impose the proposed National Bio-and-Agro
Defense Facility (NBAF) on the 4th District of North Carolina. This
facility, which will be researching over 100 diseases with no current
cure (including Foot and Mouth disease), will be within 50 miles of 2.2
million people if placed in Butner, one of the proposed locations.
Simply put, this lab is a disaster waiting to happen from
environmental, public health, and property rights perspectives. As a
poster on the Democratic blog Daily Kos described the situation:
The great minds in Bush’s Homeland Security department came up with a
doozie this year: let’s move the facility where we study the most
infectious and dangerous disease among livestock from the isolated
island it’s now on (accessible only by ferry or helicopter) and put it
where there are lots of livestock operations. Brilliant!
Can you
imagine the next Foot and Mouth outbreak occuring in North Carolina on
account of this facility being so close to livestock in the area? There
is a reason why the current facility is currently located in the
relatively isolated location of Plum Island, NY.
And what does David Price think of NBAF?
My current assessment is that the Granville County site would be a good
location for the NBAF, and that our region of North Carolina would reap
many economic and agricultural benefits from such a facility.
Wrong answer. This is not responsible leadership.
3)
B.J. is a principled opponent of the Iraq War and supports immediate
military withdrawal. He recognizes it not only as an isolated blunder,
but as a typical misadventure in what has been a fundamentally
misguided, arrogant, and costly foreign policy by our government of
aggressive interventionism. Scores of national security analysts-
including Michael Scheuer, former chief of the bin Laden Unit of the
CIA- have identified American interventionism in the Muslim world as
the chief motivator of al-Qaeda. Osama bin Laden himself in his 1998
declaration of war on the United States stated his three reasons for
doing so as: unconditional U.S. support for Israel, the bombing of and
economic sanctions placed on Iraq during the 1990s, and the stationing
of U.S. troops on the Arabian Peninsula.
While David Price voted
against the initial authorization for war against Iraq, he has been on
the wrong side on a great many issues regarding Iraq and, more broadly,
foreign policy. He voted for the Iraq Liberation Act of 1998, which
effectively set regime change in Iraq as a policy of the United States
and has been used as justification by the neoconservatives for the
invasion and occupation of Iraq. He voted for the Iran
Counter-Proliferation Act of 2007, which expressly gives the Bush
Administration the authority to define the Iranian Revolutionary Guard,
a special forces unit of the Iranian armed forces, as a terrorist
organization. This is eerily reminiscent of the rhetoric and tactics
that the Administration and its neoconservative supporters used to
promote the invasion of Iraq, and as John Edwards said during the
October MSNBC debate in Pennsylvania, "You give this president an inch,
and he'll take a mile." Further facilitating the neocon saber-rattling
toward Iran, David Price voted for H.Con.Res.21, which called for the
trial of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to be "tried for
inciting genocide" for "calling for Israel to be wiped off the map," a
claim that is overly belligerent and is based on statements by him for
which there is evidence of mistranslation. What is ironic is that the
resolution overtly states strong support of the Israeli government,
stating:
Resolved by the House of Representatives (the Senate concurring), That Congress--
(4) reaffirms the unwavering strategic partnership and close friendship
between the United States and Israel and reasserts the steadfast
commitment of the United States to defend the right of Israel to exist
as a free and democratic state.
So David Price is supporting the
trial for "inciting genocide" of Ahmadinejad for statements that likely
were mistranslated about a country whose government has a record of
human rights abuses, all the while asserting our "close friendship"
with this government, one of the very reasons stated by Osama bin Laden
for his declaration of war against the United States. This is a perfect
reflection of the blunder of US foreign policy, as we claim to uphold
the values of freedom, democracy, and human rights while supporting
governments that work against these principles and using our military
to impose our will on other countries, while spending a lot of money to
do so. If we want an effective foreign policy that promotes our
national security and interests, we need one of non-interventionism
that focuses on diplomacy and even-handedness with all countries, not
"close friendship" with some and condemnation of others. As these
stances and others throughout his career demonstrate, David Price will
not work hard to advocate this change. B.J. Lawson will.
4) B.J.
Lawson and his campaign, unlike the Bush Administration and most
Republicans in Congress, is a principled fiscal conservative who
understands that we as a nation cannot continue the fiscal course we
are on or we risk financial and economic collapse. He supports a
Balanced Budget Amendment to the Constitution, an important step on
fiscal policy advocated by Bill Richardson during the Democratic
Presidential Primaries this year. Unlike most politicians, including
life-long academic and Party politician David Price, B.J. actually has
the experience of starting a business from scratch, turning it into a
successful enterprise, and working hard to get his family out of debt.
Thus, not only does he have intellectual reasons for supporting fiscal
responsibility, but he has a very personal foundation for doing so.
David
Price, on the other hand, talks a good game on fiscal issues, but he's
not the steadiest walker. This year, he voted for a Concurrent Budget
Resolution that planned the budget for the next five years, with
planned spending amounting to nearly $16 trillion and planned tax
revenues amounting to $14 trillion. So effectively, David Price voted
for a document that plans for the government to create $2 trillion more
in new debt over the next five years. And what does he have to say
about his vote?
This budget is a clear reflection of our
priorities to build a stronger economy, keep our communities safe, and
to do both in a fiscally responsible way,” Price said. “After President
Bush and the Republican Congress turned projected surpluses into record
deficits, this Congress is committed to reversing the damage.
Fiscally
responsible? In what universe is the creation of nearly $2 trillion of
new debt, which amounts to an average of almost $400 billion in federal
deficits over the next five years and even more raiding of the Social
Security trust fund, "fiscally responsible?" This isn't just the mark
of someone who doesn't understand the necessity of taking strong action
now to eliminate the deficit; it's the mark of someone who is so
entrenched in the Washington establishment that he's out of touch with
reality. Partisan finger-pointing is not going to be enough to
resolving the fiscal problems of this country. We need strong
leadership on both sides of the aisle, and B.J. Lawson will provide
this leadership from the right.
5) B.J. Lawson has made eloquent
and strong stands of opposition to corporate welfare, an issue that
absolutely must be dealt with. As he notes in a blog post on his
website, our current system is not a free market system, it is a
corporatist system where the government actively favors selected firms.
He has also brought a very important issue to light that is not often
discussed, which is the fundamental flaws of our monetary and banking
system, one of which being the level to which it favors large banks and
financial institutions at the expense of working Americans. This
corporatist system is riddled with inefficiency and wasted resources,
and it is facilitating and promoting many of the social problems we as
progressives seek to address.
David Price is the poster child of
the apparatus in Washington that favors corporate America. His donor
list is full of high-roller donors and corporate PACs. It should come
as no surprise, then, that he supports legislation such as the recent
Farm Bill, a $300 billion giveaway to large corporate farms. He has
supported "free trade" agreements such as NAFTA that favor large
multinational corporations.
6) Congressman Price ignored his constiuents and voted twice for the Wall Street Bailout. He even brags about being able to squeeze in some earmarks. We don't necessarily disagree that the earmarks were good, but if they are good allow them to stand on their own merit; don't pile them into a bill that is obviously leaving the station.
The bottom line is that this is a very important election at a time in our history when we face a number of very important issues that must be resolved soon. To do this, we need public servants in Congress who understand the issues, have real-world experience that serves them well in tackling them, that know the need for change, that will not let partisan bickering get in the way of progress, and that are aware of their duty to uphold and defend the Constitution. David Price has simply been in Congress for too long, and he has demonstrated throughout his career to be a member of the Washington establishment, and as such he is no longer a reliable agent for change. We do not agree with B.J. Lawson on everything, but we agree with him on some of the most important issues of the day and know him to be a a man of principle, integrity, and courage, as demonstrated by his willingness to disagree with the Republican Party line on many visible issues and to even criticize the leadership of the organization. He will be a hard-working, responsible, and diligent Congressman. It is for these reasons that we enthusiastically support B.J. Lawson for U.S. Congress from North Carolina's 4th District.
Ray McKinnon (on behalf of)
Dems for Lawson
www.demsforlawon.com
Issues:
Comments
just curious