7
Street roots
Sept. 14, 2012
Jill Stein wants to
Occupy the Oval Office
The Green Party presidential candidate
talks about third party potential and the
influence of Occupy on her politics
BY ALAN PRESTON
C O N T R IB U T IN G W R IT E R
ill Stein, the Harvard-trained physician
who is the Green Party candidate for
president, knows what, and who, she is
against.
In 2002, Stein ran against Republican
presidential candidate Mitt Romney in the
race for governor of Massachusetts.
She lost the contest, but Stein won
credibility among voters, which she parlayed
into other bids for Massachusetts office
under the Green-Rainbow Party banner, one
for state representative in 2004, and one for
secretary of state, in 2006.
In that race, Stein received the votes of
more than 350,000 Massachusetts citizens,
the most votes ever received for a Green-
Rainbow Party candidate.
Now Stein is traveling the country on a
grassroots campaign for the nation’s highest
elected office. She’s on the ballot in Oregon
and Washington and seeking a ballot line in
others. In Georgia, Indiana and Missouri,
she’s a write-in candidate.
On a recent stop on the campaign trail,
Stein answered a few questions about her
candidacy.
J
A lan P reston: Why are you running for
president?
Jill Stein: We are in a crisis. People are
losing jobs, unemployment is going up, not
down, and it’s been outrageously high for
years. There are no solutions. Wages are
declining as they have been. People are
losing homes by the millions, and there are
no solutions. (While people suffer) and the
climate is in meltdown, a wealthy few are
making out like bandits, and the political
establishment is making it worse with
austerity politics and tax breaks for the
wealthy.
People are nearing a breaking point, and
I’m running to turn that breaking point into
a tipping point.
A.P.: Do third parties have a chance to win?
J.S.: That’s like asking, will we live to see
tomorrow? We are on a trajectory that is
taking us over the cliff. Jobs are going
overseas, the president is negotiating the
latest free trade agreement that will cut
wages and undermine American sovereignty,
every day there is a new Wall Street fraud,
we continue to see healthcare costs
skyrocket, students are turned into
indentured servants, the climate is in
meltdown, our civil liberties are under
attack. We can’t grin and bear it. Our
economy and planet can’t survive.
Every step of that fight is critical. The
idea that we can’t vote for ourselves is really
dangerous. (Those in power) want to assert
politics of fear. Look at where politics of fear
has brought us. If we silence ourselves, the
voice of public interest, all we are left with
is the public relations campaigns of the Wall
Street-sponsored candidates.
It’s not just OK to vote your values, it’s
life-saving, job-saving and planet-saving to do
so.
This propaganda about throwing away
your vote has it backwards. To vote for
either Wall Street candidate gives them a
mandate for four more years. Let’s cast a
vote for ourselves and a vision for our
future. Politics is like an abusive relationship
where so many people have been taught to
speak the apologies of their abuser. They
can just walk away and walk into a healthy
mutually respectful political relationship.
That’s where we need to be going.
A.P.: Many say that candidates who get
elected president end up being limited by
politics and partisanship to what they can
actually get accomplished once in office. How
could you avoid this?
J.S.: By not selling your soul to get to
office to start with. People like Obama, who
seem to be switching allegiances the minute
they get elected, had sold those allegiances
in order to get to office. The president has
been paying back his corporate sponsors,
especially Wall Street, defense contractors,
fossil fuel goliaths and the health insurance
and pharmaceutical industry. They all got a
good return on their investment. My
campaign and the Green Party does not
accept corporate money. We do not accept
money from lobbyists. We don’t accept
money from CEOs of private industry who
hire lobbyists. If you have an agenda to your
contribution, we don’t take it. Most of our
money comes in pretty anonymously over
the Web. I do very little fundraising. To get
things done in office, I will rely on everyday
people to be the engine of our democracy.
Let me give you an example. Recently the
SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) bill was
stopped in its tracks. SOPA would have
P H O T O C O U R T E S Y O F JILL S T E IN F O R P R E S ID E N T
privatized the Internet. It was supposed to
be a slam dunk. Word got out, and people
called and emailed their elected
representatives to tell them ‘Don’t vote for
the bill.’ We the people stopped it in a blink
of an eye. This should be the process for all
the important bills. The president should be
a whistleblower and let people know what
bills are coming up that matter ... and
encourage them to contact their elected
reps. The president could represent the
United States for a change, not lobbyists.
collaboration?
J.S.: (One is) the abolition of slavery.
from the get-go and continue to do so. I
share the gratitude of so many Americans to
the Occupy movement for reviving hope,
democracy and justice in America.
I rely on Occupy as an engine of a social
movement. An electoral movement can do
nothing without a social movement to work
with hand in hand. Throughout history, it is
the alliance of a social movement on the
ground with an independent political party
that has worked together to make
transformational change.
There was a social movement for abolition,
and the Liberty Party drove the abolition
agenda to the Republicans, which became a
political party under Lincoln and carried the
issue into the mainstream. Another example
is women’s suffrage. A strong social
movement worked hand in hand with (the)
Women’s Party, which helped make the
right to vote for women a political issue and
drive it forward. Another example is the
labor movement, where a social movement
on the ground was strengthened by the
Socialist party, Progressive Party and
Communist Party, all of which forced
workers’ issues and drove forward the
agenda of a 40-hour work week, safe
workplaces, social security and the New
Deal.
These reforms were all the product of a
partnership between a social movement on
the ground and an independent political
party that could drive that movement into a
broader political agenda. As Frederick
Douglass said: “Power concedes nothing
without a demand. It never did and it never
will.”
A.P.: What are a couple examples of this
Reprinted from Real Change, Seattle, Wash.
A.P.: How was your campaign influenced
by and accountable to the Occupy movement?
What do you think the movement has
accomplished?
J.S.: We have been supporting Occupy
S is te rs Of The Rood
c r e a tin g c o m m u n ity ,
c r e a tin g c h a n g e , t o g e t h e r
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