Obama-Clinton: Make It So

By Si Dunn

After the results in the South Dakota and Montana primaries are known, Hillary Clinton is expected to acknowledge that Barack Obama has gathered the necessary delegates to secure the nomination, and she will end her run for the presidency.

The best strategy now for uniting the Democratic Party and defeating John McCain will be for Sen. Obama to ensure that Sen. Clinton becomes his running mate. This will help minimize race and gender in the equations for future presidential campaigns. And it will unite two powerful and inspiring voices for renewed action and change in our tired and troubled land.

Obama-Clinton. Make it so!

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What Now for Hillary?

By Si Dunn

The Democrats’ nominating mess/process effectively could be over by early June. But many political columnists and political leaders want Hillary Clinton to drop out now, while she’s riding high in West Virginia and still--theoretically--has some sort of mathematical chance, visible at least through rose-colored magnifying glasses.

A slim majority of Democrats are ready to nominate an inspiring speaker—Barack Obama—-who won’t have quite enough political experience to pull Humpty Dumpty America back together again and also take on an enormous list of challenges at the same time. Not without one hell of a lot of economic and diplomatic Superglue and significant help from both sides of the political aisle. (And don’t count on much from the Republican Party, of course, except grumpy lip service and petulant foot dragging, once John McCain and many GOP incumbents are trounced at the polls.)

Pundits such as E.J. Dionne of the Washington Post also want Sen. Clinton to forgo any thoughts of the vice presidency in favor of becoming “a powerful figure in the Democratic Party”—-which, in case he hasn’t noticed lately, she already is. Dionne wants her to clear the way for a “Clinton supporter” such as Sen. Evan Bayh of Indiana, Gov. Ted Strickland of Ohio, or Gov. Ed Rendell of Pennsylvania to become the vice-presidential nominee.

Any of these gentlemen no doubt could be reasonably good veeps. But now is not the time for “reasonably good.”

Whether Obama and Clinton secretly like each other or hate each other, millions of people from many diverse corners of this nation have voted for them in almost equal numbers. They want inspiration—-“Yes, we can!”—-but they also know the challenges ahead demand deep ranges of national and international experience, much of which Hillary Clinton (and well-picked advisors) can provide.

Many voters also believe the time is long overdue to break two glass ceilings at once in the White House: race and gender.

We can’t have a co-presidency, of course. But an Obama-Clinton (or Clinton-Obama) ticket would present the strongest possible combination of inspiration and experience. We will need that—-and we will need them--to help get us off our dispirited butts and start cleaning up the massive wreckage left behind by Hurricane Bush.
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Indiana Limbaugh and the Temple of Gloom

By Si Dunn

The Washington Post has reported that conservative radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh is claiming smashing success for his “Operation Chaos” in the Indiana Democratic primary.

In several recent primaries, Limbaugh has urged Republican listeners “to vote for Clinton to ‘bloody up Obama politically’ and prolong the Democratic fight.”

According the Post: “Limbaugh crowed about the success of his ploy all day Tuesday, featuring on-air testimonials from voters in Indiana and North Carolina who recounted their illicit pleasure in casting a vote for Clinton.” Limbaugh contends that “his” voters cast the votes that gave Hillary Clinton her narrow, 14,000-vote win.

Now, in his own “Mission Accomplished” moment, however, Limbaugh is telling his 20 million listeners that Barack Obama actually will prove to be the weaker of the two Democrats against John McCain. (Meaning: “I know I told you I wanted that Devil incarnate, Hillary, to win. But now that she can’t win and I’m beginning look stupid, I want Obama to win, so I’ll look smart again.”)

Meanwhile, supporters of Obama, Clinton and a possible Obama-Clinton ticket may be tempted to respond: "Hey, wake up and smell the change, Rushmore. Once the Democrats unite and line up their new waves of registered voters, it’s gonna be tsunami time for anything resembling neoconservative Republicanism. Your signal’s gonna take a big-time fade, bud."

I had a Rush Limbaugh-Indiana moment a few years ago while driving through some of that state’s rural areas. I turned on my car’s AM radio, hoping to get some sense of the local, small-town news or music. Instead, on every audible channel from 540 to 1610 kilohertz, it was all Rush Limbaugh all the time, amplitude-modulating his spleen.

It was hot outside in the Indiana sun, and almost no one was visible doing any work in the great fields of corn. There seemed to be no life, either, in the widely scattered farmhouses. Yet, Rush Limbaugh’s radio rants were flowing over and through thousands of acres of corn, from horizon to horizon. And the stalks seemed utterly unmoved by his vitriol.

For just a moment, it reminded me of a grim movie scene where emaciated prisoners stand huddled inside a barbed-wire compound while loudspeakers blare “Achtung! Achtung!” and warn against trying to escape.

American politics has long had its share of colorful scoundrels, thieves and fools. Rush Limbaugh’s “Operation Chaos,” however, is just one more sad example of how small-minded people can become once they convince themselves that they are completely right and anyone who doesn’t agree with them is completely wrong.

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Democrats for McCain: Are You Crazy?

By Si Dunn

Pollsters analyzing the Indiana and North Carolina primary results are again reporting a disturbing trend that has been seen in earlier primaries.

A number of voters in the Democratic elections are saying they will switch to John McCain if Barack Obama or (to a much lesser extent) Hillary Clinton is not the nominee.

Of course, some of these party-hoppers are Republicans who have showed up at Democratic polling stations specifically to vote against Clinton or Obama. They are hoping to help steer one candidate or the other into the general election in the belief that John McCain can beat them.

Others are Republicans so disgruntled with the Bush Administration that they are willing to back "an inspiring speaker"--Obama--despite his unabashed liberalism and somewhat thin record. Yet, if Obama is not the nominee, most of those Republicans say they will slink straight back to McCain rather than vote for Hillary Clinton and her slightly more conservative agendas. Never mind that John McCain basically is George Bush in an older--and, okay, yes, genuinely battle-scarred--flight suit. (And never mind that neither one of them could possibly outfly the embattled president in Independence Day.)

Some Democrats completely enamored of one candidate, however, say they will abandon the party and vote for John McCain in November if Obama (mostly) or Clinton (to a much lesser extent) is not the nominee.

Which raises three questions for these voters: (1) Are you crazy? (2) Have you paid any attention to these past eight years? And (3), do you always choose political petulance over practicality and common sense?

We need true change this time, not another pilot who will keep up the bombing runs on Iraq and the nation's economy.

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Clinton-Obama or Obama-Clinton (Again!)

By Si Dunn

They both want to serve, and the current predictions are, they each will reach the Democratic Convention with no clear advantage over the other.

So here's the proposal: Let them both serve. It will take both of them to help straighten out the enormous messes that the current Administration will leave behind.

By convention time, whoever has garnered the most delegates should be the candidate for President, and the other one should be willing to run for Vice President. No angry arguments, no bitter backroom deals. Drop the balloons; start the grand speeches.

Glass ceilings will be shattered, greatly minimizing race and gender as future issues in American politics. Two very good political camps will be melded into one unstoppable November steamroller. And both candidates will end up in the White House in positions of leadership, power and influence.

With such an agreement in place and known, Senators Clinton and Obama could stop the negative bombing runs on each other. They could focus harder on giving us their visions for our future and let us simply compare them and decide.

Individually, they are very vulnerable to savage attacks by Republican "swift boats." The GOP's "more of the same, only slightly different" message will not resonate with voters this fall. So the inevitable strategy will be to make endless torpedo runs:

"...And, when Obama was eight years old, he grew fascinated with the changing shapes of clouds and soon became a card-carrying member of the Weather Underground. "

"...And, when Hillary Rodham Clinton was six years old, one of her classmates punched her on the playground, and she cried and started espousing liberal causes. Do you really want a crybaby liberal as Commander in Chief?"

Together as running mates, however, Senators Clinton and Obama would be the Republicans' worst nightmare. The GOP swift boats would steam in and start blasting away at a wide array of targets (both Clinton and Obama do have plenty of baggage that reflects political radar signals). But the swift boats ultimately would sink themselves (and John McCain), because voters quickly would tire of the constant explosions of negativity and just tune out the strident yammerings.

Hope and change. Those are the two main messages that will resonate this fall. John McCain and the Republicans can't offer those visions this time. Together, however, Clinton and Obama can...no matter whose name is listed first on the ticket.

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My Baggage Can Beat Your Baggage

By Si Dunn

Yawn. Another Democratic “debate.” Another rash of unscientific online polls claiming Obama “won.” More newspaper articles contending Clinton put Obama “on the defensive.” And major television journalists still harping on flag lapel pins, angry pastors and invisible snipers.

One more voice of opinion won’t matter in this cosmically insignificant scale of things. But here it is, anyway-- just another tiny crackle in the rising, roaring, utterly unfocused static of the blogosphere.

In the Philadelphia television event, Sen. Clinton came across as more competent—and advised and rehearsed—particularly on matters of international affairs, while Sen. Obama came across as more genuine but a bit less ready to serve, particularly on matters of international affairs.

Hillary’s main credibility problem is that her face still lights up with a “Gotcha!” little smirk and smile when she gets an opportunity to score a political dig against Obama. It’s at least partially her inability to disconnect from old-style politics that keeps her low in the polls of personal likeability.

Barack’s main problem is that he is still—bottom line--more smooth political style than actual political substance. Of course, in America, style almost always wins over substance, because most people don’t like to pay any attention to details until after something happens that that they don’t like.

Hillary Clinton may yet squeak out a win in Pennsylvania. However, she may not win the nomination unless she learns very quickly how to come down to the level of talking with (not just to) voters directly across a kitchen table, over coffee and cookies, with absolutely nowhere else to go for a few hours on a rainy afternoon.

She does have baggage; she’s right about that. Countless people have rummaged through it, and some are still rummaging through it, desperately looking for any nuggets of undiscovered dirt—or any new clues as to who she really is behind that policy wonk facade.

But we all have baggage that we struggle to deal with or hide or ignore or wish away.

As our potential leader and commander in chief, Hillary Clinton needs to sit down with us now and tell us honestly, in unflinching depth and detail, how her famous baggage has affected her, how she deals with it, and, most importantly, how she will keep dealing with it if she returns to the White House next January.

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Memo to Obama, Clinton and McCain: Shut Up (Again!) About Each Other Already

The political idiocy just never stops.

In the seemingly neverending--and endlessly stupid--game of campaign "Gotcha!", now we have Sen. Clinton accusing Sen. Obama of looking down his nose at weary middle-class voters. We have Sen. Obama responding by criticizing Sen. Clinton for voting for a bankruptcy bill backed by credit card companies. And we have Sen. McCain's campaign accusing Sen. Obama of being "elitist" and "condescending" and "out of touch" in his views.

Can someone kindly explain how any of this (and its accompanying mini-firestorm in the weekend news media) has helped any voter anywhere learn anything new and useful about any of the candidates and where they stand on any issue?

"Gotcha!" politics is utterly useless, except that it gives the news media a convenient excuse for avoiding more substantial reporting. And it is totally insulting to voters who want to give fair consideration to all candidates.

Indeed, the whole campaign process now is broken and needs to be scrapped and replaced with a long series of public and televised forums where the candidates have to explain themselves and their hopes and proposals for America--without any mention or implied criticism of other candidates in the race.

American voters are smart enough to pick their leaders without the "help" of campaigns that try constantly to undermine their opponents or make them look stupid.

It's the campaigns and their candidates--every one of them--that end up looking absurd.

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Democrats for McCain? Few Will Remain

A new poll is raising flags of hysteria and giddiness among some of the political candidates’ supporters and opponents. And once again the media is focusing mainly on how those flags, metaphorically, are rippling and popping in the wind.

We still aren’t being told enough about who the candidates really are, what they really believe, where they get their advice and counsel, how they really define the major issues facing the nation, and why they really think they can make a difference.

According to CNN, a recent Associated Press poll shows that Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and John McCain are essentially tied, and McCain may be “benefiting from the drawn out Democratic primary race.”

The AP survey also supposedly found that “[c]lose to a quarter of Obama supporters reported they will back McCain if the Illinois senator fails to get the nomination, while a third of Clinton backers said they'd vote Republican if Obama is the Democratic nominee, “ according to the CNN story.

Actually, it’s difficult to believe that that many supporters of Obama and Clinton would throw over either Democrat in favor of at least four more years of rip-off economics, Middle East quagmire, and political stalemate.

In many other news accounts and blogs, there have been numerous reports of Republicans saying they have had absolutely enough of their party’s hard rightward drift and economic decline under Bush-Cheney and see little hope of meaningful change under McCain. They would rather vote for Obama or Clinton than bear any further responsibly for the possibility of a John McBush Administration.

It’s a safe bet that most Democrats who say they will back McCain if their candidate loses are just trash-talking to hear their jaws flap during the run-up to the Democratic Convention. Once their candidate does lose, and they realize it’s the other one vs. John McBush-McCheney, they’ll likely eat their threats and vote, even if grudgingly, for real change.

Yes, it would be something of a change to have an older Caucasian male succeed George W. Bush. Of course, given the history of the American presidency, that would scarcely count as any difference at all.

Obama-Clinton or Clinton-Obama--either combo would represent the all-time breakaway ticket for change in American presidental politics.

It will take a mega-change like this to start reviving the national economy and, more importantly, the national spirit, in January, 2009.

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Obama-Richardson or Obama-Clark?

Some political observers started floating the idea of an Obama-Richardson ticket well before Barack Obama announced his run for the White House. Indeed, New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson would be a potent vice-presidential candiate, because he has Washington insider experience and a wide-ranging international resume. He is a former U.S. Energy Secretary and U.N. Ambassador who also has been a capable U.S. negotiator during difficult and sometimes dangerous situations involving North Korea, Iraq and Cuba.

At least one other former Presidential candidate may also get a hyphenated shot at the White House, however. Retired four-star Gen. Wesley K. Clark was NATO’s Supreme Allied Commander Europe from 1997 to 2000 and a Democratic candidate for President in 2004. He has extensive combat experience and has held numerous command posts during his 34-year Army career. His civilian-life credentials now range from investment banker to book author, as well as tireless fundraiser and promoter for Democratic candidates and causes. Gen. Clark has endorsed an old friend, Hillary Clinton, and has worked hard to help get her elected. But if her campaign falters in the next primaries, he may be free to entertain offers from the Obama camp.

The next President, whether Obama or Clinton, likely will need Clark's unique background to help oversee the complex process of getting the U.S. out of Iraq. Indeed, Clark and Richardson both might play major roles in the next Administration, even if neither gets a vice presidential offer and John McCain unexpectedly wins the presidency.

Gov. Richardson might not want to be Energy Secretary again, but the nation now faces enormous challenges in its energy future. It would be a bigger and more crucial job this time.

Gen. Clark might not want to be Secretary of Defense, but America's military is exhausted and short-handed at a time when other international powers, such as China and Russia, are rising again. Someone who knows how to regroup, reorganize, re-equip and re-energize fighting forces will need to have the next President's trust and attention.

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Has the Clinton Campaign Now Become Bosnian Toast? If Memory Serves Me…

By Si Dunn

Can you accurately remember what you did 12 years ago or longer? How about things you did last week? Or last night?

CBS News recently has been pounding on Hillary Clinton for claiming to have been under sniper fire in Bosnia in 1996, when their old videos seem to show her mainly receiving incoming flowers and handshakes after arriving in a very dangerous area.

Memories can, as the old saying goes, play unfortunate tricks on you. One case in point: A close Hillary Clinton ally, retired Gen. Wesley K. Clark, and I were friends in junior high school. (I am briefly mentioned in one of his books.) For years after he became a famous military leader and presidential candidate, I enjoyed telling people how he and I also had been close friends in elementary school and how he, on more than one occasion, interceded with the principal and saved me from being paddled for misbehaving.

The only problem is, when I met up with Gen. Clark again last year at a Dallas political fundraiser and brought this memory up, he assured me that he and I had attended different elementary schools and didn’t even know each other until the 7th grade. (I have to believe Wesley on this, because 50 years after he edited the school newspaper at Pulaski Heights Junior High School, he still can recite my best times in the 440-yard dash.)

Somebody helped me get off that hook with my elementary school principal, and, obviously, I can’t recall who did it. But it was easy, years later, to conveniently insert Wesley Clark into that scenario, then let the combination meld into a warm memory that I honestly came to believe.

I think Hillary Clinton fell into a similar memory trap, one that snares us all at times. To her credit, she now has admitted that she “made a mistake" and added: "That happens. It proves I'm human, which you know, for some people, is a revelation."

If CBS News and other media outlets tried hard enough, they could search back through past videos of all candidates and come up with numerous snippets where memories or claims do not mesh with reality.

Meanwhile, if you asked me at this moment to tell you something I did 12 years ago, I could state with complete accuracy that I had some meals and brushed my teeth. And I probably did not do these things while under sniper fire. But who knows? Maybe a celery stick or my toothbrush was blown out of my hand, and I simply forgot?

I really was in some combat during the Vietnam War. But I didn’t shoot anybody, and only one bullet (sniper fire!) came within 50 feet of me. Still, if I were running for high (or low) office, my campaign staff could intone with complete accuracy: “He saw combat in Vietnam.” My eager supporters then might imagine me dashing into a Viet Cong stronghold with automatic weapons blazing in each hand.

Yet the truth would be this: I watched planes drop bombs nearby. I saw ships fire their guns. I observed Marines hitting the beach. And I was scrutinzing a nearby hillside--gawking like a tourist, actually--when the sniper’s bullet thudded into a metal armor plate.

I did fire some weapons a couple of times during the Vietnam War. My booming bullets made puny little splashes in the Tonkin Gulf and hit absolutely nothing except maybe a poor fish or two. Yet it’s possible two evil North Vietnamese frogmen might have been right under the waves and I got them both with my shots.

I think a heroic new memory may be taking shape.

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DON'T Shut Down the Mars Rovers!

By Si Dunn

Space.com has reported that the Spirit and Opportunity rovers on Mars are in danger of being shut down by NASA budget cuts in 2008 and 2009.

The two robot explorers have been driving around on the Red Planet since January, 2004, making surprising scientific discoveries and going and going and going like the Energizer Bunny well past their 90-day life expectancies.

For more than four years, it has been wonderfully easy and educational to follow the rovers' adventures at the Mars Exploration website: http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/

Now, one or possibly both rovers could be killed by budget cuts that will total a paltry $12 million over two years.

In a nation currently wasting billions to drive manned, armored vehicles around in the sands of Iraq, surely $12 million can be found somewhere to keep Spirit and Opportunity alive and continuing to do peaceful exploration of a neighboring planet.

• In her will, the late Leona Helmsley left a $12 million trust fund for her dog, Trouble, last year.
  
• John McCain's campaign raised $12 million in February, 2008. (McCain, of course, is not known as a great fan of serendipitous scientific research.)
  
• Several wealthy Hillary Clinton supporters offered to pay the $12 million cost of funding a new state primary in Michigan.
  
• The website CafeMom recently raised $12 million from venture capitalists to continue its expansions.

Money is out there. It can be found somewhere, somehow. Contact your U.S. Representative and Senator now and tell them to do something to help save two of America's finest roving ambassadors and national symbols: Spirit and Opportunity.

And while you are at it, don't forget the Mars Odyssey spacecraft. It has been orbiting the Red Planet since 2001, taking thousands of high-quality images and, like the rovers, making many surprising findings. It, too, is facing the NASA budget chopping block in 2008 and 2009.

Space exploration is one of America's crowning achievements and a source of great national pride. Let's not give away some of our most spectacular crown jewels, Spirit, Opportunity and Mars Odyssey, for a few million bucks.

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Memo to Obama, Clinton and McCain: Shut Up About Each Other, Already

By Si Dunn

All's fair in love and war--and politics.

That, of course, is just the polite way of saying nothing is fair in love and war and politics--particularly politics.

So now, in a suppposedly tight race for the White House, we are stuck once again in a short lull between "key" Democratic primaries.

Meanwhile, the candidates and their campaign staffs are busily finding any direct and obtuse way they can to try to discredit their opponents' potential abilities to be commander in chief or national healer or shining beacon of peace and hope to the troubled world.

Oh, please, Senators Obama, Clinton and McCain. Just shut up about each other now, please, and get on with explaining yourselves.

Convince us why you (without any further mention or slam of your opponents) should be the next President of the United States. Tell us what you (without any further mention or slam of your opponents) propose to do about the national economy, the housing crisis, the war in Iraq, and America's shattered world prestige, to name just a few of today's troubling issues.

Put away the race cards, the White House cards, the combat cards, the patriot cards, the religion cards, the ringing-telephone cards, the retired-generals card, the endorsement cards, etc., etc., ad naseum.

Skip the overseas "fact-finding" photo ops and the strident demands for apologies, retractions and resignations from each other's campaigns.

Rise above this petty crap. Step out of your political Green Zones--and Twilight Zones.

Between now and the November general election, just show us and tell us who the hell you really are and what you propose to try to do about the many incredible messes the current Administration will leave behind in January, 2009.

That's what we voters want and need to know. Who are you, what needs to be done, and how you think the massive mountain range of problems should be approached.

Most of what else you are doing and saying right now amounts to absurd, empty posturing and a babble of irritating noises that we voters can, and will, shut off very soon.

So shut up about each other already. Tell us something that we actually can use to help us decide.

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Republicans for Obama--AND Clinton?

By Si Dunn

If Hillary Clinton loses the crucial and tightly contested primary races in Texas and Ohio March 4, one important key to her defeat will be the sudden surge of Republicans crossing party lines to vote for Barack Obama.

Despite Obama's strongly liberal track record, many disenchanted GOP voters have begun to view the Illinois Senator as someone who truly can bring much-needed fresh air to Washington and work constructively with political leaders on both sides of the aisle.

In Texas and Ohio, registered Republicans can choose to vote in their state's Democratic primary, rather than casting their ballot for the likely GOP contender, John McCain. And many will do just that--mostly for Obama. The irony here, of course, is that Republican leaders such as Karl Rove really wanted Hillary Clinton to be the nominee to go up against John McCain in the general election.

Indeed, many months ago, some key GOP leaders began urging Republicans to vote in open primaries for Hillary, so flyboy McCain could score an easy "mission accomplished" victory this November. They considered Senator Clinton both a very easy and strongly polarizing target.

What the Rove-ites and other Bush Administration nabobs didn't count on is that many everyday Republicans meanwhile have grown sick and tired of their own party's fiercely partisan politics and ultraconservative attitudes toward social and environmental issues. The U.S. economy now is swirling around and around in the toilet, and McCain's stated willingness to stay a hundred years or longer in Iraq has further dispirited many moderate, liberal and even conservative Republicans. The Democrats' strong message of change, whether voiced by Sen. Obama or Sen. Clinton, is resonating with them, too.

One other ironic note: some conservative Republicans recently have been urging their fellow conservatives in Texas and Ohio to vote for Hillary Clinton, because she is now seen as being politically more conservative than Barack Obama! These GOP conservatives fear a nationwide groundswell is growing stronger by the minute for Obama-style liberalism. At the same time, they also see their not-so-true-conservative John McCain's chances of getting elected now plunging out of the sky like a 500-pound bomb. Their one remaining hope to keep some faint semblance of conservatism in the White House is to help Hillary Clinton beat...Barack Obama.

Republicans for Obama--and Clinton. Truly, it's gonna be a long fall for the Grand Old Party!

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The Next Clinton Administration

By Si Dunn

Yes, the next presidential election is still many months away. But I am already thinking that a Clinton-Obama ticket will bury Romney-Huckabee deep under a landslide of votes for drastic change and new directions.

Predictions are cheap and easy, so I am predicting Hillary Clinton will be the first female President of the United States, and Barack Obama will be America’s first black Vice President. Might as well get two precedents out of the way for the price of one.

Suggestions also are cheap and easy, so I am making some suggestions for who I would like to see in the next Clinton Administration. You, of course, you are free to post your own predictions and suggestions and to vehemently disagree with any and all of my views. That is one of the great features of our democracy.

Bill Richardson, I think, should serve another stint as Energy Secretary. This position will be more critical than ever to America’s national and international security and to the battle against global warming. The job will require strong international credentials, as well as many domestic leadership skills. Gov. Richardson has a very rich and varied resume that could help him serve America well in a time of increasingly complex challenges.

Madeline Albright should be brought back as the Clinton-Obama Administration’s Secretary of State. She knows and is respected by many of the key international players, and she has the right combination of skills and knowledge to help rebuild America’s tattered international reputation and leadership abroad.

John Edwards could be a very effective Secretary of Health and Human Services, if he wouldn’t view the post as a great demotion after competing so long and hard for the presidency. His comprehensive health plan focusing on revenue sources and cost containment could become a key part of the national debate over how to provide affordable medical coverage to all Americans.

Joe Biden believes strongly in working to improve America’s economic competitiveness. He could make many contributions as Labor Secretary, a post that also will have to deal heavily with illegal immigration and guest worker issues, as well as outsourcing, strengthening unions and domestic job creation, to name just a few.

Christopher Dodd has campaigned forcefully against constitutional encroachments and abuses of executive power. As Attorney General, he could work to help restore constitutional balance and bring a new focus on decency, honesty and fair play in the Executive Branch. He is fluent in Spanish, so he also could help the Clinton-Obama Administration tackle some increasingly thorny immigration issues.

Dennis Kucinich has made peace and international cooperation the centerpiece of his campaign. He should be appointed United Nations Ambassador, so he really can give peace a chance in a very troubled world.

Mike Gravel has been an outspoken advocate for better veterans’ care and for full disability payments for victims of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). He should head the Veterans Administration and try to help bring new resources and efficiencies to that long-troubled agency.

As previously noted, we are still many months away from casting votes for President and Vice President of the United States. But, with many critical issues becoming more pressing by the day, it is not too early to start casting grassroots votes for the other key players we would like to see in the next Administration.

Don’t just sit there stewing, disagreeing and being mad. Make your own choices known, now.

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