{news} pro-Cobb op-ed in New London Day

[David Bedell]

http://www.theday.com/eng/web/news/re.aspx?re=5F6FDF0F-839D-4912-B1D5-E06E0E0CCC68

Green Party's Cobb Anti-war Candidate

By BOB BOBIER
Published on 10/31/2004

Contrary to the portrait painted in a recent guest column in The Day of a 
solitary presidential candidate opposing the war in Iraq, four of the six 
candidates on Connecticut's ballot call for an immediate end to the war: 
Green Party candidate David Cobb, Libertarian Michael Badnarik, Constitution 
Party candidate Michael Peroutka and independent Ralph Nader. Connecticut 
voters who want to end this war and prevent similar ones in the future would 
do best by investing their votes in the Green Party.

That's because the Green Party is the only party which embraces non-violence 
as a core value and whose platform addresses the root causes of the war in 
Iraq.

By now, most Americans would agree with the long-held Green Party position 
that the Iraq invasion was based on lies and deception. There were no 
weapons of mass destruction, no Al Qaeda links and the Iraqis are greeting 
our soldiers not with flowers, as was predicted, but with deadly ambushes.

Our country's foreign policy is opportunistic at best and morally bankrupt 
at worst. The U.S. embraced Saddam Hussein as an ally and turned a blind eye 
while he used weapons of mass destruction on his own citizens. Whether it's 
Saddam Hussein, Manuel Noriega or the Taliban, the U.S. coddles oppressive 
regimes when it serves the government's interests and attacks them when they 
have outlived their usefulness. With friends like the U.S. State Department, 
who needs enemies?

Foreign policy in a Green Administration would end the support of corrupt 
and brutal dictatorships and the U.S.'s role as the largest arms merchant in 
the world. Greens would focus on providing developing countries with medical 
and agricultural assistance instead of bombs and weapons. For a fraction of 
what our country is spending to destroy Iraq, we could be addressing the 
AIDS epidemic in Africa. Besides being the right thing to do, this would 
vastly improve America's stature in the world and address the root causes of 
terrorism—hopelessness, despair and disgust with our government's 
militarized approach to diplomacy.

Reducing our dependence on foreign oil would have an enormously positive 
impact on our foreign policy, environment and economy. Our nation's 
record-setting trade deficit and disproportionate contribution to global 
warming are directly related to the massive importation and combustion of 
fossil fuels. Developing renewable energy sources at home, such as wind, 
solar and biodiesel, would create millions of jobs; reduce pollution, global 
warming and the trade deficit; and remove a major temptation for the hawks 
in Washington to go to war.

In the short term, the best thing we can do is to immediately remove our 
troops from Iraq and replace them with an international peacekeeping force 
composed of Arabic-speaking troops from neighboring countries. To prevent 
the further looting of Iraq, all crony contracts awarded to Halliburton and 
other foreign companies profiting from the misery of the Iraqi people should 
be rescinded.

Sen. Kerry, who supports the continued occupation of Iraq, is heavily 
favored to win Connecticut's electoral votes. Because the presidential 
election is determined by the Electoral College on a state by state basis 
and not by national popular vote, the people of Connecticut can vote their 
conscience for Green Party candidates David Cobb and Patricia LaMarche 
without fear that their vote will keep George W. Bush in the White House for 
another four years.

Send a message on Election Day that you want to bring our troops home now. 
Vote for peace and invest your vote in the fastest growing political party 
in America: Vote Green Party. Vote for Cobb-LaMarche.

Blair Bobier is the media director for the Cobb-LaMarche campaign.


© The Day Publishing Co., 2004

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