Mike Gravel on Principles & Values Libertarian for President; Former Dem. Senator (AK); withdrew from Presidential primary July 2019

Sub-sections under Principles & Values:
• Campaign Videos
• Past Campaigns
• Other issues under Principles & Values

Made debate donor count with help from opponent Williamson

"You may not have heard of him because he hasn't yet qualified for any debates," the email reads, referring to Gravel. "But his voice is important."

The email, signed by Williamson, touts Gravel's body of work in Congress and "diverse and provocative" voice as reasons he should be on the debate stage next to her. "Thanks to you, I'm on the debate stage. I'm using this platform, granted to me by you, to ask for your help," and asks donors to consider giving Gravel a dollar to increase his individual donor count.

[Gravel made the donor count but did not make the cut for the 20 slots in the July debate].

Push Dems toward sensible views on political reform

The account has also fired off several scathing attacks of Gravel's prospective opponents, including Sen. Kamala Harris (D-CA), who "kept innocent men on death row"; Joe Biden, who "voted for the Iraq War"; Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), who likes to "abuse American workers"; and Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ), who "invented a drug dealer friend (and voted with Big Pharma)." The account also attacked Booker's "melodramatic" performance during Brett Kavanaugh's Supreme Court confirmation hearing last year while touting Gravel reading the Pentagon Papers into the congressional record in 1971. Meanwhile, the account seems to favor Sen. Bernie Sanders (D-VT) and Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-HI), candidates it wants to push "toward more sensible views on political reform and foreign policy through the debate."

Served in US Army in the Cold War in Europe

But I would need the people to elect me. So I drove my brother’s station wagon from Springfield, Massachusetts, to Anchorage, Alaska, and spent four years in the State House before Alaskans sent me t Washington as a senator.

There was a very unpopular war going on when I arrived. Few members of Congress were willing to do anything about it: just like 35 years later in Iraq. But ordinary Americans in the street protesting the killing inspired me to stand up alone in Congress. I confronted the leviathan of militarists and arms makers who, since the end of World War II, had changed our country, maybe forever. The press and my Senate colleagues vilified me. I’ve never regretted it.

Political career started as teen handing out campaign flyers

My political career began with handing out flyers. Some people when they’ve got flyers to hand out, stuff them down the sewer, but I was diligent. My employer realized this and came back a week later and slapped a $10 bill on the counter. That was about a month’s wages for me. He kept loading me up with flyers and I passed them out, borrowing my father’s dump truck to ride around town promoting him. He got re-elected.

I became involved with every local election after that. I was also motivated to pursue a public life by a strong feeling that has remained with me since the Depression: the desire to fight for social justice. I was driven too by recognition for a job well done.

Dyslexic, hence became avid political reader at a late age

As army spy, felt rotten spying on innocent people

I got orders to go to Germany in 1952 I was an adjutant of the Army’s Communications Intelligence Service. That meant opening people’s mail and listening to their telephone conversations. I was a little uncomfortable spying mostly on perfectly innocent civilians.

I knew French and thought I would be more valuable in France. I became an agent working with French intelligence. Soon I was in Paris, infiltrating communist rallies dressed as a Frenchman. I could pass for one if I didn’t talk long enough for my Quebec-American accent to be exposed.

I still had to spy on innocent people. One time I got orders to follow an American physicist, who had done nothing wrong except to have the bad luck of being born with Russian blood. I followed him everywhere and I felt rotten doing it.

Moved to pre-statehood Alaska because no political elite

So I sought a frontier state, where a complete nobody could show up and set up shop without facing an established political elite. I narrowed it down to New Mexico and Alaska and, after much careful thought, made the final decision on a scientific basis: climate. I hate the heat.

Alaska had the added bonus of still being a territory, so there were fewer people living there. There hadn’t even been an election for a state legislature yet, but it was clear statehood was coming. Nearly all white people in Alaska were carpetbaggers or their parents had been. So I left New York for Springfield to pack up for my journey north.

Conservatives support the rich; liberals support the state

Gadfly who’s mad as hell at Democratic Establishment

Gravel is less polite than Dennis Kucinich, whom he joins in challenging the other candidates on their timid and pathological centrist positions. One-on-one, Mike Gravel is jovial and mild-mannered; on stage with his rivals, he’s mad as hell, and he’s not going to take it any more.

No-nonsense challenge to mainstream Democratic shuffling

In one, Gravel stares straight into the camera, his gaze steady, then finally he turns around and walks away along a shoreline. He pauses, stoops to pick up a rock, throws it in the water, and continues to walk into the distance. He speaks not a word.

The symbolism is explained by one pundit, “It would be the rock in the water and the ripple effect of the senator and his message and who he is, a man with an idea, who is little by little, day by day communicating that message.” Gravel himself was uncharacteristically blunt in response to ridiculing of the spots on Tucker Carlson’s show: “It’s a metaphor,” he said. “Why can’t people like you understand that?”

Protests being cut out of debate as free speech issue

We need people to come in and protest. We need people who feel deeply about free speech; who understand the dangers of corporations taking control of our society through denying the American people the right to know what is going on. That’s what’s at stake here. This is corporate censorship.

I believe in the power of love over the power of prayer

A: What I believe in is love. And love implements courage. And courage permits us all to apply the virtues that are important in life. I was always struck by the fact that many people who pray are the ones who want to go to war, who want to kill fellow human beings. That disturbs me. I think what we need is more love between one human being and another human being.

Leadership brings society to civic maturity on tough issues

Leaders are seen as mavericks, and only later as courageous

Let the people decide: Solution is with you, not leaders

A: Well, the problem with not a lot of money can be solved by the people who hear my voice. All I need is a modicum of money, around $10 million and I’ll win. I’ll win because I’ll be able to get to the American people and say the solution is with you. It’s not with the leaders.

US citizens should be allowed to vote for or against laws

Citizen Power: democracy requires participation

There can be no democracy unless it is a dynamic democracy. When our people cease to participate then all of us will wither in the darkness of decadence.
-- Saul Alinsky

“Why not?”

“Because you’re talking about something that doesn’t exist. There’s no such thing as ‘citizen power.’ Not for people like us.” The black youth regarded me with open skepticism, challenging me to prove him wrong. The others nodded their agreement.

Sitting in Harlem in the middle of neglected America, I could readily understand why the idea of “citizen power” was greeted with contempt. What did that mean to these alienated young men & women?

“Wouldn’t you like to change that?” I asked. “Be a PART of the government instead of just under it?”

“Sure. But how?”

“You get together and make up a program--that’s all a people’s platform is--and then you present it to all the candidates. You tell them that they either support IT or you won’t support THEM.”

2008: YouTube political "video art" went viral

So it stood out when Gravel released The Rock, a satori-inducing clip in which the former senator stares silently at the camera for more than a minute, then turns, heaves a rock into a body of water, watches it splash, and walks away.

Or Fire, which begins with some brief footage of the candidate hiking through the woods before settling in for a Warholian seven-minute shot of the blaze.

But the best Gravel video, the one that truly captures the late-hippie ethos of the campaign, is a mash-up of John Lennon, and Duck and Cover [entitled "power to the people vs give peace a chance"]. It made me feel like voting for the guy, and I say that as someone who never feels like voting for anyone:

Withdrew from politics for 26 years, ashamed of politics

Video: "Power to the people vs give peace a chance"

Decisive moment: realizing representative gov’t is broken

A: The decisive moment in my life came with the insightfulness of realizing that human governance is extremely complex and that representative government is broken. And so, there’s only two venues for change: One is the government, where the problem lies, or the people. And so the people must be equipped as lawmakers, the central power of government, in order to make decisions on all the policy issues that affect their lives, working in partnership with elected government. It’s a win-win. The people make the policy decisions, and we then would make the day-to-day operation of government work better.

Video “Fire” is metaphor for gathering & using experience

Video “Rock” is metaphor for causing changes in society

Not at all, replies Gravel, explaining that “It’s not a spot” ad but rather the brainchild of a couple of young men from California who sought to film a “metaphor of what they saw me as a person who’s thoughtful, who then wanted to make a difference. Throwing a rock in the water was a metaphor for causing ripples and changes in society, and then walking down and disappearing--isn’t that what life’s about? We start, try to do something, and then go on.”

1958: Ran for Alaska Legislature as prep for US Senate

I talked my way into becoming president of the Young Democrats. I joined the Junior Chamber of Commerce, the Jaycees and I let them train me in public speaking.

Then I made my boldes move to that point. I ran for Alaska’s last Territorial Legislature in 1958. It had 16 senators and 24 representatives. I was 28 and had been in the territory less than two years. I ran my own extremely modest campaign with neither mentors nor money. I was learning the hard way. I put up my own signs. I had no platform. But I had an embarrassing slogan: “Gravel, the Roadbed to Prosperity.” It wasn’t good enough. I lost my election, but it didn’t discourage me. I knew there would be other chances.

1965: False promise to opponent to get House speakership

The vote was taken and I won. Then I announced the committee chairmen. Taylor said, “You promised me Rules.” I was convinced that the reason he wanted Rules was that he could hold up legislation for my entire two-year term. “Warren,” I said, “Yes, I promised you that. But I lied.” Taylor was my enemy for two years.

Some of the other old-timers took my admission of lying to Taylor and exaggerated it to make it look like I had promised chairmanships to everyone. So I had extra obstacles to overcome as speaker. If I’ve got to push people around, I push them around.

1980: Forced into bankruptcy by bad real estate deals

Lost re-election after alienating every AK constituency

Blogosphere hails Gravel/Paul ticket with cross-party appeal

The idea of direct democracy might have broad appeal to an electorate sick of a political system mired in soft money, corporate cronyism, and partisan gridlock.

Wildcard independent run raises specter of Nader

To make matters worse, Nader himself has praised Gravel. After hearing Gravel speak before the Democratic National Committee, Nader called him “a fresh wind coming down from Alaska,” complimented his National Initiative, and compared him to the Roman statesman and orator Cicero, who “defined freedom with these enduring words: ‘Freedom is participation in power.’”

Clintons & DLC sold out the Democratic Party to Wall Street

CLINTON: Obviously, I am running on my own merits, but I am very proud of my husband’s record as president. Look at the diversity you have here in the Democratic Party. Any one of us would be a better president than our current president or the future Republican nominee. I hope the people of this country will judge me on my merits.

Q: Do you have a problem with that?

GRAVEL: Well, yes, I do, a serious problem. The Democratic Party used to stand for the ordinary working man. But the Clintons and the DLC sold out the Democratic Party to Wall Street. Look at where all the money is being raised right now, for Hillary, Obama and Edwards. It’s the hedge funds, it’s Wall Street bankers, it’s the people who brought you what you have today. And they’re lock, stock and barrel in their pocket.

GOP lost in 2006 because they were lousy; Dems must earn ‘08

But now we have the power, & we’ve had the power since January. Like many Americans, I’m distressed by the inability to use that power. If we don’t establish a record in the next 18 months, we may not deserve to have the White House and the Congress.

Did not plan on presidency, but candidates are frightening

A: You’re right. I made that statement. But that’s before I had a chance to stand with [the other presidential candidates] three times. It’s like going into the Senate. You know, the first time you get there, you’re all excited, “My God, how did I ever get here?” Then, about six months later, you say, “How the hell did the rest of them get here?” And I got to tell you, after standing up with them, some of these people frighten me. When you have mainline candidates that turn around and say that there’s nothing off the table with respect to Iran, that’s code for using nuclear devices.

Q: Who on this stage exactly tonight worries you so much?

A: Well, I would say the top tier ones. They’ve made statements.

Achieved much in Senate, but prefers governors for president

If they like what I’m saying, that I’m not politics as usual -- and they could look at my record -- very unusual. I ended the draft, released the Pentagon Papers, stopped the nuclear testing in Alaska. You know, it’s all there. And I did all that within four years.

Q: And of all the other candidates you’re seeing running right now, if these voters aren’t going to pick you, who should they pick?

A: Well, I like the governors. For some reason, they bring more of an executive approach. And so if I were to pick right now, I’d say Vilsack first, Richardson second, because they have executive experience. Our record of people in legislative positions providing real leadership is very, very dismal. Governors have had to lead a state in a very personal kind of way, and so I would say that that would be the approach.

Came in 3rd for Vice Presidential nomination in 1972

Has campaigned in NH almost fulltime since April 2006