Interviews with Truthout.org: on Budget & Economy

2011 debt ceiling debacle spurred candidacy

A: I've been fighting as a third party candidate for ten years. I stepped up to the plate for this election, basically, because it is a perfect storm for really organizing a political alternative, a politics of integrity that our lives depend on--and more and more people are seeing that. Specifically, it was the debt ceiling debacle last spring when President Obama put Social Security and Medicare on the table: it really felt like, "How could we not put an opposition voice up against this? This is outrageous! Between the Keystone XL Pipeline debacle, the ozone regulation roll-back; expanding war--multiple wars, drones and drone surrogate wars-- our "pull out of Iraq"; only to establish a new base in Kuwait, that we now have a new front in the war for oil in Central Africa; and the tripling of the troop presence in Afghanistan, it just felt like "How can we not have a voice of opposition here? This is nuts!"