cannabisnews.com: Ten Questions for Gore and Bush Ten Questions for Gore and Bush Posted by FoM on October 03, 2000 at 10:02:28 PT By Salon News Staff Source: Salon Magazine We'd like to see these issues discussed at Tuesday night's debates, but we don't think we will. Tuesday night's face-off between Gov. George W. Bush and Vice President Al Gore may well decide the outcome of the presidential election. The race is the closest such contest in 20 years, and each candidate is banking on his performance before moderator Jim Lehrer to help pull away from his opponent. But there are a handful of questions that probably won't make the cut during Tuesday's 90-minute showdown. Below are some of the questions we would like to see Bush and Gore answer before the American people. No. 1: Polls show that Americans support the death penalty, even though they believe innocent people have been executed. If you believed innocent people had been executed, would you still support the death penalty? No. 2: You both support the war on drugs, which has swelled the American prison population with hundreds of thousands of nonviolent offenders. Both of you have had family members who've used illegal drugs (Karenna for Gore and one of Jeb's children) who have never been in prison, and both of you have faced questions about past drug use. First, how can you be a credible force in the drug war if you don't believe it should be applied to your own children, and second what will you do to make sure that the force of the law doesn't disproportionately fall on the underprivileged? No. 3: Name your top five priorities for the continent of Africa, specifying which countries, and what, in precise detail, your plans entail. No. 4: Both of you have spoken with regret about the perception that candidates have been bought by special interests. But haven't you been part of the problem? Vice President Gore, in retrospect, was it ethical for you to attend a fundraiser at a Buddhist temple? And Gov. Bush, do you regret the Wyly brothers' ads that attacked John McCain in the New York primaries? No. 5: Gov. Bush, why shouldn't gays and lesbians, like, say, Mary Cheney and her partner, be afforded the same marriage rights as, say, Bill and Hillary Clinton, and the same civil rights protections as anyone else? And why do you think gay civil unions would threaten the institution of marriage? Mr. Gore, do you still believe that gays should be allowed to serve openly in the military, and are you still planning to apply a litmus test to any prospective chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff? No. 6: Both of you, as professed born-again Christians, believe as a matter of faith that those who have not accepted Jesus Christ cannot be saved. Therefore, do you believe that Joseph Lieberman and all other Jews are going to hell? No. 7: You both offer extensions to entitlement programs that benefit seniors, who already, by a ratio of 10-to-1, receive more government-sponsored aid than children do. How do you justify the difference between the money the federal government spends on seniors and the money it spends on children? No. 8: Did President Clinton perjure himself in the Monica Lewinsky case? If a jury finds him guilty of doing so, are you willing to pardon him? No. 9: Gov. Bush, how much carnage would you tolerate in a foreign arena that was not of strategic interest to the United States before you intervened? Would you never intervene? Vice President Gore, under your administration, would American troops be committed to foreign deployments for strictly humanitarian efforts, no matter how disconnected the events in a country were from American interests? No. 10: Gov. Bush, if you truly believe that every abortion takes an innocent human life, how do you justify avoiding a pledge to do everything possible to overturn Roe vs. Wade immediately after entering office, including putting Supreme Court justices through a litmus test? Mr. Gore, with the Born Alive Infants Protection Act, the House of Representatives voted to outlaw a method of "abortion" that involves delivering a baby pre-term and withholding care until the child dies. Given that the child is no longer physically dependent on the mother, and that other children born at similar points in pregnancy are given extensive medical care, what is the difference between this abortion method and euthanasia or infanticide? What are the questions you'd like to see asked at Tuesday night's debate? E-mail your questions here. E-Mail: ayork salon.comSource: Salon.com (US Web) Copyright: 2000 Salon.com Published: October 3, 2000Contact: salon salonmagazine.com Address: 22 4th Street, 16th Floor San Francisco, CA 94103 Fax: (415) 645-9204 Feedback: http://www.salon.com/contact/letters/ Website: http://www.salon.com/ Forum: http://tabletalk.salon.com/ Related Articles & Web Sites:Al Gore 2000 - ( Official )http://www.algore2000.com/George Bush - ( Official )http://www.georgewbush.com/Blowing Smoke About Medical Marijuana:http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread7222.shtmlAn Eerie Campaign Silence - Arianna Huffington:http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread6905.shtml What Al Gore Must Do to Win:http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread6746.shtmlAl Gore On Drugs - MoJo Wire: http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread6712.shtmlGore: Give Prisoners Drug Tests:http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread5577.shtml Bush Case Offers Chance to Change Bad Drug Laws:http://cannabisnews.com/news/2/thread2891.shtmlBush Refuses To Answer Rumors Of Cocaine Use:http://cannabisnews.com/news/2/thread2500.shtml Home Comment Email Register Recent Comments Help Comment #9 posted by FoM on October 04, 2000 at 09:05:22 PT Thanks eco I was hoping you would post your Nader info. Thanks! [ Post Comment ] Comment #8 posted by kaptinemo on October 04, 2000 at 04:56:30 PT: They're digging their own political graves. Shrub and Snore are hungry for the UnDecided vote. They know that the shrinking numbers of the Party Faithful, the Hofferian True-Believer types, will not sustain them. They *must* reach out to the more discerningly politically-minded of the population, because their robotized, party-hatted, slogan-chanting, flag wavers cannot carry them.But to reach out to the UnDecided, they must at least appear to share some of the *attributes* of the UnDecided. One of those attributes is open-mindedness. The willingness to hear out opposing views in the spirit that they are offered. To at least be patient with them.By rudely slamming the door on Browne, Nader, and Buchanan, the Big Two(year-olds) have demonstrated their depth of the most important attribute they needed to claim the UnDecided vote. It is as shallow as they are.But doing what they have done, they have hastened the accelleration of the solidifying of a process that has been going on for some time. More and more people have become disaffected with major party politics, and are turning to alternatives. By shutting out their 3rd Party contenders, they have demonstrated to even the densest UnDecided voter that they are not welcome.So, where can the UnDecided voter go? Straight into the arms of the very parties that were shunned at the debates.Anyone who possesses half a cortex will have figured out by now that the two wings of the Duopoly have hung out a "No freethinkers need apply" on the front door...but they'd be very happy if someone would volunteer to clean out their toilets, tote their barges or lift their bales.By doing what they've done, they've guranteed that they will eventually swell the ranks of parties they cannot co-opt. [ Post Comment ] Comment #7 posted by eco2 on October 03, 2000 at 23:57:22 PT Nader Alert on drug war, death penalty, prison. And now for reality. Something that rarely reaches the airwaves.*10-00. Nader Alert on drug war, death penalty, prison industrial complex. October 2, 2000 Action Alert from the Nader 2000 Campaign email list. http://www.angelfire.com/rnb/y/nader.htm The following "print mission" is from the October 2, 2000 Action Alert from the Nader 2000 Campaign email list. You can sign up for the list from VoteNader.org at: http://www.votenader.org The print mission excerpt is followed by the rest of the alert. --- excerpt begins --- PRINT MISSION: The topic for this week's letter to the editor is the connection between the failed war on drugs, the death penalty, and the for-profit prison industry. Both major party candidates are supportive of these failed policies and are taking money from the prison industrial complex. Some points to include: * The War on Drugs: Nader: The War on Drugs unfairly targets people of color and the poor. Drug abusers do not need to be incarcerated-they need opportunity and treatment. Opposes the criminalization of drugs, and the incarceration of nonviolent drug offenders. Gore and Bush: The Clinton-Gore Administration has shown little creativity in coming up with new approaches to drug problems. Neither Gore nor Bush have shown any inclination or ability or the courage necessary to come up with new approaches that would reduce the drug problem. * The Death Penalty: Nader: Has opposed the death penalty since he was a law student at Harvard. Opposes the death penalty because it does not deter and is discriminatory against people of color and those who cannot afford competent legal counsel. Supports moratorium on the death penalty Bush: Supports the death penalty. Texas has one of the highest execution rates in the United States. People of color are disproportionately represented on death row in Texas. Gore: Supports the death penalty. Has been silent on the injustices of the death penalty, such as the disproportionate representation of people of color on death row. * Prison Industrial Complex: Nader: Calls for corporations, such as the Corrections Corporation of America-the largest multinational prison corporation operating in the United States-to get out of the prison industry; human dignity should come before profits. Corporations wrongfully exploit prisoners, who are disproportionately people of color. Prisoners are used as cheap labor to increase corporate profits. He believes that public policy should be aimed at reducing the incarceration rate through treatment and rehabilitation-not locking people up by the masses. Bush and Gore: Both encourage the growth of the corporate prison industry. Both have accepted more than $100,000 in soft money that corporations running for-profit prisons have given to both the DNC and RNC. The corporate-prison industry has grown tremendously under the eight years of the Clinton administration, particularly in George W. Bush's state of Texas. --- end of print mission excerpt --- ----------------------------------Date: Mon, 2 Oct 2000 12:40:06 -0400 Reply-To: campaign V... From: Nader 2000 Campaign campaign V... Subject: Action Alert: Democracy on Death Row To: NEWSLETTER L... Go to this link for the rest:http://www.angelfire.com/rnb/y/nader.htm [ Post Comment ] Comment #6 posted by FoM on October 03, 2000 at 22:00:13 PT: Nader is Turned Away at Door of Debate By Justin PopeWeb Site: Salon Magazinehttp://www.salon.com/Oct. 04, 2000 | Boston (AP) -- Green Party presidential candidate Ralph Nader, shunned by the presidential debate commission, scored a ticket to Tuesday night's debate but was turned away at the door. "It's already been decided that whether or not you have a ticket you are not welcome in the debate," John Bezeris, a representative of the debate commission, told Nader. The commission had excluded all but Democratic and Republican candidates. "I didn't expect they would be so crude and so stupid," Nader said after being turned away. "This is the kind of creeping tyranny that has turned away so many voters from the electoral process." Nader, who took the subway to the debate site, had received the ticket as a gift from Todd Tavares, a 21-year-old Northeastern University student who said he got it from a roommate. When he arrived at the site of the debate at the University of Massachusetts-Boston, Bezeris, surrounded by several police officers, told Nader he could not enter because he was not an invited guest. Nader was among a trio of third-party candidates who did their best Tuesday to keep the Republican and Democratic nominees from stealing the show. Hours before the debate, a judge threw out a court challenge filed earlier in the day by Massachusetts Libertarians to try to force organizers to include their candidate, Harry Browne. "The plaintiffs have slept on their rights by waiting until the last minute to seek relief," Suffolk Superior Court Judge Gordon Doerfer ruled. He said intervening in the debates would deprive the public of information it needs about the candidates. The lawsuit claimed Browne should be included because Massachusetts, which officially recognizes the party, spent $900,000 to help pay for the debate. Nader also criticized the commission's decision to limit the debate to candidates with more than 15 percent support in national polls. Only the Democrat, Vice President Al Gore, and the Republican, Texas Gov. George W. Bush, qualified to participate. "They have the keys. This debate commission is a private company created by the two parties," Nader told about 1,000 supporters. "The thing is why do we as a society let them control the gateway? Why don't we have many gateways, many debates?" As he concluded his remarks some students chanted "Let Ralph debate! Let Ralph debate!" Reform Party candidate Pat Buchanan, meeting reporters in his Boston hotel, said it was unfair to keep his party out. He and Nader were appearing separately on Fox News Channel after the debate. "I feel like Slippery Rock State Teachers and we made the Final Four of the NCAAs and they won't even let us in the gymnasium," Buchanan said. "They won't even let us on the gym floor to show what we can do." Buchanan, who has more than $12 million in federal campaign funds to spend, outlined plans to launch an advertising campaign next week in states he says have been abandoned by Republicans, including California, New Jersey and most of New England. He is aiming for 5 percent of the popular vote in the Nov. 7 election to guarantee that the Reform Party gets federal matching funds again in 2004. Buchanan said the ads would run mainly on Christian radio stations and would highlight local concerns, such as immigration in California and Arizona. Copyright © 2000 Salon.com [ Post Comment ] Comment #5 posted by FoM on October 03, 2000 at 18:10:47 PT: They haven't said anything. I'm not surprised I'm listening to the debate and they haven't said anything about anything at all yet. Plastic people in their very own plastic world. Literally!Thanks Dank Hank! I'm glad you like it! [ Post Comment ] Comment #4 posted by dankhank on October 03, 2000 at 17:50:51 PT: No chance for real debate 'bout real issues ... Sad to say that I also believe that nothing but pablum will issues from the debate tonight.By the way, FoM, I like the flag in the teaser for this story.Nice touch ... :-) HEMP n STUFF [ Post Comment ] Comment #3 posted by Lehder on October 03, 2000 at 16:12:36 PT suggested question What measures will you take to enforce federal law in areas such as Mendocino County, the State of Alaska or other states, counties and municipalities that may legalize marijuana? [ Post Comment ] Comment #2 posted by FoM on October 03, 2000 at 12:02:58 PT: What a great time for Drug War TV Programs! Hi MikeEEEEE,Check out all the drug related shows that will be coming up in the next week. This is the first debate and with all the tv programs they might have to talk before elections. Too many people want answers!I hope everyone checks this out!A Frontline Series in Collaboration with NPRhttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread7230.shtml [ Post Comment ] Comment #1 posted by MikeEEEEE on October 03, 2000 at 11:50:27 PT Do you really think these guy will talk Gore and Bush want it really bad; they won't talk now. If they talk they will regurgitate the party line. I bet the drug war is off limits. They can't upset some of the people in power at this time, but they may sing a different tune later, we’ll have to see. [ Post Comment ] Post Comment Name: Optional Password: E-Mail: Subject: Comment: [Please refrain from using profanity in your message] Link URL: Link Title: