"New American Patriotism"

Clark is traveling the country this week, introducing his "New American Patriotism" initiative.

In a speech today at Hunter College in New York, Clark will give the first of four speeches outlining his initiative. Today's speech will focus on "service", and Clark will announce that he intends to create a Civilian Reserve, which will focus on rekindling the spirit of volunteerism that poured out of Americans following the September 11th attacks.

"A New American Patriotism calls on leadership that will make the right choices for all of our people; it calls for an administration that unites our country and works with the world community, and it calls all Americans to action in order to make the commitments and sacrifices to meet these historic challenges."

The Civilian Reserve would permit ordinary citizens to register to contribute their talents and labor, creating a "safety net of skilled Americans who are willing to help in times of trouble", without any new bureaucracy being needed.

The next three speeches will focus on the economy, health care, and national security.

Meanwhile, the Bush administration has given the American people a recession, a jobless "recovery", a tax cut that mostly benefits the wealthiest 1% of Americans, a tax cut that, in turn, cuts funding to the States, thus causing States to raise taxes or cut vital services, a war that the administration chose to fight, based either on faulty intelligence or intelligence that the administration knowingly fabricated or "sexed up", a resulting guerilla war in which American servicemen are dying at a rate of 1-2 per day, a war that we easily won, but are now left to "peacekeep" on our own, because our administration was too cocky, headstrong and paranoid to obtain international manpower and financial assistance.

Just think. We're being asked to spend $87 billion of what Bush snarkily called the "people's money" in 2000, to ensure that Iraqis can, among other things, get healthcare. Meanwhile, back here in the US, more people are uninsured now than they were in 2002. (43.5 million Americans are uninsured, up 5.3% from last year, and the highest number in 10 years). Why is Bush sending the people's money to the Iraqi people? Why did Bush take over and occupy a middle-eastern country with huge oil reserves, and yet gas prices are still at record-high levels?

Is there anyone out there who doesn't realize that we desperately need a change in 2004?

How about a President who focuses on service (i.e., working for something greater than one's own self-interest), the economy, health care, and national security? How about Wesley Clark?