Kucinich writes: "When anyone of us resolves toward self-improvement, it can impact the lives of those we love."
Dennis Kucinich is considered one of the most
progressive U.S. senators of his time. (photo: Getty Images)
03 January 15
hen anyone of us resolves toward self-improvement, it can impact the lives of those we love. How much more impact can we have, if in the new year we work to recreate the future of this country we love, by resolving to take bold steps in a new direction in a new year?
In 2015 I will observe the 48th anniversary of my public career, which began when I was a 20-year-old candidate for city council. In that time, with the help of many, I have seen miracles occur, outcomes change, new directions taken when people courageously strive to challenge a seemingly unshakeable status quo, on matters both personal and public. I remember well years ago in Cleveland, when a powerful corporate establishment dictated the sale of a city's municipal electric system, yet through a long battle the heroic people of Cleveland, who I was proud to lead as Mayor, regained their rights, and our city's lights.
Today, our nation's government has been taken over by special interest groups and idealogues, who have rapidly distributed our nation's wealth upwards, built a national security state to protect its hold on power and wealth, involved America in destructive, unnecessary wars abroad, ignored the escalating violence at home, and broken the laws of our nation with impunity, while punishing those who expose their unlawfulness.
This New Year, let us, as President Lincoln once pleaded "highly resolve" and organize to recreate our nation, summoning the vision of the Founders' ceaseless quest, unfurled with the words, "We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union...."
This is my New Year's vision for our nation:
Let us, in these times of increased violence, restore the dream of "Domestic Tranquility" nourished by President Jefferson and others, and reach a new awareness, a new consensus, to rid our nation of the thinking that violence is inevitable, through supporting the effort, now carried forth by Rep. Barbara Lee.
"America does not go abroad in search of monsters to destroy," said President John Quincy Adams. Let 2015 be the year that we recreate at home an empire of democracy, a true citadel of freedom, and stop the plotting, the interventions, the wars, and the calamitous reach for world domination. This will require a concerted effort, to demand Congress and President Obama stop funding military build-ups, stop funding nuclear escalation, begin to disestablish the global US military empire and start taking care of things at home. Americans are ready.
My wife, Elizabeth, and I travelled to a dozen American cities recently and met with thousands of citizens who re-defined "National Security" in terms of human security - - jobs, health care, education, retirement security, safe communities and privacy.
It is for us to gather the knowledge and resources, the strength and determination, to regenerate the soil, protect the land, purify the air, preserve the water, in a ceremony of personal, civic and political engagement which protects and celebrates the natural world as the precondition of life itself.
We can lessen climate disruption by changing the way we grow our food, and restoring our agricultural lands with regenerative organic (agroecological) practices. In doing so, we acknowledge that our food choices have the greatest single impact on our environment, and on our own health.
Let us face the New Year with the confidence that our ability to bring great change depends on our willingness to expect great things of each other and of ourselves. Our current condition of nationhood begs to be re-joined to the visionary confidence of those who 238 years ago announced the birth of a nation and the empowerment of 'we the people'.
Let us summon great courage, and, through the work of our hands and our hearts, create anew the nation which we most desire, one that is blessed with peace, prosperity and justice.
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