Disclosure: I work for the Courage Campaign which has worked on the Blackwater issue, but these opinions are my own.

Earlier this week, I asked What the Hell happened in San Diego in the June 3 election. I explored a particularly underwhelming electoral performance and noted that there was a massive failure of leadership from the city’s elected Democrats (active and retired). Councilmember Donna Frye supported GOP mayoral challenger Steve Francis and Council President Scott Peters ran against the Democratic incumbent City Attorney Mike Aguirre. Incidentally, both Francis and Peters failed to make it to the November runoff.

Then yesterday it happened again. Councilmember Ben Hueso, who in May was rallying to Block Blackwater in his council district, announced his endorsement of Republican city attorney candidate Jan Goldsmith. This is particularly notable because Goldsmith’s opponent is incumbent Mike Aguirre. Aguirre has been a champion for the city in the fight to force Blackwater’s permits into public hearing at a time when a number of other city leaders have…attended a rally and then thrown up their hands.

If Jan Goldsmith as City Attorney would go to bat over Blackwater or any other number of issues that might be uncomfortable for the Mayor or inconvenient for the City Council, I would be absolutely flabbergasted. The campaign, like every other challenge to Aguirre this year, has been centered around a promise to sit down and shut up. The last thing this city needs is another elected official who doesn’t have the necessary combination of power and motivation to force important issues.

As the UT newsblog notes, Hueso and Aguirre have never exactly been close. And Aguirre has taken a lot of flack throughout his term as City Attorney for his rabid pursuit of Mayor Jerry Sanders for all manner of scandal- real or imagined. But as Councilmember Hueso well knows because he’s at the meetings, the City Council hasn’t exactly put on a clinic when it comes to keeping mayoral power checked by the legislative branch. Fighting the good fight has consistently taken a back seat over the past two and a half years to misguided “pragmatism” that largely allowed Mayor Sanders to get anything he wanted.

So what we’re left with is Ben Hueso surveying this scene- Mayor Sanders re-elected to a second term with what CW will term a convincing mandate (it’s not, the turnout was too low to carry a mandate) and a City Council that will likely go from a narrow Democratic advantage to an even split, further neutering a body that had given itself over to the inevitability of the Strong Mayor government- and deciding that the best thing for the city is that the single dissonant voice of any weight in the city government should be replaced by, as the UT put it,

Hueso said the city attorney’s political persuasion is less important to him than getting “the best legal advice.”

If the Democratic Party in San Diego is ever going to be able to capitalize on the tremendous infrastructure building being done at the precinct and street-corner level, leading Democrats need to stop undercutting both their party and basic points of fundamental governance at every opportunity.

What happened in San Diego? Ben Hueso and destructive politics like this happened.

Very glad to hear from Jess Durfee and the San Diego Democratic Party on this issue. Originally posted as a comment in What the Hell Happened in San Diego?, it deserves its own post (with light formatting adjustments).

David Washburn’s slap at the San Diego County Democratic Party in the Voice of San Diego does readers a disservice, to say the least. I’ll cite just a few examples where more serious analysis would have helped.

Consider this year’s mayoral race, in which a Republican challenger spent $4.5 million to promote himself as a kind of progressive independent. He couldn’t even force a runoff against the incumbent.

As the “Voice” has reported in the past, incumbent mayors in the City of San Diego are virtually never unseated. So who is really “openly wondering why established Dems didn’t jump in” – other than a writer trying to justify a story?

The glib comparison to a special election for Congress in Mississippi doesn’t shed much light on the political reality in San Diego.

The passing reference to Republican “financial support from the downtown business establishment” understates the huge fundraising disadvantage that our community-minded candidates often face. The fact is that Democrats remain competitive and are building momentum in those races, despite being outspent by 2-to-1 or 10-to-1 or more.

San Diego isn’t the only area where the kind of low turnout seen on June 3 strongly favored our opponents. But our City Council candidate placed first in District 1, where Republicans still lead in party registration. In District 7 our candidate virtually tied to force a runoff for a seat that has always been dismissed as out of reach for Democrats.

This November, when turnout will be more than double what we saw in the Primary, Democrats will enjoy a very different playing field. We’re also looking forward to demonstrating the actual infrastructure we’re building, from data management and professional staffing to a robust training program for our growing army of volunteers. Unfortunately, this story is long on quotes from armchair analysts and short on facts that might show a more balanced view.

Take the instance where Washburn writes: “Another piece of conventional wisdom holds that the local GOP does a better job targeting absentee voters.” Had he checked, he would have found that the early voting rate among Democrats countywide in June was actually slightly higher than for Republicans.

Campaigns are indeed primarily candidate-driven. But by any measure, the County Democratic Party is vastly further developed than it was even four years ago. We have undertaken a long-term program that will bear fruit over multiple electoral cycles, helping Democratic candidates at every level.

This year’s separate Presidential Primary was one of many factors skewing the June results. But in February, the majority of the vote here went to Democrats, even in some of the county’s most conservative districts.

While some aspects of our plan may take longer than others to materialize, it would be a mistake to ignore the signs of a real “new era in San Diego politics” that a more thoughtful study of the underlying trends would suggest.

By November, Democrats may actually have a countywide plurality thanks to our unprecedented voter registration program and our inspirational Presidential candidate. When we translate those numbers into local victories, I hope the Voice will take the time to set the record straight.

Jess Durfee,

Chair

San Diego County Democratic Party

At Voice of San Diego today, David Washburn asks Where are the Democrats?

It’s a question that I’ve been contemplating and broaching in conversations since June 3 which was, to put it mildly, a disaster for Democrats of San Diego. In a Democratic majority city, the official mayoral nominee of the Democratic Party received 6.3% of the vote. The contested Democratic primary in the 50th Congressional District received in total just 70% of the votes that incumbent Rep. Brian Bilbray received running unopposed. In the 52rd district, Democratic candidates combined for 81% of the total received by Duncan Hunter Jr. himself in a four-way primary.

Not a single Democratic challenger to the Board of Supervisors reached 30% of the vote. One fresh face was added to the Unified School Board- running unopposed. Democrats could not force a runoff in all four City Council races or reach 50% in any, leaving a very real possibility that Dems will lose control of the nominally non-partisan Council in November. Dems in the race for City Attorney split the vote three ways, allowing Republican Jan Goldsmith to slide into pole position for the November runoff against incumbent Mike Aguirre who clocked in at under 29%. Heck, the Chair of the San Diego Democratic Party came in 7th in a vote-for-six race for Central Committee (and then won a DNC spot over the weekend). I could go on.

Each of these races on their own might be justified. But when it represents the entire strength that the San Diego Democratic Party can muster in the midst of a pro-Democratic tide across the country larger than anyone has seen in decades, it’s cause for concern. So what happened? Washburn offers a few thoughts as do I:

One of the most glaring issues is money. As Washburn notes,

In the just-finished primary, the Democratic Party spent $35,000 on direct mail and other support of Stephen Whitburn. His chief competition for the District 3 seat came from two other Democrats — Todd Gloria and John Hartley. Gloria and Whitburn made the runoff.

“Why would you spend a penny on that race?” asked Andy Berg, the director of government relations for the National Electrical Contractors Association and a Democrat. “Gloria and Whitburn would likely vote the same (on council) 100 out of 100 times.”

Meanwhile, Berg noted, Democrats are in dogfights against well-funded Republicans in Districts 1 and 7. The party spent nearly $70,000 in the primary to support Marti Emerald and oppose Boling in District 7. The GOP spent more than $200,000 in that race.

In District 1, the funding disparity is starker. The Democratic Party spent just more than $5,000 supporting Sherri Lightner in a race against Thalheimer and Marshall Merrifield, Republicans who combined raised more than $700,000, most of it coming out of their own pockets.

In the mayoral race, the GOP spent $230,000 on Sanders while the Democrats spent $1,869 on [Democratic nominee Floyd] Morrow.

I should note that District 1 is current represented by Democrat and City Council President Scott Peters, so losing that seat could mean losing control of the Council.

Current state GOP Chair Ron Nehring came up in San Diego, where with unlimited national-level resources he rebuilt the SD GOP with a focus on infrastructure and electoral victory, leaving ideology as incidental. As designed, it has almost completely eliminated the ability of local Democrats to win or often contest elections- which makes the ideological debate moot since…well…there isn’t one.

One wonders what exactly the point is of even nominating someone for Mayor if there will be no support at all. The most prominent Democrats in San Diego looked past Morrow, with former state Sen. Dede Alpert, former Assemblywoman Lucy Killea and former Rep. Lynn Schenk endorsing Jerry Sanders and Councilmember Donna Frye doing everything but endorsing GOP challenger Steve Francis. There’s a time and a place for pragmatism, but completely giving up on even having a debate of the issues that ranges outside the far right-to-center right continuum should be embarrassing. If we can’t even talk about these issues in an election, when are we gonna do it?

Washburn goes on to touch on another issue that I’ve discussed many times with local Democrats: Where the hell are the candidates and the infrastructure? Lorena Gonzalez lost an exceptionally tight race for City Council in 2006 in a district that covers beach communities and downtown urbanites that should be favorable for a Democrat:

“Here we have a Stanford-educated woman with brilliant ideas and Democratic ideals — she epitomized what the party is about,” Berg said. “And [the party] couldn’t muster the support to win a City Council race.”

Gonzalez, who is now the secretary-treasurer of the San Diego-Imperial Counties Labor Council, said she felt, to a degree, like she was on her own during the race.

“Speaking as a candidate, we don’t have the same infrastructure that the GOP has,” said Gonzalez, who estimates she was outspent 7-to-1 in the race. “And there have been no real attempts to create an infrastructure and professionalize the party.”

Gonzalez might be going a bit further than I would there, because the SD Dems and Chair Jess Durfee have in fact been making tremendous strides recently. Indeed, Washburn notes “Since taking over as chairman four years ago, Durfee said he has increased the organization’s budget from $60,000 to $300,000. Also, he said, and the party has gone from having no field operations at all, to more than 700 trained precinct leaders in the county.”

That’s a darn good start, and one that should be commended. But when the money is being misallocated, when candidates don’t feel like they’ll be supported by a vigorous infrastructure, and when leading figures in the party check out and throw their lot in with the GOP under the guise of some cop-out notion of pragmatism that simply justifies the opposing point of view, there’s been a fundamental and catastrophic breakdown.

The infrastructure that is beginning to take root here is encouraging, but remain small steps in the right direction. These few encouraging steps are more than outweighed by the colossal “DNP” on the coaches’ scorecard for prominent Democrats throughout the County. If they weren’t busy with in-fighting, they flat did not show up. And with that kind of leadership, building from the ground up- even in times as conducive as these- becomes a herculean task. If June 3rd’s results are any indication, local Democrats won’t be done wandering in the wilderness any time soon.

Disclosure: I work for the Courage Campaign

There’s a protest from 3-5pm today at Blackwater’s new Otay Mesa facility, and tomorrow Jeremy Scahill will be doing a special Courage Campaign Conversation tomorrow afternoon at 4pm.

In a little noticed vote yesterday, the Merida Initiative passed easily through the House of Representatives 311-106. It provides $1.6 billion with an emphasis on training and equipment to fight drug cartels in Mexico, the Caribbean and Central America, because as Rep. Brian Bilbray explained:

“Either we can go after these cartels in Ensenada, or we can fight them in Escondido,” said Rep. Brian Bilbray (R-Carlsbad), who voted for the plan. “I’d prefer that we move now and take care of this problem south of the border. The drug wars in Mexico and in other regions have grown horrendously violent, and their destructive ways must be quashed.”

It’s tough to directly take issue with any of that, but where does it lead? Potentially to some unpleasant places. In September, the Defense Department opened up five year contracts in support of counter-narcoterrorism efforts to five private companies, including Blackwater USA. “The indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity contract could be worth up to $15 billion for the awardees.” The Army Times analyzed the content of the contracts, describing:

a series of task orders covering a wide range of products and services. These could include anti-drug technologies and equipment, special vehicles and aircraft, communications, security training, pilot training, geographic information systems, and in-field support.

Now back up for a second and compare that to the State Department description of the Merida Initiative:

   *  Non-intrusive inspection equipment, ion scanners and canine units for Mexico and Central America to interdict trafficked drugs, arms, cash and persons.

   * Technologies to improve and secure communications systems that collect criminal information in Mexico.

   * Technical advice and training to strengthen the institutions of justice – vetting for the new police force, case management software to track investigations through the system, new offices of citizen complaints and professional responsibility, and witness protection programs to Mexico.

   * Helicopters and surveillance aircraft to support interdiction activities and rapid response of law enforcement agencies to Mexico.

   * Equipment, training and community action programs in Central American countries to implement anti-gang measures and expand the reach of these measures.

Quite a bit of overlap. However, in a May 22 press release from Blackwater, it asserted

What it isn’t. Critics of the project have used blatant fabrications —       claiming that the facility will be used for border security or immigration purposes — to build support for their opposition of the facility. The proposed facility will be used for training alone…

This might be comforting if there was any reason at all actually trust Blackwater’s integrity. As just one example, Post-Katrina investigations by expert Jeremy Scahill discovered that Blackwater deployed to New Orleans without a government contract. They just showed up, fully armed, and went to work of their own accord. Leaving aside local San Diego concerns (where private firefighters are already being used to combat wildfires), Blackwater’s contempt for law and oversight in New Orleans is hardly an isolated incident. When Blackwater mercenaries killed 17 civilians in Baghdad’s Nusoor Square,

the first U.S. soldiers to arrive on the scene have told military investigators that they found no evidence the contractors were fired upon, a source familiar with a preliminary U.S. military report told CNN.

The soldiers found evidence suggesting the guards fired on cars that were trying to leave, and found that weapon casings on the scene matched only those used by U.S. military and contractors.

Yet there have been no successful prosecutions and Blackwater’s contracts with the U.S. government continue to grow and it’s existing Iraq contracts renewed. Why? Because every time a government function is outsourced, the capacity (at least short term) for the government to retake that responsibility is lost. Which means that without dramatic top-down action (the Stop Outsourcing Security Act would be a good start), every step forward by Blackwater is one that’s exceptionally difficult to take back.

Which circles back to San Diego in a number of ways. If Blackwater establishes itself locally, it’s exceptionally difficult to push them out again. With a local base of operations, not only are they positioned for “narcoterrorism” contracting and unauthorized deployments on the streets of downtown San Diego, but it’s a base of marketing operations for what Blackwater itself describes as a private CIA offering “surveillance and countersurveillance, deployed intelligence collection, and rapid safeguarding of employees or other key assets.”  In a land of Minutemen and giant contracts for virtual border fences that “failed to perform as expected,” outside-the-law private intelligence organizations are unlikely to help anything.

Activists are keeping up the fight in San Diego, but this is not a local issue. The Bush Administration and its allies have been trying to sell off the entire government without any concern for functionality or accountability, and the front lines of resistance have extended to San Diego. There’s a protest from 3-5pm today at Blackwater’s new Otay Mesa facility, and tomorrow Jeremy Scahill will be doing a special Courage Campaign Conversation tomorrow afternoon at 4pm.

Two small but important steps to avoid the Blackwater wormhole.

Full disclosure: I work for the Courage Campaign

A day later than expected, a federal judge today ruled in Blackwater’s favor, ruling “that ‘the public interest weighs in favor’ of allowing the company to open its facility” in Otay Mesa. The ruling will allow Blackwater to occupy the facility, which they’re expected to do in the morning. Court hearings will continue on June 17th when the City of San Diego will again present its case that Blackwater misled city officials during the ministerial review of permits.  This doesn’t end the case, but it does rob the city of some of its thunder. The legal wrangling will continue, and in the meantime, Blackwater still has more permits pending that will hopefully receive quite a bit more scrutiny.

In related news, the political landscape shifted considerably in elections yesterday. Mayor Sanders avoided a runoff in his bid for a second term, which could either free him to do the right thing or lessen his concern for public opinion. Incumbent City Attorney Mike Aguirre will be heading for a runoff in November, coming in second to GOP candidate Jan Goldsmith. If activists locally are savvy and get the support they need, Blackwater can become a central issue in that campaign. That runoff also knocks termed-out City Council President Scott Peters out of the equation- it will be interesting to see what he does with the remainder of his time in office on this issue. He’s spoken out with us previously and his will be an important voice going forward.

As more develops, we’ll continue with the updates. The next date circled on my San Diego/Blackwater calendar is June 10, when Blackwater: The Rise of the World’s Most Powerful Mercenary Army author Jeremy Scahill will be in town to speak on the depth and breadth of Blackwater in America (pdf).

Brian did one for San Francisco, so now it’s my turn. I’ll defer to the Calitics endorsements for contested state and federal races and focus on a few collected locals. I’m skipping the unopposed races, I’ve done varying amounts of research on these ranging from “exhaustive” to “I trust this one guy’s opinion” and as usual, I speak only for myself, not Calitics or the Editorial Board.

Superior Court 19: Garry Haehnle

Superior Court 45: Evan Patrick Kirvin

San Diego Prop A: Yes

San Diego Prop B: Yes

San Diego Prop C: No (The Mayor should not appoint his/her own auditor)

San Diego Mayor: Floyd Morrow. While this is almost certainly a Sanders/Francis race, this is more than a protest vote. It’s important to force this race into a runoff, otherwise most (maybe all) leverage is lost with the Mayor’s office from here until the end of the upcoming term. Squeezing at least a few more months out of it would be great.

San Diego City Attorney: Mike Aguirre. I have serious reservations about all of these candidates and Aguirre is certainly no exception. His personal squabbling with the Mayor has often been counter-productive and reckless and I don’t overlook that lightly. But flawed as he may be, I haven’t seen any other candidate distinguish themselves as interested in being quite the rabid counterweight to a “strong mayor” that’s already proven itself a failed model. That role doesn’t have to be filled by the City Attorney, but I’m not yet convinced it’ll be handled anywhere else.

There are also a number of people who I would like to vote for if I were in other parts of San Diego, but this is who I’m voting for.

Anyone inside San Diego or with a fleeting interest in San Diego issues, feel free to share your own voting plans or simply beat me into submission for the insanity of my picks.

Tomorrow’s the big day (depending on your perspective I suppose), with local, legislative and proposition votes going on all over the state and the Montana and South Dakota primaries wrapping up the Presidential calendar.  There’s speculation that Sen. Clinton will suspend her campaign tomorrow night, plus an easy dozen congressional primaries to watch, the Leno/Migden/Nation battle royale, I’m masochistically fascinated by the San Diego mayoral race- the list goes on.

It looks like I’ll be holing up for a bit at the Obama watch party at the W Hotel here in San Diego. I’ve also heard that local Young Dems will be at The Shore Club and City Council candidate Todd Gloria will be gathering with supporters at The Local. So that’s a random and incomplete collection of spots around San Diego…What city/bar/restaurant/corner of your house will you be reporting from as we all obsess tomorrow evening?

Earlier today, Blackwater ratcheted up the San Diego battle, suing the City of San Diego on federal charges. Blackwater claims that the revocation of its occupancy permit (so that the public has a chance to comment and review) violates not only state and federal rights, but Blackwater’s Constitutional protections under the Commerce Clause.  You can read the entire complaint in pdf form here, but I can assure you that the irony of a company who operates outside of all law- Constitutional and otherwise- trying to claim those same rights runs right through the whole thing.

I work for the Courage Campaign

The argument rests on a number of misrepresentations, including the assertion that Otay Mesa is a “remote” and maintaining that fulfilling a military training contract somehow corresponds to a closed-to-the-public “vocational school.”  But the crux of it all is that Blackwater thinks it’s unconstitutional for there to be a public review of its permit. Which of course inaccurately attempts to convince us all that Blackwater is just another business. That’s the Blackwater pitch through all of this, and (hopefully) it’s never going to fly. Blackwater likes being a special case when it’s insulated from murder prosecution, but not when it screws up their permits. Speaking with KPBS, City Attorney Mike Aguirre said “It’s not really something that in my judgment is a appropriately before a federal court. [sic]”

Brian Bonfiglio for his part as Blackwater West’s shill accused the city of trying to suck up to activists (when was the last time that happened ANYwhere?) in defense of the lawsuit.  This is a whole new level, we’ll see what comes next.

[cross-posted from dailykos]

Yesterday Mike Copass and incumbent Susan Davis participated in a debate hosted by Common Cause and the League of Women Voters.  They are candidates for the Congressional seat in the 53rd district of California, my district.  The hour-long event at the Joyce Beers Center was very well attended – standing room only – and it was a great debate.

I didn’t take notes – and I should have – but below the fold are the points I can remember.

You can contribute to Mike Copass at my ActBlue page

I don’t know if “full disclosure” is called for, but I’ll try to describe my association with Mike.  I don’t have any position on his campaign, but I’m a supporter and have come to know him better over the course of the campaign.    I consider him a friend.  I have long been impressed with his clearheadedness, his courage, and his attention to detail, but in yesterday’s debate he revealed even greater mastery than I already knew him to have.  My overall, admittedly biased, impression was that where Representative Davis spoke in generalities and evasions, Mike had specifics – in terms of the facts of the issues, the legislative context, and his positions.

It is very much to the credit of Susan Davis that she agreed to participate in the debate – one thing I have admired about her in the past is her willingness, with frequent Town Meetings, to face her constituents and defend her votes and positions.  She had nothing to gain, really, by this debate; as the incumbent she only lends legitimacy to her challenger by giving him this forum.  Both candidates showed class, showed respect for the other, and that made this serious debate about serious issues focus almost entirely on the issues, on the record, and not on personal attacks.  Mike did point out Susan’s voting record and the contributions she’s received from Titan Corp.  I (with my acknowledged bias) felt that was entirely appropriate.

The question that most struck me was whether the candidates would end military recruitment in high schools.  Mike’s answer was an unequivocal Yes – and that we shouldn’t have shooting ranges on our high school campuses, as are already (I think) present on some San Diego schools; Susan’s was a tempered No, that somehow we need to fill the military and while there should be rules about it, the rules should allow our schools to be used to prime the cannon fodder pump (my words, not hers, of course).

The war machine, the Congressional military industrial complex, and our illegal occupation of Iraq (Afghanistan was shouted out by someone in the crowd, too, but it didn’t reach the mics) were probably the dominant subjects of the debate.  Susan is proud to have voted against the use of force resolution, and conflicted, but still proud, of her support for so many war funding resolutions – she considers herself to be “supporting the troops” by these votes (this statement brought a rare chorus of boos from the audience, which had been enjoined by the moderator to keep quiet so we could have more time for the debate).  With respect to ending the war, she expressed hope that the new administration would turn things around.  It was odd, too, the circumlocution by which she said (or didn’t say) it will be President Obama: as best I can remember, her words were, “of course we all hope it will be one of two candidates, and I think we all know which of those two candidates it’s looking like it’s going to be.”  That, to me, in a nutshell reveals just how unwilling she is to take a position that might offend someone.  But that’s not the point; the point is that she seems to consider the continuation or termination of the Iraq occupation to be a question for the Executive branch – despite her steady votes of support for its funding.  

Mike, of course, explained that he supports ending our illegal occupation of Iraq and understands the role of Congress in bringing that about.

Both candidates support a woman’s right to choose and stem cell research; there was not a lot to differentiate them on these issues.  As a microbiologist, Mike arguably has significantly better credentials on the stem cell question, but Susan’s answer was quite correct and heartfelt, referring to a family member who might have been helped by such research.  

One question asked for specific projects for the San Diego area; I’m sorry, but the only answer I remember is Mike’s support for a public park to take the place of the Naval Training Center; this is a rather pointed contrast with Susan, who supports turning the property over to a developer for commercial development.  

Specifics were again asked for with regard to policy to fight global warming.  Mike talked about Kyoto and Jim Bell’s plan to make San Diego energy independent.  I’m sorry to say I have forgotten Susan’s response.

I am sorry I did not take notes; it would be better to have more specifics to share with you.  I came away with strong impressions: of a defensive, misguided incumbent and a very well prepared challenger.  The audience certainly was on Mike’s side, and I think that most people watching the debate would be compelled to consider him, not just the superior debater, but the person better qualified for office.  I hope more voters in this district will have the opportunity to watch the debate.  Please join me in contributing to Mike’s campaign; the primary election is June 3rd and he could use all the help you can give him.

my ActBlue page

Mike’s campaign website

I have been holding off writing to Susan Davis, my local superdelegate, but after what Hillary Clinton said yesterday, I finally had to let it out.  Here is the text of my letter to Rep. Davis:

May 24, 2008

Susan Davis for Congress

PO Box 84049

San Diego, CA 92138 Via Facsimile

Re: Superdelagate Endorsement

Dear Congresswoman Davis:

I write to you as my member of Congress and as a superdelegate to the Democratic National Convention.  I strongly suggest that you endorse a candidate for President of the United States now.

It is my understanding that there are three positions that you and the other superdelegates have taken in this election: those who have endorsed a candidate; those who have declared their intention to vote for the winner of the most pledged delegates; and those who have made no endorsement.  It appears you fall into the third group.

Recent developments in the presidential campaign have, in my view, made it absolutely necessary that you and the other superdelegates declare your intention as soon as possible.  Specifically, Senator Clinton’s remarks about her staying in the race, juxtaposed with a reference to the assassination of Robert Kennedy in 1968, are simply beyond the level of decency I expect from a Democratic candidate.  Further, any attempt on her part to explain them as a mistake are unconvincing to say the least; as she has made such a comment on at least one other occasion in March to a Time magazine editor.

I want to say that I will respect your decision as to whom you will support; the party rules have reposed such discretion in you and your conscience, and I will leave it to you to exercise such discretion whether or not I agree with you.  However, the Democratic Party can no longer wait and watch as this internecine battle winds down.  In order for Senator Clinton to win the pledged delegates, she would have to win well over 100% of those delegates to be awarded in the remaining primary contests and caucuses.

I have supported you in Congress since you got there, but I feel that I am witness to a disturbing lack of alacrity on your part for both your Congressional and political duties.  I have been rather unimpressed with your legislative accomplishments with regard to the core duties and powers of Congress as set forth in Article I of the U.S. Constitution.  Let me point out, for example, that you were on the Veterans’ Subcommittee for years while conditions deteriorated at Walter Reed and other VA hospitals, yet I am unaware of any statement from you regarding those conditions until they became public in late 2006.  Walter Reed Hospital is only a short distance from Capitol Hill.  Based on the conditions I saw in the news, they should have been obvious to anyone who had visited the place.  I would think that you even more than others, being that your husband was a military physician, would have made an effort to visit that hospital.

Further, I note that going into the second primary election this year, you do not have a functioning campaign website.  The page asks viewers to “bear with you” while it is being updated.  I must ask: what is the holdup?

This is a disturbing trend.  Now, as the Democratic Party needs unity, and Senator Clinton seems bent on destroying it, you again “sit on the sidelines.”

It is time for the party to begin to move on to the general election.  John McCain is being given a “free ride” to do as he pleases, in spite of his daily gaffes, flip-flops, and shockingly bad positions, such as his cowardly abdication of any leadership on the new G.I. Bill.  He says he opposes the Webb bill, but would rather be fundraising rather than vote either for or against it.  The Democrats simply cannot let him get away with it any longer.

I urge you to do the simplest of things, even though it will take courage.  Please publically endorse a presidential candidate now.

Very Truly Yours,

greggp