WEEK IN REVIEW II (Aug. 12-18, 2007)

The biggest story of the week was the election of Demopublic as the new leader of the U4Prez Independent Party. In my experience with her, she was a vocal member of the first incarnation of the Women's League, and my desire was to make her a co-chair of what is now the Women's Society. She declined for her own reasons, which I thoroughly respected, but her absence from the Society left a gaping hole no one adequately filled. She is energetic, intelligent, and will no doubt bring the Independent Party to a new level of prosperity, doing it her own way. I strongly encourage all Independents to assist her in any way they can, and to continue to be as active as they possibly can be in the discussions and movements within U4Prez. You have a winner at the helm, if everyone gives it everything they have, the sky is the limit.

With this, the biggest mess of the upheaval of my departure is now tidied up. That's one less piece of Olivia at U4Prez. And while I truly admired the tribute TheWiz put together in my behalf, this is now your baby, guys. I'm still part of the U4Prez world, apparently able to exert a great deal of influence from where I am, but you have the hard part of rebuilding the Independent Party.

For that, I deeply apologize. The party should not have had to pick up my mess, and it did not deserve to suffer from my own dramas. I departed angrily, quickly, and without consideration as to what would happen after I left. I re-ignited this blog and went to work badgering those I felt were ruining U4Prez the most, including its creator. I left a gaping hole for you all to attend to. From my position, and from what virtually every Independent was telling me, my leadership was appreciated, even loved by some, and my style of leaving my own to be free to campaign without hindrance, of putting promotion before platforming, and of being a lightning rod for controversy and attack, for its time, worked. In my way, I felt I knew what it was to be an Independent, and by promoting without condition on one hand, and taking the heat off of everyone else by letting it heap on me on the other, I hoped other Independents could achieve a degree of success completely on their own merit. Even in my departure, I continue to pull for the Independents, not just because the leadership role was my baby, but because I truly believe in what I always say, that voting for the lesser of two evils is still voting for evil, and it's time the good guys got a break. I just hope I was able to help a few of them get that break and make the most of it. Aside from that, I owe you all an apology. I am sorry for leaving as I did, and I am even more sorry for leaving such a mess for you to clean up.

In the move from candidate to pundit, I continue to be that lightning rod for controversy, and this blog continues to be one of the hottest topics, if not THE most talked-about item, at U4Prez. My name is still on the tip of everyone's tongue, and I resigned ten days ago. The Hard Right goons continue to tell you all they don't read this blog--by the tone of their talk shows, their videos, and the comments they leave here, trust me, they read every single fucking day. Other candidates chime in with a note for me, and I might start a Mailbag section of this blog in the future.

I am very surprised by the continuing success of this blog. I truly thought it would burn itself out after the first two tumultuous days, when Eric Gurr was being demoted from god to janitor. Holy Hell was raised by THIS BLOG. I am flattered to take some credit in this, but truly, there had been a deep undercurrent of dissatisfaction at U4Prez. If my departure and Eric's scolding makes U4Prez stronger, if the infrastructure is truly refurbished, if the vote count is transparent, then maybe it was worth it. I get to be Queen Bitch, Eric still has his lottery ticket but can't wipe his ass with it anymore, and those who benefitted the most from the favoritism are knocked down a few pegs. With the exception of the few unhappy campers who no longer have Eric to back them up--generally the ones I describe in detail in this blog--I think it's a win-win for almost everyone.

I do consider Kiss & Tell a source for "news and opinion", and when news breaks at U4Prez, I try to be the first source with the scoop. So, when Elected_Al leaves a comment on my MySpace telling me he quit, I check out his profile, sure enough, he resigned, and it's on this blog within minutes! Before it becomes a topic of conversation, it becomes a topic on Kiss & Tell. I am truly upset that there was not more notice of Al's departure. He was one of the most positive candidates here, someone who fought for decency and clean campaigning. He was also upset that it seemed more prudent to some to sully opponents than merely leave them be, and he watched with a keen eye what these Hard Right hooligans were doing. I kept telling him, he has that clean image, it's not worth getting it tainted by mixing it up with the Liberty Crips. Ultimately, he chose to keep his soul instead of selling it to get back at those who brutalize innocents. He deserves far more respect than he is getting, and I do hope I'm not the only candidate who continues to chat with him. If so, then he grossly overestimated the alliances he built here. Much more than I do, Al deserved more from U4Prez than no one noticing his absence.

The typical Iron Lady response would be WAAAAAAAH. Mduminiak, it's Al's fault completely he wouldn't get down in the mud and sling it out with him and his fellow swine; he chose to give his pearls elsewhere, and leave them to stew in their own filth. Hawk would just say Al was "typical liberal crap" and walk away with a smirk. At least I know where these heathen stand where Al's resignation is concerned, as pernicious as their stands are. Truly, he must have touched more of you than you let on. I would have loved to have seen more of it.

I did get responses for my comments on the departures of dk08 and Atticus, including from dk08 and Atticus themselves. Congratulations, warmongers, the antiwar sentiment at U4Prez is officially dead, for the three most vocal proponents of the PNV--these two and myself--are gone. I left, and everyone knows where I went. dk08 is brokenhearted. Atticus is re-upping, not because he believes the war is worthy of anything or because he is promoting democracy, but for the only reason that should matter to any father--his children. Whether he ends up in Iraq or Afghanistan or Darfur or Kosovo or wherever he is ordered to go, the children of those countries have a true hero to turn to. Atticus got it, and he would give it to you good if you tried to give him the usual patriotic bullshit your American sensibilities would tell you to give. He sees in his children what every father sees in his children around the world, and he is willing to die for THEM, not you, chickenhawks, and not me, and not some ethereal thing called democracy or America. For THEM.

Trust me, were Atticus to die, I would not glom onto his death and gain brownie points for it. If I hear from him, I will definitely write something, so those of you who love him as well can stay in the loop, and I do hope, if any of you hear from him, you talk it up. But trust me, Atticus will not be thinking of me in his moment of worldly demise, he is not going to think, please, Olivia, keep fighting the good fight. I will miss him and hope he returns safely, and if he doesn't, I will grieve in my own way. But trust me, I am no keeper of the Atticus flame, nor would he want anyone to be. This is HIS thing, and he hates people who try to glom onto such events. He knows fakes when he sees them, and he called a few of you out for being just that. A letter from Atticus from, say, the Sudan, is news at U4Prez, and whether he writes to me or anyone else, there's plenty of us who would like to be kept in the know.

I'll do what I can if you do what you can.

Next week I will continue to fight the good fight, try a few new things. If these poll things ever work correctly, I might try a new poll question. A bunch of us are wondering who the poster "Your a Whore" is, and we're all taking guesses on the subject. I still maintain it's Mduminiak, even though he says it isn't him. He also said he doesn't read this blog, yet he leaves messages here? The man has THIRTEEN VIDEOS out on me, and he has the nerve to talk about someone else being a stalker? I have always put my faith in the candidates of U4Prez, and he has always thought you all are stupid. Yesterday's video is evidence of this. He expects you to forget all the videos he's made concerning Olivia, all the time he's spent on his radio show talking about me, all the time browbeating me at U4Prez simply because we're there at the same time, and yet, somehow, it's ME who is obsessed? I've never lied to you before--embellished, maybe sensationalized, but never lied. I listened to Mike's show one day for about ten seconds, in his archives, and I moved on, because he was just another conservative on the radio. That's just what Western Civilization needs, ANOTHER CONSERVATIVE WITH A RADIO SHOW! Nothing to distance itself from any other such show. If I want to know what Mike thinks, I can just listen to Rush Limbaugh or Sean Hannity. If I want to know his opinion, I'll ask the people who do the thinking for him, thank you very much.

I am of the opinion that U4Prez is a perfect place to put your theories of politics to practice. You can say whatever you like in your platform, but in your conduct, in the way you campaign, and in the way you build alliances, you say more about what you really stand for than all the spindoctoring you will ever do. Take Mike, for example, Caped Conservative Crusader. Now, from what I know about the right, conservatives are supposed to loathe bureaucracy, right? After he smears his face all over the Republican leadership profile, what does he do? He creates a bureaucracy! The Steering Committee is the GOP's nanny state, where the poor Republican peasants are supposed to go to know what they are supposed to say and think and do. Conservatives allegedly loathe centralization of power, right? Here's Mduminiak, not only ruling the GOP as a tyrant, he gets his fellow goons from the LC and a few new asskissers to join this committee, people he knows will rubberstamp whatever he wants to do. Evidence of this was the loud outcry from others over what was to go into their platform. Typical tyranny, instead of providing a forum for all candidates to have a say--which they eventually had to do under pressure from within the GOP, much to the chagrin of the privileged SC members--Mike and his Politburo dictated to others what the platform would be, kiss his ass if you don't agree. Mduminiak can paint as rosy a picture he wants about conservatism, but when given a chance to put it into practice in his platform and leadership roles, he chooses tyranny. Again, it's typical, how many real-life candidates out there claim to be conservative, only to get to Washington, sign onto pork barrel spending and all their pet projects, and ignore what they promised in the first place? Such politicians use conservatism as a bumper sticker and nothing else, and when they get elected, it's wadded up and thrown away. Mike is no different, ladies and gentlemen. When given a chance to apply conservative ideals to his campaign, you know what, fuck conservatism, he'll do what he wants. Talk is cheap, and listening to the ten seconds of his show, it's VERY cheap in the Breach. Conservatism gets a vote or two, but when given a chance to use it in his campaign, it's ignored. And whoever voted for him for Leader is hosed.

Then again, according to Mike, if you get hosed because a candidate uses conservatism as a bumper sticker, then tosses it easily aside after he gains power, IT'S YOUR FAULT.

I wish Demopublic nothing but success, and if there's anything in this blog she can use or learn from, I would be deeply honored to continue to keep writing these articles, telling these stories, and posting these opinions. Be it my own experiences and mistakes, or the experiences and mistakes of others, I will most undoubtedly continue to serve the U4Prez community, whether it's to hold the moderators' feet to the fire, call a spade a spade, go toe to toe with the goons, pull the mask off of imposters, or deliver news as it happens, I'm not going anywhere.

Love, Olivia. XXX

The OTHER Five Rules

I watched the Mikester’s video last night, the one with the five rules to success at U4Prez, and as I partook, I kept thinking of that Mel Brooks movie, HISTORY OF THE WORLD, PART ONE. There is a scene, the Ten Commandments, where Mel is portraying Moses as a crotchety old Brooklyn Jew, and as he stands before the people of Israel, tablets in hand, one of them drops and crashes where he stood, and as this happens, he says, “The Lord Jehovah has given you these fifteen… (drop) Oy… ten, TEN COMMANDMENTS!”

That’s what I felt when I saw Mduminiak, one of the dirtiest candidates in U4Prez history, get on video, get in your face, and tell YOU how YOU need to run YOUR campaign, so you could be just like him. The irony was oozing from my screen, was it oozing from yours? I wouldn’t call it hypocrisy, that word is bandied about all too often, usually by the Hard Right thugs he employs. It’s been used so often at U4Prez by those goons who merely seek violence, that it holds little of the real force it’s supposed to have. When Jesus calls the Pharisees hypocrites, it means something. When Hawk calls a liberal a hypocrite, people generally chuckle under their breaths.

Anyway, I watched that, not only seeing the subtextual attacks he was making, but also wondering, is this it? He doesn’t stand for ANY of this nonsense. Have fun? Of course he wasn’t having fun when his rating was going down because of his negative campaigning. The only fun I see is when the Hard Right chases off another candidate, THEN they have their fun.

So, in the spirit of wanting to help Mduminiak, here is the first draft of “rules for success” he started with, along with my interpretations on what they mean. He can thank me later.

1. FIND A VERY STRONG CANDIDATE AND BECOME HIS MONKEYBOY. You really don’t have to do much else. When was the last time RogueJew came along and did anything other than burn a liberal in effigy? That’s because, because he chose his master well, he doesn’t have to do anything but be a goon. All you have to do is find someone who has a little merit, and glom onto him. Do everything he does. He goes negative, you go negative. He uses the Liberty Caucus like a punching bag, you use the GOP in the same way when you become leader. Whatever your guru does, defend the practice to the end, watch and learn. You really don’t have to be creative. Just do what he tells you to do. Occasionally, in true mafia fashion, he might ask you to show your loyalty by running an “errand”, which might be to browbeat an antiwar candidate into submission, or run a handful of negative ads you might apologize for the very next day, but the fact that you did it will be enough. Whoever that candidate is, dig into him like a chigger, like a pit bull, like Mike Tyson on Evander Holyfield’s ear. And don’t let go, no matter what. By doing this, you will never have to think for yourself, you can coast almost the entire way, and with a little luck, if the captain of your heart is in good with the creator, you just might get to ride all the way home.

2. CREATE A DETAIL OF LOYAL GOONS TO DO THE DIRTY WORK FOR YOU. According to MDuminiak, if you have been harassed by the same four or five hooligans I keep mentioning on my blog as the notorious Hard Right, if you have been told very lewd things because you are a woman, if you have every intention on running a clean campaign only to let the sophists twists it to their own ends and then laugh as you pick up the pieces, IT’S ALL YOUR FAULT! Personally, why would you want to deal with such goons anyway? The smart thing would be to quit, because, truly, people, you have better things to do than have the same gang of trolls coming up to you every day, saying the same smarmy things you were getting on every other political message board on the Net, berating you for everything from your ideology to your gender. It’s not worth the aggravation. However, if you do decide to stay, do what MDuminiak did, and assist your master in creating your own goon force. Find the most ruthless characters on the site, befriend them, and let them do the attacking for you. It’s real easy to talk tough when you benefit from six months of violence. Don’t ever forget what Mike says, when the Hard Right is pressing on you, calling you names, twisting logic to suit their needs, and laughing at you for fighting back, YOU CHOSE TO BE A VICTIM! When a Neanderthal candidate talks to a woman about her body and what he would do with it, all that humiliation and frustration she feels, IT’S HER FAULT. Be a winner like Mike chose to be, and get your own goon squad today!

3. PLAY THE DIRTIEST POLITICS POSSIBLE, AND THEN ACT INNOCENT. This takes some doing. Kempite’s not very good at it, Mduminiak is actually a little bit better. Kempite will allow the nastiest things to come flying out of his piehole, and even with all his goons falling on the sword for him, with having Eric Gurr in his back pocket (or front pocket, depending if one or the other feels frisky), he still comes out looking worse than before. I wonder why. I think it’s because the U4Prez population isn’t as stupid as he makes them out to be. I think it’s because it takes a little more than whining after the fact, a little more than playing the victim card, a little more than blaming others, to gloss a situation over. Perhaps an apology—hint hint? Perhaps just a shred of humility? Mike is a little better on this one, and I think it’s because of all the time being second banana has taught him what his place is, in Kempite’s shadow. He has that barest minimum of humility, so he knows how to fake it. When he looks in the camera and talks about how YOU, you worthless little peasant merely trying to get off the ground, need to be positive, it’s because he has spent so much time going after HAK. Copulate. Olivia. Dk08. Dozens of others. Hey, there’s not just one attack video against Copulate, there’s FOUR! Mduminiak put up EIGHT attack videos on me IN ONE NIGHT, took them off when they were no longer politically expedient, then put them back up, along with FIVE MORE SINCE, because Olivia was calling his buddies out for the bullies they are. Truly, there is no one out there more likely to slit your throat than Kempite and Mduminiak, everyone who’s been at U4Prez for any length of time knows this. Better to be at the right hand of the devil than in his path, I guess. Truly, though, if Kempite goes after you—and if you stand up to him, he most assuredly will—he’ll just whine like a girl after the fact. Not Mduminiak. After he lynches you, he has enough sense to tie you to a boulder and throw you in the deepest part of the river, and then act like, there’s no body, you can’t prove a thing.

4. USE ANYTHING AT YOUR DISPOSAL TO GAIN BROWNIE POINTS. Some have proven, there is truly no limit to what you can use to generate not just a positive appearance, but also sympathy and pity. Kempite will use deadly diseases and dead candidates to enhance his agenda. Hedrick sold his soul to the VRWC for thirty pieces of silver, and it might have cost him his integrity and reputation, but he did get in good with the Hard Right, and he did show that mean old Olivia not to play nice with him. Iron Lady will defend her fellow criminals to the end, no matter what they say, no matter how putrid the vomit, no matter if she herself finds it repugnant, so I guess she is willing to use her integrity gleefully for the Hard Right to take turns wiping their asses on. It was Kempite himself who set this tone, that dirty politics is American politics, that anything goes. Pick a virtue and sell it for a vote.

5. EVERY CANDIDATE WHO QUITS IS A STEP UP FOR YOU. Truly, this is a game, and the faster you get someone to quit, the easier it is for you. Once a candidate gets his footing and creates a niche for himself, it’s much harder. But if you put together your goon squad, as recommended in Step #2, it’s a little easier to harass him. Smart candidates usually quit when they realize U4Prez is just another freeper’s paradise, no different than a thousand other political message boards. Never doubt this, not only have the Hard Right knuckledraggers never talked a candidate outside their tidy clique out of resigning, they celebrate when one does. Such parties have been thoroughly documented. Mduminiak can smugly talk about such candidates being weak. I gotta tell you, there is no sport in a game where the object is to be the biggest blithering asshole you can be, and get away with it. Anyone who browbeats others and then tells you you CHOSE to be victimized is downright cruel. Anyone who decides to leave because she is embarrassed and humiliated from unwanted sexual advances, apparently that’s a woman being too weak to hack it. Be that as it may, it’s still cause for the Hard Right to party like it’s 1999!

Now THAT'S a little more honest of a list! You're welcome, Mike.

Now, as a candidate who has fought the many battles on U4Prez and decided to abdicate because they were all in vain, let me give you five tips (not rules, that’s a tyrant for you, always making RULES) that might help you.

1. BE CREATIVE. You always wanted to do this, here you are, your own campaign. Let it all hang out. Try the things you see the big boys doing, or if you have your own million dollar idea, give it a whirl. You are limited only by your own imagination.

2. PICK YOUR ALLIES WISELY. The backstabbing at U4Prez is atrocious, and there is blood on hands you would never think were capable of such a thing.

3. KEEP IT SIMPLE. Don’t exhaust yourself with a separate position for every single fucking issue out there, no one reads all of it. But think of what you truly stand for, what you believe deep in your heart, and let everything you say and do revolve around that point. It’s called focus, and trust me, people will remember you far more for the one principle you hold dear above all others than how you feel about tort reform and abortion and Israel AND health care AND entitlements AND immigration AND yada yada AND…

4. PAY ATTENTION. There are opportunities for exposure all around, and if you find ways to take advantage of them, you can catapult your way to the top in no time, even in just a few days. I’ve seen candidates come in here and light the place up from the get-go, and in literally a week, everyone’s talking about them. Get involved in debates. Watch what the high-profile candidates do, and out-do them.

5. AT THE MOMENT YOU FEEL YOUR DESIRE TO WIN OUTWEIGHS YOUR MORALITY, LEAVE. Too many candidates are here who will say and do anything to bully someone, to make another look bad, to promote themselves in unethical ways. Don’t sell your soul just to get another tenth higher on your rating. Don’t throw other candidates under the bus to make yourself look good. If you find yourself saying and doing the very things you know in your heart are wrong, then you are becoming the very thing you swore you would never be. Many of the people I go after in my blog, they sold themselves out a long time ago, and they are to a point that they think they are truly doing U4Prez a service by sexually harassing the female candidates, by dogpiling on perceived opponents, by using the most twisted logic this side of Rush Limbaugh, and in general, by browbeating you into submission. They’re trying to thin the herd. They’re NeoCons, they don’t like democracy or diversity, they don’t respect differences in opinion. They think they’re doing the place a favor in getting you to quit, and they’ve talked themselves into the notion that if you quit, IT’S YOUR FAULT. Don’t buy into it. If you feel you have to constantly rumble with them, leave. You’ve done exactly what they wanted when you retaliate. You’ve lost your focus, and you are on the road to becoming what you loathe—one of them, someone who will say the meanest and dirtiest thing they can think of to get you to go home, so they can dance on the corpse of your campaign. By all means, challenge them, they’re just a bunch of bullies, you hit them in the nose hard enough, they back away. They’ll come back later, and they’ll talk shit about you behind your back, but you can get them off of you by a show of strength, for the moment. But if you feel you have to sink to their level and stay there, it’s time to go. Whatever you should be doing as you waste your time at U4Prez, it’s better to do that than seeing just how deep in the mud you are willing to go to take on these slugs. Go do it. It’s not worth the time and effort. What does it profit a man to gain the entire world, yet lose his soul?

Oy.

Eavesdropping on the Indies

By Friday, the vacant Independent Party Leader position will be filled. One of the largest gaping holes left by my departure will be spackled over, and life will assume a different standard of normality, but normality nonetheless. The strange predicament TheWiz found himself in as the interim spokesman will end, and another Indy will be in the position of being ignored by the moderators, defending the Independents against the onslaught of criticism the Republicans and especially their Hard Right elements, promoting candidates who most likely will be completely on the other side of the political spectrum from him or her, while at the same time conducting his or her own campaign.

It was a challenge for me, but I will tell you, fellow Independents, and especially whoever assumes leadership, it became my favorite part of being at U4Prez.

I peek in from time to time, and I know there has been praise for my efforts from some, criticism from others, concerning my definition of Independent Party Leader. From within the party, I almost universally received positive feedback, even gratitude. I think most of U4Prez understood what I was trying to do, even my staunchest adversaries on the Hard Right knew, they were merely contrarian for its own sake. God Bless them for their consistency, even in promoting difference of expression, they never turned down a chance to stick it to Olivia.

Which might be to your advantage, leader-to-be. Without the baggage Olivia brought with her, you might have less opposition from the Hard Right thugs than I did.

So, what exactly did Olivia do as Independent Leader, anyway? I invite anyone to offer her own perspective to this question, but this is the way I perceived what I did.

When I ran for the leadership position, I already had a record of being against the two-party system. I had declared myself an Independent because I wanted to make a stand against the Republocrats and somehow make a dent in their duopoly. There is no inherent reason why there should be but two major parties in the first place, both of them trying to appeal to all, yet serving none. I felt, because these two entrenched parties had been drunk with power for so long, they no longer differentiated themselves from one another, except to try to convince the American people the other guy was bad because of the R or the D after their names. Between the truly petty partisanship, the ultranegative campaigning, the distortion of news to fit agendas, and the collusion the two parties had to keep other parties out of the loop, I simply had enough. I am an Independent because I do not wish to be associated with either party at all, because other voices are out there that deserve to be heard, and if we continue to prop up this two-party fantasy, politics will get more and more corrupt and less and less answerable to the American voting public.

As a candidate, I ran primarily on this one issue, and I had set up the Antipartisan Pledge as a way of seeing who was out there who agreed with the sentiment. There are plenty of other candidates, from all parties, who are simply tired of politics-as-usual, of petty partisan bickering, and they want to do something about it. Some want to bring that garbage to U4Prez, thinking dirty politics is all fair in love and war. Others, and I consider myself one of them, believed politics need not bring out the worst in people, and the winners need not be the one who can sling the most mud.

More or less, everyone knew why I was an Independent, so I didn't have to talk too much about myself when I ran for Indy Leader. With my record out there for all to see, I could focus on HOW I would do the job of Leader. While the Republicans and Democrats were talking about platform-building, I shucked that idea altogether, and put together my own methodology.

I made it very clear in my speech when I campaigned for the post, and I put it on the Indyleader profile, there was no way you could get, at that time, 600 Independents, going 600 different directions, to agree to a centralized platform. One of you might know how to do it, but from where I sit, I deemed it impossible, so I didn't even try. I lean left on most issues, how in the world am I going to convince a hardcore rightwing Indy like, for instance, CoryF, to go along with any platform I could come up with? Even if a committee were set up to compromise, inherently, such a central agenda is anathema to everything Independents stand for. The very idea of an Independent Party was a contradiction of terms.

That's something my detractors on the Hard Right never understood. There are reasons as to why we all went Indy. I rattled off a few reasons why I did, and chances are they reflect the same opinions of others. But Icababe's story is different from CoryF's, or MejicoJohn's, or CHASE, or Maditude, or my own. Respecting their individual cases, I never lifted a finger to try to agree on a platform. Independents are a diverse bunch, whether they promote it or not. People belong to parties so they can do the work leadership provides them, and work themselves up over the years. They don't want to lead themselves, they want to be part of something greater than themselves. While I can respect that, it's not for me, and it's not for anyone who wants to promote their own campaigns, without having to answer to party elite.

I think I had a good bead on this, and I think that is why I won with 52% of the vote, the only party leader to win with a majority. Of course, ALL elections are suspect on U4Prez, but I digress.

And, true to my word, I didn't ever bring up platforms. Outsiders, especially select Republicans, felt I was blowing my party off. To hell with them. I was going to be damned, whether I followed the traditional route of platform-building or not. If I'm going to be damned for anything, it's for acting on my own terms.

So, no platform. What, then, did I do?

My big thing was promotion. Exposure. Trying to give Independents other outlets. I get enough exposure as it is, it was time to promote them with the same zeal in which I promote myself. I defy anyone to claim I plastered my name and face all over the Indyleader profile, you would be a damn liar. I only put my name it twice, once within my usual farewell of Love, Olivia. XXX. The other was my resignation letter. You never saw my face there, and you never saw a shred of self-promotion.

One consideration I made was using the Indyleader profile itself as a billboard for individual Independents. Typically, you would see five or six videos, all from Independents, from what I could find from YouTube. It was my way of giving the more creative Independents a small boost of exposure. Any Independent could take advantage of it. I check YouTube all the time, so if they even put one up without being told, I would know it existed myself.

We will never know how effective such tactics were, but I know they were appreciated. I remember one particular night, CHASE came around, excited about his new camera. I told him previously I was using the Indyleader profile to promote videos, and I used his latest one. He couldn't believe anyone would try such a thing, and he was very gracious toward me, thanking me. Previous to that, CHASE and I would talk incredibly rarely, so the notion that someone he barely knew would take enough interest in him to promote his videos, he thought that was the greatest thing! A few weeks later, he hunted me down in mid-debate and told me he just made a new video with his new camera, but it wasn't on YouTube yet. I was able to get his video on the Indyleader profile within five minutes of his telling me of it. In other words, I got a video on the Indyleader profile before YouTube! Whether that gets CHASE any more 10's, only he knows if it helped. But he certainly did seem to enjoy the fact that someone gave enough of a damn about him and his campaign to give it a try.

What were the Democrats or Republicans doing? Think08 was on family leave, so the Dems were dead in the water. The Republicans had Mduminiak's mug smeared all over the profile, his name is big bold letters. No promotion for anyone except himself and his Steering Committee. Remember how I told you there was no way I could ever force the Independents in a box and make them like it? Mduminiak tried to strongarm the entire Republican Party the same way Kempite bullies the Liberty Caucus, and he used the Steering Committee to do so. Basically, he found about twelve yes-men, many of who knew he could count on to brown-nose him pretty good from the LC, and basically created an elite within the GOP. A couple of the more veteran Republicans, namely Copulate and HAK, raised hell over this, and it literally took a month for Mduminiak and his new gang of goons to capitulate and let others in. Back to promotion, what was Mduminiak promoting? Well, other than himself, he was putting out videos, one campaign was to insult the other parties. He basically called the Independents a bunch of sheep for following me in what he referred to as the Olivia Party, and he called the Democrats a bunch of whiners. His other campaign was to promote the history of the GOP, and in both campaigns, I found it odd, he never brought up a thing the GOP did in the last 30 years. Any accomplishment he cited as a Republican victory, it was when Lincoln or Teddy Roosevelt was president, when the party was much more progressive than it is today. Everything he cited as a Republican plus, liberals could also point to. The fact that Mduminiak asked Independents the question, why have Eisenhower, when you could have Ralph Nader, was laughable at the time, and it's more laughable as time wears on. Was there a single president from the last 20 years he could say the same? He pointed out the very reason why we became Independents, because the presidential nominees the two big parties put out over the last 20 years have been horrid! Mduminiak is probably the lamest candidate on U4Prez, and five months of tangles with me have proved it again and again and again. Not the dumbest, not the meanest, not the ugliest, just the lamest.

Every so often, when I sensed a dead spot in the current discussion, I would chime in on the Indyleader board with something snappy and snazzy, something to bring a little attention to the Indies while, at the same time, taking a poke at the other parties. I might write something like, while the other party leaders are busy turning their profiles into jukeboxes, we at the Independent Movement are finding new ways to promote our candidates. While other party leaders are trying to tell their candidates what to think and feel and do, the Independents are free to run their campaigns any old way they choose. While other party leaders are picking their buddies for committees, the Independents have no leadership to kiss up to. I know it irked Think08 and especially MDuminiak, but it did seem effective in getting the Independent message out.

It was also effective in gaining not only several defections, but it drew such a thick line between the Indies and the other two parties, that they had a clear-cut choice, not only in ideology, but in philosophies of leadership. MDuminiak proved to be a top-down kind of guy, big on organization, and if you were on the outside looking in, sucks for you. I had no structure, no organization, no platform at all. I was earning my keep by being a one-woman PR staff, using my energies in promotion alone. Candidates from any party could look at the very different tactics used, and many turned Independent, in spirit if not in actual practice, because there was such a disparity of style. Mike could never understand why I didn't put a platform together, and I know it was a mistake for him to try.

The grand virtues I had as a candidate were a big mouth and a lack of shame. I had no problem mixing it up during an argument, and every chance I get, I tried to defend Independents. That is, after all, part of leadership, right? Defending yours? MejicoJohn was screwed with TWICE in run-offs, and I made sure my opinion was heard. Someone would laugh at why we didn't have a platform--I said we do have platforms, we have 700 platforms, because we have 700 Independents. BigDaddy was playing his petty little games with me one day, trying to drive a wedge between myself and the more conservative elements of the party, asking if I kept candidates like CoryF and Icababe in the loop; I had to ask, what loop? What business? They have no one to answer to, they're Independents, you genius! They're their own boss! LuckyNum was lashing out at CoryF one day, calling him a Republican disguised as an Independent--I jumped hard on Lucky, telling him CoryF has every right to give up his autonomy and play goon for Mduminiak if he pleased, but he chose to be his own man and be an Independent, and I don't care if he's left or right, he has his reasons, and I respect them, step off. This was my baby, and as I wrote elsewhere, no one fucks with the Independents on my watch.

But that was me, and it's no longer my watch. The new leadership will have his or her own style. For instance, you might indeed think it pertinent to put together a platform, or at least a list of ideals all Independents generally agree upon. I had such a list on the Antipartisan Pledge. You might try to find those common bonds, that which repelled you from the two mammoth parties. For the right leader, it could happen.

But I am confident that our fellow Independents, the ones who supported me and gave me words of encouragement throughout my tenure, will give whoever emerges as leader their loyalty and support. That's one thing I could count on among the Independents; although they were all their own sovereign, they all knew the ties that bound us all together and respected them. Liberal or conservative, moderate or extremist, they all know why they went Independent, and that reason is their own. We are all captains of our own ships, and yet, at the same time, we're all in the same boat.

Good luck.

Love, Olivia. XXX

Atticus

Today's note, a letter to the u4Prez Independent Party, can wait one more day.

I have no doubt, when each candidate learns of the departure of Atticus and his return to the military, it will fill us all with a myriad of emotion. Loss. Sadness. Patriotism. Confusion. And in that same vein, he will be remembered by each in their own unique way, some to beat their chest and rekindle the flames of war support, some to shake their heads in anguish as another beautiful American is being led to slaughter.

This is Atticus, the way I will remember him, and the way I will see him when he returns.

Atticus was a soldier in the same vein that Pat Tillman was a soldier, wanting to defend and serve, wanting the terrorists gone, and wanting America safe. By the same token, he had huge problems with this war and had no problem expressing it.

When the PNV had just begun on U4Prez, I was awed that, right next to dk08's name, when I saw the profile for the first time, I saw the name Atticus. Which is to say, Atticus was the very first to sign up for it. Atticus had been there before, had seen the worst in mankind, and the sheen of pride and patriotism had been warn off the hard way. I knew he had been in combat, and I also knew he had issues with this war. And yet, there was his name, the first to join what was then the lone antiwar voice on U4Prez.

We talked about videos, and Atticus presented his. There are currently four under the name Bacchus1975, and they all have the names INI and Atticus, names he used on U4Prez. Between all four, if they are all watched, I think you get a much better idea of the man than the myth possibly already being projected onto the U4Prez psyche.

About his videos, they are wide-ranging, and it's hard to think about them being done by the same person. On one hand, you have him printing the lyrics to a reggae song "Murderer", calling to task any leader who wages wars of choice and refuses to understand the carnage he has wrought. On the other, you have a very uplifting, light, cheerful video, done to the delightful music of Ziggy Marley, preaching the joys of love and peace, worthy of being put on any hippie's profile. Possibly the most disturbing video I've seen in the U4Prez canon, entitled "INI", starts with a tiny--and I do mean tiny--infant gruesomely suffering from the effects of depleted uranium, the weapon of choice for both Presidents Bush in their wars in Iraq. I had to turn it off when I saw the very next picture, a toddler whose eyes had exploded to the size of bloody grapefruits outside her head. Having finally stomached the rest of it, I report it as a scathing report on the farce that is the War on Terror, done Atticus style--in your face, THIS is what this war is about, look or be called a pussy!

I am sure the warmongers out there will talk about his final video, and that will be the Atticus they will conveniently remember. The same people will remember Pat Tillman as the man who gave up football riches to defend his country, never recalling that, when overlooking Baghdad from a helicopter, he is reported to have said, "This war is so fucking illegal."

Candidates, don't pick and choose the Atticus you wish to remember. Remember Atticus for what he was.

I could count on Atticus to defend his friends at the drop of a hat. There were a few times he jumped in when I was taking on a handful of Hard Right thugs, and they generally steered clear of him. I don't think they got him, here was a man, possibly more man than any two other men at U4Prez, been in combat, I am sure they wanted to embrace him as evidence the war was noble. He talked frankly about it.

And I think he appreciated my willingness to jump into the fray and take a bullet for something I believed in. On the Fifth of July, after the ruckus died down, Atticus and Mikep1990 both sent me PM's, telling me what I did was the right thing. I appreciated their sentiments, but isn't that what democracy is supposed to be about? Doing the right thing?

When the Hard Right zoomed in on dk08, and I stepped in to assist, Atticus asked me if I needed his assistance, because he was ready to defend not only us, but the PNV he was a part of. I told him the show was over, but to hang tight, things could spark up again.

When MejicoJohn got rooked A SECOND TIME, a month later, in the next run-off, losing to a candidate who hadn't had a comment on his profile since FEBRUARY, the first one to alert me to it was Atticus, who basically came up to me and said, MejicoJohn is getting screwed again, what are you going to do about it, Olivia? By that time, Atticus knew I would stand up and fight, and I think he wanted a fight, too.

The perfect Atticus video was on the PNV profile for the longest time, and you can see it on YouTube at your leisure. It's the Ziggy Marley one, the one with the hand-drawn hearts all linked together, and the words LOVE BEGETS LOVE. In the end, that's what Atticus stood for, even if he believed that's not what could ever come from this putrid war he set to music and pictures in his other videos. That was the soft soul of a soldier, the one I tried to describe to the warmongering set once upon a time, the one who stands out over the battlefield, beholds the multi-levelled carnage and the wasted and broken bodies strewn about in the dusk, thinking not of such petty things as country and courage and presidents, but of his children, how they will be protected on this day, and dear God, if there is one, let this be the LAST time we human beings ever have to fight like this, that we come to our senses and find better ways to solve our differences, for if my children have to fight as I did, this was surely done in vain.

No one else has anything better to offer than platitudes. For once, can we do away with the trite little comments, the patriotic pleasantries, the politicking, and just admire the the equally beautiful and horrific complexities of this man as he leaves the building? Just shut up and watch him go? Just this once, can we do that?

The Fifth of July

I woke up on the morning of July 5th and came onto U4Prez, thinking I needed to put something together to promote the upcoming MejicoJohn-Icababe run-off. This was our very first primary, for we Independents, and as a party leader who had always tried to promote out candidates widely and wildly, I was hoping to inspire the population to vote. Maybe I would set up a couple of banners, maybe I would talk the Independent Party up. I didn't plan to spend but maybe an hour or two, getting the good word out.

What I thought would be a nice brief day on U4Prez, promoting fellow Independents and having a good time all around, turned into one of the most seminal events in U4Prez history, the sort of event I hadn't seen before and haven't seen since, and most assuredly I have never seen another candidate act in quite the same way.

Because the previous day was a holiday, the moderators--Eric--neglected to set the Independent schedule accordingly. MejicoJohn and Icababe were supposed to run off, and I was to run off against the winner. The victor of all that would be the June Independent primary winner, the very first Independent to be represented in the Conventions and general election at the end of the election cycle. It's a big deal at U4Prez, to be in these run-offs, they are your foot in the door toward moving up a level, to being a real contender for President. And as Independent Leader, I took this as our party's glorious moment to shine, to present our best and brightest, to give the more veteran Independents the chance that had been screwed out of for so long. This was going to be our coming-of-age, our grand debut, and our chance to prove ourselves every bit as legitimate as the Republicans and the Democrats.

As per usual, unless it has to do with Kempite and his pack of snarling wolves, Eric was pretty lackadaisical, and there was no moderator on that morning. There had been one earlier, if I remember correctly, one had made some sort of news announcement, and in the twilight hours there were two other faces. I come back to U4Prez, and what do I see, but MY face where John's should have been. Something was wrong, and I was not sure what was going on. My first impression is, dammit, it's our first primary, and the Independents are already getting bent over!

I had chatted with MejicoJohn over the previous couple of days. John was my first choice for the run-offs. It's still ambiguous to me exactly how much input the party leaders actually have in picking run-off candidates, some have told me I get one choice, others none at all. I submitted to Eric a list of TEN candidates I thought would be fantastic choices for our inaugural primary; all four of Eric's choices happened to be on that list, so I really don't know if I had any influence or not. I do remember the moderator telling me MejicoJohn was "my" choice, so I guess I will have to go along with it, I have no reason not to.

John was in the middle of moving him and his family from San Antonio to their current home in Nuevo Laredo, so campaigning was way down in his list of priorities. The ability to even get online, let alone stage a campaign of any strength, was minimal at best. We exchanged a few notes, and I told him his time was coming, to get ready for it if he could. He was happy to just be part of the whole thing, which I think is what every candidate truly wants at U4Prez, not necessarily to win President, but to be in the thick of things, to be active in the community here, and to feel validated for his or her contributions. He wanted to be more active and knew he couldn't be, but he was happy that he was being taken seriously at all.

I am on record in saying it would not surprise me one bit if MejicoJohn won the whole thing. His charm and sense of humor have won over a lot of people, and I think he gets a kick out of laughing at the rest of us when we take ourselves way too seriously. U4Prez is a soap opera, and I'm sure, no matter what rama was playing itself out, John was always sitting there, a Budweiser in one hand, a cigarette in the other, laughing his ass off at the rest of us.

When I saw he was getting screwed out of his position, I flipped out. John was going through his own personal turmoil, fate itself was keeping him off the site, now the moderators were going to jerk with him too? Jerk with the Independents, on our inaugural primary?

I remember talking with Republicans and Democrats about how these primaries worked. They all said that mistakes were common, that candidates had been screwed out of their places in the past, it's just part of the territiory, Olivia, deal with it.

If the way the Republocrats handle incompetence is to shrug their shoulders and let it go, that's their business. No one fucks with the Independents on my watch!

I started getting very loud, trying to wake the moderator up. I know U4Prez is a fishbowl, that someone is always looking in, and I was hoping to get someone to realize a mistake had been made, and for them to get off their duffs and correct it before too much of the day had burned away.

I think it was about 9am where I was, so I have to assume it was the middle of the business day wherever the moderator was, assuming he was in America. Who knows, the job could have been outsourced, and I would have had to be yelling for hours waiting for a moderator in India to wake up.

It started to irritate people right away when I got on a comment board and started shouting things like WAKE UP! and QUIT SCREWING WITH US! Some of the names I remember that were gathering around me when this was going on were Friday, Musicman, Iron Lady, and BigDaddy. I talked nonstop about what was going on, that MejicoJohn was getting rooked, that I had to do something to change this.

While I was being loud and boisterous in public, I was sending the moderator PM's, repeating the same thing. If they were going to ignore me, they were going to ignore me on two levels, not just one.

I truly had hoped I would have gotten a quick response, that the error would have taken a few moments to correct. But these are moderators, more times than not a trained chimp can do their job faster and with greater efficiency. To think a swift reply was possible was daydreaming on my part.

So I tried setting a fire under them, and every ten minutes for an hour, I sent a commend board message and a PM, counting down that hour, and telling them if they did not make some sort of repair to this situation, I would take matters into my own hands.

I have to be honest with you, when I started the idea of an ultimatum, it was a bluff. I truly hoped a moderator was just taking a nap on the other side of the screen. For as loud and obnoxious I was being--and I was indeed saying some pretty inflammatory things, shy of cursing--I would think, if the moderator was doing his damn job, he would see me and react. Me being loud was my way of waving my hands frantically over my head, hoping the overhead plane would see me.

I think everyone stuck around just to see what I would really do. I at least think that was Friday's position. The rest--Musicman, Iron Lady, BigDaddy--took this as a golden opportunity to try to knock me down a peg. All three of them had been rather forward in their disdain for me, and I always gave at least as good as I got, if not better. They each had an axe to grind with me, and in their own way, they took this moment, when I was desperately trying to get the mods' attention, when I was trying to restore MejicoJohn's place in the run-off, when I was trying to protect the Independent Party from the same negligence that the Republocrats had become accustomed to, to get back at me. Heaven forbid they should set their petty squabbling aside for the sake of doing the right thing. When it counted the most, these three proved that pettiness is far more important to them than maintaining democratic integrity.

I had called Musicman a pussy in recent weeks, and instead of assisting me to get MejicoJohn back to where he was promised, he made a few snide remarks. What are you going to do, Olivia, call the mods names? I was floored with just how much that man snivvels. Instead of putting personal feuds aside for the moment and assisting me in getting their attention, he's pouting about how I called him names. Whatever honor he might have built up as an alleged veteran and a so-called minister evaporated at that moment, because when the shit really hits the fan, Musicman has a record of turning into a vindictive little guttersnipe. About the only constructive thing he had to say to me that hour was, maybe the moderator was in a car accident on the way to work, lighten up. I was livid with that statement, for one, a moderator had made changes to the board just a couple of hours before, so someone was there; and for another, it was simply the lamest excuse I had ever heard.

Iron Lady was merely irritated by me, wanting me to shut up. I realize the one I was protecting wasn't one of her Hard Right gigolos, so I don't think she understood how any other candidate could possibly be worthy of being protected by someone. Instead of standing up to the moderators and shouting them down to correct their mistake, she whined to me and told me over and over again to shut up. She might very well have been one of those Republicans who simply accepts mediocrity and even defends it for no other reason, save her own GOP indentity. If she chooses apathy in her democracy, that's her business, but why insist others share in that apathy?

BigDaddy was taking the position that I was grandstanding, and he was making a few snide remarks about that. He has never bitten me higher than my ankle, but Daddy, he is as relentless a viper as they have on U4Prez. Doing the right thing is always secondary to sticking it to Olivia. When a crisis hits, you can definitely count on Musicman to cry like a girl, for Iron Lady to tell you to shut up, and for BigDaddy to try to knock your legs out from under you. You wonder why I say the Hard Right on this board isn't at all concerned with democracy and completely obsessed with personal attacks? Here's two of them and one of their flunkies, with a golden opportunity to set petty bickering aside for a moment and truly stand up for democracy, and yell out to the moderators to get off their asses and do their jobs. Instead of joining me in this, their narrowmindedness took over. Their love of democracy was overshadowed by their hate for Olivia. People were dying in Iraq for their right to vote, and here were three onU4Prez, giving democracy the middle finger the very moment it was neglected and on the brink of extinction.

At the moment of truth, they picked pettiness. I will never forgive them for it.

Well, an hour of shouting at the sleeping moderator passed, and after all the comment board messages and PM's, after the chorus in the background doing everything it could to submarine me, it was time to put up or shut up. I thought it completely ridiculous that the moderators would not respond, during a business day, within an hour. I honestly thought at that point that Eric was out to screw the Independents, and whether it was on purpose or out of negligence, it really didn't matter to me. I wasn't going to be part of this. And I was not going to allow Eric's shenanigans screw MejicoJohn out of what could have been his only shot at a run-off.

Think about it. You've been at U4Prez for months, playing the game, campaigning, hoping to get just a chance at the run-offs. You finally get that chance, and the moderator makes a mistake and takes you off the schedule. How are you going to feel? Cheated? Pissed? As if a gross mistake had been made? Brokenhearted? Who would you rather have in your corner at a moment like this, Olivia, who will shout down the heavens to get you back where you're supposed to be, or the apathetic trio I had to deal with, who just would want you to deal with it, you got hosed, so what?

After that hour, I announced that I would rescind my spot in the run-off. For U4Prez, that's sort of like giving up your chance at a million dollars. No one gives up the chance at winning a primary. No one. Spots in the run-offs are hard to come by as it is, such a spot might never come back around. This might be my sole chance to get into the general election. I rescinded it in protest, hoping the notion that one of the high-profile candidates raising such a ruckus would get someone's attention.

I also said that, if the moderators STILL had no responded by that afternoon, I would have to take even more drastic measures. I was rolling them around in my head. Maybe I would give up my party leadership position, or go on hiatus. Mduminiak chimed in, and I will give him credit on this, something he would never give me on any point. When I asked him what I could do to throw a wrench in the whole thing, he served up a brilliant method of sabotage--in changing my own party affiliation, the election would come to a screeching halt. Apparently someone previously had done the same thing by mistake. I give Mike a degree of credit, which makes it even worse, because for all his potential, he chooses to use his powers for evil instead of good. Instead of being his own person, he chooses to be Kempite's monkeyboy. For one shining moment, Mduminiak set his petty differences aside for the greater good. Why his stooges couldn't do the same, I will never know. After the calamity, Mduminiak returned to his usual smarmy, thuggish self. I don't know what's worse, someone who is ignorant because he doesn't know better, or someone who is ignorant and DOES know better. Certainly the latter brings with it an ironic sadness.

Fortunately, Eric came in with a big OOPS, and corrected the mistake, apologizing to the crowd, saying the holiday screwed the schedule up, yada yada yada. He went out of his way to thank me for making such an issue of it. BigDaddy asked if the whole thing was grandstanding, which is what he does, all motives are questioned by BigDaddy.

Eric also said it would not cost me my run-off position, to which I laid in on him big time. The only way a protest has any teeth to it is if it's followed through. It means nothing to make such a big deal if there is no sacrifice. I gave up my spot in protest, and that cannot change. I was glad MejicoJohn was back, but whoever won between him and Icababe would be the June winner, end of story.

I felt a sense of validation when MejicoJohn won. Who knows, that right there could have decided the fate of the entire election. A glitch in the primary, something the Republocrats were so accustomed to that they thought it odd anyone would dare challenge the mods when they messed up, could have had far-reaching effects. This also could have been John's only chance at the run-offs, it would have been a crying shame his only shot was marred by moderator incompetence.

As I said, no one fucks with the Independents on my watch.

I am watching earnestly these days as to who will succeed me as Independent Spokesperson. I hope they will not have to deal with the kind of dangerous incompetence I dealt with when I had to talk with the moderators, either in calm or at the point of crisis. I am sure, whoever wins out, will serve as a fine candidate.

In our lives, we all have those moments of truth, when we have to take the shitstorm on, head-on. It's moments like that that define us far more than any awards we've won, or any clubs we belong to. Democracy lived on at U4Prez to fight another day. It died a few weeks later, but for at least one more day, it lived. And when such moments occur, I then knew who would stand up and fight for what's right, and who would take the opportunity to play petty bullshit games. Musicman, Iron Lady, and BigDaddy, these three do not have a single sincere bone in any of their bodies. They saw me out on a limb, and they tried to cut it out from under me. Instead of trying to prevent another candidate from getting shanked by incompetence and negligence, they saw an opportunity to salve their wounded egos and take me on when I was fighting a much bigger fight. They were more than willing to let what could have been MejicoJohn's only shot at the run-offs fall idly by, just so they could take a shot at Olivia.

We all know Kempite will be coronated, and that is why I quit. But back then, when I still believed there was a degree of fairness, I thought about how great it would be to see MejicoJohn win. Not only to see an Independent win, or to see a friend win, or even to see the Republocrats eat crow, but to see how something I did alter the course of U4Prez's history, that would have been something. To think in November, if MejicoJohn won, how sweet it would have been. We can debate whether or not my mouth actually helped the situation or not, but most assuredly, doing nothing might not have gained anyone's attention at all, and John's place in the run-offs, let alone as President, would have fluttered away. The Fifth of July might end up being the most important day in U4Prez history, depending on who wins.

And I think that would have been a hundred times bigger a FUCK YOU than I could say to those three who hacked at me that day.

Requiem for a Candidate

In the aftermath of my controversial departure, I tried to convince dk08 to stay on at U4Prez, the place needs as many positive candidates as possible. I doublechecked his profile, and I request those of you who did and did not know him to read his resignation.

News of this no doubt fills the Hard Right Brownshirts with a certain giddiness. The creator of the PNV has left, there is no one left to champion the cause of peace, they are free to roam and spread their violence and mayhem without someone standing in their way. The lone student at Tienanmen Square has been removed, the tanks can now roll in and squash a revolution before it can take place.

dk08 is as bleedinghearted a liberal as there was on U4Prez, which meant he simply had to be pummelled for having a non-warmongering opinion. He was a soft-spoken individual, rarely making waves, trying, like many, to figure out just how U4Prez works and hoping someone would throw him a bone.

When I saw he had created the PNV (Peace & Nonviolence), I thought it would be great to have at least one antiwar profile. In the want to create a community where all voices throughout the political spectrum could find voice, certainly there could be room in the marketplace of ideas for someone who promoted the beliefs of Martin Luther King, Mahatma Gandhi, John Lennon, and any other heroes who dared to say the real choice is not between violence or nonviolence, but between nonviolence and nonexistence. Mankind must evolve past the bitter and petty level of tribal warfare, and after the bloodiest century in human history (and the first seven years of this century don't look much better), it truly is a wonder we haven't destroyed us all as of yet.

dk08 believed that the current path of American foreign policy was dangerous, that no country, let along America, had any moral right to enforce its own beliefs on another, and that every president since World War II was guilty of promoting war for his own sake, for his legacy, for the selfishness of American interestes, for the greed of the military-industrial complex, for the bloodlust of the American partisan, for the hate of the brown peoples of the world. He believed that there was only a better way, but that the current way could only end in total aanihilation.

There was nothing arrogant about this candidate. I am sure he wanted to win president, even if there were candidates more advanced than he was. He was fairly content to not only participate in an occasional debate, but to promote the PNV and make it a haven for those tired of the nonstop warfare this country has waged for sixty years, most of it unnecessary. Considering how over 70% of Americans think the war in Iraq has been fought the wrong way on one level or another, the PNV had a place at U4Prez.

I had previously tried to create a peace profile, but it flopped, for several reasons. As such, I could certainly appreciate someone trying to promote peace as the basis of his platform, and I was honored to present myself to dk08 and become a member of the PNV.

dk08 was always trying to find ways to make his profile more appealing. Though I made it clear to him I had plenty on my own plate with my own campaign, Independent Party leadership, the Antipartisan Pledge, the Women's Society, getting cats out of trees, looking the Hard Right bullies in the eye, and that the PNV would be his baby, I helped him in any way I could. Whether it was coming up with a few songs for his little jukebox (I will always adore him for finding "One Tin Soldier" and putting it there), or ideas for videos, or promoting a worldwide Peace Day coming up on September 21, or looking up great websites like peaceoneday.org, I tried to give him ideas for his profile. He always appreciated my ideas, whether he used them or not. But he was also especially heartborken that I was the only one of the PNV members who was giving him such input. There were about seven of us in the PNV for various reasons, and I surely thank anyone who promotes peace and antiwar causes as a point of conscience. I think he overestimated the sentiments of the U4Prez populace, hoping to make his little profile just a little more noticeable. He loved talking about Bono, and he was considering a tribute to Princess Diana, of whom the tenth anniversary of her death is coming this month.

That's all he wanted, a conversation of peace.

Because of my want for him to succeed, he left the Democrats and became an Independent. If for no other reason, because I validated his want for a simple dialogue over peace, he turned Indy.

Negligence frustrated him, but what really broke his heart was the very obvious resentment some at U4Prez had against such a sentiment. Wanting to eradicate every liberal from U4Prez with the same fervent zeal that the Nazis sought to remove every Jew from Poland, the Hard Right knuckledraggers were a constant source of harassment. You know the ones I'm talking about, I refer to them all the bloody time, because it seems whenever someone's getting gangraped on U4Prez, it's the usual suspects on the Hard Right who had some part in it.

I remember one time coming here, and dk08 was getting being roughed up by Mduminiak and Hawk. Heaven forbid they could have an honest conversation. Either agree or disagree, or live and let live. Oh no, not on THEIR U4Prez could they possibly have someone talking peace. That's tantamount to treason! Who is this dk08, is he a terrorist sympathizer? Why does he hate America so much? Why does he want to cut-and-run so desperately? The Republican talking points were flying at him pretty good.

I tried to jump in and deflect this tagteaming a little bit. These cowards usually made a few snide remarks when I come around, but when I find all they have to offer is hate, I let them talk themselves out. They were hitting dk08 on this point, that according to him, we should have given the terrorists flowers for what happened on September 11th. When he said there was such a thing as a necessary war--and even I said the same thing, that I never had a problem with going after the criminals who rammed planes into the World Trade Center, so long as we were focused in what we were doing and we caught the bastards--Mduminak's and Hawk's eyes lit up. Hypocrisy! So the PNV DOES promote war! And like the anklebiters that they are, they danced and flicked their tongues at us and gave the na-na-na-NAH-NAH chant, hypocrite hypocrite hypocrite!

Without caring for an explanation, these two delinquents patted themselves on the back, having thoroughly twisted logic to their own means, not caring who they hurt, so long as their appetite for liberalbashing was whetted. Convinced their sophistry to be superior over the desire for peace, they danced away like drunken fools.

I don't think dk08 ever recovered from that.

Now, I realize the Hard Right thugs are never interested in real discussion, in the swapping of ideas, in adult discord. They talk fast and hit hard. The more liberals they can slaughter and stack up like cordwood, the happier they are.

They weren't looking for a conversation, they were looking to gangrape a liberal.

So, here is the response we were trying to give. This is on the record, take it as you wish. Hawk and Mike, I realize you rapists have no real desire to hear this, but it is here, and no twisting of logic will change this.

While no one doubts that there are very obvious times when we need to defend ourselves, whether it is personal or national, it is imperative that we always look at each particular episode with sobriety, calmness, and intelligence. That does not give a person the right to go to his neighbor's house and start a fight because he looked at you wrong, neither does a country have the right to wage war, something that always brings out the very worst in human beings, at whim. Many discerning people of conscience know the difference between the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and many supported the desire to go after AlQaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan. Such an act, though, does not give the Bush administration carte blanche to start wars of choice. This country has had sixty years of nonstop warfare that got us nowhere, that buried us in debt, that filled our cemetaries, that toppled democracies and installed tyrants who acted in American interest before that of their own people. What is happening in Iraq is the exact same fucking thing we did in Iran in 1953, in Guatemala in 1954, in Chile in 1973, all of which had budding democratic societies, demolished because of the shortsighted and bloody desires of the United States government. We talk ourselves into a blather over and over and OVER again to stir up one war after another after another. We haven't won a war in 60 years, and there are too many who see war as a sport and want to just win, no matter the toll in human lives. One million Iraqis are dead because Americans are on an ego trip.

Now, you can debate me on the topic all you like. Actually, I take that back, you had five months to debate me on this, but instead of wondering where I stood, and where dk08 and the PNV stood, you played your little freeper games. You had your chance to have an adult conversation on the subject, but the Hard Right hooligans thought it better to slit a throat than to hear an alternative. What you did was not honest, and you know in your hearts what you did was not honest. Whether you agreed with the PNV or not, you didn't have to bully it, did you?

dk08 wanted to quit after that, but I talked him into sticking it out. I believed U4Prez needed, and still needs, a viable antiwar voice. If nothing else, we could stick our noses up at the Hard Right skinheads and play hippie on the profile, talk about the sixties, play a few songs, and pray for peace, even if all around us are screaming holy hell for the war to get bigger and bigger. It will never stop to impress me how the most peaceful people on the planet, the ones who have truly figured out that we don't have to live in a world of war, are somehow treasonous and dangerous. I've never figured that one out, and I never want to. To basically call the teachings of Buddha, Jesus Christ, Thoreau, Gandhi, and Martin Luther King treacherous and wrong breaks my heart.

I know it broke dk08's.

He tried, and I think he welcomed when I would come around with something new for him to promote. He liked talking the talk of promoting peace, and he truly wished there was more of it.

So do I.

I contacted him the day after I left, and he said he was leaving as a result. I begged him to stay, because U4Prez needs him, just as I had said all along, U4Prez needs positivity, it needs someone to champion peace, it cannot fall into darkness without at least his candle, however vain the light was, shining on.

I truly wonder how many candidates the Hard Right Brownshirts have tried to convince to stay. Every candidate who leaves is a victory for them, never think otherwise with these goons. Every liberal who exits in frustration is another body to throw on the pile, to hurl upon their hedonistic pyre, and with every corpse they carelessly throw into the blaze, like so many Hutu nationalist thugs tossing the thousands of nameless Tutsi bodyparts in a mass grave, laughing as the blood of their fellow countrymen, the ones they referred to as vermin, soaks their fingers and pants and shoes in Rwanda during that bloody spring of 1994, Mduminiak and Hawk raise their fists in victory, another liberal has been hacked by their machetes, another voice for peace dies, another candidate gone, another victory for the Hard Right.

Were Martin Luther King and Jesus Christ candidates on U4Prez, I have no doubt they would do the same to them. Take a good look at the Hard Right militia, pick your James Earl Ray, pick your Pontius Pilate and Judas Iscariot.

I have recently referred to what's going on at U4prez as a civil war. The Hard Right is playing it like the Rwandan genocide. There are about 2000 candidates there, and nothing would make them happier than to get that number down to about 50, all of them ultraconservative Republican. Most men dream of beautiful women when they masturbate. Mduminiak, Hawk, and the others on the Hard Right, they dream of dead liberals when they touch themselves.

The thought of them pleasuring themselves at the demise of dk08 makes me shudder. All true, there were few souls at U4Prez as pure as his. If the whole of U4Prez were to die away and forget his contributions, I vow, I shall never let his work slip away. To the Hard Right, he is a nameless victim, an opposition candidate that had to be destroyed, just another vermin liberal, another one bites the dust. What Brownshirt wept when just another Jew was turned to ash? For me, I mourn my friend.

And anyone who's ever had a heart, they wouldn't have the heart to break it.

NEWSFLASH: Hard Right Dancing in the streets again!

For those of you who question not only my sincerity in delivering you the news and history of the U4Prez sensation, but my motives for doing so, here is the latest breaking news.

Elected_Al, known in the real world as Albert Johnson, Democratic candidate at U4Prez, former primary winner, and all around good guy, has resigned from U4Prez in the same sort of disgust that led others to quit.

Elected_Al has been one of the truly shining lights of U4Prez since he debuted in March. His enthusiasm, his sense of humor, and especially his ability to work with others and form coalitions, made him a real contender at U4Prez. Among other accomplishments, he is the creator of the Youth Organization, a former Democratic Party Leader, and the author of the U4Decency petition (well, the one that was actually decent, comments about hookers spreading their legs sort of rescinds Kempite's co-authorship). Very few candidates at U4Prez had the sort of broad-based appeal Al had.

In time, my reflections of him will be presented in this blog.

In other news, there was a loud popping sound coming from New Jersey, as if the opening of a champagne bottle. Immediately thereafter was jubilation, music, and dancing, as the Hard Right, with their usual glee, celebrated and gloated over the frustrated resignation of another opposition candidate. Luckily, Hawk slept on his side when he passed out on Kempite's front lawn, so he wouldn't choke to death if he puked while passed out on his back. Way to go, Hard Right, you did it again!