#WeThePeople candidates with Primaries on June 5th, 2018.

Part 4

Katie Dunne, Passionate believer in democracy and member of UHM's Digital Media Content Crew.

Ruben Major on the Responsibilities of the Secretary of State, Election integrity and what to do about it, Streamlining the business filing process, the Intelligence Agencies, Solar being safer for National Security and Medicare for All.

Ruben Major is running as a Democrat for the Office of Secretary of State of California.  He was interviewed by #WeThePeople on October 30th, 2017.  The incumbent in the race is Alex Padilla - an Establishment Democrat.  There are also 2 Republicans, 1 Libertarian, 1 Peace and Freedom Party candidate and 2 Green Party candidates in the race.
 
Ruben had a rough start to life.  His teenage mother and alcoholic (at the time) father separated when he was just an infant.  Ruben remained with his mother until he was 14 – when he moved out.  At some point in his young life his mother was on drugs and there was even trafficking involved.  He remembers food boxes and his mother eventually getting some sort of disability allowance.  I’m sorry to hear that - says John, looking shocked.  From then on, Ruben made his own way, without help.  He worked full-time through high school, and was tired after night shifts.  Clearly the teachers - or some of them, didn’t know he was working and suggested he was lazy and should quit school.  Thankfully he didn’t.  Ruben worked very, very hard and is living the American Dream now.  He has a law degree, a Masters in military history (and some) extensive training in counter-terrorism, obtained a paramedic certificate and has spent 20 years as an EMT.  He has an amazing life now and 3 awesome children.  His worry though is that others won’t be able to work hard and live the American dream in the future, as it is becoming more and more difficult to achieve.
 
Ruben is 100% behind Medicare for All.  It’s a no-brainer for him.  When people don’t get preventative care, the problems will be worse (and more expensive) later on.  Besides, those who have insurance - and show up in E.R. with serious issues, would not have to wait so long if everyone had Medicare for All, he says.  Single-Payer healthcare (which Alex Padilla blocked in 2007) would mean substantial savings.  Ruben lost a friend to cancer.  Insurance didn’t cover the treatment …Why, he says?  So that corporations can make more money, he answers.
 
What are the responsibilities of the Secretary of State?  He or she is the Chief Elections Officer of the State, and has certain responsibilities relating to corporations and business filings and also maintaining a number of registries (State Archives).  The latter is also very interesting to the military historian that he is.  As Secretary of State, you should be an advocate for the causes you believe in, as well as administering what you are doing appropriately, but your job in general is to be as non-partisan as possible.
 
What did you think of the integrity of our elections in 2016, John asks?  Well, there were big problems with administration, voter rolls and easily hackable machines.  I do believe the Russians were involved – Ruben says, but that’s not the issue because we have to do something regarding those machines and the corporations that administer our elections.  We need publicly owned systems, open source software, printed paper ballots, and more accountability for election officials.  Nothing has changed since 2000, because those in power are happy with the system, John says.  Ruben continues.  We need a process that incorporates both paper and machines.  People might put in a few years in an Election Systems Department in government, but they are offered substantially more money to work in IT... Government doesn’t retain the staff it needs to be able to do the job.  We have to invest more money into our democracy.  CA right now has source code that is actually required to be updated into an Escrow account.  The only way the Secretary of State can find out about the actual source code is if he/she has cause.  How do you know if that’s the case if you can’t look at the system?  We need to urgently de-certify bad machines and bad software - that just got certified by the way.  People need to have confidence in it.  Ruben believes you need a system that complements paper.  Paper should be your primary count.  Then you could put the paper through an open source scanner.  If everything lines up, there’s no problem.  Paper is prone to “hacking” too, i.e. ballot stuffing and ballot stealing.  I like the sound of all that - says John.  Alan Dechert - Ruben continues, is the computer scientist who helped to develop this. 
 
YouTube chat still prefers paper, so the conversation continues.  Ruben - when he was counting votes himself one time - had personal experience of someone carrying away the ballot box in order to count the votes at home or in the office, he tells us. Cameras might be an idea also.  I like the idea of having multiple redundancies he says.  NASA uses open source software (that’s open code that is not owned by private companies).  Right now private companies own pretty much all election systems except for New Hampshire’s.  Considering the results that we have had, why not try something else?  Older folk do not necessarily trust all these machines, but they phone or use ATM cards every day, John says.  They don’t really understand what secured is.  Laura intervenes “The system doesn’t want it to be fast, efficient and accountable.  They want it to be manipulable…” We’d like to have 100% paper count but although we can advocate for that the counties may not allow it, Ruben answers.  He tells us that a private company, which has (already) been paid, has no incentive for maintaining the machines.  And the hacking of proprietary software – he says?  Look at all the data breaches that have happened recently.  Yes says John, you have to get into Office to start the work of dealing with all this.
 
Alex Padilla is a Dianne Feinstein Democrat.  What would you do differently to him?
 
Well, the first difference is that Alex has decided he wants to certify proprietary code, and (that) in an election crisis!  I try not to be disparaging, but the problem when we have all these people taking money from corporations is that it’s clear the way the votes go.  We need to represent the people better.  As to the Mail-in ballots in CA, the ACLU has filed a lawsuit against Secretary of State Padilla regarding the up to 45,000 votes that were trashed from mismatched signatures.  Discrimination against minorities (having the vote-by-mail ballots thrown out) is 2 to 1.  If we’re going to a system which is going to be substantially increasing vote-by-mail, which we are in CA ... that’s a serious problem!  We could potentially be disenfranchising a lot of people.  We could have a proper process and notify those whose votes aren’t counted.  All they are required to do right now is put the information on-line, but most people don’t look there to see if their vote counted.  Ruben has looked at the court cases and at what is happening with Kobach.  He is pretty concerned about it.  I let people know.  I say this is the active voter suppression that is going on right now all over the country.  CA needs to speak to the rest of the country and say, we can do X here, why not all over the country? Alex Padilla doesn’t seem to have investigated any of the problems we had with the election cycle.  Ruben plans to not give Donald Trump access to the voter registration base, but that involves sending a letter, or more activism perhaps (not what Alex Padilla has or is doing?).  What you do when dealing with elections, whatever your position, needs to be issue-based and not people-based, Ruben states.  That’s very Bernie says John.  Ruben is grassroots funded.  He takes no corporate donations at all, unlike Alex Padilla who takes a lot.  And then he (Alex) is overseeing these businesses…!!  If you take lobbyist money, you leave yourself open to suspicion.  For Ruben because he does not, it is a simple question of right vs wrong.
 
Ruben would like “to streamline the business filing process.  We must maximize technology and create a better, more transparent business environment for California.  As a small business owner / entrepreneur, I will fight for California business.”  What is involved here?  We have gone to electronic filing for LOCs.  We need to get more information about businesses and relay information to whatever department.  We also don’t attract a lot of limited liability corporations to CA, in comparison to other States.  The reason is that we charge an $800 fee to do business in CA.  Sometimes businesses operate here as long as they can, then when caught pay the fee.  It’s a substantial amount if you’re starting out.  There is also a ($250) fee if you don’t file your statement of information on time.  It doesn’t matter what size a business is, the fee is the same.  We need to be alert for shell company registrations.  The money laundering issue is really a hot topic right now.  We should be able to figure out ways to catch that, and police it better.  Also it is really important to turn over information to the Attorney General on a more frequent basis, for people who are performing fraudulent actions, that includes during elections too.  Perhaps the A.G. could maybe look into this signature issue (mentioned above)?
 
Jilly asks whether Ruben thinks the CIA should be dismantled.  No, Ruben replies.  It is important to do the work of (spying) because of the possibility of total war at any time.  The problem is where the intelligence agencies are mixing (in) with domestic affairs.  We ‘d have to see that they are doing their job, in their role, the way they were supposed to do it, and let the internal police do the internal work.  John comments that that would be one of the issues, but asks about the fact that because they are the CIA, they are allowed to murder and torture people, and the fact that we don’t really know what they do and yet they get trillions of discretionary dollars and we never even know where it goes to.  I have issues with them in that regard John says, and then continues.  You talk about making government agencies more transparent, and I’d like to say that the CIA is just part of the larger issue which is the military industrial complex.  You will know Eisenhower’s famous speech about that.  Where do we stand today?  Do we need a military as giant as it is?  I think, replies Ruben, we’ve reached a point where you can’t actually do total war anymore … from a practical standpoint the only thing left is police affairs.  It’s a difficult issue, because as you’ve said we can’t have our intelligence agencies hooking up with businesses and industry to undermine our democracy.  We don’t want to see people suffering by any means.  I feel very strongly that we need to take care of each other.  I don’t like torture at all.  And it doesn’t work anyway.  That’s a tough one, says John, because a lot of the business filing you’ll have, probably have to do with the M.I.C.  You, if in office could change the focus there. 
 
Ruben was photographed helping out during the Napa Valley fire.  He says he was honored to, and misses - helping out, field work, providing direct patient care and contact.  I had to be dragged away, he tells us.  He (and team) assisted with logistics too.  CA has experienced some extreme weather that has been exacerbated by climate change.  Do you agree, says John?  Ruben does.  Here’s a different viewpoint for you, he says.  Solar is safer for National Security because it pulls people off the grid.  That way if there is an attack on a power facility or a utility target, it won’t have as big an impact if you have solar on everybody’s house.  John adds - and our grid needs updating ... If we had solar going around and not fracking, we’d have a healthier CA, wouldn’t we?  Yes.  I don’t see why anyone would support fracking.  That’s not a People position, Ruben answers.
 
Thanks Ruben for teaching us about the job of Secretary of State.  You are very focused on your issues.  I like that, says John.  CA just changed their primary dates to be on a Super Tuesday instead of way later in the race.  Is that going to be a huge factor in the elections, John asks?  Well says Ruben, people are upset that we vote late and the results are kind of known, so maybe that contributes to lower voter turnout in some of the down-ballot races …
Also, I have a concern that non-incumbents are going to have a very difficult time running, and let me tell you the deck is stacked against us.  They are already putting Alex up for endorsement now - 13 months ahead of November 2018.  How do you fight that system, Ruben asks?  I hadn’t thought about that says John.  You joined the race early, but now you will have less time to prepare for the primaries.
 
So why should you be Secretary of State Ruben Major?  Because, Ruben answers, if we continue on like this, we may see another 4 years of Donald Trump, 8 years of Mike Pence and his sons after that.  We’ve got to deal with this immediately and repair the election systems right now.  We want to increase confidence in our election systems and have a real democracy not just a facade.  That’s what I’d like to see. 
 
Ruben’s choice of song “This land is your land” by Pete Seeger is all about coming together and loving and caring for one another, rather than being divided and hateful, he tells us.
 
The links are in the video description.  Good luck Ruben!

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Douglas Applegate on the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station, Renewables, Ending oil subsidies, “War is a racket”, AUMF, Income disparity, Getting money out of politics, Support for Women, H.R. 608, the ACA and Medicare for All.

#WeThePeople interviewed Douglas Applegate on December 6th, 2017.  This Progressive has been a civilian trial attorney for going on 40 years and is running in California’s 49th Congressional District as a Democrat.  The incumbent (at the time of the interview that follows) - Darrell Issa, to whom he barely lost in 2016, pulled out of the race in January 2018.  There are 3 other Democratic candidates, 8 Republicans, 1 Green, 1 Libertarian, 1 Peace and Freedom Party candidate and 1 Independent in the race. 
 
Doug’s campaign ad is short and to the point.  “Let’s face it.  Something’s wrong.  The system’s broken.  Congress is broken.  Politicians, they don’t represent us.  It doesn’t have to be this way.  I am Colonel Doug Applegate.  I’m not a politician.  I’m a Marine.  I’ll always stand up for what’s right, no matter who’s the President.  It’s time to put the game playing and the party politics aside and put the country first.”
 
John and Doug discuss the following - which the WTP team took from Doug’s site.  (Thank you by the way to the latter for the brilliant slides they always prepare for these interviews!)  “San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS) threatens 12 million Southern Californians with its current plan to place a nuclear waste dump of … half-buried nuclear-fuel-rod-storage-casts containing 4 million pounds of fuel rods at temperatures of more than 400 degrees on the beach of San Onofre.”  Doug details the “felony stupid” plan and as he says “existential threat” involved.
 
He has plenty to say on the issue of renewable energy - such as the fact that CA could be using 100% renewables within 10 years.  Doug has been talking - over the last 2 years with a lot of international (consultants) from firms like Deloitte … he has been told time and time again that the above is possible.  Scotland, he says – if they were to break away from the U.K. would control the North Sea oil fields, and yet they are making a huge investment … and plan to have 100% renewable energy within 2 years.
 
The first question you need to ask a politician - Doug says, is “Will you vote to put an end to the oil subsidies immediately?”  This is a faster way to get there and the best way to help the environment.  The hydrogen fuel cell vehicles that Mike Levin (another Democratic candidate) and others like to point to are a bit of a problem because there are no natural hydrogen deposits anywhere on Earth.  It is obtained from carbon fuel.  He says there’s a lot of half-speak and parsing of words, and it fools a lot of people.  What about bridge fuels, says John?  It’s too late for bridge fuels I think - Doug says.  We need to use every tool to drive the market to a higher percentage of renewable energy.  Walmart is looking to go to electrifying all of their vehicles for delivery all across the United States, U.S. Postal Services is already doing that and is very close to awarding a contract.  This is all based on the markets and costs.  Would you give the subsidies to renewables, John asks?  Doug doesn’t even think that that’s going to be necessary.  45% of carbon fuels produced within the U.S. would not be produced without 50 to 60 billion dollars a year of subsidies to oil companies.  So if you “let the market work its magic” as business people would say, Doug thinks we’ll be driven to renewables at a far greater pace.
 
Adrian in YouTube chat asks whether it is possible to make the argument that renewable energy should be paid for under the Defense budget?  Interesting - Doug says, because for the last 15 plus years, the Navy and Marine Corps especially, have been asking for additional renewable fuel programs because of the vast logistics load for P.O.L (Petroleum, Oil and Lubricants) which are all carbon based.  If you could get 100% renewables within the Defense Department, as has been requested up on Capitol Hill - where Doug later says “The interpersonal skills of everybody … have to be that of a Kindergarten...” – and has fallen on deaf ears!  That would drive the race to renewables even faster.  It is a National Security risk because if you’re the second world (power) to become a military with 100% renewables, you’re going to have a handicap in getting to the fight or getting to the containment.
 
I’m proud to say I’m a Marine Colonel - Doug says.  I’m prouder to say I’m a Marine.  Most Veterans who have had combat deployments believe in containment and peace rather than kinetic deployments. Most Veterans - and certainly this Marine, believe “war is a racket”.  Doug explains that that quote is from Major General Smedley Darlington Butler and dates from the 1920s or 1930s.  The Major General had won 2 Congressional medals of Honor.  He turned on the early phases of the Military Industrial Complex and recognized that most of his fighting had been done to the benefit of United Fruit Company in the Caribbean and Central America.  He was a very strong advocate for a reduced military and a limited use of kinetic operations to solve the world’s problems.  “You can’t kill your way out of problems” Doug adds, saying that history has borne this out.  Great answer - says John, and I appreciate what you (and the Major General) have to say about war being a racket.  So - John says, the military makes requests but the government spends a ton of money on the arms trade, perpetual war and regime change because they make money there.  Doug continues.  It’s a perpetual war.  Most combat Veterans will concede that we’re making more enemies than we can kill right now on the world stage, wherever the threat comes from.  And a lot of the operations going on all over the world, whether or not the United States population knows about them, are based upon oil and natural resources and there are 2nd, 3rd and 4th collateral effects to what we are doing to keep the oil flowing.  John appreciates this Veteran‘s honesty.  It’s refreshing to hear, he says.  Doug is clear about where he stands.  He believes that Irak was a strategy blunder … and that history will reveal it to be so.  It will be held up - he says, as an example of the failures of the whole concept of pre-emptive war, which by the way was never taught in the military colleges from the U.S.  The Military alone isn’t a solution.  Most professional (military) personnel know that it’s “Diplomacy, Intelligence, Military and Economic leverage.”
 
Doug’s first reason for wanting to run was the AUMF (Authorization for Use of Military Force).  Congress does not have the courage to vote for it on a roll-call vote he says.  They are shirking their Constitutional obligations this way, and have been since 9.11!  From 1945 to the present – he continues “The fewer Veterans that you have in Congress, the more likely you will get votes authorizing the use of military force, because they’ve never seen a combat zone, and aren’t going to be sending their children and grandchildren to the wars they authorize.
 
John has heard that the military has asked for more educated soldiers.  Doug has the following posted on his site.  “Public education has clearly fallen behind the pace of the modern world.”  “Within 20 years robotics, automation and artificial intelligence will eliminate half of today’s jobs and deliver the greatest disruption of the world’s economy in history.”  This is tied into income disparity in the United States, he tells us … people won’t even believe in the American Dream anymore unless they can participate and compete at a higher level.  I’m from a blue-collar union household, outside of Dayton, Ohio.  It’s not only an issue of an educated population that can fill the ranks of National Defense, it also concerns our economy!  We need to harness technology and integrate it within our population - otherwise the income disparity will grow.  I believe government is the solution not the problem.  John comments that Republicans moan about big government, but he just wants one that works!  Doug answers that Republicans never seem to mind a bigger military though.  John laughs.  Another brake on the economy, Doug says, is 6 figure debt on the shoulders of the Millennials, after they get out of college with very few job prospects.  They aren’t going to be able to contribute to the economy by buying a house or car or starting a family, and raising children that they send to college.  This tax reform bill - by the way, is the biggest scam and theft of wealth from the middle and working class, in history.
 
John asks Doug (who is not taking money from Corporate Interests) how he feels about getting money out of politics, adding that the tax scam is kind of the end result of that problem.  Doug says that “One of the reasons we don’t have renewables is because Big Oil and the carbon fuel oligarchy is buying off everybody.”  If you want to get a more economical education system, then fewer people will go to private institutions and government loan programs won’t be the same sources of revenue.  Follow the money.  Here Doug speaks of banks, money laundering and how the Trump name and business stayed afloat.  He is impressed with Mueller and the legal team he has around him.  The Trump family behavior was calculated in from the beginning to gas-lamp the American public, he says.  This is intentional (the move to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel) and it is going to put American lives at risk all over the world, to drive up disruption in the Middle East again, bring further opportunity for the Military Industrial Complex, and draw people’s attention away from crimes committed on the right side of the aisle … People will go to jail he says, trust me!
 
How do you support women, is another YouTube chat question that Laura passes on.  Doug replies.  I grew up in a union family.  With collective bargaining agreements you don’t have issues with equal pay for equal work.  The military is the other place apart from that, where you have women being treated fairly as regards pay.  By the way, I’m the first to concede that the military has a huge problem with sexual assaults.  I think it should be taken out of the Commander’s authority to deal with criminal action against an in-service member.  JFK signed the Equal Pay Act in 1963.  (I missed some detail here due to sound issues.)  Doug thinks the issue will only disimprove due to the Conservative majority (5 to 4) in the Supreme Court.  He was proud he tells us, that the military was one of the first places they got more rights for LGBTQ folks.  The government shouldn’t be able to get away with discrimination he says. 
 
Joseph in chat wants to know whether Doug if elected, would co-sponsor H.R. 608:  Tulsi Gabbard’s Stop Arming Terrorists Act.  Doug says that Tulsi’s got a lot of great ideas.  I’m completely on the side of de-weaponizing places which are hot-spots, he says.  We shouldn’t be in the business of training in a lot of places because we end up representing the wrong side.  John presses him.  So are you for or against it?  Doug answers that he’d need to be more familiar with it.  He explains:  Weapons are readily available in the Middle East, Africa, and many places in South Asia.  We sell weapons at a huge profit level to people who don’t need to be wasting that much money even if their conflict may or may not be a righteous one.  Tulsi’s bill is more of a symptom of the problem according to Doug.  Add what you’re going to do about the weapons already there, and the reasons for the conflict.  This breaks down to … Should you be treating the symptoms or the disease?  Why is there conflict Doug asks?  There is corruption over minerals and oil and the first step to change the metrics of wealth and power is ... Shift away from oil and give people economic opportunity in parts of the world, so that they have an option other than to become warriors.
 
They discuss the Affordable Care Act.  It is a conservative Republican Heritage Fund based healthcare system.  There are better outcomes at less cost.  The ACA was a huge mistake ... the perfect example of starting off by asking for less and ending up with much less.  Under the ACA - Doug says, we insured 25 to 30 million more people and expected to win an election next time?  In Western World healthcare systems (11 or so of them) he tells us, the U.S. ranks last in 5 out of 6 categories).  We’re average in the 6th category.  We may have tremendous healthcare research capacity, which by the way we are under-funding, but we’re not delivering a better outcome at even the same cost as these countries.  This is simply business.  You don’t even have to believe in socialism.  We’re doing a lousy job of capitalism.  On Single-Payer Doug says that the costs are lower (due to less administrative waste and no profit for insurance companies).  People then want to know whether it is readily available and what the outcome is.  It’s not enough to say – you can keep your doctor.  That was an absurd promise to make.  You have to sell the idea to people as “a healthcare system that’s good on delivery and will give you a good outcome and it’s not going to break the bank.”  John adds that he remembers that M.S.M. spent a lot of time pushing the idea that Single-Payer was government controlled healthcare and that that was bad.  That was the way it was sold, he says. I think we need to work on the message that “Right now you have insurance companies controlling it and they’re killing you, wouldn’t you rather have your government Representatives?”  “It’s time for the U.S. to put people before profit.”  Doug supports Medicare for All.
 
John asks about Darrell Issa’s chance of staying in Office – He won’t, Doug answers (12.06.2017).  This is still a Republican District - he says, and you’d better be able to talk to Republicans as well as Independents and Democrats.  Doug has an advantage over other Democratic candidates who might think it will be easy … he’s a Marine.  There are (50,000) Veteran households … and it’s a Marine Veteran population.  Aside from that Doug knows his district and other challengers don’t, and have been bought out by Moneyed Interests.  Some of them have an undisclosed investment in their (campaigns) from Exxon and still claim to be environmental attorneys (Mike Levin – Democrat, was or is a lobbyist…).  Doug found that the DCCC were stalling in terms of helping him out in 2016 and nothing has changed it seems.
 
So what else does Doug want to tell us? There is a need to talk about income disparity and that will depend upon a new labor movement.  We have to have $15 an hour minimum, no cost public education preschool to 16 years and vocational apprenticeship or public university, Doug answers.  I repeat that we need renewables and to end oil subsidies.  We must demand that Congress come out and vote on-the-record on any use of military force … I support or vote nay on AUMF, in the realization that I am sending your children and grandchildren to the most dangerous part of the world and that they could pay the ultimate price, for what everybody concedes is our freedom.
 
He’d also like to say that sometimes Veterans are a little offended when people say “Thank you for your service.”  One told him recently, that what people should be doing is thanking “us” with their vote.  Vote for people who are going to support the Vets and going to support Vets that are going to serve in the future.  Exercise courage when you vote to send out young men and women overseas to kill and destroy things because that’s what our military is being forced to do, and it’s being done in a very ineffective manner.  On a cheerful note, Doug has been told all over.  “I voted for you the last time.  I’m going to vote for you again.”
 
Douglas Applegate needs donations and votes. He is endorsed by National Nurses United, Vote Vets, Justice Democrats and a lot of other groups.  He is intelligent, very well-spoken, confident and clear about what needs to be done, convincing, definitely has cross-party appeal, and must have his opponents shaking in their boots. He's a leader no doubt about it.
 
The links are in the video description.  Good luck Doug!

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Jess Phoenix on Volcanology, Geology, The Challenges of Climate Change, Green tech R&D,
Women in science, Single-Payer healthcare, The Military Industrial Complex,
Climate as a National Security issue, Gun control and the CDC.

On January 3rd, 2018 #WeThePeople interviewed Jess Phoenix who is running as a Democrat in California’s 25th Congressional District, along with 3 other Democrats and the Republican incumbent Stephen Knight.  She is running because scientists aren’t represented in our government at the highest levels, she tells us.
 
Jess has a brilliant campaign ad.  Here is an extract of what she has to say in it:
 
“When you work on an active volcano, you are literally at the mouth of hell.  It’s a fiery inferno and you are there to do a job, and you have to make sure that the whole crew is safe.  Everyone is responsible for everybody else’s safety.  To me that’s how I see taking on the challenge that we’re going to see with climate change.  We will see more hurricanes, more flooding.  Out here in CA we’re going to see more wildfires. ... You can’t control the weather, but what you can control is how you deal with it and how you decide to push on.  So we need to get people in Office who not only accept the science, but believe in the science and say – Look, we can solve this by mitigating and adapting.  We could become the global hub for green tech innovation.  That’s the future I see.  We’re creating jobs.  We’re sparking growth…” 
 
Jess is a volcanologist - a volcano scientist (and also a Star Trek fan).  Specifically, she studies active and sometimes extinct volcanoes to be able to more accurately predict eruptions, which scientists are still attempting to do. The modern era of this science began with the eruption of Mount St. Helens in 1980.  It’s a scientifically exciting time to be doing this work.  Jess does lots of different science research, which is the neat thing about being a geologist (volcanology is her speciality).  She has worked on all sorts of natural hazards and done climate research in Peru and Western U.S. (Hawaii).  She tells us that “everything is connected.  It’s all a series of systems.  The rocks are a part of it, but it’s everything from the microbes to the atmosphere, that’s all tied in together and it’s all affected by climate change.”  Jess backed Bernie in 2016, then Clinton (to avoid a Donald Trump Presidency).  She and her husband were very excited by Bernie’s evidence based policy.
 
The 25th Congressional District was on edge after 5 years of drought in CA and everything being really, really dry.  In January 2017 they got a ton of rain which meant that everything bloomed, which in turn meant that there was more to burn if anything were to ignite.  Add Santa Ana winds which blow hot, dry and strong … Jess helps rescue animals.  She has helped evacuate horses and wild animals during the last few fires.  Trying to get large prey animals into confined spaces when it’s hard to breathe or see is a challenge.  You realize how important it is to be ready for climate change!  Climate change doesn’t cause these fires, but it makes them worse and more frequent, she adds.
 
What Jess would like to do is to re-instate the Paris Climate Agreement, promote green tech research and development, support a moratorium on fracking, invest in renewable energy, stand up always for the U.S. National Parks and Monuments and strengthen the EPA to protect clean air and clean water.
 
When one part of the Arctic is getting warmer, there is less of an ability for those polar cold winds to be kept up there.  So they are sweeping down and hammering the East Coast right now (01.03.18).  We’re going to keep seeing these chain reactions.  With Donald Trump threatening to cut earthquake, volcano, hurricane etc. warning systems … we’ll be flying blind.  Not to mention - says John - we’re not really doing anything to sequester carbon to try to reduce global warming…
 
Jerry Brown comes across as an environmental Governor and yet he’s fracking the hell out of CA.  What do you think of that Jess – John asks?  As a scientist - she responds, when I first heard about fracking I wasn’t sure.  I thought it sounded like it could be problematic.  I started to read up about it.  Then, when the first big study came out, I read that and thought that fracking seemed to be having an effect not only on local water supply but also on earthquakes … so it’s definitely not something we should have in CA with all the fault lines we have.  They are getting earthquakes in Oklahoma! There are (ancient) faults that we don’t even know about yet here in CA and tons of active faults too.  For building codes in CA, active is considered to be something that ruptured within the past 10,000 years.  If it was 15,000 years ago, it doesn’t disappear, it’s still there.  We always say geologists love our faults – we do, but it’s really dangerous and we shouldn’t be fracking here.  We have other effective ways of energy generation.  Jess talks in detail about the big leak that occurred in the natural gas storage facility at Aliso Canyon a few years back and which released so much methane into the atmosphere.  John recalls.  That whole storage facility is underlain by the Santa Susana fault which has the potential to rupture at magnitude 8.  There are 100 plus wells there - that are sealing off the natural gas storage.  Those are all 50 plus years old.  We can do this smarter she says, and John agrees.  He adds that it can be done without the fossil fuel industry.  We have got to be moving that way, says Jess. 
 
She advocates and is passionate about her district and surrounding areas in Southern California, becoming a global hub of green tech R & D - We have the knowledge base and the skills in manufacturing and fabricating to make that happen.  With automation and people losing jobs to that, and artificial intelligence gaining more of a foothold … we have to balance it with good green jobs here. 
 
Congressional District 25 is north of L.A.  It’s a blend of suburbs.  There are older homes (1950s on) and there are other very rural parts - where people have 3, 5 or 10 acre parcels of land.  (People still commute to L.A. - a good 2 hour trip).  There are aerospace manufacturing jobs there, Six Flags Magic Mountain, a lot of hospitality and retail, and then they have some biotech and manufacturing.  So - says John, plenty of land for wind and solar, and people ready to be transitioned into other projects with renewable energy – who are already working in the aerospace industry.  Jess agrees, adding that they’ve got a really successful electric bus manufacturing company in Lancaster - one of the most successful in the world.  We could be that hub pretty quickly.  We just need the federal backing and investment.  That’s what we’re looking for, having that leadership at that level, she says.
 
John talks about Stephen Knight and the money he takes from Defense Aerospace.  Only one third of his money comes from individuals, Jess says.  Mostly it comes from PACs and dark money from the GOP.  He has benefited a lot from Citizens United, and also has name recognition.  His dad Pete Knight authored Proposition 22 at the State Assembly level - that was anti-marriage equality.  Stephen Knight himself was in favor of Proposition 8 which was also anti-marriage equality. He votes with Donald Trump almost always.  He signed on to the GOP tax plan.  It’s unbelievable.  That directly hurts people in our district!  He is having a hard time explaining his voting record, and that eats away at his name recognition, Jess says.
 
The district used to be a Republican stronghold, but now we have a lot more Latino, African-American, Asian and Pacific Islander communities.  It’s cheaper to live here than in L.A. proper.  However, we still have access to a lot of things.  We have some really good schools (and others that need a little more help).  It’s a fantastic community and the high desert weather is amazing (Lancaster and Palmdale).  Down in Santa Clarita and Simi, you get more of a true Mediterranean Southern CA feel.  Nice says John - as long as we can keep it from going on fire.  Yes.  There is climate change - Jess says… they both sigh.
 
Ben Jackson in YouTube chat asks:  As a woman in science, what do you think that the government can do to enable more women to enter the sciences and what impact might that have on the world?  Jess responds that she would love to see the government providing some initiatives to spark creative efforts by young women in particular.  A lot of young girls fall out of love with science around middle school.  I took chemistry in high school, had a terrible teacher … and hated it.  It turned me off becoming a veterinarian.  So, I think the government could announce a design competition as a way to get kids to innovate and work on teams.  We could send more kids to the Intel ISEF (international science fair) and get schools to improve on their science programs.  Jess’s Non-profit organization Blueprint Earth works with a STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Maths) Academy in L.A.  LAUSD (Los Angeles Unified School District) has started to push STEAM in lower income communities with students who are mainly Hispanic, Latino, African-American and Asian-American - as something they want to promote.  The government needs to get behind programs that will encourage them to be scientists, Jess says.  Give people the opportunity.  Level the playing field and they will come.  76% women have participated in her science Non-profit - at college and university level, Jess tells us. 
 
Bram in YouTube chat asks about Single-Payer in CA and how Jess would pay for it.  Jess is in favor of Medicare for All, countrywide.  Presently the government pays 2/3 of the healthcare bill - she says, and there is such a high satisfaction rating for Medicare and such low overhead, related to most other insurance outcomes.  We could find funding perhaps from programs that may be over-funded in other areas - like certain elements of the Department of Defense, she suggests.  Plus, Jess says - I hate when people suggest that we don’t have the funding when we just gave a 1.5 trillion dollar tax cut to billionaires and corporations.  She would like to roll up her sleeves and get in there and find the money, because it exists and we also have to prioritize it.  If we don’t have elected officials who are willing to say, this is our priority:  we have to get everybody good coverage and make it so that it doesn’t cost them the Earth to have it; then it’s never going to happen.  The priorities of the people you elect should be the will of the people, Jess states.
 
Metalhead in YouTube chat would like to know about Edwards Air Force Base (just outside Jess’s district, but lots of those employed live in the 25th Congressional District) and what Jess thinks of the Military Industrial Complex.  It’s out of control at the moment in terms of the spending versus the result that we achieve.  The military is great.  Don’t get me wrong, my Mom is a terrorism and foreign counterintelligence expert.  She worked in the FBI and so did my Dad.  So National Security is actually a big priority for me and preparing for all sorts of different threats, whether a natural hazard, terrorism, cyberthreat etc.  I’m really in favor of National Security and funding it, but we have to be smarter and can’t just be having people run roughshod over the system - getting non-competitive contracts and then over-charging. We are wasting so many tax payer dollars.  I think we can rein that in and do a much better job of how we spend our money.  “Diplomacy is actually a fine art, and a skill, and we can’t just be tweeting about nuclear buttons and their relative sizes…” Jess says.  John comments that “Our Congress debates at an 8th grade level … We really need more scientists in office.  We need people who can actually speak coherently about the issues that we face as human beings.”
 
As scientists, we have kept to ourselves.  A lot of the reason for that is because we were afraid of losing research funding, Jess says.  Robert Oppenheimer, one of the so-called fathers of the atomic bomb was persecuted by the House Un-American Activities Committee because he spoke up about his beliefs.  He felt that we needed to rein in Atomic power.  What happened to him effectively silenced the scientific community. To bridge the distance created, a lot of us have been working really hard to connect with the public.  My big thing is that we are all born as scientists.  You observe, test hypotheses, taste to see if something is good … A lot of people have this love of exploration, questioning and curiosity forced out of them.  Show people science is accessible, not scary. It’s fun and relevant.  That’s how we fight the ignorance that we see being flung around from Donald Trump and others.
 
That leads the conversation around to education - and as Jess says, someone in charge of education that has no background in it.  I used to teach college in Cal State L.A. she tells us, and I still work with students from elementary school up to university.  DeVos and her agenda are just atrocious.  We are a society becoming ever more dependent on technology.  We cannot have people who are afraid of that or anti-science running things.  Science is true whether or not you believe in it.  
 
You were talking in the green room about bringing climate on as a National Security issue - and talking about it as such.  We know there is a lot of different data out there with a lot of different numbers.  Where do you stand John asks, adding that to his mind we have about 10 years.  Jess answers that we need to be working on solutions already.  Not all climate change is man-made, but the man-made stuff is what we have to be concerned about.  The rocks show that over time the climate has been shifting, but now the pace of change has been accelerating and it is becoming dangerous for multiple species including us.  We like to live in coastal areas where the sea level is rising.  The planet will outlive us (so she doesn’t put a number of years on how long we’ve got), but if we want our kids and grandkids to have a safe and nice place to live, to be able to grow food and to enjoy beautiful days without freezing or boiling, then we need to deal with climate change now, from the local level to the global level.  This is everybody’s problem and the closest thing to a truly global issue that there is.  Climate Change is a threat multiplier.  It takes whatever is happening and ratchets up the pressure.  You see it with terrorism.  When there is a scarcity of land or food the terrorists will have a stronger foothold.  We will have more climate migrants.  Jess and John agree that nobody will be able to avoid it.
 
Jess if you had control of the dials, how would you suggest we deal with it – as a nation, John asks?  Education – Jess replies.  I’ll take the example of the Dust Bowl.  People couldn’t have anticipated what was going to happen.  The depression was going on.  People were out of work.  And then we had this crazy shift where the climate became really hot and dry in the center of the country, and we had these punishing winds.  The area had been over farmed.  You had people planting stuff and then abandoning their fields - when the crop prices dropped.  So what remained was dirt - and a lot of it.  When the winds came through, it was dropping these crazy black dusters - as they were called, all the way to Washington D.C.  It was massive.  People were starving and losing their livelihoods.  The nationwide crisis was intensified by the depression.  Roosevelt said basically, that he was not a scientist, but he was going to find some scientists.  So he found soil scientists and forestry scientists and had them study the problem.  They implemented a solution!  There were lots of epic moments, but in order to get Congress to play along, they had a soil scientist speaking in front of said Congress as a black duster was sweeping towards the Capital (Capitol?).  They were notifying him as it got closer and closer.  So, when he made his ask of Congress for the funding, the Capital (Capitol?) was engulfed by the black dust cloud … and he got his funding!  Then the scientists and the government worked together with local communities to get them to plant things differently, to manage their land in a more efficient way and to manage their water in a different way.  The black dusters tapered off too, and the weather changed - which was helpful.  There was a massive education campaign that went out that said - Hey people at the local level, you’re suffering and we need to make it better.  My priority would be to allocate some money and get the education out there.  We need to say to people - This is what you are going to be feeling as far as climate effects in your region, and here is what you can do on a local level.  Here also is what you need to ask of your Local, State and Federal legislators.  We need committees working on this - at a Congressional level and Committees of scientists.  We need to be sharing our information and our technological workarounds to the problems with other countries.  So that is why Paris is good, because it is an Agreement with so many other Nations.  It shows we are all on the same page.  We need to step together – it’s so important!  Climate change isn’t a money-making game as Donald Trump claims, because he’d be all over it if it were.  It works for his political messaging to say it isn’t.  The problem is that that is going to cost lives, but he doesn’t care.  John comments that you could make that same statement of all establishment politicians.  I think that is a problem Jess replies, but many people are realizing this.  I am a huge proponent of overturning Citizens United and publicly funded elections at all levels.
 
YouTube chat would like to know whether Jess supports Tulsi Gabbard’s Off Fossil Fuels Act.  I’ve had a chance to look at it and it’s definitely going in the right direction, Jess replies.  I would like to see a few more of the details in it, before I’d fully sign off on it.  I like anything that I support to be something that we can actually do in a reasonable amount of time.  Jess would want to talk about the detail, but she does love the principles behind it.
 
Pat in YouTube chat asks Jess how she differs from Katie Hill (another Democratic candidate in the race).  Jess answers that she has been in several forums with Katie and that they actually have pretty different views in a lot of areas.  I’d encourage people - she says, to check out a stream of two of the candidate forums, which she (Jess) has put up on her page – available for all to view, and you’ll see where answers diverge.  Gun control is one of them.  I knew people who were killed at Columbine.  I was a student at a school next door… I am a big proponent of common sense gun reform, closing the universal background check loopholes, cracking down on these assault style weapons, dealing with bump stocks, and the concealed carry issue is a huge, huge problem too.  We cannot have States with the laxest gun laws making the laws for the rest of the country.  I also - as a scientist, want to see the CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) able to investigate the gun violence epidemic and to study the causes and what we could do to prevent it.  Congress has restricted the CDC’s ability to do that since the 1990s.  It’s time we looked at this, because it’s not just mass shootings; it is suicide by guns; it’s easy access to weapons that is causing domestic violence to be perpetrated again and again with ease and frequency.  I’d also like to see Congress form a select committee to investigate gun violence. 
 
Jess and John talk about Columbine.  John went there at one stage.  It’s a small world!   She wants people to realize that these mass shootings can occur anywhere – you always hear people say “I didn’t think it would happen here!”  John is really happy that Jess brought up the CDC, and she talks of not having data and looking at gun violence being the equivalent of flying blind.  The gun lobby is so powerful and they just want to make a profit - she says, even though most NRA members support common sense gun reform.  The NRA corporate folks say no - and the rest of the gun lobby goes right on board. 
 
Without taking care of humanity’s basic needs - John (the Star Trek and Universal Basic Income fan) says, we can’t even aspire to do some of the cool things we want to do, like (in) Star Trek.  Well in Jess’s case, a number of Star Trek actors support her, he says.  Tech and future technology is something that comes up a lot at home (as both her father and her husband work in that area), Jess tells us.  Automation is coming.  AI is increasing in importance every day.  We need to make sure that we are prepared for that.  A discussion on UBI needs to be prioritized at a government level.  When the year in Back to the Future is now behind us, that’s a sign that we’ve got to get our act together, says Jess.
 
John comments about a book where it is stated that our generations have been robbed of 100 years of progress because Capitalism choose to keep us behind – as slaves to corporations instead of moving forward with what humanity could have done.
 
“People deserve the right to fulfill their innate curiosity and I think that’s part of the whole life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness that we stand for as a country” - Jess states.  She also says that social media is the way of the future, and we need to figure how we can use it to do the greatest good that we can with it.
 
What Jess has to say to people - Find candidates to vote for, who agree with you on most things.  You won’t find people who agree with you on everything, but she says - I am definitely the most progressive candidate.
 
Jess is really intelligent, progressive, passionate about science and a great story teller.  Amazing interview!  The links are in the video description.  Good luck Jess Phoenix!

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Pete D’Alessandro on Winning the Future, Medicare for All, Endless Wars, the DCCC, the Environment, Climate crisis, Leadership, New Deal answers, Progressive values, Bernie Sanders and Scott Galindez.

#WeThePeople interviewed Pete D’Alessandro on November 27th, 2017.  Pete, who ran U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders’ 2016 presidential campaign in Iowa, is running as a Democrat and seeking to challenge two-term Republican U.S. Representative David Young, in Iowa’s 3rd Congressional District.
 
UHM’s Scott Galindez spoke with Pete in June 2017.  Here is some of what Pete had to say, in the clip from that interview:
 
Resistance isn’t enough.  We have to stand for something.  A living wage starts at $15 an hour.  Healthcare is a right.  College tuition should be for all those eligible.
Scott refers to something he has heard Pete say in the past about winning the future, and not just the election.  Pete replies that we need to talk about all of this, and if we do and then a wave also comes along, we will be in the legislative position that we can say - not only did we come in because Donald Trump was not liked, but talking about the above and now we will do the above.
 
John talks first about how Scott died since speaking to Pete, because he was denied a kidney.  They continue talking about Scott later in the interview.
 
Pete is not into centrist language.  It doesn’t win elections.  Regardless of whether a wave gets us to a certain point, we need to be talking about the issues that matter to people and in doing so we are doing it without nuancing them – he says.  “Why run to not stand for things that matter?”  Pete seems to genuinely not understand.  There are 16 counties in his district and they include some of the most urban and some of the most rural counties.  Talk about the issues and don’t put labels on people and what they are going to accept or want to hear, he says.  Talk about the block they live on.  John asks about gerrymandering.  There is none in Iowa, Pete says proudly.  Those people going around the country trying to stop the gerrymandering … most have what they call the Iowa plan.  We don’t gerrymander here.  A computer draws the lines.
 
The Our Revolution group in Iowa was very affected by Scott’s death, Pete told John earlier.  Pete would certainly advocate for the Medicare for All bill, if elected to Congress.  There is a bill in the Congress right now he reminds us, and mentions Bernie’s Medicare for All bill put in the Senate in the last few weeks (11.27.2017). Healthcare is a birth right, he continues.  Medicare is and has been very successful.  It has allowed people to live out their lives in dignity.  He speaks to everyone and asks them to pay attention when (candidates) and especially Democrats say – I’m for healthcare for all.  We should question them further regarding what they mean by that.  If they start talking about covering everybody, without specifics or by attempting to nuance it, then watch out - because Scott had healthcare!  Not only that John adds, but he paid his insurance.  They said he’d be covered for certain things, but they never did cover him.  Scott had to fight every month to get them to pay the dialysis, while going through dialysis!  It’s insane and inhumane – John says.  It’s Un-American Pete comments!  It’s unacceptable!  We have an obligation to ask the tough questions of these people running for office, he continues.  Saying you’re covered, is not enough. 
 
The possible costs of Medicare for All lead to a discussion about the Military Industrial Complex.  The incumbent makes a lot of money off the global arms trade.  Is it political suicide to talk of cutting the military budget – John asks?  Pete replies - Oh I don’t think so, but let me put it in a different frame.  I think our government has always been better when we take the best parts of community and the best parts of family and we mould those ideas into a coherent way of how government should serve people.  We’re sick we need help first and foremost.  Then let’s discuss how to pay for it.  The endless wars that we’ve seen for so long … is a pretty good place to start.  There might be other places we can talk about.  It is an issue that I can bring up as a Congressman or running for Congress, because Congress has given up its Constitutional mandate and authority in these endless wars (which are never even declared).  I mean by that that Congress has given up one of its major powers in terms of the balance of power.  Pete thinks that this is an issue which cuts across party lines.   Outside the fund raiser in Iowa tonight (27.11.2017), there was a group from the Catholic Worker, he tells us.  They were protesting endless wars.  They were questioning the basic concept of why nobody is questioning these endless wars.  Real change starts on the street.  We’ll win some. And we’re gonna lose some, but ultimately we’re gonna win because we’re right. 
 
The root of the all the problems, comes down to income inequality and money, John says.  He leads into a statement that Pete put out saying that the DCCC told him to raise $350,000 in his first 36 days to be competitive.  As Pete doesn’t take corporate PAC money, that wasn’t going to happen.  So he asked people to help him get to 350 grassroots donors by the end of the cycle.  They not only made it something realistic, but about something that matters in so doing.  Pete has been in politics for 20 years in Iowa, and 30 in total.  Those aren’t the circles I mix in (referring to lobbyists I think).  John is clearly disgusted at the idea of being sent a message stating - Hey, your value to us is 350 Gs, not who you are or what you stand for.  I think a lot of campaigns will try to duplicate Bernie’s example at all levels.  Bernie set one helluva precedent – says Pete!
 
And from that let’s move on to Iowa - says John, specifically the environment.  You have pesticide issues, run-off dead zones, industrial farming, oil pipelines, problems with clean water wells etc.  What about climate change?  How bad is it and what do we need to do to mobilize - John asks?  Pete references activist (Channing Dunning) who has taught him a lot, and says - we have all these issues we need to address and we will, but in a lot of ways climate is the umbrella issue.  Actually it’s the upside down umbrella.  Everything else is in it and unless we as a people address the climate crisis (which is what it is) we won’t be able to affect those other things anyway, because we’re not going to have a world in which to affect those things.  We should be leading on addressing the global climate crisis.
 
As a country - Pete says, we used to expect that if there was a big issue in the world we were going to lead on it.  Maybe there was a bit of arrogance in that, but you know what, when we led on issues, and we lead correctly, things happened, things changed, we took the responsibility and things were made better when America decided to do that.  This administration is abdicating that role (of leadership) … pulling out of accords … and claiming there is an equal debate between climate change believers and deniers!!  We need to study this issue more closely - Pete continues, and to work with people who work with the land.  Democrats say they have lost those people in rural America, but it’s not because the values are any different, it’s because we haven’t talked to the values.  When we don’t do well in the rural parts of the district, people there are affected by the issues of healthcare and the environment disproportionately.  It’s more a totality of their existence, of how they live every day.  You know that expression when you are in disagreement with someone - What, you gonna make a federal issue out of it?  Well that’s why I’m running for Congress.  “If the States aren’t doing what the States are supposed to be doing … then yes, it does become a federal issue.”
 
The EPA is dismantling a lot of the protections that were in place, John says.  Look, says Pete - elections have consequences.  John refers to the string of progressive wins on November 7th, 2017 - Pretty powerful, he says.  A lot of people are starting to see money flowing in from out of State, what about you?  I think we are, says Pete.
 
I think there are 6 other people in the race I’m in (Primary).  Iowa is an interesting place in terms of our election law.  If nobody gets 35% of the vote, we don’t have a runoff.  We go to a Convention to pick the nominee.  It’s sort of a two-pronged process.  We have them every 2 years (although America only watches during the Presidential elections).  I do get a lot of $27 campaign contributions from around the country, whether it’s a show like this that gets out to a new group or we’ve been reaching out to our delegates that carried the conversation to Philadelphia.  I’ve not had more than 3 bad conversations in 3 weeks of reaching out to the National Delegates, Pete tells us.  It’s really uplifting for someone to say ... yeah I live in Michigan, but if you’re doing this let me see if I can help.  Send me your link.  People get it.  It’s bigger than just our own piece of it.  We like to do the same thing (for them).  I was in 6 different States … It’s positive and uplifting and I think it is going to happen all over the country.  I think we have finally learned to support the candidate, the person - not the party, says John.  Pete nods.  Cindy Axne – Is she Establishment, asks John?  What I’m telling folks – Pete replies, is we’re going to have a family discussion in this Primary, but if it’s up to me it’s not going to be a family fight.  Any of the other candidates running in this race would be far superior to the current Congressman.  The discussion starts at Medicare for All.  If you are working 40 hours a week in the United States of America, you’re working full-time.  You shouldn’t be living in poverty and we need to raise the federal minimum wage to a living wage.  I believe that starts at $15 an hour.  We’re going to have that discussion in this Primary.  I’m not sure everyone’s there yet.  There is not a State in this Union – Pete continues, in which you can rent a 2 bedroom apartment in a decent part of town, if you’re making less than $15 an hour.  Who needs two bedroom apartments?  Families who’re just (starting out).  If you can’t live in dignity on less than $15 an hour, then that’s where the discussion starts.  The same goes for Medicare…    “It’s like access to healthcare - says John.”  Exactly – says Pete.  And while we’re at it, the same applies to education.  If you earned it and you worked hard, you should be able to go to any State college in the country – tuition free.
 
Pete continues.  These are New Deal answers to New Deal problems.  “This isn’t new.  The things we’re talking about in this campaign and the things we’re talking about around this country are the things Franklin Roosevelt didn’t get around to because he died in his 4th term ...We won a lot of elections between 1932 and 1968, when that’s what this Party was about, when this party talked about economic justice and when this Party said we’re going to try to give everybody a chance to do better whenever we can.”  John mentions that he thinks Kennedy was about to get around to all this.
 
Pete says - A political party in a free society should be existing to push values, and push ideas and push concepts that move our society forward. We’ve gone and reversed over the course of the last 30 years … The party should be the vehicle for the things that we want our country to be.  Pete is not giving up on this yet though.  He thinks there are a lot of folks and a lot of elected Democrats around the country who actually believe that and have been fighting for that, and are pushing these progressive values.  I believe that the Medicare for All bill, when it was first introduced just 4 or 5 years ago, had like 3 sponsors.  Now it has about 123.  We’re going to get there - Pete assures us!  
 
John thanks Pete for all his years as a public servant, while mentioning that he himself only woke up 2 years ago, with Bernie … to the realization that he was supposed to be commanding the public servants who have forgotten who they serve.  Pete gets it.  He says that most of the folks who came to the Bernie campaign were just waiting for the vehicle.  We like to talk about economic issues ... I understand … but more importantly these are social justice issues.  He adds that it took 3 weeks after 9.11 to figure out that we had enough money to gear the war machine up again.  John answers - of course, we always have enough money for war Pete.  Well, replies Pete - we could find it for the other things as well, is the point I’m making.  Remember, he says - There’s more of us than them!  They might have more money right now and more of the levers of power in their hands right now, but there’s more of us than them.  As long as we stay diligent in our democracy, stay diligent on making sure that we stop some of these voter suppression things, stay diligent on fighting for other States to be as forward thinking as Iowa is in terms of gerrymandering…
 
He tells a story.  Bernie’s campaign was the campaign you’ve been hoping for your whole life – Pete says, because it was both joyful and purposeful at the same time.  Pete was the first person hired by the Sanders campaign outside of Vermont or Washington D.C.  He mentions the first conversation he had with Bernie Sanders.  Think about it – he says.  Bernie’s going to run for President of the United States and he’s going to have to do well in Iowa.  The first question he asks me is - Pete, do you understand my politics?  Yes Sir I do, Pete answered.  The next question was - Are you comfortable with them?  Bernie understood that it wasn’t about winning an election.  It was about winning the future.  I tell that story because it puts into perspective who he is and why the movement worked.  It wasn’t about him.  It was about what we needed to do.
 
The audience are in agreement.  Pete is definitely on point.  They all really appreciate hearing about Scott whom everybody misses.  John asks Pete to tell the Scott story that they spoke of in the green room earlier.  So Pete describes the scene.  Iowa City, good crowds, very early in the campaign … The National Press were there because it was Bernie’s first trip to Iowa City.  At the end of the event, this little guy (Scott) dragging all of his equipment with him, comes up and calls me by name, introducing himself, and asking whether he can have a moment with me.  And I’m thinking - ah you know what, I just talked to the New York Times and the Washington Post … I gotta have time for someone who cares enough to be dragging all his own equipment with him.  So I said - yeah of course, do you want me to wait, do you want to set up or do you just want to ask some things off-line that you’re gonna add to your report?  And he goes - nah I don’t want to interview you, I was just wondering if I could get a ride home?  Anyway, Pete had to go the opposite direction, so he goes to his thing, and the next day is relaying the story to someone else that was literally the only other person on the ground in Iowa at the time, and discovered that this guy had given Scott a ride home.  That’s when he realized that this was the kind of campaign where they were going to give the press a ride home if they needed one.   Scott cared about the issues and he became a part of the Bernie Sanders Iowa campaign … if we didn’t see him at an event – Pete says, we figured he couldn’t get a ride or maybe he was at another one, but we really expected to see him at all the major events and we always made sure there was room for him.  He was there from the beginning.  He believed in what was going to happen, way before a lot of other people even knew … with his heart and soul, and he really did become an integral part of who we were as a team … and he wasn’t (even) on the campaign team! … Scott was the driving force for getting the Our Revolution chapter set up in Iowa.   The chapter has been re-named Our Revolution Central Iowa – Scott Galindez chapter. 
 
A lot of people worked on the Iowa campaign who had given up after the Robert Kennedy or the McGovern campaign.  I used to joke that the one demographic that I knew we were going to win was 60 year old guys in ponytails.  Here Pete tells another story.
 
What an amazing candidate!  It was a great interview, which felt like a conversation with a caring member of the family. Everyone was so happy to hear the stories he shared about Scott Galindez.  The links are in the video description.  Good luck Pete D’Alessandro!
 
 
P.S.  The outro is Frank Sinatra singing The house I live in.  The song is from (1945) when Frank was still liberal (before he was super rich, says John).  At the time it was a pro civil rights song.  It’s about all of us caring about the same things.  I always thought it would be a good song to use – but (so far) it hasn’t been (used) - Pete tells us.  This is a 1973 version.  There is a story here too, but you’ll have to listen to the end of the interview to hear that one.  Beautiful choice Pete!

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