Kucinich rallies in Bangor, tours Unity fairgrounds

UNITY – Congressman Dennis Kucinich, D-Ohio, one of 10 Democratic candidates vying for the presidency, said Friday as he strolled through the grounds of the Common Ground Country Fair, “Boy, if I put on a fair, this is what it would look like.”

The candidate was fresh from a campaign rally in Bangor at the public library attended by about 80 supporters.

At Unity, Kucinich was not allowed to politicize the fairgrounds but it was clear this was his type of crowd, and if he had spoken, he would have been preaching to the choir.

Dozens of supporters crowded around Kucinich as he walked, many shaking his hand and thanking him for his stand on peace, the environment and his support for American farms and businesses.

As he munched on organic chicken tempura and tucked a loaf of oatmeal rosemary bread under his arm, Kucinich walked to shouts of “Democrats for Dennis” and stopped at nearly every booth he passed, shaking hands and wishing people well.

Lora Moore of Penobscot stopped at the Waldo County Democrats booth to pick up Kucinich buttons.

“We’ve been waiting for this type of candidate,” she said. “In 1996, I voted for a presidential candidate to vote against the other one. That is no way to vote. Now, finally, I have someone to vote for.”

Kucinich, an Ohio native and former mayor of Cleveland, has a platform of radical reform that vows to repeal the North American Free Trade Agreement, eliminate World Trade Organization laws and keep manufacturing jobs in the United States.

He is also opposed to Operation Iraqi Freedom, and said he would cut the Pentagon’s budget by 15 percent and put that money back into education, if elected president.

He also has pledged to file a “friend of the court” brief in support of Oakhurst Dairy in its fight against Monsanto to have the right to advertise and label its milk as hormone-free.

By tradition, the Iowa caucuses in January are the beginning of the presidential campaign races, and often are crucial for picking presidential favorites.

However, Kucinich is in the bottom percentile, according to various polls that show U.S. Rep. Richard Gephardt, D-Mo., and Howard Dean, former governor of Vermont, as the front-runners.

As of late August, Kucinich was above the Rev. Al Sharpton and Sen. Bob Graham, D-Fla., and was quickly gaining ground on U.S. Rep. John Edwards, D-N.C., Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., and Sen. Joe Lieberman, D-Conn.

But what the celebratory agricultural atmosphere at the Common Ground Country Fair prompted Kucinich to discuss as he prepared to head to Boston for more campaigning, was his desire to abolish the WTO and NAFTA agreements and to emphasize sustainable agriculture for American farms.

“NAFTA hits Maine in several different ways,” he said. “It hurts farmers, particularly small family farms. The game is rigged against them and they are being strangled by corporate monopolies.

“In the last three years, Maine has lost 17,300 manufacturing jobs. These jobs were directly affected by these trade agreements, which undermine our ability to trade on a level playing field,” he said.

Kucinich maintained that he is the only presidential candidate who is raising the NAFTA and WTO issues.

“As president, I intend to cancel them both. They’ve taken Maine’s woolen mills, the textile industry, the shoe industry. Jobs are going out the door while we have a tremendous trade deficit.”

He said the effects of the trade agreements are nationwide. “When I left Cleveland this morning, they announced that a Ford plant was closing and taking 1,600 jobs.

“I want the people of Maine to know that when I’m elected president, it will be a whole new ball game in international trade,” he said.

Kucinich said he was one of a handful of congressmen who fought to retain organic standards. “I also have a bill in now to label genetically engineered food,” he said.

“We must enable small farms to survive,” he said. “This is the path back to our basic values of independence, free choice, the preservation of family, sustainable communities and preserving the environment.”

“Unfortunately, America now leads the world in categories we should not be proud of,” Kucinich said. “America is now the world’s leading jailer with an incarceration rate higher than China. We lead the industrialized world in poverty and in the growing gap between rich and poor. And we are the only industrial nation not to provide national health care.

“It’s time for America to resume its glorious journey,” he said. “Time to reject shrinking jobs and wages, disappearing savings and rights. Time to look out upon the world for friends, not enemies. Time to counter the control of corporations over our politics, our economy, our resources, and mass media. Time for those who have much to help those who have little by maintaining a progressive tax structure. Time to tell the world that we wish to be their partner in peace, not their leader in war.”