What frightens me most is that there are members of this organization, Vietnam Veterans Against the War (VVAW), who today support his candidacy for President. I have been told by some members that I should get over my sour grapes, forget his past indiscretions, and just get behind him because he is, “Basically a good guy and has a real chance of beating King George.”

Whether or not he has a real chance of beating Bush remains to be seen but is the only part of that statement that has any ring of truth to it. Unlike some other members of VVAW I do not have a case of sour grapes against him. I was not a member at the same time he was. While he was doing his thing with VVAW I was still enjoying my extended vacation in sunny South Vietnam. My only knowledge of his exploits (exploitations) were things that were told to me by others who were around for them.

My problems with the man go to his fundamental philosophies and his character, or lack thereof. His lack of character and lying, two faced, back stabbing BS can be seen by anybody who looks at the things he said back in 1969 and everything he has said subsequently.

He supposedly opposed America’s imperialist foray into Vietnam but has endorsed and applauded every one of our similar endeavors since then. He was among those that hurled their medals over the fence in Washington to show their contempt for what our government was doing.

But now he claims to have thrown someone else’s medals over the fence and proudly displays his medals in his Washington office. That would be the same as a draft resistor burning someone else’s draft card, or a supporter of the war letting someone else die in his place, a la Shrub and his pals.

As early on as the first half of the 70’s he tried to cover-up and renounce some of the things he took part in while he claimed to be a member of VVAW. He tried to deny that the American Flag, which was being carried by members of VVAW in a picture that was on the cover of a book about VVAW, was upside down. When the full un-cropped version of the picture showed that it was in fact upside down he was force to backtrack.

On many occasions since then he has tried to downplay or dismiss what he did then, trying to pass it off as a case of, youthful, wild eyed, but ignorant passion. These examples of his character I believe are self explanatory.

As for his philosophies and political beliefs, even these are quite unacceptable to me. He is first and foremost a politician. Think about every derogatory remark you have ever heard about politicians and they pretty much sum up this man. I remember a quote, though I do not remember who said it. This is the best paraphrasing I can come up with, “A statesman cares for the next generation, a politician for the next election.” To me this explains a lot about Kerry the politician.

Next he is a Democrat, (boo hiss) editorial emphasis intended. I see the difference between Democrats and Republicans as being nothing more than minor differences in how the wealth should be divided. But when it comes to where that wealth comes from there is no discernable difference.

We in America today live in the age of Neo Manifest Destiny. We never really abandoned this philosophy it merely transformed to a global perspective. Manifest Destiny claimed that it was our God given right to posses all of the resources in North America.

Since the early twentieth century is was seen by the American corporate visionaries that the resources available here in our “homeland” were very finite, and we had to move beyond our own borders. Hence we get “Globalization.” This philosophy is endorsed by Democrat and Republican alike with very rare exceptions.

Thus it is my inclination that switching from a Republican administration to a Democratic one is tantamount to rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. Voting for them only encourages them.   While I acknowledge that the distribution of the wealth in this country is a high priority, I have to believe that it can not be meaningful till we address where that wealth is coming from. To believe, as some would have us, that it is our inherent right as Americans to exploit others for our own benefit and give it nice sounding names like freedom, entrepreneurship and capitalism is the root of our current problem.

America consumes, by far, more than any other nation, per capita. That is why we need to fuel this consumption with the blood, sweat and tears of those around the world not strong enough to resist us. Americans need to learn that we do not need all the baubles that corporate America throws at us as necessities.

Everyone in America does not need an SUV, a cell phone, a plasma TV, a Dolby, stereo home entertainment center and all the rest of the crap that they sell on TV. The cost of one of these things could feed a village for a year in some parts of the world.

Unfortunately we are all susceptible to these overt and sometimes subliminal messages. I even find myself wishing that my 40 gig hard drive were 140 gigs. Or that my CD burner was also a DVD player and burner.

Even back in the sixties in my, anti-commercialism, hippy days, no self respecting hippy would be caught dead using a “record player” we had to have the best component stereo system possible. McIntosh turntable, 120 watt per channel amplifier, and the best KLH loudspeakers money could buy. In other words we need to address the concerns of redistributing the wealth globally before we can properly redistribute our own wealth.

In Canada recently a group dedicated to the idea of anti consumerism tried to get TV ads on the air, the day after Thanksgiving, calling for a “no buy day” when they asked people to stay home and buy nothing. This was, in my opinion, a great idea but you can imagine the cold reception it received from the television stations that rely on consumerism for their livelihood.

I would propose here that we have a “BUY NOTHING” day at least once a month. I can get away with such a proposition here because we at this newspaper are not selling anything more than ideas and information and the only cost to you for these things is your time to read it.