The Buzz on Kucinich

Buzzflash interviews Dennis Kucinich. Snippet:

BuzzFlash: You stand in contrast to many other candidates in your position on free trade and jobs. Could you tell our readers what your position is on NAFTA (North American Free Trade Agreement) and free trade, and how your presidency would create more American jobs and keep jobs here at home? Rep. Kucinich: We have to recognize that we've lost 3 million jobs since July of the year 2000 and there are several reasons why. NAFTA and the WTO (World Trade Organization) were chief among them. NAFTA has produced a system that enables corporations to set lower wages in other countries and make a profit by moving jobs out of this country - into Mexico in particular - and where they pay Mexican workers even less. And the WTO was set up to facilitate global trade without regard to workers' rights and human rights, and environmental quality principles. I stand for global commerce, but global commerce that's based on morality, based on the rights of workers to organize, to bargain collectively, to strike, to have decent wages, to have a safe workplace, and to have a secure retirement. It's based on human rights, on protecting people from being exploited, on prohibitions on slave labor, child labor and prison labor. My trade policies will be based on protecting the environment, protecting the quality of our air and our water and our land. Until we cancel NAFTA and the WTO, and return to bilateral trade, conditioned on workers' rights, human rights and environmental quality principles we'll never be able to reclaim the essence of morality in our commerce because global corporations are setting the rules. And they're setting the rules without regard to the interest of people or countries. And that's why my presidency will return to bilateral trade, where we'll set the conditions. And this way, we can elevate the cause of workers not only in this country but everywhere. We can also create jobs by moving quickly to rebuild America with a WPA-type program – the sort that Franklin Roosevelt sponsored. We can rebuild our cities, our suburbs, and our rural areas. We can build new water systems and sewer systems, and bridges and roads and ports. We can create conditions where we can put millions of people back to work. We can rebuild America and help create investments for business. My plan to build new technologies to help create the jobs of the 21st Century in energy and the environment will help lead to a more sustainable America. And my plan to help create universal, single-payer health care will create not only more jobs, but we will have a healthier America and a healthier workforce. So there's so many ways in which we can restore America's economic vitality. We must end the tax cuts that are going to people in the top brackets. We have to end this war in Iraq, which is sapping our national economic vitality. We have to end our commitment to the Pentagon, with higher and higher amounts of our resources going for this war machine. We can be safe as a nation, but we have to also take care of our basic concerns of health, education, jobs, and our veterans. That's what I stand for.

The interview is short, but, as always, Kucinich comes off as good and wholesome, just like Mom's apple pie (which I haven't had since January, 2001). Really, what does he say that doesn't make sense or doesn't support basic, peaceful, human values?