"If there is someone in Congress, maybe just one person, it gives them a sense that change is possible."

dossier
a cura di Nadia Scardeoni
Interlinea
http://www.edscuola.com/interlinea.html

Ricevo

E' una mattina di lutto qui da noi ..

Abbiamo perso il voto al congresso: i repubblicani (il partito di Bush) ha vinto i seggi al senato

Purtroppo, la maggioranza dei democratici non ha vinto la sfida con i reppublicani;

Sembra che la forte voce di Paul Wellstone sia morta con lui.

Questa vittoria dei repubblicani vuole dire: guerra, perdere nel campo della giustizia

(la scelta dei giudici del tribunale supremo, la legge repressiva, il cambiamento dei diritti umani della costituzione),

perdere nel campo dell'ambiente, della sanità (non ci sara la possibilità di una tutela della sanità pubblica), dei diritti riproduttivi

delle donne, di una liberale educazione, dei diritti dei poveri, degli immigranti, dei neri

Sarà IL CROLLO DEI DIRITTI CIVILI.....

E' una perdità per l'umanità.

Abbiamo perso la nostra ragione.

La violenza, i soldi, le corporazioni, la "mass media" delle bugie ci tengono per il collo nella loro mani putride

Jane

*********************

http://wellstone.senate.gov/

********************

http://wellstone.senate.gov/menthlth.htm

February 24, 1999

Wellstone Introduces Legislation to Treat Mentally Ill Children in the Juvenile Justice System

Community-Based Approach to Identify and Treat Youth with Mental Health or Substance Abuse Disorders, Improve Youth Mental Health Services within the Juvenile Justice System is Alternative to Jails' Revolving Doors

says Wellstone

-------------------------

dall' Agenda di P. Wellstone

Education

A former teacher and current member of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, Senator Wellstone has worked to realize our national promise of equal opportunity and a decent education for all children. He fought to expand school funding; established a new teacher recruitment and retention program to train and retain highly skilled teachers for high-need urban and rural areas in key subject areas such as math, science and special education; secured funding for competitive grants to help states which adopt the highest quality assessments; and won funding for local, community-based Parent Involvement Centers to help low-income communities. Senator Wellstone has proposed halting the repeal of the corporate Alternative Minimum Tax and freezing scheduled tax rate reductions for the wealthiest 1% of the population (those making over $300,000 annually) in order to fund a proposal to bring an additional $2 billion to Minnesota's schools over the next ten years. He has contributed significantly to the Higher Education Act, the Elementary and Secondary Education Act and other major education bills. Senator Wellstone continues to fight for sufficient resources to expand early childhood education, provide adequate financial aid for college students, improve teacher quality in public schools, expand after-school enrichment programs and renovate schools in disrepair

. *******************

http://wellstone.senate.gov/On_the_Record/Press_Releases/Education/education.html

http://wellstone.senate.gov/covedamd.htm

Wellstone Offers Amendment to Make Education Count as Work

Under Welfare Law

Seeks to Focus the Education Debate on the Relationship Between Education and Work Getting a Good Job Depends on Getting a Good Education.......

*********************

Il mio amico, il senatore Paul Wellstone, racconta una storia

My friend, Senator Paul Wellstone, tells the story...

..." about a fourth-grade teacher in a poor area of Minnesota. The teacher walked into the classroom one day and said, "How many of you in

here had a big breakfast today?"

BRADLEY: And 10 of the 20 kids raised their hands. He said, "How many of you in here had any breakfast today?" Six more kids raised their

hands. He said, "What about the other four, what about you?" Silence. Finally, one little girl, somewhat self-consciously, raised her hand and

said, "It wasn't my turn to eat today."

When the founders of our republic said that life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness were the unalienable rights of all Americans, they didn't say

anything about taking turns.

They didn't say that it was your turn today to have life and liberty, but not tomorrow, that it was your turn tomorrow to pursue happiness, but not

today. The whole point of the American ideal is that opportunity is always present for all of us. Yet the chance that this chance is being denied

to millions of working families who are trapped in a prison of poverty.

Tonight, one-fifth of the children in this country are ill-fed, ill-housed and ill-educated. When there's a natural disaster -- a hurricane, a flood --

we don't talk about repairing a roof here, a window there, a house here, a bridge there. We make an enormous investment in restoring things

the way they were before the disaster struck. Child poverty is such a disaster.

BRADLEY: Most of us would never turn our backs on a starving child. Yet every day we ignore 13 million poor children in this country. If all of

them were gathered in one place, it would create a city bigger than New York, and we would then see child poverty for the slow-motion national

disaster that it is. If we don't end child poverty in our lifetime, shame on me, shame on you, shame on all of us.

But our ability to end child poverty and provide health care for all depends on our will to defeat the special interests and return politics to the

people.

Democracy, from it's very beginnings, has always been a vulnerable form of government: vulnerable to armies from without and tyrants from

within, vulnerable to the complacency of citizens and the secret maneuverings of powerful groups, and vulnerable to the influence of money.

".......

http://www.cnnitalia.it/2000/MONDO/nordamerica/08/16/bradley/

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

(Washington, D.C.) -- In an effort to increase educational opportunities and build economic self-sufficiency for people on welfare, Senator Wellstone will introduce an amendment to the Coverdell education bill to make education count as work under the welfare law. Wellstone's amendment would allow states to count two years of postsecondary and vocational education as a work activity under the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) welfare law.

"If we are serious as a nation about moving people from welfare to work, we must take steps to ensure that people on welfare can become economically self-sufficient," Wellstone said. "The most important factor in determining people's economic self-sufficiency is their ability to get access to quality higher education. Even in states that want people to go on to higher education, federal law now mandates that these people have to leave school and take a job -- most likely a low or minimum wage job. This is the most short-sighted thing we could do. People who are in school are the very people and families that are on the road to economic self-sufficiency. These are the people who, because of their education, can move into well-paying jobs and stay off the welfare rolls. When Congress passed welfare reform, surely it did not mean to force students to choose between feeding their children and obtaining the education they need to better their families' future."

Currently, states can only count 12 months of vocational education as a work activity. Parents -- mostly mothers -- across the country, some of them merely months away from graduation, are being forced to leave college in order to work menial jobs so that the welfare benefits with which they feed and cloth their children will not be eliminated. Wellstone's amendment will be offered to H.R. 2646, the Coverdell Education Savings Account Bill.

.........

......................

http://www.senate.gov/~labor/Members/members.htm

http://wellstone.senate.gov/Paul_In_Action/paul_in_action.html

http://wellstone.senate.gov/On_the_Record/Press_Releases/Human_Rights/chechnya4.htm

"The world community must remind Russian leaders that even in a war on terrorism, ends do not necessarily justify any means," Wellstone said. "A war against terrorism does not permit abuses against civilians. We must remind Russia that the war against terrorism is a struggle for freedom and democracy. Free and democratic nations do not round up boys and beat them so badly that they have to be carried home when they are finally released. They do not torture and rape women. Today as I read the reports of intensified human rights violations on a massive scale in Chechnya, as well as of Russia's refusal to investigate such reports and hold responsible individuals accountable, I have to question Russia's commitment to democratic norms and to internationally recognized human rights standards."

______________________________________________________________

Statement from Paul's Staff

October 26, 2002

Yesterday morning Senator Paul Wellstone, Sheila Wellstone, and Marcia Wellstone, along with Will McLaughlin, Tom Lapic, and Mary McEvoy of our campaign staff were traveling on a plane flown by Captains Richard Conroy and Michael Guess in northern Minnesota. The Department of Transportation confirmed that the identification number on the tail of the plane that went down southeast of Eveleth, Minnesota matched the serial number of Senator Wellstone's plane. There were no survivors.

We are shocked and saddened by this horrible news. Our thoughts and prayers are with the family and friends of those who were on the plane.

This is an unspeakable loss of a leader and mentor we loved, and of friends and colleagues who were dear to us. The overwhelming number of messages we have received since the crash is a tribute to the kind of person Paul was: a passionate visionary who never gave up hope that we could make the world a better place for everyone; a committed fighter for social justice who gave a voice to the voiceless; a man with a huge heart who lit up a room – and the hearts of others when he walked in.

He was a man who valued others for who they were not where they came from, or what they wore, or their position or social status. We who had the privilege of working with him are confident that he will be remembered as he lived every day: as a champion for people.

We will miss Paul and Sheila and our friends and colleagues dearly. And we will remember them, fittingly, by picking up their banner and holding it high, in our work and in our lives.

Memoriali

http://www.wellstone.org/

http://www.wellstone.org/memorial/info.html

http://www.wellstone.org/memorial/remembrances.ph

http://commondreams.org/views02/1026-08.htm

Published on Saturday, October 26, 2002 by The Nation

Paul Wellstone, 1944-2002

An Appreciation

by John Nichols

For grassroots economic and social justice activists, there was never any doubt about the identity of their representative in Washington. No

matter what state they lived in, the senator they counted on was the same man: Paul Wellstone.

But for the family-farm activists with whom Wellstone marched and rallied across the 1980s and 1990s and into the twenty-first century, the

Minnesota Democrat was more than a representative. He was their champion. And the news of his death Friday in a Minnesota plane crash

struck with all the force of a death in the family.

I know, because I had to deliver that news. Family farm activists from across the upper Midwest had gathered Friday morning for the annual

rural life conference of the Churches' Center for Land and People, in Sinsinawa, Wisconsin. I had just finished delivering the keynote

speech--ironically, about the need for activists to go into politics--when a colleague called with the "you'd better be sitting down..." news. Sister

Miriam Brown, OP, the organizer of the conference and one of the most tireless crusaders for economic justice in rural America, and I talked for

a few minutes about how to tell the crowd.

We knew the 150 people in the room well enough to understand that this news would change the tenor of the day. But we did not know just

how much until I announced from the podium that Wellstone, his wife of thirty-nine years, Sheila, their daughter Marcia, and several campaign

aides had been killed two hours earlier.

Cries of "No!" and "My God! My God!" filled the room, as grown men felt for tables to keep their balance, husbands and wives hugged one

another and everyone began an unsuccessful struggle to choke back tears. The group gathered in a large circle. People wept in silence until,

finally, a woman began to recite the Lord's Prayer for the son of Russian Jewish immigrants who had touched the lives and the hearts of solid

Midwestern Catholic and Lutheran farmers who do not think of themselves as having many friends in Congress.

"He was our flagbearer," said Cathy Statz, education director for the Wisconsin Farmers Union. "There are plenty of people in Congress who

vote right, but Paul did everything right. We didn't have to ask him, we didn't have to lobby him, he understood. It was like having one of us in

Congress."

That was how Wellstone wanted it. "People have to believe you are on their side, that someone in the Senate is listening," the senator once

told me. "If there is someone in Congress, maybe just one person, it gives them a sense that change is possible."

Wellstone's deep connection with progressive activists across the country was something that his colleagues noted again and again as they

recalled the rare senator who was, himself, as much an activist as a politician. "He was the pied piper of modern politics--so many people heard

him and wanted to follow him in his fight," recalled Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts, who is considering a bid for the Democratic

presidential nomination in 2004, just as Wellstone considered a similar run in 2000.

Mourning in St. Paul, where he had come to campaign for Wellstone's re-election, Senator Edward Kennedy hailed his fellow liberal. "Today, the

nation lost its most passionate advocate for fairness and justice for all," Kennedy said of Wellstone, who was the No. 1 political target of the

Bush Administration this year but had secured a lead in the polls after voting against authorizing the President to attack Iraq. "He had an

intense passion and enormous ability to reach out, touch and improve the lives of the people he served so brilliantly."

For Wisconsin's Russ Feingold, the loss was doubly difficult. Wellstone and he were the truest mavericks in the current Senate, lonely

dissenters not just from George W. Bush's conservative Republicanism but from the centrist compromises of their own Democratic Party. Yet,

Wellstone was something more: an inspiration. Recalling that the Minnesotan won his seat in 1990 with a grassroots campaign that relied more

on humor than money, Feingold, who was elected with a similar campaign two years later, said, "He showed me that it was possible for

someone with very little money to get elected to the Senate."

Before his election to the Senate, Wellstone was a professor at Carlton College, in Northfield, Minnesota. Officially, he taught political science.

Unofficially, he was referred to as "the professor of political activism." He created a course titled "Social Movements and Grassroots

Organizing," and he taught by example. In the 1980s, Wellstone organized Minnesota campaign events for the Rev. Jesse Jackson's

presidential campaigns, marched with striking Hormel workers in Austin, Minnesota, and was arrested while protesting at a bank that was

foreclosing on farms.

That was when Denise O'Brien, an Atlantic, Iowa, farm activist, first heard of Wellstone. "I remember hearing about this professor in Minnesota

who cared so much about what was happening to farmers that he was willing to get arrested with us," O'Brien said Friday. "That had a big

impact on me. I always remembered that he had stood with us." O'Brien, who went on to become president of the National Family Farm

Coalition, recalled how amazed she was when Wellstone was elected to the Senate.

"But, you know what, he never changed. He was always that guy I first heard about, the one who was willing to stand up for the farmers," she

remembered. "When the black farmers from down South were marching to protest their treatment by the Department of Agriculture, he would

march with them. When no one was paying attention to this current farm crisis, he organized the Rally for Rural America."

At that March 2000, rally, Wellstone delivered one of his trademark speeches, a fiery outburst of anger at agribusiness conglomerates mixed

with faith that organizing and political activism could yet save family farmers. "When Wellstone got going, he was so passionate. He was like the

old populists, the way he would tear into the corporations," recalled John Kinsman, the president of the Family Farm Defenders.

At the children's camp run by the National Farmers Union, Cathy Statz says, "We use the video of his speech to the Rally for Rural America to

teach the boys and girls that there are people in politics you can really look up to, that there are people who speak for us."

Then Statz stopped herself. Tears formed in her eyes. "I can't believe he's dead," she said. "I can't imagine the Senate without him."

The emotions ran deep after the announcement of the senator's death. But the people gathered at Sinsinawa were activists in the Wellstone

tradition. So after they had wiped away their tears, they gathered to hear a panel of farm activists discuss running for local office. Greg David,

of rural Jefferson County, Wisconsin, got up to tell the story of how, after two losses, he was finally elected to the county board of supervisors.

His voice catching as he spoke, David concluded, "I think if Senator Wellstone was here today, if he could speak to us, he would say: Don't be

afraid. Go out and run for public office. Put yourself in the contest. Running for office, serving in office, that's a part of building our movement.

Maybe we didn't know before that it could be a form of activism, but we know that now. Senator Wellstone showed us that."

John Nichols, The Nation's Washington correspondent, has covered progressive politics and activism in the United States and abroad for more

than a decade. He is currently the editor of the editorial page of Madison, Wisconsin's Capital Times. Nichols is the author of two books: It's the

Media, Stupid and Jews for Buchanan.

Copyright © 2002 The Nation

###

http://www.repubblica.it/online/esteri/americaele/prova/prova.html

Nelle elezioni di metà mandato una sfida alla tradizione

------------

da

http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=13279

Paul Wellstone, Fighter

By John Nichols, The Nation

June 3, 2002

Minnesota's senior senator is not just another Democrat on White House political czar Karl Rove's target list, in an election year when the Senate balance of power could be decided by the voters of a single state. Rather, getting rid of Wellstone is a passion for Rove, Dick Cheney, George W. Bush and the special-interest lobbies that fund the most sophisticated political operation ever assembled by a presidential administration. "There are people in the White House who wake up in the morning thinking about how they will defeat Paul Wellstone," a senior Republican aide confides. "This one is political and personal for them."

That has made it political and personal for Wellstone. The man who decided to abandon a self-imposed two-term limit on his Senate service at least in part because of his determination to block Bush's conservative agenda wears the target with pride. At a moment when most Democrats are still trying to figure out how to challenge a popular President, the former college wrestler is leaping into the ring. Wellstone is not running for cover; he is running to deliver a message about politics in a state and a nation that he believes to be far more progressive than the readers of political tea leaves in Washington could begin to imagine.

"This race is going to be a case study of whether you can maintain liberal, progressive positions and win in this country in 2002," says Wellstone as he campaigns among Laotian immigrants on a sunny spring morning in St. Paul. "We're not running a race that asks people to vote for me because, as a Democrat, I will be a little more compassionate, a little better for working families and children and immigrants, than a Republican. We want to draw the lines of distinction. I'm saying that there is a big difference between the America the conservatives want and the America I want." He adds, "I don't want this to be just about me. This race has to be about basic questions of whether liberals and progressives can flourish in national politics. That means there is a lot more on the line than whether Paul Wellstone wins or loses."

Wellstone is right. His race is being read as a measure of the potency of progressive politics in America. If he wins, a blow will be struck not just against the Bush machine but against those in the Democratic Party who argue for tepid moderation. With Senate majority leader Tom Daschle and House minority leader Dick Gephardt still struggling to identify the themes on which Democrats will stake their claim for control of Congress later this year, Wellstone is refreshingly different; he knows where he stands and he stands there proudly. For years, progressives have argued that Democrats will win big only when they distinguish themselves from Republicans on fundamental economic and social justice issues. Here is Wellstone -- arguably the most prominent elected progressive in the country -- doing just that.

Yet even as he follows the progressive playbook, Wellstone is no sure bet. In a state that gave America liberal Democratic icons like Hubert Humphrey, Eugene McCarthy and Walter Mondale, and that has not backed a Republican for President since 1972, current polls show Wellstone running roughly even with Republican challenger Norm Coleman, a former mayor of St. Paul. To be sure, Coleman has benefited from being "Bush's best boy" and from steady infusions of campaign cash that are available to the Administration's chosen ones. But the full explanation for Wellstone's tight spot is found in a more complex calculation that involves Wellstone himself, the changing character of the upper Midwest, the flux in which the Democratic Party finds itself and the machinations of the people who manipulated Bush into the highest office in the land. "Sure, the Bush Administration is targeting Paul this year, but Paul is never a shoo-in," says Myron Orfield, a Minnesota Democratic Farmer Labor Party (DFL) state senator widely regarded as one of the nation's top experts in the study of voting patterns. "Paul's a controversial guy. He's the little guy who takes on the big guys. That is not something the political process is designed to reward these days. If you take strong stands you put yourself at risk, and Paul takes more strong stands on more issues than just about anyone else."

Virtually alone among Senate Democrats, Wellstone sees himself not just as a member of Congress but as a member of a movement. He identifies with progressives, organizes family-farm rallies in Washington, marches with striking hotel workers and dares to title a book "The Conscience of a Liberal." That does not mean that Wellstone is the unbending leftist that his critics allege and that many of his supporters would prefer. The man who began burning bridges with the Bush family when he challenged then-President Bush's Persian Gulf War preparations on their first meeting ("Who is this chickenshit?" Bush Sr. asked) may be the Senate's boldest foe of the Star Wars national missile defense program and of increased military aid to Colombia. But he disappointed peace activists when he joined a unanimous Senate vote to authorize an ill-defined military response to the September 11 attacks and dismayed civil libertarians when he refused to join Senator Russell Feingold's solo opposition to constitutionally dubious antiterrorism legislation.

Still, Wellstone has few rivals on the left side of the Senate aisle. Congressional Quarterly says no senator had a more consistent record of voting against Bush Administration proposals during the new President's first year. Wellstone racks up 100 percent ratings from the AFL-CIO, Americans for Democratic Action and the League of Conservation Voters. He is the veteran grassroots organizer hailed by consumer activists for waging a three-year battle to temper the draconian "bankruptcy reform" bill pushed by the credit card industry. He is the former college professor who has been the chief Senate voice of those who maintain that education-reform initiatives must involve better measures of success than standardized tests. He is the crusader for disability rights and healthcare reform who -- since he was diagnosed in February as having a mild form of multiple sclerosis -- is in demand not merely as an advocate but as a very human example of what the struggles are about. The Minneapolis Star Tribune recently described him as "the go-to guy to advance the causes of educators, environmentalists, consumer and labor groups, the elderly and the poor."

For many progressives, that still sounds like a recipe for electoral success. But this "Democratic" state has not elected a DFL governor since 1986, its Senate seats have switched partisan hands twice in twelve years, and while Minnesota still backs Democrats for President, it does not do so by much. "This idea that Minnesota is an easy Democratic state is overblown," says Robert Richman, a veteran Democratic campaign aide. "Gore barely won the state in 2000" -- prevailing over Bush by fewer than 60,000 votes out of almost 2.5 million cast. Minnesota Democrats note that when Green candidate Ralph Nader's 126,696 votes -- 5 percent of the total -- are added to Gore's, the numbers look better. But Democrats didn't used to have to resort to such calculations in a state that swam against rougher Republican tides to back Jimmy Carter, Walter Mondale and Michael Dukakis.

Some of the slippage has to do with signals sent by national Democrats. The 1990s saw the Democratic Party relying more on the upper Midwest than ever before for Congressional ballast, yet DC Democrats get low marks for addressing the region's traditional concerns. "This is the part of the country that has saved the Democratic Party in the Senate," says Neil Ritchie, a DFL precinct activist and one of the savviest analysts of farm-state voting patterns in the country. "But, when you've got Clinton, Gore and the Democratic Leadership Council promoting free trade and helping corporate agribusiness, it makes it hard for Democrats out here." Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, North Dakota and South Dakota have ten Senate seats, nine held by Democrats who, for the most part, preach a farm-and-factory populism with which the technocratic Al Gore was never comfortable. Eight years of Clinton/Gore centrism sucked a lot of air out of the "us against them" populist rhetoric that was long the currency of Democrats in the region. That's a big part of why Bush beat Gore by an overall margin of more than 80,000 votes in these states, and why the shift of relative handfuls of votes would have given Bush an additional twenty-eight electoral votes -- making the Florida recount fight irrelevant.

Now, Rove is gambling presidential prestige and Republican dollars on the prospect that the upper Midwest is the key to taking back a Senate that went Democratic last spring after Vermont Senator Jim Jeffords exited the GOP. "Midwestern voters don't feel the connection with the Democrats that they once did," crows Rove. To that end, Wellstone, South Dakota's Tim Johnson and Iowa's Tom Harkin, all up for re-election, are getting what GOP insiders call "the Rove treatment": recruitment of high-profile Republican challengers, major-league fundraising assistance and regular presidential visits. All other things being equal, picking off either Johnson or Harkin would be enough to split the Senate 50-50 and again allow Vice President Cheney to break partisan ties. But beating Wellstone would be the sweetest win. "They have made it very clear that if they could beat one Democrat this year, it would be Paul Wellstone," says Minnesota political consultant Richman. "Paul gets under their skin."

"When I first met the President, he called me 'Pablo,'" Wellstone jokes. "That lasted a day or two. Then they started trying to figure out how they were going to get rid of me." While other Democrats approached the new Administration cautiously, Wellstone raised hell. In one of the first confrontations between the Administration and the newly Democratic Senate, Wellstone used his chairmanship of a subcommittee on worker safety to demand that Bush Labor Department officials justify the Administration's rejection of federal ergonomics standards. And Bush aides are still smarting over a Wellstone amendment to the President's tax cut plan that diverted $17 billion to veterans programs.

For Bush and Rove, payback takes the form of Norm Coleman. A weathervane politician, Coleman switched from Democrat to Republican in the late 1990s. That and his too-slick-by-half style ("I've changed my party, my hair, my smile," he boasts) have never endeared him to the Republican faithful. But he plays well in the burgeoning suburbs of the Twin Cities, where voters know him from two terms as mayor of St. Paul and where Rove thinks the race could be decided. In a state where politics traditionally followed urban and rural lines -- the DFL's "Farmer-Labor" tag recalls the populist party that merged with the Democrats in the 1940s -- Minneapolis and St. Paul suburbanites now represent 44 percent of the state's population. That, explains DFL State Senator Jane Krentz, who represents suburbs northeast of St. Paul, "is shifting the way people look at politics."

Coleman's 2002 plan had been to avenge his 1998 loss of the Minnesota governorship to Jesse Ventura, the wrestler-turned-third-party-pol who has yet to decide whether he will seek a second term this year. (There was speculation at one point that Ventura might challenge Wellstone on the Independence Party ticket, but the talk fizzled. If Ventura seeks a new term, an Independence Party Senate candidate might still draw votes -- most likely from Coleman. By the same token, a Green candidate could shave some votes off Wellstone's total. But third-party candidates are not expected to gain much traction arguing that voters lack a choice between Wellstone and Coleman.)

When Coleman switched ambitions under pressure from the White House, even Republicans said he would not be helped much by being identified as "Bush's boy" in a state that tends to favor politicians who think for themselves. But things changed after September 11. As Bush's approval ratings soared, Coleman wrapped himself in the cloak of presidential popularity -- and perks. When Bush made his second Coleman-promoting trip to the state this March, banners announced Minnesota Is George W. Bush and Norm Coleman Country. The ex-mayor stepped off Air Force One with Bush, and stuck by his supporter-in-chief like glue through a day that culminated with Bush's raising $1.2 million for Coleman and another $800,000 in soft money for GOP efforts on his behalf. Former President George Bush headlined an October fundraiser in St. Paul for Coleman, and Cheney signed a fundraising appeal. Rove steered special-interest contributions -- especially those from an energy industry angered by Wellstone's decadelong battle against oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge -- toward accounts established to aid the man Minnesota media call "Bush's favored-son candidate." Minnesota political observers predict Coleman's campaign will spend $10 million, while another $5 million will be spent by the GOP and anti-Wellstone interests. Anti-Wellstone attack ads are already on TV, and the hits will keep on coming. Republicans say Wellstone's decision to seek a third term -- after having stated years ago that he only planned to serve two -- is evidence that the maverick Senator has "gone Washington." It's a tough sell, considering Coleman's party switch, but Richman says, "They'll hit Paul from now until November -- above the belt and below the belt."

In this most intense of all Senate contests, Wellstone knows he will not win re-election simply by unfurling old Farmer-Labor banners. To counter Coleman's claim that a Republican can get more done for Minnesota, Wellstone is showcasing legislative accomplishments and the coalitions he has forged with Republicans to increase funding for teacher training, vocational education and environmental protection. Those efforts got an unexpected boost in April when Bush broke with Republicans to endorse Wellstone's proposal to make corporations provide mental healthcare coverage for employees.

But while he will make the case that he can forge coalitions with the best of 'em, Wellstone is not selling himself as a centrist. No one would believe him. Besides, he says, the winning message is still a populist one. Wellstone is determined to "draw real lines of distinction" in this year's campaign, and that will serve him well in the DFL's urban and rural strongholds where he can energize voters who were unenthused about Gore. Yet, like Democrats in rapidly changing states across the country, Wellstone understands that he must craft a message that adds suburban votes to his base. He would have a comfortable lead today were it not for the margin -- twelve points in a recent poll -- that Coleman has in the nine suburban counties around the Twin Cities. One of the primary tasks of the Wellstone campaign this year is to find the populist bone in the suburban body politic. Orfield, the expert on suburban voting patterns, thinks it will succeed. "Some of the issues Paul has fought hardest on -- healthcare, protecting pensions, environmental protection -- play very strongly in middle-income suburbs where people are feeling squeezed," Orfield argues. "I think that Paul is going to do a very good job of reaching them, and I think that his success will provide a very important lesson for Democrats in other parts of the country."

Wellstone says the strategy is to reach across lines of class and community to focus on issues that are universal -- like education. So what's the populist twist on the education debate? Wellstone's first television ads explain that Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest 1 percent of Americans will dry up money needed to educate urban, rural and suburban kids. Scrap the cuts, Wellstone argues, and free up $121 billion for education programs over ten years. While most Senate Democrats shy away from such talk, and while Coleman claims the Senator is engaging in "class warfare," Wellstone says, "This is a message that gets people excited because it rejects the Administration's line that there isn't enough money to educate our children, care for our seniors, clean up the environment and provide healthcare benefits to people who need them."

Coleman and Rove are betting that while Wellstone's message may play in rural and urban areas, it won't excite suburbanites. But Krentz, the suburban state senator, thinks Wellstone is on to something. "Paul understands that he's got to connect with suburban parents who know that their kids' schools are not being funded adequately, and he's got to get them thinking about why that is happening," she says. "It's tough because people like to believe that it's possible to settle things without a fight. Paul's challenge is to convince people that there are issues worth fighting for."

With the Enron scandal fresh in America's memory, Wellstone will also push the idea that there are interests worth fighting against. "When the oil company money comes in, we're going to talk about it," he says. "We're going to fight like hell."

Wellstone means it when he says "we." Despite Bush's aid to Coleman, Wellstone is keeping pace in fundraising thanks to an activist base that has provided 70,000 contributions averaging $48. But that does not mean that he is mounting a standard campaign. While campaign manager Jeff Blodgett says Wellstone will try to match Coleman's advertising blitz, the campaign will devote more than half its budget to the sort of people-to-people networking that can deliver Wellstone's message to every precinct in the state. Labor, farm and education groups are helping to organize 25,000 volunteers, 7,500 of whom are expected to take time off from work to help on Election Day. Says precinct activist Ritchie, "You're going to see a campaign where the Bush money gets beat because Wellstone is so damn strong at the grassroots that -- no matter how many lies they try to tell -- there will be a network to get the truth out." Wellstone is devoting tremendous time and energy to expanding the network far beyond the traditional DFL base. "This really is the new Minnesota," he says as he enters Pooh Phetnongphay's Laotian restaurant in St. Paul. "Paul's a sweetheart," Phetnongphay says. "Everyone is registering to vote to help him win."

Even as Phetnongphay speaks, Wellstone is working the other side of the crowded room. The candidate is limping because of his multiple sclerosis. But the disease, which by all accounts is both under control and of little concern to Minnesotans, has stolen none of his thunder. At 57, he is running harder than ever before. His state and his country are changing. But his faith that a progressive populist message can reach a new Minnesota -- and a new America -- is unshaken. "The President can come in. The Vice President can come in. The big money can come in. But I'm not worried. I've got you with me," Wellstone roars, as he rallies his troops. "I am a proud progressive senator from Minnesota. I am a proud liberal senator. I am a labor senator. I am an environmentalist senator. I am an education senator. I am a civil rights senator. And that's how we win this election. That's the politics that wins this year."

John Nichols is the editorial page editor at the Madison Capital Times.

******************

http://www.lastampa.it/redazione/Esteri/Abuenos.asp

..................Proprio gli equilibri al Senato sono stati oggetto del colpo di scena della vigilia del voto: il governatore uscente del Minnesota, Jesse

Ventura, ha deciso di assegnare all'indipendente Dean Barkley il seggio di senatore lasciato vacante dal democratico Paul Wellstone,

scomparso in un incidente aereo.

La decisione ha un forte impatto politico: ristabilisce la parità assoluta fra democratici e repubblicani al Senato (49-49), togliendo ai democratici

la guida dei lavori dell'aula e dunque creando una situazione più favorevole all'Amministrazione Bush da adesso a quando, all'inizio del nuovo

anno, si insedierà il nuovo Congresso.

Il Senato in mano all'opposizione - grazie alla scelta dell'indipendente Jim Jeffords di schierarsi con i democratici - è stato negli ultimi due anni il

più tenace avversario delle politiche dell'Amministrazione, sia sull'economia che sulla sicurezza nazionale.

http://www.ilmanifesto.it/Quotidiano-archivio/27-Ottobre-2002/art12.html

NORD AMERICA: Pacifisti a Washington e San Francisco In piazza contro la guerra all'Iraq. Cortei in tutto il mondo

Secondo gli organizzatori sono state le manifestazioni più grandi dai tempi della guerra in Vietnam. L'America pacifista è tornata ieri in piazza a

Washington e San Francisco. Nella capitale centomila persone si sono radunate davanti al memoriale ai caduti nel Vietnam, sul Mall, per poi

marciare fino alla Casa Bianca. In testa al corteo i reduci. I manifestanti hanno chiesto a gran voce al presidente di Bush di destinare alle

politiche sociali i 200 miliardi di dollari che costerebbe la guerra in Iraq. «Niente prove, niente guerra», «George W. Bush non puoi nasconderti,

ti processeremo per genocidio». Questi e altri slogan gridati dai pacifisti. Tra loro l'attrice Susan Sarandon, il reverendo Jesse Jackson, la

cantante Patti Smith, il vescovo di Detroit Thomas Gumbleton. «Sganciate Bush, non le bombe», dicevano i cartelli di alcuni pacifisti. Molti di

loro hanno voluto ricordare il senatore Paul Wellstone, il democratico contro la guerra morto venerdì in un incidente aereo. Ma la giornata di ieri

è stata caratterizzata dalle manifestazioni un po' in tutto il mondo. Cortei ci sono stati a Città del Messico, Copenaghen, Seoul, Tokyo, Berlino e

Porto Rico. Una manifestazione anche a Roma. Intanto all'Onu è ormai scontro aperto sulle risoluzioni, mentre Bush insiste: se serve faremo la

guerra a Saddam, anche da soli.A PAGINA 5

http://www.larivistadelmanifesto.it/archivio/33/33A20021105.html

Pochi candidati democratici – come Paul Wellstone del Minnesota, che corre per la rielezione al Senato – hanno mantenuto un'opposizione

inflessibile ai piani di guerra di Bush e hanno ancora una buona posizione per vincere. Le vittorie elettorali però non possono essere

considerate come fini in sé. L'atteggiamento della leadership dei Democratici è stata, per non dire altro, immorale e ha contribuito in gran parte

al decadimento della democrazia negli Usa. E tuttavia, le cose non potrebbero addirittura peggiorare, se il prossimo 5 novembre gli elementi

progressisti del paese decidessero di togliere il voto ai candidati democratici?

http://lgxserver.uniba.it/lei/rassegna/wellston.htm

da

http://lgxserver.uniba.it/lei/rassegna/010713h.htm

Chi è Tobin, che cos’è la sua tassa, come viene travisato

STORIA E IDEE DI UN ECONOMISTA CHE DA QUALCHE TEMPO CONDIZIONA LA POLITICA IN EUROPA E IN AMERICA

....... Una specie di imposta Tobin nazionale è già stata introdotta dal governo di centro-sinistra cileno. Negli Stati Uniti, una proposta di legge in

tal senso è stata presentata nell'aprile 2000 da due congressisti democratici, il rappresentante Peter DeFazio e il senatore Paul Wellstone.........

..............

http://www.radicalparty.org/china/an_i.htm

Seguono le firme dei membri di governo, dei premi Nobel, dei parlamentari e dei professori universitari che hanno sostenuto la candidatura di

Wei Jingsheng a premio Nobel per la Pace 1997

....

http://www.padmanet.com/ait/tibet%20news%20italia/TibetNews37/37_Estate_2002.htm

SENATO USA APPROVA RISOLUZIONE SUL PANCHEN LAMA

Washington, 5 giugno 2002. Il senato degli Stati Uniti ha approvato una Risoluzione con la quale condanna la violazione dei diritti umani in

Tibet, chiede il rilascio del Panchen Lama e sollecita l’inizio di un dialogo tra la leadership cinese e il Dalai Lama o i suoi rappresentanti. Il

documento, presentato dal senatore Paul Wellstone il giorno 25 aprile, giorno del tredicesimo compleanno del Panchen Lama, era stato

redatto con l’intenzione di far conoscere al vice premier Hu Jintao, nell’imminenza della sua visita nella capitale americana, la preoccupazione

del congresso per le sorti del piccolo prigioniero politico.

......

che vede perdente il partito che occupa la Casa Bianca

Elezioni del "Midterm"

prova del fuoco per Bush

I democratici sono in vantaggio nelle corse per i governatori

dal nostro corrispondente ARTURO ZAMPAGLIONE

http://www.rai.it/RAInet/news/RNw/pub/articolo/raiRNewsArticolo/0,7605,36559%5EhomePageLeft%5E21%5E,00.html

Ecco che cosa c'è in palio

Senato. Si vota in 34 stati per eleggere i senatori, Missouri compreso dove sono in palio i quattro anni rimasti alla scadenza del mandato dello

scomparso Mel Carnahan. Dopo la morte del senatore Paul Wellstone, i democratici e i repubblicani hanno 49 poltrone ciascuno in Senato. Un

indipendente, James Jeffords del Vermont, vota con i democratici. Un altro indipendente, Dean Parkley, è stato appena nominato a sostituire

Wellstone. Parkley ha dichiarato di non sapere ancora con quale partito votera'.I repubblicani difendono 20 poltrone, i democratici 14.

http://www.corriere.it/Primo_Piano/Esteri/2002/11_Novembre/05/eleusa.shtml

IL SENATO - I repubblicani hanno 49 seggi. I democratici, che contano anche sul voto dell'unico indipendente, ne avevano 50, ma la morte del

senatore Paul Wellstone del Minnesota li ha portati a 49. Per complicare le cose, in un clamoroso colpo di scena, per ripicca contro i due partiti

che lo hanno spesso boicottato, il governatore indipendente del Minnesota Jesse Ventura, umorale ex lottatore professionista, ha ieri sostituito

Wellstone con un suo uomo di fiducia, Dean Barkley. Il vincitore delle elezioni, il repubblicano Norman Coleman o l'ex vicepresidente

democratico Walter Mondale, si troverà con il seggio occupato, e potrebbe non accedervi fino a gennaio, l’inizio della nuova legislatura. Una

prospettiva inquietante: il Senato ha un ruolo chiave in politica estera.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

apertura

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

http://www.ilmanifesto.it/Quotidiano-archivio/27-Ottobre-2002/art47.html

Iraq, all'Onu è guerra aperta

Si prepara la battaglia di risoluzioni al Palazzo di vetro, tra Francia, Usa e Russia che si combattono a colpi di minacce di veto. Per la morte in

incidente aereo del senatore democratico Weller la maggioranza è a rischio alla Camera alta

FRANCO PANTARELLI

NEW YORK

Un po' freddina la solidarietà che George Bush ha espresso a Vladimir Putin sulla conclusione della tragedia al teatro Dubrovskaya. Almeno

fino al primo pomeriggio di ieri c'era stata solo una «comunicazione» del suo portavoce Ari Fleischer, che a nome del capo condannava i non

meglio precisati «terroristi» che avevano preso gli ostaggi, ricordava «i rischi che i terroristi rappresentano per tutto il mondo libero» e

rispondendo a una domanda diceva che no, «il presidente Bush e il presidente Putin non si sono ancora parlati per telefono». Le ragioni di

questa riluttanza, sostenevano i leader dei manifestanti che già dalle prime ore del mattino avevano preso ad arrivare a Washington, sta nel

fatto che la tragedia di Mosca, come del resto quella di Bali, non può essere collegata al perfido Saddam Hussein e depone semmai contro

l'ossessione anti-irachena di Bush; e soprattutto nel fatto che la Russia di Putin, tragedia o non tragedia, è ora il paese in seno al Consiglio di

Sicurezza dell'Onu che più si oppone alla «guerra di Bush». L'appuntamento per i manifestanti era nei pressi del Vietnam Memorial e la

previsione era che nel corso della giornata sarebbero diventati almeno 100.000, che poi avrebbero marciato in direzione della Casa bianca con i

loro slogan «No proof, no war», niente prove niente guerra, e «Sacrifice oil for justice», sacrifichiamo il petrolio in nome della giustizia. Un sorta

di legame ideale con quanto stava accadendo alle Nazioni unite, dove anche ieri la «battaglia delle risoluzioni» è continuata ed ha preso aspetti

anche un po' buffi. E' accaduto che francesi e americani hanno ambedue interpretato la riunione di venerdì del Consiglio di sicurezza come una

propria «vittoria», ma siccome non erano sicuri di ciò che dicevano lo hanno fatto attraverso le parole di loro funzionari anonimi. Ecco così dalla

missione francese arrivare l'indicazione la risoluzione da essa presentata (cioè quella che toglie alla risoluzione americana le parole chiave che

possono consentire a Washington di partire all'attacco dell'Iraq) «ha la maggioranza», ed ecco - pochi minuti dopo - uscire dalla missione

americana un «neanche per sogno, la maggioranza è nostra», cioè sulla risoluzione che contiene le parole chiave di cui si diceva, vale a dire

quella che considerano l'Iraq già in «sostanziale violazione» delle risoluzioni dell'Onu e quindi passibile di attacco militare senza ulteriori

autorizzazioni del Consiglio di sicurezza. Attacco per condurre il quale «non ci sarà nessun problema», hanno detto sempre ieri dalla Casa

bianca, perché sarà «tutt'altro che difficile» costruire la coalizione necessaria. I russi, presi da altre faccende, non hanno vantato nessuna

vittoria, ma è un fatto che la loro bozza di risoluzione alternativa sia a quella americana che a quella francese (visto che quest'ultima è solo una

«correzione» della prima) pesa sulla discussione molto più di quanto gli americani siano disposti ad ammettere. Un momento significativo della

disputa si dovrebbe avere domani, quando davanti al Consiglio di sicurezza si presenterà il capo degli ispettori, Hans Blix, per spiegare i termini

esatti della situazione e per dire cosa, secondo lui, è necessario per compiere efficacemente il lavoro in Iraq. Ma gli americani si sono già

«premuniti» contro le risoluzioni francese e russa chiedendo che la loro venga votata mercoledì. Si tratta di un espediente «tecnico» che

consente alla risoluzione americana di essere votata per prima e le implicazioni politiche sono in una voce, non confermata ma non inverosimile:

quella secondo cui gli americani hanno fatto presente ai francesi che se il voto di mercoledì dovesse risultare a loro favore e Parigi dovesse

decidere di bloccarlo con il veto, loro faranno altrettanto al momento di votare la risoluzione francese.

Il gioco si sta facendo duro, dunque, il che rende ancora più opportuna la mobilitazione popolare vista ieri a Washington e San Francisco.

Disgraziatamente nessun senatore o deputato democratico (per il terrore di venire bollati come «antipatriottico» in tempo elettorale) era

previsto a quelle manifestazioni. L'unico che ci sarebbe probabilmente stato era Paul Wellstone del Minnesota, che ha votato il no alla guerra

all'Iraq «contro due presidenti dal nome George Bush» e del quale non si ricorda il minimo atto di opportunismo politico. Ma Wellstone è morto

l'altro ieri in un incidente aereo, assieme alla moglie, la figlia, tre suoi collaboratori e i due piloti del piper su cui stavano viaggiando. La sua

scomparsa, oltre al dolore per la fine di una delle persone migliori che la politica americana degli ultimi anni avesse prodotto, pone grossi rischi

alle possibilità del partito democratico di conservare la sua risicata maggioranza al senato. Pare che come mossa disperata venga presentata in extremis la candidatura di Walter Mondale, l'ex candidato alla presidenza negli anni `80.