Cross-posted at OpenLeft.
I'm glad to see the netroots have been talking about Pennsylvania's Third Congressional District lately. As a candidate for that seat, I want to make the case to you that we can elect a progressive Democrat here in the northwest corner of this state. I think I'm the only candidate in PA-3 who is both a progressive and a Democrat - and that's why I think I'm the only candidate who can beat Phil English.
I'm not a politician. I'm running for Congress because I want to represent the increasing number of people who are being left behind in our country. Like my mother: she's almost 70 years old and works the third shift in a gas station convenience store here in Erie. I mention this because I think it's important that you know that this race is very personal to me. I'm tired of the misplaced priorities and blatant corruption of our country's current leadership. My hometown is losing young people year after year, even while it gets harder for our seniors to live here on a fixed income. Wages are stagnant and economic opportunity is disappearing along with our dwindling manufacturing base.
I'm a graduate of Union Theological Seminary, currently serving in a lay-ministry position at the Cathedral of St. Paul in my home town. I'm running as faith-focused progressive: I believe that budgets and government policies are moral documents that should reflect the true values of our society. While I support keeping government out of the affairs of the Church, I think that faith can play a positive role in politics.
We face a spiritual and moral crisis today in America. An idolatrous attachment to free-market dogma has hardened the hearts and clouded the judgment of our leaders - they don't seem to care that millions upon millions of Americans are being left out of the new America they're creating for themselves and their big money supporters.
You get a different perspective when you see how hard it is for those who are struggling to make it. To me, public service is just that: service. Too many people in office today seem to have no idea what that means, because they have never served anything but themselves. Phil English is a career politician, and he's very good at getting himself re-elected, but I believe that a true progressive can beat him, because progressives offer what America needs: a new generation of moral leadership.
As a progressive, I believe that the Iraq War is immoral, unjust, and harmful to America's national security, and I support a full withdrawal on a date certain. I strongly oppose torture and the abuse of Constitutional and human rights.
I support a single-payer universal health care plan that will cover every American.
I believe that the federal government should be held accountable to regions, like mine, that are suffering from years of bad trade policies. We should improve funding for worker retraining programs, develop incentives to create partnerships between high-tech industry and traditional manufacturing, invest aggressively in energy alternatives to put our country on course toward energy independence, and build infrastructure to move industrial belt areas like northwest PA to the cutting edge of the 21st-century economy.
I believe we need to keep our promises to our seniors and our young people. We've reached a moral and political crisis when, for the first time in our history, polls show that most Americans no longer believe that their children's lives will be better than their own. Our young people are burdened with unsustainable levels of student loan and credit card debt, even while we shackle them with the financial and moral debts of the Bush administration's failed leadership.
And because politics should be open to all Americans, not just career politicians, I support public financing of elections.
But being a progressive is not just about the policies you support. It's about the values you uphold. And that's why it's easy for me to explain to people why I'm not just a progressive, but a Democrat: I believe that the Democratic Party, at its best, stands for progressive values. I am a Democrat because I believe in the principles of this party and the people those principles exist to serve. My grandmother was a dyed-in-the wool Democrat: she believed in helping people out when they fell on hard times; she believed in shared sacrifice and hard work and that we all should pitch in to improve our own communities and the country as a whole. My loyalty to this party is a loyalty to these principles.
You in the netroots have done so much work to hold the Democratic Party to its progressive values, and that's why you're an invaluable part of America's political future. Because the real story of America is that it's made up of places like northwest Pennsylvania, and northwest Pennsylvania is made up of people like my mother and my grandmother: hardworking people who understand what it means to say that we're all in this together. Natural progressives, and natural Democrats. That's why I'm asking you, as netroots leaders, to help elect a real progressive Democrat here in PA-3.
You can find more coverage of my campaign at EriePressible and Pennsylvania Progressive. I hope you'll recommend this diary, and stick around to chat for a few minutes. My website is here: www.waltnerforcongress.com. Pay us a visit and join the fight!
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