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Committee to Elect
Vivian Houghton Attorney General
MEDIA RELEASE
For immediate release: Wednesday,
September 9, 2002
Contact:
Robert Bohm, Campaign Coordinator
(302)239-2572
RebSalerno@msn.com
AG
Candidate Responds to Common Cause Survey of Elected Officials
Houghton supports initiatives for
free air time, campaign finance reform, establishment of a non-partisan
redistricting commission, enforcement of the Freedom of Information Act,
and House/Senate rule reform at press conference
Wilmington: At a press conference
held today, J. Roy Cannon, representing Vivian Houghton, Green Party
candidate for Delaware Attorney General, presented the candidate's
response to the recently completed survey conducted by Common Cause of
Delaware. The following are remarks made on her behalf:
"Of course the Houghton campaign
is for campaign finance reform.
"When big money is allowed to buy
political influence, as it does now through campaign contributions, it in
effect buys the political system, robbing our citizens' of their voice,
and uses the system for its own ends. Those ends are to control our
leaders so that they serve corporate interests rather than the peoples'
interests.
"Look at MBNA. MBNA's financial
contributions have squashed any opposition from Senators Bidden and Carper
or Congressman Castle as MBNA pushes for bankruptcy law changes that will
help the rich and hurt the poor.
"Or look at the situation of
African-Americans and Hispanics. The fact that, as a group, they are
politically under-represented and earn about a fraction of the per capita
income of whites means that they have less political influence than do
predominantly white corporate contributors. This means that in
Delaware, where 9.4 blacks are imprisoned for every white, little effort
is made to change the criminal justice system's racial biases. Those who
have the money pay the piper and minorities suffer.
"Another example is companies that
pollute. Here in Delaware such companies--Rodel, Motiva, Metachem
and so on--get off with relatively mild fines when they break our
environmental regulations contributing to our state's health problems. Yet
if the average person were to commit a felony by poisoning people, that
person would be sent to jail. Big companies, which make big financial
contributions to our current leaders, can get away with murder because, in
effect, they've paid for protection.
"The Houghton campaign does not
accept contributions from corporations. We support initiatives like Senate
Bill #148 to remove the heavy hand of corporate donations from our
democracy.
"Yes, we believe in financial
reform. It's insane not to. This is supposed to be a democracy for the
people, not against the people."
The chairperson for the Green Party of
Delaware Coordinating Council, Vince Sottilie (sottilevj@worldnet.att.net
) was present along with representatives from the Delaware Chapter of
NAACP, delawarehispanic.com,
members of Common Cause, and other interested citizens. John Flaherty (JDF0000@aol.com
) of Common Cause presented the results of the survey sent to all Delaware
legislators.
FOR MORE INFORMATION
Committee to Elect Vivian Houghton
Attorney General
800 West Street
Wilmington, Delaware 19801
(302)239-2572
agcandidate@vivianhoughtonl.com
http://vivianhoughton.com/vivian
Green Party of Delaware
P. O. Box 6044
Wilmington, Delaware 19804
greenpartyde@yahoo.com
http://www.gpde.org
Green Party of the United States
1314 18th Street, Lower Level
Washington, D.C. 20036
info@greenpartyus.org
866-41GREEN (toll free)
http://greenpartyus.org
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