Others vying for seat

Ken And Mag Seaman, Denver

Thursday, April 10, 2008

We are saddened and disappointed by the March 29 Rocky articles on the Republican and Democratic contestants for Colorado's vacant Senate seat ("Udall vs. Schaffer: Agreeing to disagree" et al.).

Apparently, the Rocky and its writers and editors refuse to recognize other candidates for the office. Rocky readers have a right to know of the credentials and position of candidates such as Robert Kinsey, the Green Party's candidate for Senate.

Fairness and accuracy in journalism require that the views of all those seeking any office be published in the spirit of full and free speech.

• April 10, 2008

  8:38 a.m.

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  Old_Grouch writes:

  Perhaps the letter writer will deign to enlighten us as to who, or what, is a "Robert Kinsey"; and maybe even tell us just what "credentials and position" he, or the Green Party has.

  Might this be a kind of Colorado edition of Ralph Nader; and another attempt to act as "spoiler", splitting away votes from one side for the benefit of the other?

  Has the letter writer actually gone to the Denver Newspaper Agency - which owns the two morning adversiting throwaways with comic pages in the Metro-Denver area - and asked for publicity? Or written something of a "position paper", or informational material on the candidate, to let the newspapers even know he's there?

• April 12, 2008

  6:08 p.m.

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  GarySwing writes:

  The extreme irony of the letter titled "Others vying for seat" is lost on readers of the Rocky Mountain News who are unfamiliar with the behavior of the Colorado Green Party.

  First, I would like to say that I like and respect the letter writers, Mag and Ken Seaman. I also like and respect Bob Kinsey. I believe that he is an excellent candidate and the Green Party has an excellent platform. There is absolutely no way I would ever vote for the chosen nominees of the Democratic or Republican Party for federal office. However, I will not vote for Bob Kinsey either -- or any other chosen nominee of the Green Party because of the Green Party's anti-democratic, authoritarian process and the party's consistent pattern of hostility to independent thinkers.

  The comments of "Old_Grouch" have no validity. The old spoiler/vote splitting argument is a pathetic defense for an archaic, illegitimate voting system that makes American elections a meaningless sham. People who want to assess Bob Kinsey's candidacy, issues, and credentials for themselves can read his campaign website at www.kinseyforsenate.org.

  Certainly, Bob Kinsey's campaign and/or the state Green Party must have asked for publicity from the Denver Newspaper Agency. Indeed, the Greens held a rally for Bob's official campaign announcement on Colfax Avenue right outside the Denver Newspaper Agency Building.

  In their letter, Ken and Mag wrote that "Apparently, the Rocky and its writers and editors refuse to recognize other candidates for the office...." and "Fairness and accuracy in journalism require that the views of all those seeking any office be published in the spirit of full and free speech." While I believe that Mag and Ken are sincere in writing this, my observation of the behavior of the Colorado Green Party has convinced me that the the party is absolutely, unequivocally opposed to fairness, accuracy, full and free speech, and recognizing all legitimate candidates for public office.

  First, readers should know that two candidates have been seeking the Green Party's nomination for U.S. Senate this year. The other candidate is Buddy Moore (See www.buddymooreforsenate.org). Buddy Moore's candidacy was perfectly legitimate under state election laws and the Green Party's bylaws. However, the Greens maneuvered to block Buddy from being being recognized as a candidate for their nomination, obstructed his participation in their internal nomination process, demonized him for trying to run, and even changed their party bylaws specifically to block him from being a candidate. They refused to consider the relative merits of the two candidates on the basis of their platforms or credentials.

• April 12, 2008

  6:10 p.m.

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  GarySwing writes:

  The Greens manufactured a specious argument for excluding Buddy on the basis of a difference in language between a Colorado statute and the party's bylaws. The party's bylaws only required a candidate to be registered as a Green for two months prior to the nominating assembly. State law requires that nominees of a minor party must not have been registered as a member of a major party for a year, unless otherwise provided for by party bylaws. The party's bylaws did provide otherwise. Moreover, the courts have ruled that constitutionally, the bylaws of a recognized political party overrule statutory restrictions on this matter. Nevertheless, the Greens contrived to block Buddy's candidacy on this deceitful basis.

  An additional irony here is that Ken Seaman (one of the letter writers above) was the Green Party nominee for U.S. Representative in Denver in 2002. Like Buddy, Ken had switched his party affiliation from Democrat to Green less than a year before the election. At that time, Ken's nomination explicitly violated state election laws, but the restriction on party affiliation had been nullified by a prior court ruling. The Greens embraced Ken's candidacy. This year, Buddy's nomination was explicitly permitted under both the Green Party's bylaws and under a 2003 state law that I had lobbied for, yet the Greens took the opposite tact of pretending that the candidacy was not permitted. Here's my role in this matter -- in both cases, with Ken in 2002 and Buddy in 2008 -- I suggested to them that they switch parties to run as Green Party candidates.

  I was an activist in various Green organizations from 1986 to 1997. I was the campaign treasurer for the first Green Party campaign in Colorado (Phil Hufford for Governor, 1994) and I was a Green Party candidate for state representative in 1996. I served variously as co-chair and secretary of the Denver Greens, and as a volunteer election reform lobbyist for the Colorado Green Party in my capacity as the Vice Chairman of the Colorado Coalition for Fair and Open Elections. I helped draft, found sponsors for, and lobbied for the legislation that enabled the Greens, Libertarians, and American Constitution Party to establish ballot status as recognized minor parties in Colorado.

• April 12, 2008

  6:12 p.m.

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  GarySwing writes:

  However, once Ralph Nader's fans took over the Green Party, the Colorado Greens seemed to become more and more obsessed with shutting out independent thinkers from participating in the party. They used double standards, consensus and supermajority process and other procedural obstacles to stifle dissent.

  In 1996, when I was a Green Party candidate for state representative, I was invited to speak at a multi-party demonstration calling for fair and open elections, and open debates. The person who invited me to speak had assumed that as a Green, I supported Ralph Nader's candidacy. I did not. I asked to speak on behalf of the Socialist Party's candidate for president, who also happened to be a member of the Green Party. I was not allowed to speak. I guess elections were not intended to be that fair and open.

  In 1999, Ron Forthofer at the Rocky Mountain Peace Center organized an event in Boulder where people were encouraged to switch their voter registration from major parties to minor parties or to unaffiliated, to protest the U.S. bombing of Yugoslavia and Iraq. He invited me to speak there on behalf of the Pacifist Party. However, when I arrived at the event, one of the organizers of the event told me that it was a Green Party event. I was not welcome there and would need to leave. Ron Forthofer became a Green Party candidate for Congress in 2000. The person who told me to leave became his campaign director.

  In 2000, the Greens held a march and demonstration in Denver calling for "fair and open" presidential debates including Nader with Gore and Bush. However, the Greens were proposing arbitrary debate inclusion criteria which would have allowed Nader in the debates while excluding the candidates of the Libertarian, Natural Law, Reform, and American Constitution Parties. I counter-demonstrated, calling for fair and open debates to include all of these candidates of nationally organized political parties.

• April 12, 2008

  6:13 p.m.

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  GarySwing writes:

  In 2002, the same year that I suggested Ken Seaman run for the Green Party nomination for Congress, I also sought the Greens' nomination for Congress in a different district. I received 75% of the vote for the nomination, yet the Greens used a supermajority process to block my nomination. I then switched parties to get the Natural Law Party's nomination.

  In 2003, I testified before a Colorado Senate State Affairs Committee hearing that the Colorado Green Party's internal nomination process is authoritarian and anti-democratic. I was lobbying for legislation which was opposed by the Greens and other minor parties. It required minor parties to use democratic nominating procedures, created a minor party primary candidate petitioning process as an alternative to nominating conventions, and required minor parties to place nominees onto a primary ballot if two or more candidates received at least 30 percent of the vote at their nominating convention. Each candidate receiving at least 30 percent of the vote would qualify for the primary.

  To this day, the Colorado Green Party absolutely refuses to abide by legitimate democratic nominating procedures. The 2003 legislation regulating minor parties has been effectively nullified in the case of the Green Party by provisions of their bylaws that enable them to obstruct candidates from participating in their nomination convention. I firmly believe that the Green Party's adamant refusal to use legitimate democratic nominating procedures should result in the revocation of their ballot status as a recognized minor political party in Colorado.

  Sincerely,

  Gary Swing