State Convention Issues
By Dennis Roseman
Dennis sent this out to the Johnson County List-serv, but it's very important to understand this for the convention. I've also included a link to the IDP Platform discussion site. Also, Alta and I discussed figuring out how to organize a Progressive caucus. Let's look into this on Saturday.
Note that the rules make it very difficult to introduce changes/additions from the floor. The petitions need to be submitted by 9:00am on Saturday. (Which is an hour before alternates are officially seated.) There are several rules of the convention whose purpose seems to be to severely limit platform debate.
Each of you may have your own special interest in some particular issue, but let me just mention a few things that might be of general interest.
Note the “minority reports”. There are quite a few of these—a substantial number initiated by a single member of the Platform Committee. These are guaranteed to come up for vote on the floor.
There are two controversial topics that may come up, each of which was dealt with by the chair or co-chair in a controversial manner.
Both of these were originally put forth as platform planks but were forcefully changed to resolutions.
1) There was a resolution to the effect of asking candidates to support a large portion of the platform. That was removed by the Chair after it had been voted on and approved by the Committee.
2) My personal concern is the following item. At the end of the special resolutions has been put:
“Investigation of the Bush Administration. We call for an investigation into crimes that may have been committed by President George W. Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney, and their Administration”
Judging by how such resolutions have been opposed in other States (and noting the opp position of the Co-chair on this matter) I would guess that this might well be the focus of challenges—by ordinary debate or extra-ordinary parliamentary maneuvering.
If you support this be alert and ready to defend/support it.
BACKGROUND:
1) This item was (basically) in our County Platform as a plank, and in our District Platform as a resolution.
2) This resolution (in various wordings) has been approved by ten state Democratic party organizations: Vermont, New Hampshire, Maine, North Carolina, Wisconsin, Nevada, New Mexico, California, Colorado and Hawaii.
This similar resolutions are to be considered in Iowa, Minnesota and (even) Texas.
If you want a more complete list see: http://impeachpac.org/resolutions-list
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