Roseanne & Cindy for President 2012
Well-known actor and comedian, Roseanne Barr, won the nomination for President for the Peace and Freedom Party, on Saturday afternoon.
Two ballots were held at the Peace and Freedom Party’s Presidential Nominating Convention, in the United Methodist Church in Los Angeles. Barr won on the second ballot.
Earlier in the week, Ms Barr chose anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan as her running mate.
Throw The Bums Out
Before winning the vote, Barr said made it clear that she is very different to the mainstream democrats and republicans, wanting to displace politicians from both parties, who are essentially the same.
She said, “Cindy and I are the ‘Throw the Bums Out’ ticket and the ‘Ballot Access’ ticket. The American people are sick and tired of this ‘lesser evil’ garbage they get fed every election year. Both the Democrats and the Republicans do the same evils once they’re in office. I’m here to tell the voters: if you want to tell the government and the two domineering parties that you’re sick and tired of all their evil, register in the Peace and Freedom Party and vote for me and Cindy.”
Cindy Sheehan, Anti-War VP
Sheehan, the anti-war activist who had famously camped out of President Bush’s doorstep in Texas, after losing her son in the Iraq war. Specialist Casey Austin Sheehan, was killed in Iraq on 4th April, 2004. She has been an anti-war activist since then.
In the past few months, Sheehan has been part of a number of protests, including one at Beale Air Force Base, to try to stop the use of drones in Pakistan, which have killed many Pakistani civilians.
Sheehan said “I am excited about this chance to infuse the message of socialism with the heart and soul that is missing from political discourse and I am honored that Roseanne tagged me for this opportunity.”
Congress Drops The Boom On Small Parties
Roseanne Barr has a secondary purpose for running for president. In 2010, the Congress passed the “Top Two primary” legislation, that made it much harder for smaller parties to not only compete, but to stay on the ballot. As an example of what this means for small parties, after 2014, when the legislation takes effect, the Peace and Freedom Party will need around 40,000 more registered voters to maintain its ballot status.
As reported in our previous story, former Georgia Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney has been coaching Barr for this this campaign. McKinney commented, “Access to the ballot is a civil rights issue that needs attention across the country. If voters only have two choices, both of which represent the same interests, then we don’t really have a democracy. When I was in Congress, I promoted proportional representation. This is the only way to make our democracy representative of the people, rather than the corporate donors.”
Obviously, ballot access is now a very important issue for small parties. Cat Woods, a Peace & Freedom Party officer, echoed Barr on the party’s new emphasis on ballot access, Woods says the party wants to “draw attention to the ongoing erosion of alternative parties’ access to the ballot and how this directly deprives voters of control of their government. We need to reach a wider audience with its message of socialist solutions. Roseanne Barr and Cindy Sheehan can bring that.”
