Huff Post:Congratulations Chuck! You’ve Knocked Me Off the Democratic Primary Ballot: Open Letter to Senator Chuck Schumer from Randy Credico

By admin  

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/randy-credico/congratulations-chuck-you_b_686325.html

“He (Charles Schumer) is serving the parochial interest of a very small group of financial people, bankers, investment bankers, fund managers, private equity firms, rather than serving the general public . It has hurt the American investor first and the average American taxpayer.” John C. Bogle, the founder and former chairman of the Vanguard Group.

Dear Senator Schumer:

Congratulations! You’ve knocked me off the September 14 Democratic primary ballot. Fabulous news for you. Now you don’t have to answer my questions about your 36-year record as a “public” servant. Alas, it’s bad news for me. And bad news for NY Democrats. And it’s real bad news for the ideal of democracy.

I’m still a bit mystified by the manner in which I was kicked off. At the end I only had 13,350 out of the necessary 15,000 signatures. I thought I was well over the top when I turned those suckers in with your pals at the Board of Elections. However, I knew something weird was going on when I walked in and noticed half the people sitting in the lobby were waiting for me to drop off my share of the multi-candidate joint petition. The two others candidates on the petition had earlier submitted their “volumes” containing what I thought were 2/3rds of the 30,000 signatures we had agreed upon. Little did I know the two gentlemen who I was convinced were working with me were actually working against me. They turned in a wagonload of blank pages and then left Albany in brand new automobiles. The joke was on me as I was soon to discover. How I allowed those jack-offs to insinuate their sorry asses into my campaign is beyond my knowledge. But I hope they enjoy their new wheels. I am sure neither you, Senor Schumer, nor your campaign, had anything to do with this bizarre caper. No, not you guys! At any rate, by the time I had passed Kingston on my way back on the thruway your own lawyers and those wing-tip zombie ones over at the state party HQ had already filed objections with the BOE and with a kool-aid drunk hack judge in Nassau County. And, low and behold, your side prevailed. And I bet you boys got a big laugh all around. Ha ha ha!

Well, to be honest, your actions are quite understandable. After all, I wouldn’t want to go up against an oddball like me either. I’m not a typical loyal party hack who debates and campaigns within narrow, pre-set boundaries. You know that. That’s why you deployed the most skilled election lawyers and the state Democratic party legal machinery together to make sure I was given the bum’s rush. It is amazing the forces I was up against. How naïve I was. Do you realize you spent more on your successful legal effort to give me the boot than I’ve raised or spent in the 18 months I’ve been running for your seat? A seat, I might add, which was once occupied by the likes of the great orator, prison reformer and abolitionist William Seward (your complete opposite). You’ve defiled and dishonored that once hallowed seat, and that is one of the reasons I was inspired to make the run. Now just imagine us in a debate and me comparing you and Seward. My next letter to you will be about Seward’s record vs. your record.

Now that there will be no pre-primary debate, New York Democratic voters will continue to think you are–and have always been–acting in their best interest. They’ll continue to think you’re the true champion of the middle class. I know better. And you know I know better. And that’s why you’re terrified of a real debate.

The fact that you, Mr. Senator, would prefer at all costs to avoid a serious debate on your record is the main reason why you don’t care too much for primaries. Primaries may lead to a real debate. That is why they scare you. They are a potential threat to you and the big wall street/banking/corporate interests that you truly represent. You and your sponsors don’t want to take any chances; not even from some under-funded, unknown political novice like yours truly. Because, if I were on the primary ballot and the polls tightened up, you would be forced into a position of having to debate your sorry past with me, and you know I would be asking some real uncomfortable questions. The prospect probably makes your thin skin crawl.

Hey, I almost forgot! The issues. First of all, I’ve been meaning to ask you about your enthusiastic support of the war in Iraq. You know, the war responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Iraqi men, women and children. The war that has cost the lives of over 5000 American servicemen and women (not to mention the countless thousands seriously wounded). Does the loss of innocent lives bother you? Because it bothers most Americans. And it bothers a huge majority of Democrats in New York. And those democrats would have liked to hear you defend yourself for supporting this ugly war in a primary debate.

Oh, by the way, (I feel like Detective Columbo) give or take a few, how many funerals of New York’s service members have you attended? I ask this because I was shocked when you admitted in a TV interview in 2007 (with Don Imus) that you had yet to visit the scandal-plagued, squalid and rat infested Walter Reed Hospital in DC. I suppose your conscience just couldn’t stomach the ghastly specter of the horrific damage done to young men and women injured in this illegal war that you promoted and supported. Let me quote a few more excerpts from that same interview to stoke your memory:

Imus: Was your vote–originally to authorize the president to go to war in Iraq–in retrospect, was that a mistake on your part?

Schumer: I do always believe, you know, when the nation is attacked you try to give the chief executive some latitude, a little bit of the benefit of the doubt.

Imus: But we weren’t attacked by Iraq.

Schumer: No, we were not attacked by Iraq.

Imus: So, I’m asking you, do you think your vote was a mistake?

Schumer: Well, again, I would say that I do believe in a strong chief executive in foreign policy (blah blah blah) …

Indeed, we were not attacked by Iraq, Mr. Schumer. And Iraq did not have weapons of mass destruction. You knew that. But, for whatever unknown reason, you were always a fervent supporter of the unjust, unholy invasion and occupation of Iraq. You need to come clean and fess on that obsure reason. Inquiring NY voters, (particularly middle class Dems) would like to know!

You also support the endless, mindboggling and tragic boondoggle taking place in Afghanistan. Thousands of innocent Afghan and Pakistani women and children have died in our Mr. Magoo pursuit of a straw man villain for nearly 9 long bloody years. Does that not bother you? You are a Harvard graduate and, I have heard, a student of history. Hence, you must be aware of the past failures which have taken place in Afghanistan from Alexander the Great to the British on several occasions (in the first Anglo-Afghan war only 1 Brit out of 14,000 made it though the Khyber pass alive). We all know about the Soviets having their heads and asses handed to them. Explain your support for this brutal and deadly affair. By the way, have you been to any funerals of New York servicemen that have died in Afghanistan (give or take a few)?

The Iraq and Afghan wars of intrigue have sucked trillions of dollars from the U.S. treasury. This money should have been used to create peacetime jobs for millions of Americans sliding at mach speed out of the middle class (of which you are an expert) and into the unemployment class. Instead, it has been handed over to spiritually dead war profiteers whose amaments of death and destruction are listed with your buddies on Wall Street. I will get to the Wall Street stuff in a moment (I know you can’t wait for that!).

You seem to like war. You don’t mind sending U.S. troops to fight, kill and die overseas. When did you become so hawkish? It appears it was after you became a member of Congress in the early ’80s. I ask this because if you were pro-war prior to that period then you missed your opportunity to fight in Vietnam. You could have joined the service back then and you would have had a taste of what the men and women in uniform are going though in the killing fields of Iraq and Afghanistan.

But, you were anti-war at that time, just like most people your age were. In fact, you supported anti-war candidate Eugene McCarthy as a college student in 1968 (instead of anti-war NY Senator Bobby Kennedy). How did you avoid the draft during the Vietnam War? It is something you never seem to want to discuss. You also never talk about your transformation from dove to hawk as a congressman. I would have asked you these questions if we had the occasion to debate. Again, inquiring minds of NY Democrats would certainly like to know. They would love to know why, like Cheney, Rumsfeld, Newt Gingrich and Wolfowitz, and so many others who avoided military service, like to send young men and women to the battlefield and have no qualms about dropping bombs on wedding parties.

These wars have and continue to make our nation vulnerable to attacks. You cannot occupy and annex and destroy other lands without consequence. It is called blowback my friend. Lots of people are angry at the U.S. because of the policies you espouse, support and defend.

Moreover, you claim to be a strong supporter of Israel. I disagree. I believe your misguided rhetoric on Israeli foreign policy and non-stop meddling into U.S./Israeli relations are damaging to Israel’s future. You browbeat President Obama for his criticism of counterproductive new settlements in Palestinian territories. That emboldened the Likud government to take a hardline stance. You have said that “it makes sense to strangle Gaza economically,” which is tantamount to encouraging a war crime. Your words are encouraging Israel to blockade Gaza and to attract aid flotillas. All of this hurts Israel. It isolates them in a world in which we must all live together. No man is an island. Thus I believe that you, Mr. Schumer, are not a strong supporter of a strong Israel. To the contrary you are undermining their security. What irony. We could have had a serious debate about this very serious matter.

And what about torture? You not only like war but you are an apologist for torture. Torture is a war crime. A violation of the Geneva convention. You should speak out against torture instead of endorsing it like you did in this rambling speech you made at a Senate hearing (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p4CWk5LfoH0) in which you say “do what you have to do.” You then recommended and flacked for pro-torture Judge Mike Mukassy to be AG for George Bush after the Gonzalez debacle. You were successful. You got Bush a man to defend the administration on its medieval and barbaric practice of torture. Shame on you, Charlie. I wish you and I could debate the merits of this issue in front of NY Dems. I guess you don’t have to worry about that happening now. I won’t be on the primary ballot. Hence: CREDICO UNABLE TO TORTURE THE PRO-TORTURE SCHUMER OVER THE ISSUE OF TORTURE!

But I suppose you don’t think any of the points I mentioned above are on the radar of New York Democrats or the middle class in general. But what do I know. Well, I do know one thing for sure: I am so sick and tired of your obsessive observation of middle class mindset when you talk electoral politics. It is all you ever do. That New Yorker puff piece by Toobin drove me over the top. It nearly made me gag when not putting me to sleep.

I know that the middle class is where the votes are located. That is what your laughable Sunday press conferences are all about. A clarion call to registered middle class voters. But, as everyone knows, particularly in the Fourth Estate, these press conferences are in reality much ado about nothing. Glib red herring consumer protection proposals that are geared to bamboozle the coveted middle class into thinking that Uncle Charlie really give a rat’s ass about their lives.

Like the time you teamed up with Texas right wing fanatic John “cornball” Cornyn on a proposal that would eliminate prepaid cell phones and hence protect the nation from the bad guys. Hey Senator, poor people use prepaid cell phones because they don’t have credit cards. Battered women use prepaid cell phones so they can avoid their stalkers. I suppose this cheap gimmick that the wackado senator and you put on the table was yet another specious attempt to convince middle class voters that ol’ Chuckie is protecting them from drug dealers and terrorists.

Then there was the press conference in which you teamed up with that other southern lunatic Lindsey Graham on a national identity card. That is all we need: more government intrusion into our lives. Civil rights lawyers were repulsed by this repressive proposal. I guess you took a poll with middle class voters and they wanted something done with those nasty immigrants taking their jobs. Or as my friend Jimmy Tingle would say, “the ones doing our job.” If you had a heart and any balls you would be proposing a general amnesty and cut the funding for these storm troopers from the ICE squads. It is bad enough that you enthusiastically support building the wall of intolerance on the Arizona Mexican border, but to propose this national ID card is really over the top. I guess somewhere in your calculus you discovered a majority of middle class voters support the ID card. It will keep Mexicans out of their neighborhood. You suck Chuck and I want a debate. NOW.

This national ID card would basically augment the powers not given to the anti-patriotic and Orwellian worded Patriot Act which is the most intrusive and repressive piece of legislation since the Alien and Sedition acts of 1793. I and most civil libertarians were outraged when you voted for the patriot act in 2001 after 9-11. We figured that you were smart enough to know that it was nothing but a trojan horse to expand the government’s control over its population and to curb and scare off dissent. Well maybe those are the reasons why you supported the Patriot Act (which is anything but patriotic). I was hoping that you would help get rid of the patriot act when Obama was elected. Not only did you not get rid of them you were the one that pushed for and made many of the provisions permanent. How dare you.

Your favorite Sunday comedy show of late has been using those pressers to gain favor with air travelers: Getting the geese out of the airspace at JFK and LGA, award travel blackout dates, and, the one where you huff and puff and chide the struggling airline industry for charging a small fee for checked baggage. I guess your focus group study indicated that middle class air travelers generally fly coach. Surely saving them 25 bucks a flight should get you their vote. I guess these studies also conclude that frequent flyers don’t concern themselves with war, torture, starving Gaza or Wall Street shenanigans and other substantive issues as long as they can take an extra piece of Samsonite luggage on their trip, gratis.

Speaking of the middle class, cell phones and the airlines, I was quite appalled by the way you flipped out and mistreated a hardworking, underpaid and struggling middle class flight attendant on that US Air shuttle from DC to NY. That was no way to treat a lady. All she wanted you to do is turn off your cell phone so the flight could take off. As much as you fly (and I am sure it ain’t coach) you should know better. It is an FAA regulation you were violating. Now I know you were in the middle of an important conversation on how to water down the impending health care legislation to help out big pharma and the insurance industry, but if everyone else has to turn their cell phones off why shouldn’t you? But all of those years living off the public trough has given you the sense of entitlement. Maybe so, but you don’t have to call the woman a bitch for doing her job. I will tell you that no woman rich, poor or middle class likes to be called a bitch in public or private. That kind of attitude gives all of us New Yorkers a bad name. Who do you think you are, Jack Nicholson from Five Easy Pieces? I wish you and I could debate the issue of, “Is it right for a “public” servant to call a middle class woman a bitch while working on or off the job?” You got me off the primary ballot so I guess the answer is no.

I know one place where it is hard to find any middle class voters and that would be in poor communities of color. I guess that is why in the twelve years I was organizing families of prisoners against the Rockefeller Drug Laws we never crossed paths. I understand. Why would Senator Schumer want to go into hood for heaven’s sake? Not enough middle class folks in those wretched corridors and therefore not a place to grandstand and gladhand for votes. Takes up too much time and energy.

Speaking of the Rockefeller Drug Laws, I never heard you once speak out against these racist, Draconian criminal statutes. In fact you are a major supporter of mandatory minimum sentences for non-violent drug offenders. You wouldn’t even put your name on the recent crack vs. cocaine legislation that made the federal drug sentencing code a little more race neutral. Even Hatch and Sessions put their name on the bill. Of course, it comes as no surprise to me.

You are a hawkish supporter of the racist war on drugs in spite of its blatant failure both home and abroad. The war on drugs is nothing but a war on people of color. Not that you care. I hate to be blunt but I think you are nothing less than a rank drug war hustling politico. If you and I were to debate I would tell the audience just that. I have spent the past 12 years witnessing first hand just how the criminal justice system has torn asunder the hearts and souls of so many families of low level drug offenders. Most people in New York are much more informed and enlightened than you on this topic. I wanted to reach out to those New Yorkers in a debate so you could explain why you are so insensitive when it comes to the destruction of tens of thousands of black and Latino families.

You’ve always had a sorrowful record on issues of race and criminal justice. Real, real bad. I have been doing research. You boast about being the congressman that worked with that Neanderthal McCullum guy of Florida to bring back the death penalty and make it impossible for those on death row to introduce exculpatory evidence in a Federal Court by limiting habeas corpus. The death penalty is cruel and unusual and it is the ultimate manifestation of racism. Ask Barry Scheck and the folks at the Innocence Project. They will tell you the exact percentage of those they rescued from the gallows.

I understand. At the time, you saw the support of the death penalty as a good career opportunity and you seized upon it with great aplomb. Indeed, the image of Charles E. Schumer being tough on crime helped catapult you from the house of reps to the senate. You knew if being pro death penalty could help a slimy pol like George Pataki whip Mario Cuomo, it certainly couldn’t hurt your profile. And why give a damn about the consequences. Why let some poor innocent black man have a chance to save his own life when you are trying to save and advance your own sorry life. You did it. Congrats. And now, you deserve high-fives from your pro death penalty brethren in Iran, China, Egypt, Iraq, Malaysia, Thailand and similar nations.

For your information I thought you should know that most New Yorkers are now against the death penalty, as they are against the drug laws. I guess you won’t have to debate and defend yourself on those positions. DAMN!

Let’s stay on the issue of crime and punishment in America. I noticed you, Mr. Schumer, never ever talk about our prisons unless it is how to expand them (like you did in that photo-op in Otisville). I know you don’t care about the people inside those prisons even though there are so many of them. You only care about the people who live outside the prisons whose livelihood depends on the prison being in their community. That is so cynical. Well, not for you. People who depend on the prisons are middle class and vote! Yessiree! They vote. Can’t vote inside those walls (unless you are a guard). So you never for conversation’s sake throw around the topic of the ever burgeoning, deeply disturbing prison population here in America. Did you know there are roughly the same amount of people in prison in the good ‘ol USA as there were slaves in the South on the eve of the Civil War? What am I driving at? Two things: You don’t care about people in prison because they can’t vote. Secondly, there is no doubt that you, like most NY democrats at the time, would not want to rock the boat with the South over the itty bitty “get over it” issue of slavery (after all, they, too, can’t vote)!

The people that you get appointed to judgeships and as U.S. Attorneys are no better than you are. Cookie cutouts I would say. You have packed the federal court buildings here in New York with mostly bad men and women. And I will tell you another thing: You have a lot of people fooled into thinking that you were the firewall on the Senate Judiciary Committee against reactionary judges nominated by Bush. Well if that is true, please explain it (since we ain’t debating) to the millions of middle class women voters why you voted to confirm hardcore anti-choice Justices like Thomas Griffith, Deborah Cook and Diane Sykes when your fellow Senate Democrats just said NO? I will give you some time to think about it while I ask you another one: Why didn’t you fillibuster Sam Alito like you said you should have? Should have, would have, could have Chuck!

Speaking of Federal Courthouse, I was deeply offended by the slight you gave former Gov. Hugh Carey a few years back. Jim Dwyer wrote about it quite poetically in the New York Times. Carey was a good man with a good heart as far as governors go. He reminded me of William Seward (who spent two terms as the Gov before he grabbed your seat). Like Seward, Carey handed out a lot of clemencies for people in prison. He made the first changes to the Rockefeller Laws. Maybe it was those characteristics that made you decide to pull the plug on the Brooklyn Federal Plaza being named after him and instead had it named in honor of Teddy Roosevelt. The truth is that you were mad at Carey for supporting Obama over Hillary. As Dwyer points out you threw a child’s tantrum and got even with the 85-year-old former Governor. Very sweet of you, Chuck. You said you secured the change not because you were angry for Carey “chucking” you but because it made more sense to name it after Teddy Roosevelt because basically there aren’t monuments or buildings named after him in NY. He was short changed. If you weren’t so square, I would ask you what the hell are you smoking! As Dwyer points out there are millions of buildings, schools and parks named after Teddy. Nice try! Your vindictive and people should know. All your colleagues do, especially the octogenarian ex gov.

When it comes to politics you do play hardball. I knew that going into this thing you were going to do whatever was necessary to trip me up. They say you are a political animal and I believe them when they say that whoever they are. I recently read an old expose by Wayne Barrett and then later in New York magazine about some illegal campaign activity you were engaged in when you were in the NY Assembly running for congress. It was something I wanted to bring up in our not to be debate. To make a long corruption story short, it basically claims that you used your assembly committee staff of 15 (one said no) to work on your congressional campaign and that you paid them with vouchers to the state. We taxpayers, including the middle class, were paying the salaries of those people who were working on your campaign. By God that is a felony! The U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District (in the now Teddy Roosevelt Federal Plaza no less) and the grand jury recommended an indictment. You had big connections with people who had big plans for you and those connections went to the number three man in the Justice Department, Rudy Giuliani, and Rudy took care of it and it went away. Imagine if you had gone to jail. I suppose if you did you wouldn’t talk to yourself because you don’t talk to or about prisoners in America.

I suppose that Rudy Giuliani’s timely intervention in Assemblygate is the main reason you refused to criticize him during his eight-year reign of terror on the poor, the homeless, the disenfranchised and especially anyone of color. The other major reason not is that your wife worked as one of his commissioners). I was wondering why you never utter a damn word of scorn when Rudy’s police sodomized Abner Louima or gunned down unarmed men like Patrick Dorismond and Amadu Diallo. My campaign literature brings up your shameful sounds of silence in the face of these horrific civil rights abuses. I gave you a copy at the Broadway Democratic Party fundraiser. You weren’t happy. Truth hurts. No chance you wanted to engage in a debate about hideous period of your bleak political history. I don’t blame you. For you, you did the right thing in getting me the boot!

There was another occasion where it looked like you could have gone to the hoosecow. That was when you were the chairman of the Democratic Senate Campaign Committee (that is a big name and a big job). Once again it involved your staffers. I am sure you remember this but it isn’t something you want to talk about, particularly in front of a TV camera with me at the other podium. Those staffer who actually worked for you as well as the DSCC posed as then Maryland Lt. Governor and Republican Senate candidate Michael Steele and filched his social security number and used it to get the man’s credit report. Federal Investigators charged your two aides with a felony. They, of course, shielded you from any culpability. Nixon called it plausible deniability. You know, “what did you know and when did you know it?” One of the staffers pled out to a misdemeanor and did some community service and it all went away just like Assemblygate. Steele lost and your guy won and you stayed out of the big house once again. Imagine you, Sen. Schumer, going to jail for the identity theft of a black man and then spending time in jail with a bunch of black kids doing life sentences for minor drug offenses. How bizarre would that be. I think it would be a good education just like it was for judge Sol Wachler. He came out and realized half the people in prison didn’t belong there and the system was indeed racist. Gee, I would love to talk to you about it. You sure you don’t want to help me get back on the ballot?

You know Sir, it never ceases to amaze me how many politicians, like you, who claim to be tough on crime are of that mindset of “do what I say and not what I do.” I guess it is an appeal to a scared middle class. They vote. Got to make them feel safe, right kiddo? But there was a time when you were not so tough on crime. A time when you showed some sympathy and compassion for perpetrators of a senseless killing. I know of at least one occasion. Just one occasion. Lets not get crazy here. Waco. Yes, Waco. Waco! Waco! Waco! Remember Waco? I saw the congressional hearings on Waco. I saw the documentary. You didn’t come off so well the way you questioned the witnesses to the massacre. You were arrogant. You were cold. You were disrespectful. You were nasty. You were glib. Hell, you were … Chuck Schumer. You were totally in the pocket of Attorney General Reno and Federal Law Enforcement. You were as fair and balanced as that Senator from Nevada in Godfather II questioning Michael Corleone. And to suggest that it was justifiable to throw hand grenades and send in tanks and kill people, including women and children, because of alleged child abuse, does set a potentially very dangerous example. After all, there have been lots of cases of sexual abuse in a lot of churches lately. Why haven’t you urged Obama and Holder to invade those churches and save the children? We need to talk about that but I don’t think it is possible because I am off the ballot.

Obama has been a disappointment in general since his inauguration. He has moved to the center. Or maybe the center right. I am really disappointed over his unwillingness to discuss race and deal with the out-of-control prison population, which is also about race. I call it the Schumerization of Barak Obama. I suppose that you have convinced him talking about the prison industrial complex could only spell trouble for Democrats in the midterm elections. I suppose in all elections. It is about the middle class, right Mr. Schumer? And we all know there are no votes in those thousands of prisons stretched out from coast the way industrial and manufacturing plants once stood. Those dank, dangerous razor-wired fortresses that now warehouse upward to three million poor Americans. Why would any ambitious politician want to campaign on remedy this national disease? Who gives a shit about these invisible numbers even if the poor wretches are flesh and blood Americans? No time to be show compassion or concern for your fellow US citizens if they aren’t able to vote, right Chuck? Forget the imprisoned and forget the poor.

Someday this strategy is going to backfire. Because, remember Mr. Schumer, the middle class is getting smaller and smaller each day. You better start thinking about the poor. Lots of middle class people are headed in that direction. People are losing their jobs and homes. Many of them are not aware that you were a participant in the process of the economic meltdown that conferred so much pain and suffering on the middle class. You know that I know that. You have done your research. You knew that I was going to bring up your brokering of the deal that led to the repeal of the Glass-Steagel Act in 1999. Senator Phil Gramm was real pleased with your work on that one, he said so. You don’t want those middle class voters in New York (particularly Dems) to have to hear all that honest gobbledgook from me, now do you? Incidentally, those middle class voters could have had the same deal brokered by Senator D’Amato. We didn’t need you!

And then the bailouts. After the crises hundreds of thousands of Americans lost their homes. Millions defaulted on their credit cards. Rather than using your influence to bail out those folks, you put your entire weight behind bailing out the money cartels on Wall Street. Wall Street took the money and ran up the profits and then ran for the hills with their cash. People were angry. They wanted reform. Politicians responded to their demand. And you Senator Schumer, you gave the cartels a wink and a nod and bloviated in public about reform. You blasted them with a bunch of empty rhetoric and they pretended that they were indignant with you and you let them pretend. And then you got your greasy hands on the proposal and made sure that it was as watered down as humanly possible. It was another one of your deft sleight of hand tricks. Like the one you pulled with health care reform. But it worked. The middle class thinks you did them two big favors. That’s what they think. In the meantime, like big pharma and the HMO concerns, your puppeteers on Wall Street don’t think–they know you did them a big favor. Getting me off the Democratic ballot you gave yourself and those fat cats all a big favor. Thanks, Chuck

Well, I think I have ranted long enough for the time being. And by the way, even though I am not on the Democratic primary ballot, I will be on the ballot for the general election on one or two different lines. I am sure you will try to knock me off. Well, we learned our lesson going for the democratic nomination. This time we got signatures coming out of our asses. So I was down but not out. It is not over ’til the …

Best

Randy Credico

Filed in: Campaign News

Politics on the Hudson:Credico wants to ‘chuck’ Schumer

By admin  

June  9, 2010

Comedian and political activist Randy Credico was in Albany today dressed as a dead Greek philosopher trying to drum up petition signatures.

Credico, 55, is launching a primary campaign against U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y. He’s realistic about his chances against Schumer, but the Manhattan resident wants voters to take notice that the senior senator isn’t liberal enough for New York.

“He’s supported two wars,” said Credico, who talks in long paragraphs, punctuated with occasional impressions of political figures. “How can you support him as a Democrat?”

His campaign slogan: “Let’s chuck Schumer.”

He is also in favor of relaxing drug laws in the state, which he believes are too onerous on small-time offenders.

Credico needs at least 15,000 signatures from registered Democrats to gain a spot on the September primary ballot. Credico has been appearing at various political functions around the state. He was spotted at the state Democratic convention in Rye Brook wearing a Nixon mask. During the leadership coup in the state Senate last year, Credico stood outside the chamber dressed as the Greek philosopher Diogenes.

“He was looking for the last honest man,” Credico said of Diogenes.

With that, he again donned his Diogenes costume—which consisted of a rubber mask, a white whig and long white robe—on stood on the sidewalk outside the state Capitol Building in Albany to seek signatures.

“Let’s send a message to Chuck Schumer that he’s not in the British House of Lords,” Credcio-as-Diogenes said.

A passerby responded, “But I like Chuck Schumer.”

Filed in: Campaign News

We Can’t Do This Without Your Help

By admin  

Like many of you, we are dispirited by the ever-rightward lurch of the once promising Obama administration. As a result we view electoral politics more skeptically and wearily than ever. Nevertheless, we are challenging Charles Schumer for his United States Senate seat from New York for the very best of reasons.

Filed in: Campaign News, Comedy, Press Releases, Uncategorized

Randy Credico vs Chuck Schumer and the Drug Laws (Part 2)

By admin  

Randy Credico vs Chuck Schumer and the Drug Laws (Part 2)

Politics, US — By Kathleen Wells on May 6, 2010 at 12:14 pm

Randy Credico is a former comedian turned political activist/drug law reformer who has worked as Director for the William Moses Knustler Fund for Racial Justice the past 12 years.

Now, he’d like to take on and challenge Senator Chuck Schumer for his seat in the Senate.

Part 1 of my interview with Randy can be seen here:

Kathleen Wells: I can hear the critics, and they would say that drug use causes a lot of crime in society, a lot of violence in society.

Randy Credico: Well, it does. The illegality of it is what creates the crime. If there was no money to be made off the drug trade, if, in fact, it was legal, those Mexican cartels wouldn’t be able to accumulate the kind of money, hence the power to corrupt the legislature and the police force and commit heinous crimes. That’s only because they’ve got the money resulting from the prohibition here.

That’s one of the reasons. Another one is we don’t have the resources to be prosecuting people for these crimes. Correctional Corporation, which maintains and builds and services prisons — their stock has gone up over 140% in a year and three-month period of time [the time that Obama has been in office]. You’ve got three million people in prison. It’s outrageous.

Kathleen Wells: Okay, so let’s go to the federal level. We talked about the state level, where we have the Rockefeller drug laws. But on the federal level, under the current federal law, a first-time simple possession of five grams of crack cocaine requires the same five-year mandatory minimum prison sentence as a person in possession of 500 grams of powder cocaine. In other words, a person would need to have 100 times more powder cocaine than crack cocaine to be penalized the same.

This was signed into law in 1986 by then President Reagan.  It was the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986. And the act established mandatory sentencing minimums including five-to-ten year minimums for distribution of illegal drugs and/or importation.

What we have today, moving it on up, is that black folks comprise 25% of crack cocaine users, but yet they account for 82% of all people in prison populations convicted of crack-cocaine offenses. So talk to me about how this federal law has jurisdiction over many of the folks convicted for crack-cocaine offenses. In other words, how does it trickle down to the states, this federal law?

Randy Credico: If [the feds] go into a project [with] a bunch of federal agents – say there are 40 kids working together with a gram of cocaine a week or whatever or crack — they get all 40 at one time, a big sweep and they netted very little cocaine, but they just added 40 people into the criminal justice system. And that’s how they work.

The state can get you too on that. The State can get you up to nine years for selling a dime bag of crack [At the] federal level, you’ve got that five-year minimum. And so they usually pick and choose who’s gonna take jurisdiction when they’re collaborating on a case.

This woman I know got 15 years-to-life for having four ounces of cocaine at J. F. Kennedy Airport in 1989. She was a mule, and [at] the state [level] you get 15-to-life. [With] the feds it was barely a crime — less than five years. So the state took it over, and they put this mother of five in prison – Melita Oliviera – for 15 years and destroyed all six of her kids’ lives.

Kathleen Wells: What was her name again?

Randy Credico: Melita Oliviera. Peruvian. Just coming back and somebody gave her stuff to carry, and she even showed it to the customs guys, and her life was a nightmare. They offered her three years in prison, [but] when she went to be sentenced, [thinking she’d] come back to finish cooking, the next thing you know she’s in a maximum security prison, with murderers, for 15 years. She got out on clemency. It was a case that we worked on, and she got out in 2001.

Kathleen Wells: So why is there that disparity between crack-cocaine and powder cocaine?

Randy Credico: Because of racism. Remember, when the Rockefeller drug laws went into effect in ‘73, [they were] also for marijuana. But Wall Street guys, rich people — their kids were smoking pot, and they had to change that immediately. So pot was not put on the same level. Possession of a small amount of pot is not a crime in New York. Smoking a joint in public is a $100 fine, but you get arrested if you’re black and you smoke pot in New York. It happens a lot. And they shake people down — 570,000 unprovoked stops and frisks without probable cause by the police in New York. That’s the ones that were recorded.

I hate using the word “ethnic cleansing,” but it has that smell to it. And a lot of people feel that we are in a police state on every level with the drug laws, with the Patriot Act, Homeland Security, FBI, IRS –there are so many levels of law enforcement in the United States that ICE — the racist ICE Units, it’s a policy that we have. Schumer hasn’t been good on that as well.

On a federal level, Schumer, the death penalty, which is racist, we know it’s racist. We’ve got a Supreme Court that upholds racist laws just like it did under Roger Taney in the Dred Scott decision that 8-to-1 decision.

Kathleen Wells: Now today, as you mentioned before, that disparity, that sentencing disparity was 100- to-1. But today Senator Durbin has drafted or sponsored legislation which would reduce it to 18-to-1. Now, initially he tried to get 1-to-1. He tried to eliminate the disparity in its entirety, make it equal, 1-to- 1. However, Chuck Schumer voted against that decision to make it equal, on par. 1-to-1. Talk to me about this fact that Schumer voted against that. [The Bill modifying the ratio from 100:1 to 18:1 has passed the Senate and is now in the House.]

Randy Credico: Well, Schumer won’t even sign on as a sponsor of this bill, 18-to-1.  He’ll vote for it. It’s gonna go through ‘cause it’s part of a spending bill. But he’s a really bad drug-war hustler. He had a press conference yesterday to get more money to stop the importation of drugs from Canada. It’s such a waste of time to get more money for law enforcement up there to track down people. It’s really like taking a shotgun and then trying to kill all the flies in a room. It’s a Popeye episode.

So Schumer is not good on race issues. He’s bad on the death penalty, he’s a law-and-order guy, and he’s got no blacks or Latinos in his office in New York or Washington. He doesn’t care. You know what I mean? He’s tied into the law enforcement guys. He gets money from Wall Street. He’s into the prison- industrial complex. Well, it’s blacks going to jail, you know. That’s really a code word for “Let’s put the blacks in prison.” Being tough on drugs — that’s what it is – a code word.

Kathleen Wells: And so you want to play this game? You want to be a part of this system?

Randy Credico: No, listen. Here’s what I want to do. I want to test it. I want to put a mirror in its face.  If I win, I’m certainly not going to be a Schumer. I’m going to be true to my principles. I don’t have a machine behind me. Barack Obama had a machine behind him.

Kathleen Wells: But you’ll be one person in D. C.

Randy Credico: Well, maybe it will encourage other people to run. Now, do you know what happened in Massachusetts in 1855? Did you ever hear of the Hiss Legislature?

Kathleen Wells: No.

Randy Credico: In the wake of the Kansas/Nebraska Act, in the wake of all of the rendition trials there for fugitive slaves and the uprising particularly of one Anthony Burns in 1854, a man was rendition back to Virginia, and the entire state became so radical that the Abolitionists Movement voted in the following year the most radical, progressive state legislature in every office:  the Governors office, the two Senate seats, Charles Sumner — all became part of this radical movement there. They instituted child labor laws; they integrated the school system. This is in Massachusetts, which has gone backward since then in many respects. They had personal liberty laws because back in Massachusetts at that time the senator who defeated the slave laws was Daniel Webster. All these old, lying hack politicians that were in Washington gave way to a new progressive. One guy wins, everyone else runs, and you have a progressive. It was a four-year experiment here, a five year experiment there, [which included] women’s property rights. It was all amateurs. And so that is possible; something like that is possible. If I run and do well, it may encourage other people to run. I have encouraged other people to run on every level and buck the Democratic hack system that we have in the State of New York.

Kathleen Wells: So your position is that the war on drugs has been a complete and utter failure?

Randy Credico: Look, we have to take a lot of the blame for the violence in Mexico, because [of] the prohibition here, just like Prohibition when it was repealed by Roosevelt. What happened? Violence went down in Chicago and across the country. If you’ve got something people want — something like alcohol, something like cocaine, something like marijuana — if you make it illegal, then someone’s going to sell that. If you made cigarettes illegal, imagine the black-market in cigarettes and the violence that would ensue on the turf of the distribution of cigarettes.

Kathleen Wells: And earlier you mentioned something about these ICE Units. Do you want to elaborate on that?

Randy Credico: The ICE Units round up poor people that are here working.  We’ve got to just give amnesty. Everyone that’s here, have amnesty. They’re not taking our jobs; they’re doing our jobs. These are jobs that nobody wants, and they do the jobs here. They’re not committing crimes; it’s all garbage. You got prisons that are being built right now, capital construction on more prisons for people that get arrested. Like that complete lunatic in Arizona, Joe Arapio, who’s, as far as I’m convinced, as racist as they get and a sick man. I think he’s a demented individual — and racist. And maybe that’s the justification — that you’re rounding up a bunch of immigrants here, especially in Arizona with the land that used to belong to Mexico.  It was grabbed away from them. So was California.

There are people complaining about the immigrants [but the land] was stolen from them.  When Davy Crockett and all these guys went to Texas, they were fighting to expand slavery. That’s what that was all about. I know the history of Mexico. Bustamante had said, “No more slaves,” and abolished slavery when they got their independence from Spain. When Texas went from being a Republic to a Union state, that would have made them a slave state. And that caused a lot of problems. Mexico didn’t like that.

These ICE Units are aggressive. The ICE Units are bad.

Kathleen Wells: Some would say you have a very radical position. And some would say you have a liberal position. What do you think your chances are of getting on the ballot to…

Randy Credico: I know there’s a big difference between liberal and radical.

Kathleen Wells: There is a big difference. How would you…

Randy Credico: Chuck Schumer is considered a liberal. People say the liberal Senator of New York is Chuck Schumer.

Kathleen Wells: So how would you characterize yourself? As progressive?

Randy Credico: I would say I’m more of a utilitarian. And I’m into really progressive ideas. And Libertarian in some ways, I suppose. You know I’m going to get the Libertarian nomination, I think, tomorrow up in Albany. I agree with them on a great many of the subjects, issues they are concerned about. And I don’t know how I would define myself. Take a look at the positions: anti-death penalty, anti-war. I think I’m smart, and I’m humanistic.

Kathleen Wells: So, are you going to get on the Libertarian ballot? You’re going to run as a Libertarian?

Randy Credico: My foremost aim right now is to be on the Democratic ticket — I mean, on the ballot for the primary, a one-on-one with Chuck Schumer, and let the public have the opportunity to decide. And the Democratic Party, if they want to go with the old wine or the new wine, okay? Or the old whiner or the new whiner?

So they need something new. They needed an opportunity to express themselves. And then in the fall, [if] I don’t win the Democratic nomination, [but] I’m on the Libertarian line, you’ll see I get a great amount of votes in November. And then [Schumer is] going to have to worry about the Republican opponent.

Kathleen Wells: Okay. Well, you know what? I wish you a lot of luck and I really appreciate you taking the time to speak with me.

Randy Credico: Okay, Kathleen.

Kathleen Wells: Okay, bye-bye.

Kathleen is on Facebook

Written by: Kathleen Wells on May 6, 2010.

Filed in: Campaign News

Randy Credico vs. Chuck Schumer and the Drug Laws (Part 1)

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Kathleen Wells is on Facebook.

 

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kathleen-wells/randy-credico-to-challeng_b_564039.html

by Kathleen Wells    5/5/10/

Randy Credico is a former comedian turned political activist/drug law reformer who has worked as Director for the William Moses Knustler Fund for Racial Justice the past 12 years.

Now, he’d like to take on and challenge Senator Chuck Schumer for his seat in the Senate.

Kathleen Wells: Randy, talk to me about the challenge you are mounting for the Senate seat of Senator Chuck Schumer?

Randy Credico: I’m running to get on the ballot against Chuck Schumer – on the Democratic ballot line for the primary in September. I am also seeking the endorsement of other parties, lest the Democratic Party pulls some tricks and tries to keep me off the ballot. I’ll probably have to go through the signature route. If I don’t make it that way, if I get challenged by Schumer, which I believe I will, then I will end up with the Green Party.

Kathleen Wells: So essentially you’re saying you have got to collect signatures and it may not…

Randy Credico: I have to collect 15,000 signatures, which is not really a tall order and would include half the congressional districts in the state — 200 signatures from 200 registered Democrats in 15 congressional races. And we’ve got 14 of those congressional districts that kind of border or [are] inside of New York City. So, it’s not that difficult.

Kathleen Wells: It’s not that difficult, but what is the likelihood of it happening?

Randy Credico: Well, it depends on how well I’m able to organize this group of supporters and volunteers that are joining my struggle to beat Chuck Schumer. He is basically a Blue Dog Democrat in the State of New York. And there are a lot of progressive Democrats, particularly in the primary, the activist Democrats who are not happy with Chuck Schumer. He has never faced a real test since he ran against D’Amato in 1998 and beat him.

Kathleen Wells: You’re a self-professed political satirist/impressionist and social activist. Tell me, what is your motivation to run for political office and specifically to run against Senator Chuck Schumer?

Randy Credico: Well, for many years I did political humor, I did impressions. I worked in Vegas back in the late 70s, mid 80s. Then I worked comedy clubs. I was on the Tonight Show in 1984 with Johnny Carson. And I was on the Charlie Rose show as a political satirist back in 1992, and I’ve done a couple of albums.

And in the last 12 years, I have done comedy sporadically, but also I ran an organization called the William Moses Kunstler Fund for Racial Justice. That was my primary occupation, and I worked within the criminal justice system in the state of New York, in particular [with] the Rockefeller drug laws. I also worked on a project in Tulia, Texas. Our organization spearheaded the movement to help release 46 mostly African-Americans in Tulia, Texas, who were hand guided into the prison system in Texas based on very racist drug operations, and we were able to get a victory down there. It was a lot of work. [We] spent three and a half years [and] a couple hundred thousand dollars that we raised making the video by Sara and Emily Knustler, the [younger] daughters of Bill Knustler, and getting a lot of media attention. [We] organiz[ed] “Mothers of the Tulia Disappeared,” which was the offspring of the “Mothers of New York Disappeared,” an offspring of the William Moses Knustler Fund for Racial Justice.

So I did that and then we got some changes in the laws in New York in 2004, 2005, and 2009 — not significant changes, moderate changes. It did lead to the release of a lot of people. The other day Anthony Williams got out [after spending] nineteen years for two dime bags. Of course, he’s black, and he was tried up in Albany County, beaten up by the police there. He just got out two or three days ago. I was not there for his release, [but I] wrote a piece for the Huffington Post about him.

The criminal justice system in the United States is a repressive, racist from-top to-bottom enterprise with 3 million people in prison in the United States. There are 70,000 [in prison] in New York, now down to about 61 or 62,000 — mostly black and Latinos. They keep saying the criminal justice is the best system in the world. I think it’s one of the worst systems in the world, because we’ve got so many people in prison — three times as many as China, and they’ve got four times or five times our population. We’ve got double or triple what Russia has [in prison].

Why am I running? I am at my wit’s end. You go to the courthouse, you watch a white judge, a white prosecutor, a mostly white jury giving heavy sentences to black women, black men, Latino men, Latino women — all poor. Their families are there, the mothers watching their kids being snagged away and taken up to Attica for, manufactured crimes. It’s so profound.

I figured Chuck Schumer would be the perfect person to run against to highlight the things that really do bother me. Chuck Schumer is owned by the banks, by Wall Street. I call him Dr. Bankenstein. He is owned by them. He’s responsible for, in 1999, [during] his first couple months in office, the repeal of the protective legislation, The Glass-Steagall Act, that prohibited commercial banks from making these wild investments. He did that at the behest of his owners, and then when they collapsed, he bailed them out.

So, I’m dealing with a very, very powerful figure. I’m really testing the limits of our democracy by running against him, particularly in a financial state like New York, and I think it’s imperative that somebody runs against him.

Kathleen Wells: Is your motivation the fact that you have worked as the director for the Kunstler Fund for Racial Justice for 12 years? Is that your motivation, the criminal justice system? Or is your motivation the fact that Chuck Schumer is just all-powerful, omnipotent in New York?

Randy Credico: Well, it’s twofold. The criminal justice system has driven me to the brink where I don’t know what to do at this point. Schumer was on the House Judiciary Committee, and he helped put together mandatory minimum sentences, [and] and he denied restoring an extra appeal for people on death row in the Omnibus Crime Bill. You have to take a look at his record. And that’s a really racist position as far as I am concerned. Yes, it is about race.

Race in America is my number one thing. Bill Kunstler was my idol. He was a John Brown with a law degree. [When] I look at the criminal justice system right now [or] at the drug war, I look at them the same way I look at the Fugitive Slave Law. We have slave catchers coming in from Long Island into New York City as cops, and shanghaiing African-Americans into the criminal justice system, into the prison system.

Kathleen Wells: Let’s go back a bit. You said that the criminal justice system is racist. What I want to ask you is how do you define racism? And give me an example of seeing that racism played out.

Randy Credico: Well, I’ll just give you an example. Here in New York City, for example, only three or four percent of the people that go to jail for a drug crime are white, and 96, 97 percent are black and Latinos, and they’re all poor. So the juries are mostly white, the prosecutors are almost exclusively white, the judges are white — as white as can be — so you got this triangulation there. And the police are mostly white, from rural areas like in Long Island.

You have hapless victims that usually plea out. If they don’t plea out, they get a long prison sentence, and then they’re completely screwed for the rest of their life. Once they plea out to a felony, they’re under state control [much as] you had [under] slavery. After slavery, you had convict leasing, which has been described as worse than slavery, if you read Oshinsky’s book on it or the book by the Wall Street Journal reporter that’s called Slavery by Another Name. You had that up until 1941.

Franklin Roosevelt wouldn’t pass or try to pass an anti-lynching law because the people that were being killed were black. Take a look at the figures here. You hear cops talking to kids on the street; they use the N-word. They’re only targeting blacks and Latinos and young kids; it fills up this real monster of an enterprise. They keep this dirty engine going with black and brown flesh.

Kathleen Wells: Okay, but you know, I asked you to define racism. You’re a white man, and I’m…

Randy Credico: Racism? I’ve got my own level of prejudice. Everyone has a level of prejudice.

Kathleen Wells: But prejudice and racism…

Randy Credico: There’s prejudice and then there is racism. It’s this… I guess you would say it’s a hatred of another race.

Kathleen Wells: Right. But is this racism economic-motivated, psychological, sociological, biological? What is the impetus for the racism?

Randy Credico: Racism is in the fabric of the cloth of the nation. It goes [back to] the middle passage, to slavery, to convict leasing [to] Jim Crow. Jim Crow and convict leasing were simultaneous. Horrible period of time, just horrible! And now, it hasn’t changed. This country is so racist, and you have the drug laws that were initiated by Nixon and then Rockefeller and then Reagan.

These are planned schemes; they’re almost like what were called the Carlsbad Decrees, but only on African-Americans. They’ve got TV shows on it. You’ve got Cops, where this voyeur nation is seeing blacks and Latinos being shoved into the prison system. You’ve got MSNBC. In spite of their reputation of being a liberal news network, they have a show called Lockup.

There are so many prisons, but you know it’s primarily voyeurism of blacks and Latinos all over the country, and it’s an epidemic; it’s a sickness.

There have been some changes, but the beat goes on. Even though the Rockefeller drug laws have been amended slightly, but they have not been repealed. I’m for full repeal.

What’s the racism? America is one of the most racist countries in the history of the planet. Slavery was worse here than it ever was in Egypt or any other country. The Romans didn’t treat the slaves as the slaves were treated here.

How did slavery exist if it weren’t for racism? So you have 150 years later — not that long a period of time — a lot of hatred. I don’t know where it comes from. It’s a superiority complex.

You know it’s racist when you’ve been to the courtrooms like I have and you see the way blacks are treated like chattel. If they were all Italians or all Irish or all Jews only going to the prison system here, believe me, this wouldn’t exist. It’s just that there’s a collective racism in this country that allows this to happen.

I hear the way they talk — cops, judges. The whole system is corrupt, from top to bottom. And the only way it could exist is the level of racism that we have in this country. You have it in England; you have it in France; but it’s particularly vile in this country.

Kathleen Wells: So let’s talk about some specifics. You mentioned the Rockefeller Drug Law, and I know…

Randy Credico: That’s a state issue.

Kathleen Wells: That’s a state issue, I know, that…

Randy Credico: That’s a state issue.

Kathleen Wells: And I know that last April, it was reformed in your state. Now just let me give a brief overview as to the drug law — the Rockefeller Drug Law. It gave a penalty for selling two ounces or more of heroine, morphine, raw or prepared opium, cocaine, or Cannabis, including marijuana.

Randy Credico: Not Cannabis.

That’s been out since 1979. It was out early. It’s really cocaine and heroine and crack. And the crack and the cocaine are on the same level, something like the federal [law] where it was 100:1 and now [it's] 18:1.

Kathleen Wells: Exactly.

Randy Credico: Now it’s two ounces to sale, eight ounce possession, which will get you 15 to 25 years to life sentence. I see people get 62 years to life sentences because they get one for possession, one for sale [plus] the conspiracy rap. The judge would throw it all together and end up with 62 years.

They also had, until the laws were changed, what was called the Predicate Offender Law, which was from the same era, where if you sold a dime bag of cocaine you could have gotten [up to] 25 years, which is the same as [for] rape and second-degree murder. I saw it happen many times. Gary S. King is doing 12.5 to 25 years for attempted sale of a nickel bag. He is black, of course. Now you can get a flat one to nine years for selling a dime bag.

And this is not anecdotal. I can tell you a million stories like this with the raids on the homes by these white shock troops that go in with the no-knock search warrants, the stun grenades.

Kathleen Wells: What is your response to critics who say, “If you don’t do the crime, you don’t do the time?”

Randy Credico: I think it’s time for that hackneyed phrase to disappear from the American lexicon because these crimes are not really crimes. These are invented crimes. Many people smoke a cigarette or drink a beer or do drugs and it’s a social illness — drug abuse.

The economy is in such tatters that [some] people have no other way to make a living. What are you supposed to do? Just sit at home all the time since you’ve been written out of the economy? A lot of people just been written out of this economy, and they’re not allowed to jump into it. They’re not allowed to jump into the educational process. There’s so much discrimination and racism in the application of these laws.

So it’s okay to do the crime if you’re white and you got money, but it’s not okay to do the crime if you’re black and have no money? That’s the way it boils down.

And there are so many other kinds of moral crimes that are being committed by credit card companies, economic crimes committed by Wall Street, by the military. Those are real crimes. Killing a million people in Iraq — that’s a crime against humanity.

Kathleen Wells is on Facebook.

Crossposted from Race-Talk.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kathleen-wells/randy-credico-to-challeng_b_564039.html

Filed in: Campaign News

Lets Give Schumer A Wake Up Call!

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Filed in: Campaign News

The Villager/Activist/comedian is aiming to ‘chuck’ Schumer in election

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http://www.thevillager.com/villager_360/activistscomedian.html

Volume 79, Number 42 | March 24 – 30, 2010 West and East Village, Chelsea, Soho, Noho, Little Italy, Chinatown and Lower East Side, Since 1933 Villager photo by Lincoln Anderson Randy Credico and “Professor” Irwin Corey, 95, “The World’s Foremost Authority,” after a Credico Senate campaign fundraiser last weekend. Activist/comedian is aiming to ‘chuck’ Schumer in election By Lincoln Anderson Randy Credico, a comedian turned drug activist, wants to give Senator Chuck Schumer a primary election challenge — something Schumer notably didn’t face in his 2004 re-election. Credico, in his “mid-50s,” well, “early-mid-50s,” as he hedged, made his name in Las Vegas with his political impersonations in the 1980s, and appeared on the “Tonight Show” in 1984. “I imitated Johnny Carson — and was blackballed for calling Jeane Kirkpatrick a Nazi,” he recalled of his first and last gig on the show. A California native, he moved to New York in 1981. Starting about a dozen years ago, he transformed himself into an activist fighting for reform of the punitive Rockefeller Drug Laws. He had earlier met radical attorney William Kunstler when he was seeking legal help for his then-girlfriend, actress and singer Joey Heatherton. Becoming friends with Kunstler, Credico went on to head the William Kunstler Fund for Racial Justice after the civil rights lawyer’s death. For the past 20 years, he has lived off and on at Kunstler’s Gay St. building — where the Kunstler Fund is located. He recently relocated to Chelsea, though, where he both lives and has his campaign office in a building owned by Richard Corey, son of legendary comic “Professor” Irwin Corey. Not giving up his shtick, Credico for the past five years has been a once-a-week regular on New York Post political reporter Fred Dicker’s radio show as its “official comedian.” And he recently appeared in the state Senate dressed up as Diogenes, holding a lamp aloft, “looking for an honest man.” “They finally kicked me out of there — they used some state law on masks,” Credico recounted of his Diogenes routine, during a recent interview with The Villager. Humor infuses his campaign — he toted a sign with the catchy slogan, “Let’s ‘Chuck’ Schumer.” During one point in the interview, Credico did a montage of some of his impressions, effortlessly and hilariously shifting between Jimmy Stewart, Ronald Reagan, Ted Kennedy and Jesse Jackson. He’s been doing impressions since he was 16. But Credico is serious in his criticism of the second-term New York senator, whom he calls a “blue dog Democrat.” Credico said he opposes the wars in both Afghanistan and Iraq, whereas Schumer supports them. He accused the incumbent of not being supportive of gay marriage early enough. But, above all, he said Schumer has been too friendly to the banking industry. “I call him Dr. Bankenstein — he bailed out the banks,” Credico said. “He’s owned by Big Pharma and Wall St. guys. Why wasn’t he there for St. Vincent’s? Why didn’t he come up with an emergency package? … You know who’s too big to fail? — St. Vincent’s Hospital, not Goldman Sachs.” Credico also accused Schumer of not speaking out on “racial profiling” and stop-and-frisks of blacks and Latinos by New York City police, and said, if elected, he would introduce an anti-racial-profiling bill. Drug legalization advocate He supports legalizing marijuana. “It’s the number one cash crop in the country — but they don’t tax it,” he noted. “I don’t consider it a drug,” he added. “God put it on the planet.” A campaign slogan of Credico’s is: “Who would you rather smoke a joint with — me or Chuck Schumer?” In fact, he thinks all drugs should be legal. Credico supports amnesty for illegal immigrants. “ICE should be abolished,” he said of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency. On at least one issue, though, guns, Schumer has the more liberal position: “I’m against gun control, he’s for it,” Credico stated, “because I don’t like tinkering with the Constitution. The Second Amendment is there. … Plaxico Burress shouldn’t be in jail — he hurt himself,” he added of the former Giants player who accidentally shot himself in a New York disco. Asked if he was a Libertarian, Credico said, in fact, he has been invited to speak at the New York Libertarian Party’s upcoming convention. “I’m a Libertarian,” he stated. “They have been flirting a lot with me. I’m considered a lefty Libertarian.” Asked why he isn’t running against Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, who is considered more vulnerable than Schumer, Credico said it’s because his friend Jonathan Tasini is challenging her — and also, Credico quipped, because if he ran against Gillibrand and beat her, then he’d “have to be in the Senate for six years with Chuck Schumer.” Credico said he’s eager to debate Schumer, but suspects the senator will duck his offer. So he’s working on his Chuck Schumer impersonation — and, if necessary, will debate himself. Ballot hurdle Credico says he has raised $20,000 in campaign funds, which obviously pales compared to the millions in Schumer’s war chest. However, Credico’s more immediate challenge is getting his name on the Democratic primary ballot in September. He needs to collect 15,000 petition signatures statewide. But he’s confident he’ll do it. At times, he self-deprecatingly says he has no chance to win. Rather, he says, he’s running because he needs Schumer’s help to fill in the gaps in the autobiography he’s writing: Credico said that because of his “hard time with drugs and alcohol,” there are “blackouts” about which he has no memory, and that because he knows Schumer will dredge up his substance abuse during the campaign, he’ll finally find out what happened during those times. “Go to bed with Mary, wake up with Mark…,” he joked. Credico said drugs are just a fact of life in the club scene where stand-up comedians perform. “I did drugs — cocaine, of course,” he said. “It was in the clubs.” He said he’s since kicked cocaine. Doing a quick montage of impressions of various comedians when they were on drugs, Credico said, “Rodney [Dangerfield] did everything, trust me. Redd Foxx used to have a little vial.” Jackie Mason is about the only one who didn’t do drugs, he said. As for who has endorsed him so far, Credico says Larry David and Roseanne Barr are backing him. “I suspect all comics will be supporting me,” he said. He also claims the support of Malachy McCourt, former Green Party candidate for governor. Credico said he was also hoping for state Senator Tom Duane’s endorsement. “[State Senator] Eric Adams, Tom Duane — they’re all considering it,” he said. “They’re fearful of Chuck Schumer — he’s got $20 million, I don’t know why.” Asked if Duane would be backing Credico against Schumer, spokesperson Eric Sumberg said, “Senator Duane has always thought highly of Randy Credico’s comedic talent and advocacy around the Rockefeller Drug Laws.” Radio favorite Dicker said of Credico, “He’s got the comedian’s dark side of loving the limelight. But he’s a genuine talent — my audience loves him. I bill him as an activist/comedian.” Although noting there’s an anti-incumbent sentiment this year, Dicker said because there’s no public financing for state elections, Schumer wouldn’t be required to debate Credico. Dicker said getting on the Democratic ballot would be Credico’s biggest challenge. Tasini said of Credico’s Senate bid: “The record of the senior senator of New York needs to be challenged, particularly his central role in deregulating the financial services industry, which led directly to our financial crisis. I wish Randy lots of luck in challenging Senator Schumer, and I am particularly a very strong advocate of primaries as a good thing for democracy.” Credico said he would have run against Christine Quinn last year, but deferred to Yetta Kurland, who mounted a surprisingly strong race against the City Council speaker. “I’m going to be like Kurland,” Credico predicted. “I’ll probably lose. I’m going to be on the ballot in November — as a Libertarian, Green or Freedom Party,” he said, referring to the Personal Freedom Party that governor candidate Kristin Davis, the Manhattan madam who supplied Eliot Spitzer with hookers, is running on. Kurland said of Credico, “Randy is a great guy, and I know him from his work in the community. Schumer is obviously a very well-known, very powerful figure, but I always think it’s great to have as many people as possible in the political process. It raises the choices for voters. I would say Randy is certainly more liberal than Schumer on many issues — but it’s hard to say all across the board. I’m happy that Chuck Schumer recently came out in favor of gay marriage.” Kurland called the debate that The Villager sponsored last year for the Third District City Council candidates “very successful.” Of a potential Credico-Schumer debate, Kurland indicated she’d like to see more of the same, asking, “My question is, would it be a Villager-sponsored debate?” Holds a ‘FUN’draiser Last Saturday, stand-up comics performed at what was billed as a Credico “FUNdraiser” at Desmond’s Tavern, on E. 29th St. At the end of his routine, “Professor” Corey, 95, a staunch Credico supporter, fielded questions from the audience. “I only have two hours,” he deadpanned. “What about Red China?” someone called out. “Yes…,” Corey said, pausing for a moment. “Red China goes very well on a yellow tablecloth.” “I want to thank everyone who made it here tonight,” Corey said, adding, “I want to thank those who are making it somewhere else.” Credico then did his impressions with John McDonagh, host of WBAI radio’s “Radio Free Eireann,” on which Credico appears once a month. Credico ended with a flurry of rapid-fire imitations: Pat Robertson, George W. Bush, George H. Bush — “he’s easier,” he noted, mimicking the senior Bush’s high nasal voice — James Mason, Jimmy Cagney, Humphrey Bogart, Reagan. Saying Reagan had been up for Bogart’s role in “Casablanca,” he did a folksy, halting, Reaganesque delivery of Bogart’s famous “hill of beans” speech. Thank God he didn’t get the part, everyone in the audience must have been thinking. “I’m going to go through with this,” Credico vowed of his campaign. “Tonight we raised $20. I’ve got a $75 bar tab.”

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Credico FUNraiser Video /Watch:http://vimeo.com/10318703

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See it here at :    http://vimeo.com/10318703

Randy Credico for US Senate from NY, comedy fundraiser featuring Alex, Norman Thomas Marshall, Scott Blakeman, Irwin Corey, Randy Credico, John McDonagh at Desmond’s Tavern in New York City, March 20, 2010.

00:00 Alex comic guitar medley
08:50 Norman Marshall play on John Brown
20:20 Scott Blakeman political comedy
38:25 Professor Irwin Corey – 95 years old – The World’s Foremost Authority
72:55 Randy Credico & John McDonagh – political impersonations
86:25 Randy Credico stand up
119:00 Alex closing songs

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Schumer’s Civil Rights Record Questioned!

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No Joke: Comedian-Activist Running Against Schumer (AP)

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Valerie Bauman, ASSOCIATED PRESS

ALBANY, N.Y
.
February 7, 2010 Sunday

U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer has represented New York state for more than a decade with little serious opposition, but a funny thing happened on the way to Election Day this year: He picked up a challenge from a comedian activist.

Randy Credico’s race against the formidable incumbent is already drawing celebrity intrigue, with “Seinfeld” co-creator Larry David offering support for his fellow comic.

“I thought he was joking,” David said. “Charles Schumer is not going to be that comfortable with this. It’s not a stunt.”

CELEBRITY SUPPORT

Credico has also had support from comic actor Charles Grodin, and “Land of the Lost” co-creator Marty Krofft. Credico hopes to take on Schumer in a primary for the Democratic line, but he’s also talking to officials in the Libertarian party.

He wouldn’t be the first comic in the Senate: “Saturday Night Live” alumnus Al Franken, a Democrat, is the junior senator from Minnesota.

“He just believes in his own principles,” said Krofft, creator of shows including “H.R. Pufnstuf.” “If he would win, he would do great, because he has a great sense of humor and does impersonations of every big politician in the country. Randy Credico could do a debate with Schumer without Schumer being there.”

The senator from Brooklyn is a policy wonk, known for his dark suits, serious demeanor and news conferences. Schumer prides himself on visiting all 62 N.Y. counties every year and is seen as one of the hardest-working politicians in Washington and very media-savvy.

Credico is a recovered cocaine addict who mines his drug years for jokes. He’s an impressionist and a political activist with a shaky grasp on the present, so what he says is more stream of consciousness than gospel.

That’s why he’s running. He’s trying to finish his memoir but has years of blank periods from drug use. He figures, what better way to get dirt dredged up on you than run for office?

“If I get close to winning this thing, I’ll find out,” he joked.

DRUG PLATFORM

He’s spoken out for years against what had been long, mandatory sentences of New York state’s drug laws and has pushed for clemency for men and women who he believes have been harshly sentenced or falsely accused of crimes.

“I just think he’s a tremendous person,” said Grodin, who helped Credico fight unjust imprisonments. “Would he be a better senator than Schumer? He’ll always tell the blunt truth. Now will that make him a better senator? I don’t know.”

Credico has a platform – he supports decriminalizing drugs and ending the drug war, opposes gun control, supports an immediate military pullout from Afghanistan and Iraq and a ban on torture. But mostly he’s about “Dump Schumer.”

Schumer, who declined to comment, is currently third in the Senate power hierarchy and could be the next Senate majority leader if Harry Reid isn’t re-elected. Credico said that grab for power has distracted the vice chairman of the Democratic Conference from working for New Yorkers.

“He’s more concerned about power than he is about empowering people in the state,” Credico said.

Credico is known in Albany for his stunts – he once dressed up as the ancient Greek philosopher Diogenes and attended a state Senate committee meeting saying he was looking for “one honest politician.”

Credico had a shot at comic stardom when he went on “The Tonight Show” in 1984, but he went against all of his friends’ advice and included an impersonation of Johnny Carson in his set. Between that and railing against U.S. foreign policy, the host didn’t give Credico his seal of approval – a wave over to the chair for an interview – and Credico’s career took a different turn.

TOUGH CHORE

Despite Credico’s schtick and voters hungry for something different as shown in January’s U.S. Senate win by a Mass. Republican, Schumer doesn’t have much to fear. First elected in 1998, Schumer won with 71 percent of the vote in his last election and has $19.3 million in campaign funds, records show. Credico has filed reports saying he has just $2,235 in his coffers, but says he’s raised about $20,000 plus $4,000 of his own money since the end of the last reporting period.

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