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Again, I wasn't there, but I will give what bits and pieces I know of.
First things first: Chris Heinz has a lovely and comfortable apartment, but not overly grand or huge, is a charming host, and is handsome in a "JKF Jr" kind of way.
I can attest to the last point :D
This NDN "conversation" seems to have come out of a similar one held with Wes in California a few weeks ago. There were 50 people there last night. Wes spoke, and a Q&A followed.
Wes was introduced by Chris, who spoke of how much he enjoyed Gen. Clark when they were together on the campaign trail. He mentioned that, even though he wasn't present at the time of Clark's endorsement of Kerry, he said he was very moved watching it and seeing the powerful energy between Kerry and Clark. Later, Clark brought up the same subject in the course of his remarks, and Chris again seemed emotionally touched.
(I don't see who wouldn't be; I was crying my eyes out watching it on TV.)
Rosenberg said they could have gotten a lot of people to come and talk about domestic issues, but they wanted Wes to talk about national security.
Wes said the biggest national security threat is a domestic issue, because the the two-party system is at serious risk.
He said Democratic principles are sound, we just have to make sure that we articulate them in a way that people can see that we really do want what's good for the country. One of several examples he used: "We don't want people walking around on the streets with machine guns, but it's not that we're against gun ownership, we want what's good for the country."
He talked a lot about Democrats defending other Democrats, which is something, as Clark supporters, we hear a lot from him, that the country won't believe that Dems can defend the country until they start defending each other. He spoke of how angry he was at the swift boat attacks. He said Democrats would call him wondering maybe we should have some kind of investigation into the purple hearts, (the fuckers!!), just to clear the air, and he said, very emphatically, NO!, that's not what you do...You stand behind and support the nominee, not doubt him.
He talked about the emergence of India and, especially China, as future superpowers, and his recent Kazakhstan visit, and how it was made again clear to him how disliked we are in the rest of the world and how this hurt him deeply.
He talked about the Party's obligation to lift people up, how vouchers let us off the hook for public schools, leaving the least among us to fend for themselves.
He talked about how, in the military, everyone is taken care of and how appalled he was when he got out of the army to find that noone was out there fighting for those who had no power to fight for themselves.
He'd met a "lifestyle coach" at some event who coached rich people. He said the people who really need a lifestyle coach are those who are having trouble getting by. He talked about how Gert used to counsel military families who were having a hard time paying their bills and he thought that out in civilian life, this type of "coaching" has to be made available to those who need it.
He talked about faith and how we must never say the "Christian right" but only the "extremist right" and the "Christan wrong" and pointed to David Brock's book The Republican Noise Machine.
He said his focus is on 2006 and getting rid of Delay. He said that Harry Reid is a very strong and tough guy, and very good.
Chris thanked Gen. Clark and said two things he was waiting for were getting rid of Delay and taking care of Santorium who "has my father's seat."
Wes walked around shaking hands and taking individual questions.
That's about what I know about how the evening went. I didn't want to leave you hanging, but there will probably be a fuller report in GDP by someone who was there, but maybe this will hold you until then. :hi:
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