Hopeful speaks of declining political system

STAUNTON — Sixth District Congressional candidate Andy Schmookler sees an American political system that is at low ebb and that is one reason why he is running next year to unseat incumbent Rep. Bob Goodlatte. On Wednesday night, the Democrat, author and holder of a doctorate from University of California atBerkeley, talked about his perceptions of the troubled political system to Mary Baldwin College Young Democrats. Schmookler, 65, a Shenandoah County resident, has never run for political office.

But the crisis in America made him reconsider.

"As great as any we have ever faced in this country,” he said of the country’s current state. Schmookler felt he might offer an impact that mattered. He said he saw an opportunity in the 6th District to affect change in America. He knows his odds for success are long.

“We are in the most Republican district in Virginia,” said Schmookler, who estimates he will be outspent 10-to-1 by Goodlatte.

“If we could show the Democratic Party you don’t have to be so bullied … to stand up and fight and fight for the people,” he said.

He said his campaign would be about people power and would help expose the truth. The truth is missing in America, the Democratic candidate said.

“We live in a country now where the truth in the political system is regularly being defeated by the lie,” he said.

During the past decade, Schmookler said the top economic gains went to the top one percent of the wealthy. Economic progress over the past 50 years for younger families has been wiped out, he said. But Schmookler said the American electorate has not been engaged enough to bring the necessary change. He said the result has been a political system “that has shown contempt for the Constitution and the most lawless presidency from 2001 to 2009. All of these things have been visible and the American people have slept through it. Never until now, have we had a political force at center stage that had so little allegiance to truth, to mercy," Schmookler said.

He said both major political parties have serious defects.

The Republican Party, he said, speaks of conservatism and says they are patriots, but are instead radical.

Republicans, Schmookler said, have held the country hostage. Republicans have only thought of improving their political advantage in the past decade, he said. Schmookler said even past Republican corruption paled by today’s abuses.

"Even with Nixon’s abuses of power he had some fundamental connection to responsibility,” Schmookler said of the Republican president who resigned from office in 1974.

He said Republicans have focused their efforts on assuring President Obama’s failure during a time of national crisis.

“When the president fails at such a time, the country suffers,” he said.

He does not spare the Democrats from criticism.

He wonders if it is worse to be destructive or "spineless." He said Democrats didn’t wage a strong enough fight during the George W. Bush presidency.

Sixth District Democrats will choose their nominee in the spring. The likely format is a convention.