Dennis Anderson Announces Candidacy in St. Charles for Congress - IL 14

So here we are.  We the people.  We the people.  Who are we the people?  We're men, we're women, we're families, we're children.  We're white, black, Latino, Asian.  We're urban, suburban, we're rural.  We're small businessmen, we're farmers.  We're doctors, lawyers, teachers and laborers. We work at Fermilab and we work in hospitals and nursing homes, we work at WalMart.  We're unemployed, we're retired.  We've got two PhDs, and we never finished high school.  We're rich, middle class, and we're poor.  We're Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, Sikh and Buddhist.  We're unaffiliated and we're atheist.  We're gay, straight, bisexual and transgendered.  We are all in this together, and cannot be divided into makers and takers, into 53 percent and 47 percent,

As was the case two years ago, we have a Congress that doesn't work.  The House, in particular, is broken.  Our opponents are people who, if faced with only two choices in reducing the deficit, either to ask a little more of those who have much or to take from those who have little, they will choose the latter.  As we used to say back in the late 60s, "if you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem."  And our current representative is clearly not part of the solution.  He was all but invisible during the last election, and appears to be taking that same path now, holding "mobile office" meetings that are so poorly advertised and so poorly scheduled that in some cases no one appeared but some of us in this room.  He apparently held a telephone town hall this week, but only some select constituents knew of it in advance.   He has voted against women, labor and the environment.  His chief legislative interests seem to be in abstinence-only sex education, as evidenced by his introduction of a bill to spend $500 million on it; and in making it safer for banks to engage in the sort of risky trading that nearly brought the economy down just a few years ago.  His solution to the jobs shortage seems to be his suggestion that if every small business would just hire one more person, problem solved.  He says constantly that he wants to repeal the Affordable Care Act, and seems to believe that any problems with the current health care system can be solved by simply allowing more insurance companies to sell their policies across state lines.  His priorities are not those of the people of this district.

 We have serious problems in the country, and they require serious discussion.  Where is the Congressional debate on poverty?  Where is the discussion of the fact that middle and working class wages have been stagnant or falling for decades while those at the top have seen their share of the Nation's wealth grow explosively?  Where is the Congressional outrage over the many efforts in states around the country to make voting and women's access to health care ever more difficult?  We need to fight for labor.  These issues, I would argue are more critical to the Nation's future than teen abstinence.

 This is an important race.  I am running to represent the people of the Illinois 14th district in the U.S. House, and I need your support.  I need you to volunteer to help me and other Democrats throughout the District.  I need your contribution, be it $5 or $2,500.  Most of all, I need you to promise me that you talk about this race, and that you will get out and vote and that you will convince your friends and neighbors to get out and vote.  Together, and only together, we can make this happen.

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