Big and small hopes
Originally published in the Manila Bulletin (another international article)
10/15/2003
Big and small hopes
Romeo V. Pefianco
(Editor’s note: Candidates, big and small, aspire for the Democratic Party presidential nomination in July 2004, after RP’s presidential election in May.)
COLUMBUS, Ohio – There’s an interesting development in the Democratic Party presidential derby. The last to join the primary is Gen. Wesley Clark, four-star general and former commander of NATO forces.
Rating a general
This week, all the polls in the US (Gallup and other professional pollsters) rate Clark at the top followed by veteran politicians Lieberman, Kerry, Dean, Gephardt and two unknown aspirants.
But in Ohio state – home state of my mother-in-law – US Rep. Dennis J. Kucinich, who opposed sending troops to Iraq, officially kicked off his Democratic campaign for president October 13 proclaiming, “Miracles occur.”
Ohio and Virginia
All the surveys give him two percent. But wait! Analysts here say Ohio state (No. 7 in population, 11.4 M) sent to the White House seven presidents – Grant (the Civil War hero), Hayes, Garfield, Harrison, McKinley, Taft and Harding.
Kucinich wants to be No. 8 and thus break Virginia state’s solid claim it has a long-standing record of producing eight presidents – Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, W.H. Harrison, Tyler, Taylor and Woodrow Wilson, the Democratic president who gave RP the Jones Law in 1916, as prelude to independence.
McKinley and RP
Ohio has a huge statue of President William McKinley at the capitol in Columbus. (He was governor of Ohio before his election as president in November 1896.)
After Commodore Dewey destroyed the Spanish fleet on Manila Bay, McKinley decided to “acquire” Filipinas from Spain. First, he ordered the military governors (Meritt, Otis and MacArthur) to administer the occupation government.
In 1900, McKinley appointed his kababayan, federal judge William Howard Taft, head of the Philippine Commission. Taft was made civil governor (governor-general) a position he held in Manila until his appointment in 1904 as Secretary of War by President Theodore Roosevelt.
Taft dynasty in Ohio
President Taft’s son, Robert, was elected to the US Senate for several terms. In July 1952, Senator Taft was a presidential aspirant. He lost the Republican Party’s presidential nomination to Gen. Eisenhower.
The governor of Ohio is Bob Taft, grandson of the first civil/governor-general of RP. President Taft holds the record and distinction of having served as president (1909 – 1913) and Chief Justice of the US Supreme Court (1921 – 1930).
Columbus ranks as No. 15 on the list of 50 largest cities in the US.
The long shot
Let’s go back to Rep. Kucinich, the Democratic aspirant for president. He pledged to reorder the nation’s priorities by “ending US occupation of Iraq and redirecting military spending to social programs.”
He has chosen Columbus Day (October 13) to launch his campaign, enhancing his chances of national coverage in his multistate tour.
A spokesman for the Ohio Republican Party said, “Kucinich is not considered a threat by President Bush.”
Harding, the last Ohioan
An Ohioan has not reached the White House since Warren G. Harding died in office in 1923.
In 1984, US Senator John Glenn dropped out of the race after performing poorly in the primaries in the South.
Rep. Kucinich remains optimistic: “The conventional wisdom is that I can’t win, but I intend to go into the early primaries and surprise everybody.” Kucinich says he has raised about $3.5 million.
He predicts that no Democratic candidate can boast of having a majority of the delegates at the Democratic National Convention in July 2004.
Kucinich observes, “I have seen miracles. I know the power of hope, the power of optimism, the power of light.”
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