If you asked me two years ago if I thought I would be going to China at the beginning of 2003, I would have thought you were highly misinformed. If you had asked me a year ago if I thought I would be going to Iowa at the beginning of 2004, I would have thought you were mentally ill.
Yet here I am on the verge of another adventure. China was an opportunity that presented itself and I took it. Iowa is a different story.
In case you weren't aware, I'm not going to Iowa for the hell of it. In fact, if I had my druthers, I would be going to Hawaii or someplace where it isn't seven below and covered with twelve inches of snow. But my druthers went out the window when this country attacked Iraq.
When George W. Bush gave his infamous State of the Union address last year, he threw one lie after another at us, trying to convince us that Iraq posed an immediate and serious threat to our security. Without a shred of substantial evidence, he demanded that our military decimate and occupy Iraq at once. Congress rolled over and gave the war-making baton to Bush, and we're now engaged in a "long hard slog" that will cost every resident in this country $24,000, as of today. Each day, the national debt rises by $2.1 billion.
Of course we never found any WMDs because they were never there. Everything Bush said regarding such weapons has been refuted. The only things we've found is an old bearded man (of which there was plenty of evidence that he was actually there, so no big surprise) and a lot of oil.
If you swallow everything Bush verbally says and need some tonic, let me know. There are plenty of sources that can, one-by-one, reveal the truth behind the Bush lies. I can and will help.
In fact, that's why I'm going to Iowa. The country is massively uninformed and I cannot help but feel that it is my responsibility to get the truth out there, even if I have to talk to every Uniformed Republican myself. If that sounds insane, listen to this: You have an unelected president who has destroyed a $230 billion budget surplus, lead us into a massive war for no reason, earned the world's animosity, given uncontested "reconstruction" contracts to his VP's company, issued gigantic tax breaks for the rich and slashed spending for just about everything from the VA to the EPA, while lying about it all, all the time. Now that's insane.
Howard Dean thinks it's outrageous. He has been criticized for being too strident in decrying the faults of the current administration. Apparently his Democratic opponents, the ones that signed on for the reasonless war, think Dean should be more sheep-like.
Dean's success so far is due to the fact that we are not a country of sheep. As people are waking up to truth, they, too, are angry. And the truth is contagious.
My train leaves 11:30 tomorrow morning. I'll be on the thing for two days, then on the ground in Iowa for twelve. I've got everything packed up and ready to go. I hope to be able to continue posting notices while I'm in Iowa, but I am not all that aware of what the situation is like there. I'll have to wait and see.
Many of you have done fantastic work for me and for the campaign. I would like to ask you to do one more thing. This takes about 30 minutes and can make all the difference in the world. Honestly.
Please go to http://letters.deanforamerica.com. After you sign up, the Web site will give you the name and address of an Iowa resident who is still undecided about the upcoming Caucus. Please write that person a personal letter about why you think it's important that Howard Dean be elected as the Democratic nominee. If you don't believe that yourself, tell them MY story, and let them know what I'm doing and why.
Please do this for me and please do it soon. The Iowa caucus is on January 19th. Thank you.
So this is it: my Iowa adventure begins. I have little idea of what I'm actually doing, but I hope to do it in good spirits and with optimistic vigor. A whole new chapter in my life starts tomorrow. Look for me on the news.
