State Democrats outline agenda

YAKIMA – Washington Democrats called for a “rapid exit strategy” from Iraq, with the United Nations in charge of a peace conference and the rebuilding of some 15 years of war damage.

In a platform that takes issue with most aspects of President Bush’s foreign policy, they also called for “peaceful resolution” to disputes with Iran, an end to the embargo with Cuba and support of the Kyoto Treaty on global warming.

Some 1,000 delegates who gathered in this Central Washington city passed a 17-page platform on a wide range of issues, coming down squarely in favor of alternative energy and national health care, but opposed to teaching intelligent design in schools and to using the National Guard for anything but defense and natural disasters.

They took a much different tack on immigration than the Republicans who gathered in the same convention center a week ago, calling for civil and human rights for everyone “regardless of their immigration status.” They opposed the building of walls on U.S. borders.

They tried to find a middle ground on environmental concerns in the Columbia and Snake rivers, reworking the platform to say the rivers’ “fish and their dams support the economic health of the Northwest.” One delegate successfully warned against a proposal to take support for dams out of the platform because it would hurt Eastern Washington candidates.

“This is the third rail of politics in Eastern Washington. You step on this issue, you die,” she said.

The platform calls the Iraq conflict “an unjustified war based on false and misleading statements and faulty thinking.” It supports the military, but opposes its use as “aggression for the advancement of political and economic goals.”

In a separate resolution, it called for the federal government to establish a “Department of Peace.”

Early in the day, incumbent Sen. Maria Cantwell was given every opportunity to showcase her re-election campaign, introduced with a videotape by former President Clinton, and she arrived at the morning session with marching drummers and a large crowd of supporters in matching T-shirts.

But her supporters’ chants of “Six more years!” had to compete with counter-demonstrators waving anti-war signs and shouting “No more war!”

Cantwell, who has been criticized by war opponents for her 2003 vote to give Bush authority to invade Iraq, tried to walk a sharply defined line on the issue.

She cited her work to “give troops the support they need” in the field and said the nation needs to develop more alternative energy sources so it imports less oil.

“2006 needs to be a year of transition, when Iraqis stand on their own and our troops come home,” she told the delegates.

Later, Cantwell said she knew the convention would show off a wide range of views on Iraq. Rather than debate her past vote, she said, she wanted to emphasize getting the Iraqis “back on their feet,” and U.S. troops out while other countries get more involved financially and militarily in Iraq.

Her two announced primary challengers, however, called for immediate withdrawal of U.S. forces.

Mark Wilson also called for repealing the Patriot Act and redirecting federal funds from fighter jets and tanks to alternative energy.

“I’m no millionaire from a big corporation,” said the former Marine, a dig at both Cantwell, who quit a job with Real Networks to run in 2000, and Republican Mike McGavick, who retired from the top spot at Safeco to seek the GOP nomination.

Hong Tran, a lawyer who handles public housing issues, got applause when she said Democrats shouldn’t move to the right to win elections. But she also drew some boos when she criticized Cantwell on environmental issues as well as Iraq.

“We can’t count on her to protect our environment any more than we can count on her to support our core values,” Tran said. Her reason: Cantwell supported Dirk Kempthorne, Bush’s nomination for interior secretary.

But despite questions over the war, Cantwell was repeatedly praised for being strong on environmental issues, from stopping oil exploration in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to cleanup of the Hanford Nuclear Reservation.