Nancy Pelosi flees requests to debate Cindy Sheehan

October 31, 2008
San Francisco
Robert B. Livingston

In a newsletter sent out today, Cindy Sheehan´s Campaign Headquarters described how its candidate´s campaign manager, Tiffany Burns, was rebuffed by Nancy Pelosi at a morning press conference when Burns asked Pelosi why she will not participate in a public debate.

Both Nancy Pelosi and Cindy Sheehan are candidates for California´s District 8 seat in the U.S. House of Representatives. House Speaker Pelosi is the incumbent, and Sheehan is running an independent campaign to unseat her.

Sheehan blames Pelosi for allowing the Bush administration to escape accountability for the wars it started and for its wanton disregard for the U.S. Constitution. She also accuses Pelosi of caving in to costly financial requests from the administration and from Wall Street schemers who are seeking bailouts from the government after losing untold billions of dollars when their own derivative manipulations began to become exposed.

According to the newsletter, Burns confronted Pelosi three times: twice during and once after an event where Pelosi spoke on behalf of a ballot proposition which favors building a high speed train between San Francisco and Los Angeles.

The first time (according to the newsletter), Nancy Pelosi answered Burns´ request for a debate by giving her a “dirty look” and a promise to respond to her privately after the press conference.

A bit later, while Pelosi was praising the high-speed train as a good place to invest tax dollars, Burns asked (according to the newsletter) “how that would be possible since she was currently using billions of tax dollars to fund the ongoing illegal wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.”

It was then that Pelosi “groaned” and the press event ended. Pelosi said “she had to leave and would not be available for any more questions“.

Immediately afterwards, Burns (according to the newsletter) tried to approach Pelosi to get her earlier promised response.

Instead of explaining why she cannot debate Cindy Sheehan, Pelosi responded by having Tiffany Burns “forcefully removed by security.”

Earlier this week, Sheehan protested the local public broadcasting affiliate KQED for allowing Pelosi to be granted more time than her opponents during a program about the District 8 Congressional candidates. Rather than accept an arrangement whereby Pelosi would get a half hour to speak while Sheehan and two others were to split the remaining half hour, Sheehan decided not to participate like that. Rather than be marginalized and bullied, she sacrificed her allotted time and consequentially much needed mass media exposure.

Sitting outside the broadcast studio, Sheehan nevertheless managed to call the program while it was airing and was allowed to briefly ask Pelosi why she had not impeached Bush and Cheney. She also managed to suggest to Pelosi that it was not to late to impeach them-- before being cut off.

After today´s confrontation between Tiffany Burns and Nancy Pelosi, campaign workers state in their newsletter that “Nancy Pelosi can spend her time ignoring the voters and ignoring the issues - but Cindy Sheehan For Congress won't let her get away with ignoring us. We'll be bird-dogging the Speaker all weekend, if she won't face Cindy we'll face her!”
To read more about Cindy Sheehan and KQED go to:
http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2008/10/29/18547364.php

Or watch this excellent video by Clifford Roddy:
http://blip.tv/file/1416286/

Other recent news:

Cindy Sheehan´s Campaign Headquarters is vandalized and a computer is stolen:
http://tinyurl.com/6jg4b5

Key figures in the LGBTQ community, including Gore Vidal, Rosie O'Donnell, and Melissa and Tammy Etheridge endorse Cindy Sheehan:
http://tinyurl.com/64nbf2

Cindy Sheehan´s Campaign website: