[Marxism] Peter Camejo: Green Party gubernatorial candidate diagnosed with cancer

[Walter Lippmann]

I'm so glad this isn't any kind of obituary because Peter Camejo is one of 
the bright spirits of our times in the United States. He was a speaker at
the very first political rally I ever attended, against the U.S. organized
invasion at the Bay of Pigs in April 1961. I first met him in October or
November 1962 when he was on a national speaking tour in defense of
the Cuban Revolution. I had a meeting with him and a prominent leftist
grad student in Madison, Wisconsin where I was an undergraduate then.

I didn't know much about politics, but liked the energetic manner that
the Young Socialist Alliance, the Socialist Workers Party and their news-
paper, THE MILITANT, defended the Cuban Revolution. The prominent
grad student, later and still a noted minor left academic said the he
agreed with the YSA on all political questions, but was simply stubborn
and wouldn't join. I lost all respect for him after he said that. Well, I'm
not a member of any such organization any longer, but I learned a lot
from my experience in the SWP and YSA, and have no regrets for the
twenty-five years I spent in the Trotskyist movement. Peter Camejo
was and is a terrific public speaker who was always able to present
complex political ideas in clear and concise packages accessible to 
ordinary mortals not adept at the complex political rhetoric, which is
often just an exclusionary left-wing jargon, that so many on the left
use and hide behind. 

Peter was pushed out of the Socialist Workers Party in 1980, but has 
continued to be a left activist on any number of excellent levels, most 
recently as a Green Party candidate for the governorship of California
He did such a great job at debating Arnold Schwarzenegger that I took
his words at a debate which was transcribed and edited them down to
one single page with just what Peter said where you can get an idea 
how a skilled socialist campaigner gets the ideas across in a way that
is accessible and can be taken seriously by an audience:
http://www.walterlippmann.com/camejo.html

If socialism is to have any future as a serious political movement here
in the United States, we will have to learn how to speak to the people
as clearly and effectively as Peter Camejo has exemplified doing.


Walter Lippmann, CubaNews
Los Angeles, California
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SEND MESSAGES TO PETER:
info at votecamejo.com

http://www.votecamejo.com/
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CONTRA COSTA TIMES
Posted on Tue, Jan. 09, 2007

Green Party gubernatorial candidate diagnosed with cancer
By Samantha Young
ASSOCIATED PRESS

http://www.contracostatimes.com/mld/cctimes/news/state/16416713.htm

SACRAMENTO - Peter Camejo, a perennial Green Party gubernatorial
candidate and former running mate of Ralph Nader, said Monday he has
been diagnosed with lymphoma.

Camejo, 67, said doctors found the cancer after he underwent an MRI
last month for a swollen spleen.

"I was very lucky because it created pain and swelled my spleen,"
Camejo said in a telephone interview from his home in Folsom, a
Sacramento suburb. "They are going to do several more procedures on
me, and then I'll have a better idea of what my treatment will be."

Camejo said doctors believe his cancer is in the early stages and is
treatable.

Lymphoma is a cancer of the lymphatic system and can occur most
places in the body. The two main types of lymphoma are Hodgkin's
disease and non-Hodgkin's lymphoma.

Some doctors believe the cancer can be caused by chemical exposure, a
factor Camejo said he isn't ruling out.

"We have 200 chemicals in our body that we didn't have 100 years
ago," Camejo said. "So many millions of Americans get cancer and to
have to deal with it, it is a humbling experience."

As a gubernatorial candidate in California, he has supported abortion
rights, universal health care and a moratorium on the death penalty.
He ran for governor in 2002, 2003 and 2006. He also ran for president
as the Socialist Workers Party nominee in 1976.

During the 2004 presidential contest, Camejo was independent Ralph
Nader's running mate.

Camejo is chair of the board of directors of Progressive Asset
Management Inc., a broker-dealer firm he co-founded Oakland. He also
is a board member of Earth Share, a federation of more than 400
environmental organizations, where he is working to promote solar
energy.