The following is a transcript of Darcy Richardson’s address to the Alliance Party’s national convention on April 25th:
Hello everyone. It’s an honor and a privilege to be addressing the inaugural national convention of the Alliance Party, a party — as fate would have it — emerging on the American political scene in one of our nation’s darkest moments, an uncertain period in which the United States may be facing its greatest challenge in modern history.
The deadly COVID-19 pandemic, which has already claimed more than 53,000 American lives while exposing the inadequacies of the U.S. health care system, coupled with what will almost certainly be an ensuing deep recession or, more likely, a depression from which we are unlikely to soon recover, presents a most unpredictable future for all of mankind.
As national chairman James Rex — I love Jim, he’s great — has eloquently pointed out, the twin crises facing this country demonstrates just how ill-prepared the special interest-dominated duopoly was in preparing for the kind of pandemic the country is now facing. Knowing that the kaleidoscopic impacts of climate change multiplies the threats of infectious diseases, and given the SARS, the Zika virus, MERS and Ebola outbreaks in recent decades and the very real possibility of a more widespread global pandemic in the near future, both parties share in the blame for this country’s unforgivable lack of preparedness.
As Jim has said repeatedly, the United States had ample warnings — decades, actually — yet our leaders had done little or nothing to prepare the country for the kind of pandemic we’re now tragically experiencing. How pathetic that the United States, once the manufacturing marvel of the world, had to
rely on life-saving ventilators, masks and other basic Personal Protective Equipment from counties like China and South Korea at the outset of this deadly crisis.
Making matters worse, President Trump squandered at least eight weeks at the beginning of this health crisis calling the coronavirus a “hoax” — and that was only four months after he shuttered the U.S.
Agency for International Development’s PREDICT program, which was responsible for identifying and combating new emerging viruses. The President’s slash-and-burn approach to the scientific wing of the federal government also includes trying repeatedly —and sometimes with success — to cut funding
for the CDC’s unit for fighting global pandemics. Shame on him.
But the Democrats, who have been reduced to second-guessing the Republicans in recent years, also share in the blame. They, too, have neglected science and research as federal funding for basic research in these critical areas has shrunk markedly over the past two decades during Democratic and Republican administrations alike. The Democrats controlled the House for half that period and, likewise, held a working majority in the U.S. Senate for ten of those twenty years.
The forthcoming campaign will undoubtedly be a difficult one, but I am deeply honored and humbled to be part of this much-needed effort. I know that Rocky — the favorite son ofall fifty states and of every country that still looks to the United States for leadership — feels the same way.
Following a steady forty-year decline, one in which our middle class was virtually hollowed out through misguided trade deals such as NAFTA, the Alliance Party, in my view, is the party this country has been waiting for — a party determined to end, once and for all, the hyper-partisanship and extreme polarization of American politics and, most importantly, a party capable of returning the United States to its historic, independent and positive role as a force for good around the globe.
We should once again be a beacon to the rest of the world, especially at a time when most nations are gripped with fear and uncertainty. We’re Americans, after all.
This is our moment. Let the Bloodless Revolution of the year Two Thousand and Twenty begin, ushering in a new and creative approach to the myriad issues facing our country which will once again make the
United States of America a Gold Medalist nation in education, the environment and a world-class health care system while creating an innovative economy for the 21st Century that works for everyone, not just the investor class, or the so-called one percent.
Thank you and keep the faith. And stay safe everybody.
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