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Welcome to Revolutionary Optimism. Living at this time in history, we are challenged with the convergence of crises that is affecting our daily lives. Issues like economic hardship, a teetering democracy, and the worsening climate emergency have left many Americans feeling more despair than ever. To respond to the challenging times we're living through, physician, humanitarian, and social justice advocate Dr. Paul Zeitz has identified Revolutionary Optimism as a new cure for hopelessness, despair, and cynicism. Once you commit yourself as a revolutionary optimist, you can bravely unleash your personal power, hashtag unify with others, and accelerate action for our collective repair, justice, and peace. In this special episode of the Emergency Opportunity Podcast, Dr. Zeitz is discussing #unifyUSA and Landslide PAC's call for Biden to bow out of the 2024 presidential race and the holding of an open democratic convention to replace him. Here's Dr. Zeitz with more.
Dr. Paul Zeitz - 00:01:02:
It's early March and the presidential election is just eight months away. So far, as predicted, the Republican nomination process is being swept by Donald Trump. He's won in New Hampshire, in Iowa, in Nevada, and in South Carolina. Similarly, on the Democratic side, We have President Joe Biden, who has also won all the early primary states. This is a matter of grave concern because 86% of Americans believe that these two candidates are too old and they don't want the same old, same old. Who wants a repeat of Trump versus Biden? No one does. So I am joining with others who are calling for President Biden to bow out of the 2024 Democratic nomination process as soon as possible and for him to do that gracefully. He will go down in history and making a mark on our country if he's able to do that gracefully and call for an open Democratic convention. Now, many experts believe that Joe Biden will lose to Donald Trump. All the polls suggest that he is likely to lose a general election. Now, we know it's early in the election season and these polls are not 100 percent reliable. However, the high rate of unfavorability and the fact that Donald Trump usually underperforms on polls compared to what the voters actually do. Is another warning sign. Also, there are many third-party candidates. There's Bobby Kennedy Jr., Jill Stein, and Cornel West, to name a few. And the data shows that if Biden plus any of these three are competing against Donald Trump, that Donald Trump is going to win. So we're in a dire situation right now as the American community. We have to do whatever we can to stop an authoritarian takeover and to recreate our country for the future. We must unify to prevent an authoritarian takeover. We must unify Democrats. Independents, these third party groups, and non-voting Americans, and even constitutional Republicans, those Republicans that believe in the rule of law, all the way to Liz Cheney, to Cornel West. That's the political spectrum that we're trying to mobilize in a unified, hashtag #unifyUSA movement. To ensure that we can prevent an authoritarian takeover. Our call for an open Democratic Convention is responding to three things. First, an enthusiasm gap for President Biden. He's not favored to win the election. 73% of Democrats, many who voted for him in the last election, want another candidate. There is this risk of the third parties tipping the election to Trump as well. And the most egregious thing is that the Democratic National Committee primaries were designed and rigged to hand Biden the nomination. They actually forced some states to not even convene a nomination process, Florida, Wisconsin, so that any other candidate besides Biden had no chance. That was so undemocratic and against the ethics of our party. Of not my party, of the party. And of our democratic process. Although President Biden, Joe, has achieved some victories, other policies have alienated critical constituencies. And he is a very weak candidate right now. The youth vote is not supporting him. The folks that are against the war, against the Gazan people, everyone agrees that we should take out Hamas, but not while we're killing tens of thousands of women and children recklessly. And also the failure of the Biden administration to take bold action to address the climate emergency is another failure of this administration. 86% of Americans, as I said, don't want him to have another term. 73% of Democrats don't want to vote for him again. And we want to do everything that we can to prevent that. So the call for an open convention is interesting to learn about. At key moments of peril in U.S. History, open conventions have delivered extraordinary candidates who went on to win historic victories and lead great presidencies. On the cusp of the Civil War, Abraham Lincoln was surprisingly nominated by an open convention in 1860. It was a political realignment at that moment. And there was the creation of a Republican Party, which at that time was anti-slavery. And pro-abolition. And Abraham Lincoln surprisingly won that convention and went on to win the presidency. And he kept the union together by the end of his first term going into his second term. In 1932, during the Great Depression, an open convention nominated little-known governor of New York named Franklin Delano Roosevelt. He went on to win a landslide victory. In my view, and in the view of others who are now talking about this openly and publicly, an open convention in 2024 is the best option to prevent an authoritarian takeover. By establishing an authentic democratic experience that allows the candidates to participate in live broadcast debates and speeches. The candidate's ability to unify the public and lead the country through renewal and healing will become clear. We are proposing an authentic democratic process with no predetermined outcome. That can result in the nomination of the best qualified. Vetted candidate that inspires a unified movement of voters. An open convention would become the most exciting news story in our country and the world. And it would take away the media attention from the authoritarian Trump-led MAGA movement. So this is the rationale for this extraordinary call, calling on President Biden to bow out. Now, this has happened previously. Lyndon Johnson ran some primaries and then he pulled out in 1968. Harry Truman, a sitting Democratic president, ran some primaries and then he pulled out. And so there are recent precedents for Democratic presidents, sitting Democratic presidents, not to be the candidate that becomes the nominee in the next election cycle. So we have precedents for Democratic candidates pulling out. We have great examples of how an open convention can help us identify a strong leader who can shepherd us into an era of renewal and transformation. So I hope you will look into this more further and you will consider signing on to the petition at unifymovements.org. Or there's a petition also available on change.org. Calling on Biden to bow out. I also invite you to explore Unify USA, which is an interpartisan movement that's intent on catalyzing the creation of the United States 2.0. Through urgent constitutional renewal and transformation. This is going to be an exciting year ahead. Let's make some history or herstory and transform our country to be love-centered and loving and healing and repairing instead of the path of destruction that we're currently on under United States 1.0. This constitution that was created 237 years ago that was designed to have one group of people have power over another group of people in a proverbial caste system. We need to create the United States without a caste system and to unleash the full magic, the full potential, the full capacity of the entire population of our country. Thank you for listening to these ideas, and I hope that you will explore them. And I'm happy to connect with you and support your leadership. Please contact me through my website, drpaulzeitz.org, or check out Unify USA at unifymovements.org.
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Are you ready to be part of the revolution? To learn more about Revolutionary Optimism, please visit drpaulzeitz.org. To explore building movements, please visit unifymovements.org. If you like this show, be sure to follow on your favorite podcast app so you don't miss an episode. Revolutionary Optimism, transforming the world one episode at a time.