Ain't Nothing Like Freedom

Elected six times to the House from the state of Georgia,
Cynthia McKinney cut a trail through Congressional deceit
like a hot ember through ash.

She discovered legislators who passed laws without
reading them. Party leaders who colluded across party
lines against their constituents' interests. Black-skinned
individuals shilling for the white status quo.

She excoriated government lassitude over Hurricane
Katrina, uncovering dark secrets. She held the only critical
Congressional briefing on 9/11, introducing counter-
testimony of scholars, investigators, former intelligence
agents.

As a member of the House Armed Services Committee, she
held Rumsfeld to account for malfeasance by military
contractors and missing billions in the Pentagon’s budget.
Then she hammered him on the reasons for the failure of
NORAD air defenses on 9/11.

She read truth into the Congressional Record, held town
halls and hearings, led protests, showed up while others
played along to get along, took the side of the people
against the will of the Party. And when she got too truth
seeking and speaking, the Republicans rigged the
Democratic primaries to boot her out, leaving behind a trail
of achievements mostly won singlehandedly as a result of
her service on the House International Relations, House
Agriculture, House Armed Services, and Budget
Committees and the Select Committee on Hurricanes
Katrina and Rita

But McKinney rose again like a Phoenix, answering the call
to run as 2008 Green Party candidate for President,
challenging the corrupt two-party stranglehold on
American democracy. Then it was on to the Freedom
Flotilla to Gaza, to be seized on the high seas and
imprisoned in Israel. On to Tripoli, to serve as witness to
the NATO terror bombing of Libya. On to Malaysia to serve
on the War Crimes Commission...

Often introduced as the Sojourner Truth, the Harriet
Tubman of our age, McKinney reflects here on the Biblical
figures of Esther, Deborah and Naomi.

This is the Cynthia McKinney saga as it stands to date--
what she saw, what she learned, and how she fought for
change.