Michael van der Galien, Editor-in-Chief
A socialist and myself were among the co-founders of the organization. The socialist has long expressed a commitment to using debate as a tool of political transformation. I cooperated in that organization because I believed it could serve completely different and non-ideological ends.Did the charter and written goals of this organization state that the goal was to reach those socialist goals of your radical colleague? If so, yeah, when you would run for office and wouldn't be honest about this, you would rightfully be criticized for it. Your defense, for instance, is interesting; Obama did not use that defense initially. He lied, distorted, pretending there was nothing 'there' there. But now we know there is. You are honest and forthright about it, and can make a plausible case for participating in this organization, Obama does not, because he refused to talk about it. Again, with that organization, I'm wondering about the following: did this organization have a charter which explicitly said that the goal of the organization was to create socialist change? If so, yeah, I believe voters could draw conclusions on that when they vote. I really believe that - when running for office, you should be prepared to take responsibility for the organizations you were a member of. For your information, by the way, I was a member of the "Young Socialists" at the same time I was a member of the Young Liberals (meaning conservatives here). When asked about it when running for office, I would be honest about and explain why I was a member. I wouldn't lie, distort, pretend I never was a member of it. And so on.
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