This letter was drafted for my family July 9th, when Joe Biden was still the presumptive nominee for the Democrat Party, but never sent to them. It highlights the need for each of us as Americans to consider all the sacrifices that have been made to ensure our freedom, so asking our self, “what am I now willing to do to ensure this freedom for future generations?”.
Since this was written the one party’s candidate has changed and the Robert F. Kennedy Jr. / Nicole Shanahan campaign’s future hangs in the balance. The election takes a new turn from month-to-month, week-to-week, and day-to-day. The future of our country doesn’t depend on the outcome of this election. The future of this country depends on our action. We The People!
The 2024 Election
My run across the country for Gump 2024 was about thinking what the future of this country could look like.
It was the culmination of a lot of time and effort spent trying to understand why our federal government doesn’t seem to work towards benefiting the interests of the average American person, regardless of what side they’re on.
It all started for me in 2008 and 2012 when Ron Paul was running for President in the Republican Party (I think Matt introduced me to Ron Paul. Matt has always been my best friend and person I learned from the most).
You may not know in those days I was holding up signs for Ron Paul on main street and canvassing at polls for his delegates (2012).
In 2016 I donated a small amount of money to the Bernie Sanders campaign, which is completely opposite of Ron Paul’s position of a limited federal government, but faced the same backlash from the establishment party members.
I watched every Democratic Primary debate in the 2020 election cycle that had 20 Presidential hopefuls and by memory can recite almost every one of their names, along with their platforms.
I liked almost everyone except about 3. They were Mariana the “spiritual medium” person, Biden, and Harris. Biden and Harris to me seemed to represent the same ideas and establishment that caused the problems we were trying to solve.
So for four Presidential election cycles I closely followed everything, liked people from every side, and never voted for the President.
The thing that I found in common with all these different candidates (Ron Paul, Bernie Sanders, Andrew Yang, etc.) and their different political views was that they appeared to have the right motives to help average people and they were willing to do it at a great cost to themselves.
If you’re Bernie Sanders and Big Pharma is one of the largest lobbyist for your party (Democrats), and you repeatedly say they are putting their profits over the health and wellbeing of the people, then they’re probably not going to fund your campaign. If you don’t have money you, can’t win at the national level. So that’s a huge sacrifice to stand up to what’s wrong rather than be submissive and receive campaign contributions.
As I watched time and time again, the best ideas that seemed hopeful, be squashed by the two parties because it didn’t advance their goals, I started to think that they were never going to depart from what was happening. It was a conflict of interest for them to listen to these goals even though they sounded ideal to us.
So I started to become skeptical of the motives of the two parties. You get so excited about a person, or an idea that you thought could revolutionize the way we live in this country, and then the lesser person get elected, or nothing they said they were going to do happens.
Donald Trump capitalized on the growing dissatisfaction with the lifetime politicians and gridlock in Washington. I never once fell for his tactics like many people did. I knew he consistently told lies and was interested in himself above all. He motivated people out of fear by being abrasive, name calling, and bullying. I never voted for him but my open mind to his campaign was, if he says he can fix the budget in Washington by running it like a business, let’s see him do it. It turns out that he couldn’t because he had an idea of what some of the symptoms were but he didn’t know what the actual problems were. And of course, he couldn’t act outside of his own self-interest.
Fast forward to recent, the Gump 2024 campaign seemed like a revelation to me. It’s clearly reported today that most people in America don’t want a rematch of Biden and Trump.
In 2020 I came up with the idea of running across the country as a fearful response to the stay-at-home orders. In 2021 on the Florida Trail, I already had the inclination that this election was coming. So I asked myself, who would be a candidate that every American would support or looked up to. That’s where Forrest Gump came from. At the end of the 2022 season I started telling people my idea and getting engaging responses. So I started training to do the run in January of 2023.
When I realized that I couldn’t make the run in 2023 I thought the idea was over and was embarrassed that I told people I was going to do it. During the third season I had to tell people I didn’t do it over the break. So what did I do?
My first run in the Spring of 2023 was 50 miles on a Thursday, to Hermann, MO and back to the Caboose. I worked the next day. I had to know if I could do the 40-50 miles a day I was telling people I could. I ran over a marathon that day, at mile 40 I couldn’t hardly force myself into a trot, and so I walked the last 10 miles straight. When I got back I was sore (all weekend) but I thought, with some training I may be able to do this.
I adjusted my miles per day from 40-50 to 30-40, and started doing everything I needed to do, to be ready for the attempt by January 1st.
A lot went into it. There were many people who agreed with me but thought it was pointless. I figured out pretty easily that I couldn’t do the run by myself but I couldn’t find anyone to help me (except Jeff with the website). Coming back to PA in the fall of 2023, frankly, I was not ready.
But I figured everything I was missing I’d find along the journey. I knew it was what I was meant to do and not being ready was a sign that the results were out of my hands. I knew I could do the physical part but without the engagement part, would it make a difference.
Matt asked me before I left, if a long trail of people weren’t following by the end, like they were following Forrest Gump, would I be upset. I said that I understood that might not happen but I was hopeful that people would listen.
Most people that I talked to on the trip said they would vote for Forrest Gump over Biden or Trump. But they sometimes also added that they wish there was a real person they could vote for. I couldn’t help them with that problem then because I was in the same situation as they were. Another Presidential election where I wasn’t going to vote.
That changed too when I got back. A few people on the trip asked me about RFK Jr. I told them that I liked his spirit to run as an independent but I didn’t agree with some of his ideas. And that was when I only knew what headlines said about him and heard on a cut-up interview with him talking about vaccines.
Since then I’ve listened to him talk for hours and hours about anything and have never found a single thing wrong with his ideas. He bases his ideas in research while maintaining a dedication to help others as his motive.
If anyone had a question about his policies and the time to listen to his explanation, I believe they would be convinced like me. The biggest fear people have about different ideas is that they’ll have to give up something about their own ideas. His ideas are based in hope, so you want him to be right, and he spent 40 years as an environmental lawyer learning how Corporations and the Government work.
The ideals of the Gump ’24 campaign was a third party that didn’t represent corporate interests but people’s interests. It was a candidate that had the integrity to make you feel proud that they are your President. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is the model of these values.
Who knows the extent of the Gump ’24s reach but people like Mom found out that a lot of people were all talking about this idea of a third party all at the same time. Now polls show that over 50% of voters identify as independents and less than 20something % are saying they are Democrats or Republicans.
What I was hoping would happen, is happening. The discussion is no longer can a third party win. The question is, what will you do, if there’s a good option.
The whole occurrence of this happening is predicated on the Biden and Trump rematch and them both being in the condition that they’re in. I don’t think the circumstances will be like this again anytime soon. The RFK Jr. campaign is taking a tremendous amount of abuse, which is almost always immoral or illegal (slander, liable, etc.). They handle it with grace and counter-punches.
So I think now is the time. I will not miss my opportunity to be part of helping advance the future interests of the average American people and particularly the disadvantaged who RFK Jr. witnessed firsthand his uncle (JFK) and his father fight and die for.
If this means turning down job offers paying $100,000/year, selling my house, and postponing my season at the Caboose to make a second cross country run, I’m willing to make that sacrifice. I hope everyone else will also consider what’s happening and check into RFK Jr. yourself.
There’s plenty of information out in videos about him. I’d encourage you to watch the stuff that the campaign (Kennedy 24) puts out. He encourages healthy debate so he’ll go on shows that will challenge him. But if you don’t take the time to listen to him, or only read the hit pieces on him, you may get a bad characterization.
The video below is a docu American Values Super PAC filmed, narrated by Woody Harrelson, about who Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is.
The Bobby Kennedy video Facebook doesn’t want you to see, narrated by Woody Harrelson.
My Approach has always been to do as much as I can to help alleviate this problem that is rapidly growing in our country. With People not getting involved in Politics, Corporations are directing our future away from Liberty and Prosperity. The first step is to understand the problem. The next step is to ask yourself what are you going to do about it. There’s only 2 steps! We’ll see you out there!
