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The Hemp Lady takes on Mother Nature

by Leanne Ouimet

Caroline Killeen is not your tyical candidate. She will be 82 years old in January (2008). She earned food and a place to seep in exchange for doing garden work at the youth hostel in Assisi, Italy, her home for the past year. She has no family, no telephone and no permanent place to live. But today, based out of room 203 of the Holiday Inn in Concord, NH, she is starting her campaign to become the next president of the United States.

Killen, or "Caroline of Assisi" as she prefers to be called, returned to America on Nov. 22 to begin her Democratic presidential campaign which centers on only one issue: global warming.

"I’m running for president because the planet is really in worse state than we want to admit to," Kllleen says. "We’ve lost our affinity with nature. We’ve lost it, compromised it and forfeited it."

The first step in ending global warming and returning to nature begins with the use of "solar dryers" or clothes liens, Killeen says. Avoiding the electric dryer not only saves energy but it also saves money, according to Killeen’s campaign manifesto.

"We have the technology to overcome CO₂ emissions but it’s the technology we’ve created that has brought us to this," Killeen says, "You won’t solve golbal warming with more technology. You have to go back to nature whichw ill offset all the technology."

Killeen is organizing a press conference in which she will display her own solar dryer with a large sheet hanging and the words "my fault" written in Italian across it, she says. Everyone using a solar dryer should include a personal message, Killeen says.

"You take responsibility for global warming by writing a short message that will reach others so they know you are opting to save the planet." Killeen says. "I want individuals to have a solar dryer somewhere where neighbors can see it."

One of the first things Killeen will do if elected into the White House is set an example for all Americans by making the White House a little more "green."

"Way back I used to say that the first thing I’d do as president was tear up the rose garden and replant it into a vegetable garen with herbs as well," Killeen says. "People will see it and of course it would set an example. I would also hang a solar dryer in the White House area and hang up all my laundry, except for my lingerie because when the president it doing it, it’s called leardership."

But some member of the public live in condominiums and high-rise apartments and aren’t allowed to dry their clothes outside, Killeen says. She hopes those individuals take the intitiative to do what is right and just, she says.

"We must practice civil disobedience because they’ll tell us we can’t put out a clothes line and we will get arrested but we will hang our clothes lines anyways," Killeen says. "The sun is outlawed in this coutnry because people can’t dry their clothes in the sun. Bail brother sun out of jail."

While global warming is Caroline’s only platform for this campaign, she does have a plan on how to deal with the war in Iraq once she gets into the White House.

"We are suffering from the John Wayne syndrome where we think America is the best and America is number one so we won’t admit it was wrong to go into Iraq," Killeen says. "I would want to get us out and I would find the right people, like military personnel and generals, to advise me on how to get out."

This is not Killeen’s first time running for president. In 1992, 1996 and 2004 Killeen ran for president on an array of platforms ranging from promoting hemp as an environmental crop to raising awareness of the danger of President George W. Bush’s re-election. Her efforts to legalize marijuana earned her the nickname "Hemp Lady" in 1996. She received 96 votes in 1992 and 393 votes in 1996, according to the New Hampshire Almanac website.

Killeen is in the United States now, but was almost forced to campaign from Assisi, Italy. The Catholic Caritas organization in Assisi provided her with airfare on Nov. 19 because she had no money for transportation, according to Killeen’s campaign manifesto.

But Killeen’s campaign still has ties overseas in the form of her two campaign managers Frank Scaysbrook and Janet Seath. They live in Buttaba, Australia and met Killeen in Assisi during the summer of 2005.

Scaysbrook and Seath provide Killeen with secretarial help like typing up her mainifesto and personal history but don’t interfere too much with the actual campaign strategy, Scaysbrook says.

"Because Caroline is American, she knows extremely well how the country thinks and the culture of America," Scaysbrook says. "But we’re playing devils advocate. Together, we come to a consensus on which way to go in regards to the campaign."

Killeen is not like the other candidates who try to be someone to everyone, Scaysbrook says. She is eccentric yet highly intelligent and very much in your face, he says.

She’s a visionary," Seath says. "She is a person who looks to the future and can see into the future. She sees the dangers ahead just as she sees the danger all around her."

Born in 1926, Killeen grew up in an adopted family and at the age of eight realized she was gay, according to her personal biography written by Killeen, Scaysbrook and Seath. After being expelled from two different monasteries for stalking pure nuns and insubordination, Killeen applied for a job picking cotton in New Mexico, according to her personal biography.

Having been influened greatly by John F. Kennedy’s physical fitness plan, Killeen rode her bicycle from Scranton, PA to Florida in 1964 which started a 30-year nomadic voyage along the highways of America, according to Killeen’s personal biography.

"She has a good understanding of people," Seath says. "She has a very good feel of people and how they think and what their needs are. She is a perople person and she knows the demographics of America."

The Catholic faith plays a large role in Killeen’s daily life and is the source of why she feels such passion for not just speaking out against global warming but putting actions behind her words.

"Being Catholic, we are taught by example to find the grace inside us and follow Jesus," Killeen says. "There’s a sense of obligation where, once we have knowledge about something, to do something about it. There’s a strong sense of responsibility and obligation to follow through."

Mars Seer, a good friend of Killeen’s, reacted strongly to the idea of Killeen spending $1,000 to get her name on the New Hampshire ballot. Killeen used three of her social security checks to pay the fee.

"As her dear friend, my reaction was complete outrage," Seer says. "I thought ‘get a decent place to live!’ But Caroline thinks living in poverty is something other people should envy. She is much more interested in getting her hat in the ring than finding a place to live."

According to Jeff Ayers, political science professor at Saint Michael’s College, the chance of Killeen doing well in the New Hampshire primary on Jan. 8 aren’t good at all.

"People will accept that she has the right to run but she won’t be taken seriously," Ayers syas. "Does she have a shot at winning? Hell no. Does she have a shot at getting one percent of the vote? No. She will be lumped into the that less than one percent category of third party votes. She’ll be lucky to get a couple hundred votes."

Those couple hundred votes will most likely come from people who just look for a random name or from people looking for a protest vote, Ayers says.

"They have no idea what she stands for but will vote for her because they don’t like any of the main candidates."

"I think her chances are pretty slim but it doeen’t matter," Janet said, "If she gets a couple hundred votes, she made a difference right?"

Killeen is running for president because she feels a sense of efficacy which is a sense that she can make a difference politically and people will actually listen to what she has to say, Ayers says.

Killeen doesn’t expect to win the primary and doesn’t have a goal as to how many votes she hopes to receive, she says. But she would get the job done if she made it to the White House, she says.

"I’m realistic," Killeen says. "I’m 81, but mentally, Caroline Killeen is 39. I could perform as president."