United States congressional candidate Dr. Bill Durston stressed the importance of congressional cooperation with a presidential administration as part of the Progressive Speaker Forum on Thursday.

Durston is running for Congress against incumbent congressman Dan Lungren in California’s third congressional district, which includes most of Sacramento County and parts of Solano, Amador, Calaveras and Alpine counties.

“Geographically, (it’s) very large; very gerrymandered, it was carved out to try to be a safe Republican district, but it’s not so safe anymore,” Durston said. Polling data released by Durston’s campaign office showed the race in a statistical dead heat, with 39 percent for Lungren and 38 percent for Durston.

Durston first challenged Lungren in 2006 because no other politician would step up, he said. While consulting with Sacramento State government instructors, Durston was asked whether the term “sacrificial lamb” or “suicide mission” was used to describe his candidacy.

Barring any tragedy, Durston and the other panelists said Obama would most likely become the next president of the United States. In particular, Durston said that if racist tendencies were not as prevalent in American politics, Obama would be in the lead by 20 percent.

As an emergency room doctor, Durston said he was particularly pleased with Sen. Obama’s stance on “access to medical care as a basic human right.” However, he disagrees on the call to redeploy troops to Afghanistan and Obama’s support of the $700 billion financial bailout. He see the bailout as a violation of the Hippocratic Oath, in which “you should do no harm.”

“I will say flatly, ‘I will not vote for one cent of further military operations in Iraq or Afghanistan that’s not tied to a prompt, orderly and complete withdrawal of the United States from Iraq and Afghanistan,'” Durston said as the crowd applauded.

Junior psychology major Carlos Rojas commended Durston for attending the forum and showing students the importance of becoming involved in the political movement. He also commended the forum’s panelists for taking a candid look at the issue of race in the upcoming presidential election.

“Overall, the whole progressive forum has been pretty good. I think it was great [that Durston] was able to come,” Rojas said. “He’s busy doing his campaign, [and] for him to take time away from that and come straight to students and faculty here at Sac State says a lot about him. He does want to be here and work with us, not just be out there doing his thing.”

Durston said it’s important for students to be in involved in the political process. It is up to the younger generation to get involved and clean up the mess left by the older generation.

Ben Schilter can be reached at [email protected]