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A
Progressive Income Tax ·
Replacing
Republican Legislators Quote of the Week From “I can’t” to “We
can” The objective of Community Development, as
practiced by the Institute of Cultural
Affairs
Calendar of Events
Friday, September 19 at 7 PM at Olympic View Church (425 NE 95th Street, Seattle) – Public Forum on Election Fraud in Ohio 2004 and Book Signing Witness to a Crime: A Citizen’s Audit of an American Election by Richard Hayes Phillips. For more.
Saturday, September 20 – Visit your neighbors to speak for ending the Iraq War.
Saturday, September 20 at 5 PM at
Westin Hotel (
Wednesday, September 24 at 6:30 PM at Gibson Hall (150 Newport Way, Issaquah) – East King County Democratic Women Potluck and Discussion of Sound Transit’s second proposition 1 and Tim Eyman’s I-985 initiative led by Transportation Choices Coalition spokesman Rob Johnson.
Wednesday, September 24 at 7:30 AM
at
Thursday, September 25 at 7 PM at Sammamish Public
Library (825 – 228th Avenue NE, Sammamish) – Issues in American
Democracy Discussion Group with speaker
Friday, September
26 at 5 PM at
Friday, September 26 at 7 PM at Gibson Hall (105
Newport Way, Issaquah) – American Democracy Movie Night featuring “Recount”
with Kevin Spacey and Laura Dern, about 2000 presidential Florida election
recount, hosted by 5th Legislative District Democrats. Cancelled so people can watch presidential
debate.
Saturday, September 27 at 5 PM (Social), 6:30 PM (Dinner and Program) at South Seattle Community Center Jerry Brockey Center (6000 – 16th Avenue SW, Seattle) – Washington Physicians for Social Responsibility Annual Dinner, with keynote speaker former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark. $75. To register or for more information.
Saturday, September 27 at 5:30 PM
at Carrie Bogner’s home (
Friday, October 3 at 7 PM at
Saturday, October 11 at 9:30 AM –
3:30 PM at
Saturday, October 11 at 6:30 PM at
Opportunities, Petitions and
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See What the Iraq Occupation has cost us to this minute.
How Would You Spend $3 Trillion instead of Iraq?
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Try
MoveOn’s new game: What’s the difference between President Bush and Senator
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Wellstone
Action provides organizing tools online.
Wellstone
Action canvassing instructions
See Paul Loeb’s organizing tools: one, two, three.
Sign up for Democracy for America Night School featuring George Lakoff.
Visit
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Use
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Get your free Obama/Biden sticker.
Learn
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military.
Sign
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Get a
real life. Study basic theoretical
physics with the rappers.
Petitions and Donations
Tell
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Tell
our presidential candidates to make Darfur a day one priority.
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our presidential candidates to oppose expansion of offshore oil drilling.
Tell the
head of our Bureau of Land Management to protect our lands from drilling.
Tell your
congress members to support the Employee Free Choice Act (video).
Tell
DHHS Secretary Leavitt to oppose the so-called conscience rule.
Tell
your congress members to support ‘primary education for all’ foreign policy.
Commentaries From Our Members
Andrew Villeneuve on Failed Republican Economy
Excerpt
from a
longer email
Unemployment is at a five year high of 6.1%. It's expected to get worse before the year is over and the next president
takes office. Prices for food and fuel are outstripping wage increases, handing American workers what the New York Times dubs "a de facto
pay cut". Families, meanwhile, are buried under more debt than ever. And the housing bubble is
drastically reducing state government revenues at a time when we need our
common wealth to be strong.
This is what the right wing agenda has brought us. For most of this century, Republicans have been in control of all three
branches of the federal government. (Democrats are now the majority in Congress,
but the Senate Democratic caucus has only a tenuous hold on the chamber and the
House Democratic caucus is weak thanks to the presence of Bush Dog Democrats).
Instead of holding Wall Street accountable, Bush and the Republicans have done
the bidding of corporate titans eager to expand power and profits.
Instead
of working to ensure that markets are fair and constructed for the broadest
possible prosperity, Bush and the Republicans have pursued an unwise and
thoughtless hands-off approach, deriding government oversight as
counterproductive.
Instead of investing the Clinton/Gore surplus into
Instead of strengthening regulations that could have helped prevent or lessen
the crisis we find ourselves in, Bush and the Republicans have tried to erase
New Deal economic protections put into place by Franklin Delano Roosevelt.
Instead of helping American workers help themselves by fostering the growth of
collective bargaining, Bush and Republicans have waged an all out war on
unions.
Instead of conserving for emergencies, Bush and the Republicans have spent like
there's no tomorrow, running up massive deficits.
Instead of embracing government's moral mission to empower people, Bush and the
Republicans have carried out privateering (privatization + profiteering)
schemes that have hurt all of us, whether we live in a small town or a big
city.
Instead of acting to stop criminals like Ken Lay and Jeff Skilling of Enron
from defrauding consumers and state governments, Bush and the Republicans
cheerfully looked the other way while American citizens were gouged.
Ultimately, however, the names of those in charge don't really matter. What
does matter is the deeply flawed conservative moral system they believe in. It
is that conservative worldview that is truly to blame for this mess. Bush has
just been following the agenda laid out by
Jane Cameron: Recommendations for President
Bush’s library
The George W. Bush Presidential Library is now in the planning stages, including:
·
The
· The Alberto Gonzales Room, where you won't be able to remember anything.
· The Texas Air National Guard Room, where you don't even have to show up.
· The Walter Reed Hospital Room, where they don't let you in.
· The Guantanamo Bay Room, where they don't let you out.
· The Weapons of Mass Destruction Room, which no one has been able to find.
· The National Debt Room, which is huge and has no ceiling.
· The Tax Cut Room, with entry only to the wealthy.
· The Economy Room, which is in the toilet.
· The Iraq War Room. After you complete your first tour, they make you to go back for a second, third, fourth, and sometimes fifth tour.
· The Dick Cheney Room, in the famous undisclosed location, complete with shotgun gallery.
· The Environmental Conservation Room, still empty.
· The Supreme Court's Gift Shop, where you can buy an election.
· The Airport Men's Room, where you can meet some of your favorite Republican Senators.
· The Decider Room, complete with dart board, magic 8-ball, Ouija board, dice, coins, and straws.
· The museum will also have an electron microscope to help you locate the President's accomplishments.
Rebecca Wolfe thanks Jim McDermott for Supporting
Impeachment
Published by
All Americans, but especially citizens of Washington state,
should give thanks that at least one member of our congressional delegation --
Jim McDermott -- has shown the character and wisdom to support the impeachment
of George W. Bush and Dick Cheney. Holding our elected officials accountable is
our duty as citizens. Members of Congress take an oath to "Protect and
Defend the Constitution of the
Now -- Jay Inslee, Norm Dicks, Rick Larsen, Brian Baird,
Adam Smith, Kathy McMorris-Rodgers, Doc Hastings and Dave Reichert -- it's your
turn to stand up and be counted as true patriots. Impeachment is "the
remedy for tyranny." Rebecca
Wolfe
Dena Rubin on Confusion About Our Candidates
I'm a little confused. Let me see if I have this
straight.
·
If you grow up in
·
Grow up in
·
If your name is Barack you're a radical, unpatriotic
Muslim.
·
Name your kids
·
Graduate from Harvard law School and you are unstable.
·
Attend 5 different small colleges before graduating,
you're well grounded.
·
If you spend 3 years as a brilliant community organizer,
become the first black President of the Harvard Law Review, create a voter
registration drive that registers 150,000 new voters, spend 12 years as a
Constitutional Law professor, spend 8 years as a State Senator representing a
district with over 750,000 people, become chairman of the state Senate's Health
and Human Services committee, spend 4 years in the United States Senate
representing a state of 13 million people while sponsoring 131 bills and
serving on the Foreign Affairs, Environment and Public Works and Veteran's
Affairs committees, you don't have any real leadership experience.
·
If your total resume is: local weather girl, 4 years on
the city council and 6 years as the mayor of a town with less than 7,000
people, 20 months as the governor of a state with only 650,000 people, then
you're qualified to become the country's second highest ranking executive.
·
If you have been married to the same woman for 19 years
while raising 2 beautiful daughters, all within Protestant churches, you're not
a real Christian.
·
If you cheated on your first wife with a rich heiress,
and left your disfigured wife and married the heiress the next month, you're a
Christian.
·
If you teach responsible, age appropriate sex education,
including the proper use of birth control, you are eroding the fiber of
society.
·
If, while governor, you staunchly advocate abstinence
only, with no other option in sex education in your state's school system while
your unwed teen daughter ends up pregnant, you're very responsible.
·
If your wife is a Harvard graduate lawyer who gave up a
position in a prestigious law firm to work for the betterment of her inner city community, then gave that up to
raise a family, your family's values don't represent
·
If you're husband is nicknamed "First
Dude", with at least one DWI
conviction and no college education, who didn't register to vote until age 25 and once was a member of a group that
advocated the secession of Alaska from the USA, your family is extremely
admirable.
OK, much clearer
now.
Robert & Diane Thompson: Palin Is Not Qualified
We note the historical record shows that a vice president's chance of
becoming president during an administration's term of office is about one in
three. So, the strategic and operational importance of the VP choice is quite
clear.
Sarah Palin, McCain's choice for VP, was elected mayor of Wasilla by a
total of 651 votes in 1966 and 909 votes in 1999. She came into office in this
town of about 7,000 residents with a balanced budget. Six years later when she
left office, the town was $20 million in debt.
This VP candidate has now been governor of
We ask voters to consider what this VP choice tells us about McCain's
decision making. Do you really want the ex-mayor of Wasilla to have a 1-in-3
chance of being the president? Robert
and Diane Thompson
Greg Gille on Attacking John McCain’s Dishonorable
Campaign
John McCain has been running a dishonorable
campaign. . . oh, rather I should say, his lobbyists and other
behind-the-scenes vipers like Karl Rove have been running his dishonorable
campaign filled with lies, deceptions, distortions, and projection of
republican dysfunctional behavior onto Barack Obama. The Obama campaign doesn’t
have to make up things to condemn McCain, all that is needed is to tell the
truth which is damning enough. But the McCain campaign, as we all know,
doesn’t have any record or consistency he can run on, flip-flopping from one
day to the next on everything. His only shot at the Presidency is to
smear Obama. If we look at the way he has conducted his campaign, we get
a glimpse of HOW HE WOULD BE as President.
So I propose the Democrats run an ad that says something like:
“John McCain has proven his lack of integrity and honor from his voting record and now again by the manner in which he is conducting a campaign that jeopardizes the presidency with an inexperienced running mate who, along with McCain, continue to tell shameless lies about Barack Obama that have proven to be falsehoods.”
And then ask voters “Do you want another
team of liars in the White House with yet another legion of liars behind them
pulling the strings ?”
In fact that makes a good campaign
slogan: “Republicans, a legion of liars with a plan for corruption, cash,
and carnage. . .” Has a ring to it,
don’t ya think? J Greg Gille
Jean Carlson on Excellent Mental Health
Professionals
Published by
Fortunately, our "broken mental health care
system" (Monday) does not include the multitude of public service
employees caring for the mentally ill who come their way. In our experience,
from police officers to the professionals at
Liberals and Democrats
Who Supports
McCain? Who Supports Obama?
Our media doesn’t inform us of opinion poll results in sufficient detail to answer these questions. We may find out who women support. Or who White Women support. But not who unmarried white women support. So our answers to these questions are less precise and more speculative than we wish.
John McCain’s largest group of
supporters are Conservatives, perhaps a few more than those who support
President Bush. Traditional
Conservatives who are unhappy with President Bush’s increased government and
government deficits are hoping that McCain will be different. Sarah Palin is increasing support from
Christian Conservatives. Only
Libertarians may be less supportive, due to McCain’s support for the
White racists who won’t vote for Obama constitute 15% to 20% of voters. Some won’t vote. Others are Conservatives who wouldn’t vote for Obama even if he was White. So maybe 5% of our voters will vote for McCain even though they aren’t Conservatives on other issues. This makes a total of 45%.
In addition some working class White men (Reagan Democrats – probably Independents) may vote for McCain because they think Democrats favor Blacks and women with whom they compete. This would bring McCain’s support to almost 50%, if he can maintain his support among both Republicans and Independents.
Barack Obama is strongly supported by Blacks (13% of our voting population, Hispanics (14%), some of whom are also Black and young people (29% of registered voters, some of whom are also Black and Hispanic). For more. These groups may total 50% of our voting population, but their voting rates are lower than for other groups. A majority of unmarried women also support Obama, but many of them may be included in the other groups already noted. For more. For more.
I believe the result is that Barack
Obama will have 5% to 10% more support nationally than John McCain. Many of the Conservative voters are in the
Southern Red States. Similarly, Obama’s
supporters are large majorities in
The meltdown of our economy will help Obama. But crucial is stimulating Blacks, Hispanics, young people, and unmarried women to register and vote. Especially in closely contested states. Stimulating these groups to vote in all states is important in order to elect Congress members who will work with Obama to Restore Our American Dream. Electing Democratic governors and state legislators is also important to prepare for redistricting after the 2010 census. For more. Keep Calm.
What Do
Conservatives Want in a President?
Conservatives support Sarah Palin for Vice President. They clearly don’t care about experience. Conservatives support McCain and Palin because they agree with their policies.
What they want is a bellicose foreign policy. And a market fundamentalist economic policy. And Christian Conservative social policies. They ignore that Bush’s bellicose foreign policy and market fundamentalist economic policies of privatization and deregulation have clearly failed. They believe that if continued long enough, these policies will work.
It seems impossible to convince Conservatives that enough is enough. Bush’s policies have failed and if continued, as McCain proposes, would continue to fail. They accept McCain’s claims that he is for change which would eliminate corruption and bring competence to enacting Bush’s policies. They don’t recognize that pursuing Bush’s policies competently will still fail. They don’t recognize that corruption is inevitable when markets and private businesses are not regulated.
Trying to convince Conservatives, that change to Liberal policies Is necessary, won’t succeed. Such efforts are wasted. What we must do is inspire passionate Liberals to become more active. We must stimulate active Liberals to identify Liberals with little political passion and get them to vote. If we succeed in getting out our vote, we will have enough votes to win.
Note that Sarah Palin’s popularity is rapidly fading, at least among non-Republicans. And our economic crises are helping Barack Obama. Keep Calm.
Barack Obama Must
Distinguish His Change From McCain’s
Barack Obama’s change is change you
can believe in. For
more (video). It involves changing
President Bush’s policies. It involves
changing
McCain’s change is change that
won’t make a difference. He would
continue Bush’s policies. He says he
would eliminate earmarks, but doesn’t address corruption that would result from
his policies of privatization and deregulation.
He says he would reach across the isle, but his campaign viciously
attacks Democrats. McCain’s change isn’t
change you can count on to correct the mess that his Republican colleagues led
by President Bush have created. McCain’s
change is change you can’t count on.
Barack Obama must make these distinctions clear. For more. Dave Thomas
Postscript: John McCain has repeatedly said our economy is fundamentally sound. He has repeated said that he supports deregulation and referred to himself as a deregulator. For more (video). For more. Note McCain’s economic advisors. With the collapse this week of several financial companies and the steep fall of the stock market, he is still repeating his claim that our economy is fundamentally sound. But he now says that more regulation is needed and proposes a commission to recommend what regulation. For more. For more.
Barack Obama correctly notes that a commission just delays action. For more (video). For a least several years, Obama has promoted more regulation of financial markets and companies. But Obama’s message on regulation has been unclear. His economic plan doesn’t even mention it. He needs to express Robert Kuttler’s message.
Note the AFL-CIO’s recommended second economic stimulus package.
Fact
Check Is Biased
Fact Check and various commercial media are attempting to evaluate the truthfulness of various claims by our John McCain and Barack Obama campaigns. My impression is that they are biased, in attempting to find equal numbers of erroneous claims on both sides. The McCain campaign has made various claims about Obama’s proposals that are wrong. Obama’s tax proposals are clearly more progressive than McCain’s tax proposals. Obama has not proposed to teach young children about sex. For more. (video)
The fact checkers have not suggested that Obama has lied. They have instead suggested that Obama is misleading us because he doesn’t balance his criticisms of McCain’s proposals with praise for other McCain proposals. Even when confronted with his blatant lies, McCain has refused to retract them. Instead he has repeated them. Unfortunately, some of our public are believing McCain’s lies.
Here’s the Beef
What’s this? Elite nonsense? Community organizing? Liberal Spirituality? You Decide. (video)
What you can do to elect Barack Obama.
White Privilege and our 2008 presidential election.
The pundits: McCain lies. Doesn’t get it. Palin fading. More. Events are favoring Obama.
Joe Biden notes that John McCain copies Karl Rove’s divisive campaign practices.
John McCain’s campaign lies are typical of Republican campaigns. For more. For more. For more.
Even Republicans are noting John McCain’s lies. (video) For more.
Like McCain and many Republican campaigns, Sara Palin lies.
1400 people attend anti-Sarah Palin rally in Anchorage Alaska.
Why haven’t our commercial media shown Sarah Palin’s church like they did Obama’s? (Video)
Republicans do a full court press to stop Palin’s troopergate investigations. Democrats are M.I.A.
Eve Ensler has nightmares about Sarah Palin.
Sarah Palin says we may have to go to war with Russia to protect Georgia.
Sarah
Palin ignores the needs of unmarried women.
Will this help Obama win their support?
Sarah Palin is not a typical working mom.
Sarah Palin is helping John McCain obtain married women’s vote.
National Organization for Women (NOW) endorses Barack Obama.
John McCain has repeated voted against programs that help women. For more (video).
John McCain’s health plan will cause many to have less health care coverage.
John McCain should release his health records and other videos about McCain.
John McCain’s economic policies are the same as President Bush’s economic policies.
Joe Biden notes that John McCain says fundamentals of our economy are strong. (video)
During the almost 8 years of Bush’s presidency, the Dow Jones has gained less that 300 points.
Carly Fiorina, who wrecked Hewlett-Packard, says McCain and Palin couldn’t manage a corporation.
Michigan demonstrates obstacles that Barack Obama must overcome.
Barack and Michelle Obama are attentive to needs of military families. For more.
Barack Obama must sharpen his message about his and McCain’s contrasting solutions.
Obama-Biden Campaign goes on the attack. McCain doesn’t get our economic crisis.
Is Barack Obama’s campaign doing a poor job of framing?
Big business is supporting both presidential candidates, hoping to influence them.
Naomi Klein responds to Conservative critics of her shock doctrine.
Will President Bush be prosecuted for committing war crimes?
‘Yes’ magazines agenda provides more detail for our priorities.
Michael Lerner is wrong. Liberals aren’t anti-religious or anti-spiritual.
Bill Moyers on Conservative radio hate speech.
Endorsements
for General Election Candidates
In 2002, our Washington State Department of Revenue prepared a chart (for the Washington State Tax Structure Committee chaired by William H. Gates, Sr.) which showed problems with our tax system and alternatives which address them. The alternatives included a flat rate income tax and a graduated personal income tax. A sub-committee listed alternatives which did not include an income tax. To read the complete chart.
Our forthcoming issues of this newsletter will include commentaries concerning this and other recent proposals for substituting a progressive income tax in our tax system.
A Sensible
Eastside Rail Now!
has developed a plan for a truly comprehensive regional rail system that would
provide vastly greater benefits and the possibility of substantially reduced
costs as compared with Sound Transit's current and previous (i.e., Proposition 1) plans. These benefits include many more new route
miles of high quality rail service (95 or more miles versus as few as 17 miles
for Sound Transit's truncated system) and a much quicker startup of service.
This plan represents
a fundamental shift in philosophy for rail transit planning for the region.
Whereas, until recently the focus has been on implementing extremely costly new
rail projects that would serve relatively small numbers of people while
scrapping important existing infrastructure, Eastside Rail Now! proposes
constructing new infrastructure designed to serve the largest possible number
of people in all three counties but at the lowest practical cost consistent
with a high quality of service while retaining and upgrading existing
infrastructure. To see the complete plan.
David Ward:
Expand Car and Van Pools
Published by
The headline “Light rail plan may cut traffic 30 percent” reminded me of 1995 and 1996 when I voted for light rail initiatives because they promised to remove 54,000 cars from the road daily. When costs skyrocketed, I researched Sound Transit’s documents and found some surprising information in ST’s Transportation Technical Report.
Instead of 54,000 cars, light rail would remove only 24-240 cars from Sea-Tac to Northgate in the evening rush hour. Pollution and traffic would decrease less than 1 percent. Traffic delays increase at 75 percent of the light rail intersections.
There are many inexpensive, effective ways to get people off the road. Here are a few:
· Expand
· Car pools and van pools could be expanded, especially where buses aren’t frequent. I’ve developed a more flexible, usable van pool/car pool system that would take thousands of cars off the road, yet costs less than the money saved from building park and ride lots which would become unnecessary.
It makes no sense to spend billions when millions can work better. David Ward
Here’s the Beef
See who’s filing to
run for Washington state and federal offices.
New
voter registrations will break record.
Financial
contributions totals for top two candidates.
The
Building Industry of Washington violated our public disclosure laws. For more. For
more.
Listen to Darcy Burner’s
response to Dave Reichert’s lies.
2009
Washington State revenue uncertain. Budget
uncertain.
One
third of our North Cascades glaciers are doomed.
Everett-Seattle
trains and bus ridership are up 22% and 25%.
Seattle’s
bicycle plan should serve more than just commuters.
Citizen
lobbying finally stimulates Everett city council to initiate a bicycle plan.
Washington
state subsidies worth $18.6 million will encourage buyers to buy high mileage
hybrids.
Washington
Low Income Housing Alliance is mobilizing low income and homeless to act
politically.
Nation
and World
Our Economy Isn’t Fundamentally Sound
Fewer jobs. Less retail sales. Less investment. Failing
financial companies. Less credit
available. Stock market down. Lots of indicators that both main street and
Wall street are suffering.
John McCain’s
financial mentor Phil Gramm says it’s all in our heads. McCain says he believes
that the economy's fundamental strengths are strong, including the quality of
the American worker, and the strength of American innovation and
entrepreneurism. Unfortunately Bush’s
and McCain’s policies don’t reward the American worker, innovation or
entrepreneurism. Instead they reward the
wealthy and powerful and the speculators.
John McCain doesn’t realize that economic fundamentals include rewarding
productivity. He doesn’t realize that
financial companies must be regulated to reduce fraud and speculation. As McCain once said, I don’t understand our
economy. For
more. For more.
For
more.
As Barack Obama
said, John McCain is out of touch with our economy.
No End In Sight of Failed Financial Companies
Bear Sterns.
Fannie Mae. Freddie Mac. Merrill Lynch. Lehman Brothers. AIG.
As they fail, fewer agencies are able to loan money
to investors and consumers.
What should our government do? Doing nothing will cause recession as
consumers can’t borrow to purchase homes, automobiles and other durable goods
which they can afford. And investors won’t
be able to borrow to create new jobs. McCain’s
don’t-admit-problem do-nothing economics won’t work.
Simply bailing them out will cost taxpayers billions
and not create conditions to prevent the reoccurrence of risky loans that
caused our present problems. People will
borrow to consume who can’t afford to pay the loans back. People will borrow to speculate, creating
other bubbles.
It took much time and effort to produce a short term
stimulus package for taxpayers totaling less than $168 billion. But our
government has quickly (without congressional action) pledged $600-800 billion
to bail out collapsing financial companies.
For more. Obviously without a principled plan. But simply responding to the crisis of the
day. For more. Note that this is more than enough to pay for
government paid health care for all. Note
that this bailout money isn’t included in the anticipated $482 billion
government deficit, the highest ever.
We need to change from ‘borrow and consume’ to ‘earn
and invest’. Our highest priority should
be to encourage job creation, especially jobs using new technologies to meet
our environmental, health, infrastructure and other challenges. Some should be federal jobs. Others should be state and local government
jobs, perhaps funded federally. Others
should be private jobs, often offered by new small firms. Tax policies and subsidies can stimulate
these types of jobs.
Financial companies should be created or encouraged
which are regulated to focus upon making loans to job creating investors. Similarly, financial companies should be
created or encouraged which are regulated to focus upon making loans for
housing and other consumption, within the ability of the borrowers to pay back
the loans.
We should discourage loans which the borrowers are
unlikely to ‘pay back. We should
discourage loans to be used for speculation.
Partly by imposing margin requirements.
And perhaps imposing a transaction tax.
We should discourage loans which enable environmentally destructive
consumption. Until we direct our
financial industry to making only economically, environmentally and socially appropriate
loans, we will continually face fraudulent practices, bubbles and their
collapse. More detailed commentary
on what we should and shouldn’t do will appear in next week’s newsletter.
Our failure to regulate is bi-partisan. In
1999, Alan Greenspan, Robert Rubin and Arthur Levitt opposed regulation of
derivatives.
Ten Conservative Myths about National Security
1.
"Islamofascism" is our biggest national security threat.
2.
We're fighting them there so we don't have to fight them here.
3.
Military solutions are the only effective national security solutions.
4.
What we're doing is working; we haven't had another 9/11.
5.
"Law enforcement" approaches to terrorism don't work.
6.
We don't need allies; we can do this on our own.
7.
You don't negotiate with dictators.
8.
National security spending is different from pork-barrel spending on other
programs.
9.
Airport security is critical to our anti-terrorism effort.
10.
It's always necessary to give up our civil liberties in a time of war.
States Aren’t Protecting People from Health Insurance
Abuse
In
June 2008, Families USA released an extensive 50-state survey and scorecard of
the laws governing the individual insurance market in each state - "Failing
Grades: State Consumer Protections in the Individual Health Insurance
Market." They found great variation across states and, overall,
too little that states are doing to protect consumers from the anti-consumer
behavior of insurance companies.
Key findings from Families USA's report are:
· Only 5 states prohibit all insurance companies from cherry-picking the healthiest consumers and excluding everyone else.
·
In 35 states and the
·
In 21 states and the
·
In 45 states and the
·
In 44 states and the
· States have many options to ensure consumers in the individual and small group markets are treated fairly and that more of our premium dollars actually go to health care rather than profits and share-holder earnings.
How About Exporting Long Term Medical Care?
Long term care is enormously expensive. $50,000 and up and increasing. Yet we pay many of our caretakers less than a
living wage. Americans
are increasingly going abroad to receive quality medical care far cheaper than
here in the United States. How about
sending our patients suffering from Alzheimer’s and other chronic illnesses
abroad? Assuming the cost would be tens
of thousands of dollars less, I would expect that this will occur. With modern communications, we could easily
visit with our loved ones, although without touching them.
Here’s
the Beef
Individuals,
neighborhood groups and communities are erecting wind turbines to serve
themselves.
A
program to create green jobs. Lets invest $100 billion to create green
jobs.
Water should be a human
right. Not a commodity.
Women’s jobless
rate is rapidly increasing.
Colorado voters will
decide whether employers must have cause to fire an employee.
Too
few medical students are choosing primary care.
What’s the solution?
Is
our present collapse of our financial companies the smoking gun for market
fundamentalism?
Highly
leveraged investment banks are no longer viable.
Our
government is on the slippery slope to bailing out multitudes of failing
financial companies.
Our
government now owns 80% of insurance company AIG. Isn’t this socialism?
Instead
of case-by-case responses, we need a long run solution to endangered financial
companies.
Robert Kuttner: Seven sins of deregulation and three solutions.
Would a financial
transactions tax help deter speculation?
Two thirds of Americans oppose giving more power to
our president.
U.S.
arms sales abroad has increased from $12 billion in 2005 to $32 billion.
Many organizations and
governments support arms Control Treaty.
Our U.S. government is supporting
overthrow of Bolivian elected government.
Our Liberal Spirit
Human Development
From 1965 to 1973 in
Working in rural villages and urban neighborhoods, we arranged and conducted workshops, which enabled participants to brainstorm, organize and implement a plan for improving their community. Participants would discuss their history and situation, express their vision, identify obstacles and create strategies and tactics. The tactics consisted of small projects which enabled them to work together, while learning leadership, cooperation, research, resource mobilization and how to build motivation.
The bottom line was to turn people’s heads around from ‘I can’t’ to ‘We can’. We do both human development, both socially and individually. For more.
Unlike Saul Alinsky’s community organization activities, our work was in small communities in which the obstacle was a lack of unity instead of entrenched special interests. Alinsky’s approach focuses upon identifying the interests of potential participants and organizing broad coalitions (church groups, labor unions, caring and advocacy organizations, etc.) to confront entrenched special interests. Small victories lead to addressing more issues, broadening the coalition and winning larger issues.
Barack Obama’s community development experience is based upon Saul Alinsky’s approach. During his campaign, he has emphasized unity, mobilizing a broad movement to implement change. But he has given less emphasis to the type of change to be implemented and to the obstacles to that change. I believe the emphasis should first be upon the values and vision, then upon the obstacles and then upon the unity.
Our Vision is Reclaiming our American Dream. We want all people who work hard (and smart) to receive the rewards for their work. We want to assist people to be able to work hard and smart and to continually expand such opportunities for our children and future generations. This should be the first thing that Obama should emphasize. Our Puget Sound Liberals emphasizes this vision in our values which define us and in our priorities.
Obstacles to our Vision include the opposition of Conservatives and the special interests which corrupt our legislators and officials. They include our old politics in which various politicians compete to obtain power, instead of working together to realize our vision. They include a top-down Democratic Party which fails to mobilize our grass roots. They include an unorganized grassroots and political alienation. Conservatives and our commercial media critically label those who address these obstacles as ‘populists’ who are conducting class warfare.
Our major Strategy is to mobilize grassroots people to unite to elect and then pressure our legislators and government officials to destroy the undue power of special interests and enact and implement programs to Reclaim our American Dream.
I believe Barack Obama should emphasize these in the order presented here. He should always begin with references to our values and our American Dream, with a few storied examples. He should then identify and attack those who are destroying our American dream, again with a few storied examples. They are the ones who unpatriotically would ignore our American tradition of democratic opportunity. They are the free lunch bunch who seek rewards they don’t earn them, denying rewards to those who do earn them. Only then should he finish by noting that urgent change can only come through creating unity. Through mobilizing grassroots groups to work together to create and implement solutions, again with a few storied examples.
As Michael Lerner, George Lakoff and others have noted, values are basic. Naming solutions is more persuasive than naming programs. Telling stories is crucial. No one does this better than Obama. But his emphases have often been misplaced. They must be our:
1. Vision of Urgent Change to Reclaim our American Dream,
2. Obstacles of special interests and old politics, and
3. Strategy of Americans working together in unity.
Recommended Books – See our list of books for
liberals
Saul Alinsky, 1946, Reveille for Radicals.
Saul Alinsky, 1972, Rules for Radicals.
The following books about the
R. Brian Stanfield, 1900, The Courage to Lead
R. Brian Stanfield, 2002, The Workshop
Book: From Individual Creativity to Group Action
Laura Spencer, 1989, Winning Through Participation
Institute of Cultural Development, 1989, Approaches that Work
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