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Our Website Our Editor To Unsubscribe Table of
Contents * Featured Articles Calendars of Events Communication With Our Members Opportunities Petitions Commentaries from Our Members – Ray McBain Recommends Government Action Article Rich Austin on Anti-Health Reform Dialogue Liberals and Democrats Links to the Beef Major Political Battles to Come* State and Local Links
to the Beef A Vision for Washington State Democrats Nation and World Links to the Beef Federal Budgeting for Dummies* Robert Kuttner: Policies to Reform Our Economy* Japan Offers a Model for Financial Equality* Our Liberal Spirit Our
Political Priorities ·
Fair Clean
Elections and Open Government ·
Fair Taxes and
Competent Spending ·
Investment for
Productivity ·
Quality
Health, Education, Jobs, Income ·
Environmental
Protection and Energy Independence ·
Security and
Equal Rights ·
Justice and
Peace Everywhere ·
International
Cooperation and Leadership Conservatives oppose all of these Let’s
End Our National Nightmare
Let’s
Restore Our American Dream More on Conservative opposition to our
American Dream Washington State’s 5 Major Needs ·
Federal
Funding for Health and Education · Substitute
a Progressive Income Tax · Replacing
Conservative Legislators Quote of the Week It took us a couple of days because I like to know
what I'm talking about before I speak.
Barack Obama on March 24,
2009
Calendar of Events
Friday, April 3 at 7 PM at Kane Hall, Room 120 (University of Washington,
Seattle) – 4th Annual Physicians for a National Health
Program – Western Washington Public Meeting, including addresses by
Oliver Fein, Representative Jim McDermott and Robby Stern.
Tuesday, April 7 at 7 PM at Newport Way Library (
Friday, April 24 (3-9 PM); Saturday, April 25 (9 AM-6 PM); and Sunday,
April 26 (9 AM – 3:30 PM) at Seattle – Camp
Wellstone training for citizen activists, campaign workers and
candidates. $50 - $200. To
register.
Friday, April 24 to Sunday, April 26 at the Grand Illusion Cinema (
Communication
with Our Members
Help
Your Liberal Friends
This newsletter is free, costing me only
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Having more members creates a bit more
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Opportunities
and Petitions
Useful
Websites: contacts, maps, community organizing tools, and more.
Access
to jillions of political cartoons.
Download
Sightline Institute’s climate policy primer ‘Cap and Trade 101’. About
Sightline.
Obtain Progressive
States Networks resources for improving many state government services.
Petitions
Sign
petition supporting President Obama’s Afghanistan policy.
Sign petition
that public health insurance must at least be an option to private health
insurance.
Tell
your congress members to support President Obama’s 2010 budget.
Tell your
congress members to support regulation of all financial companies, funds and
products.
Tell
Governor Gregoire and legislators to fully fund Basic Health Plan and GAU.
Tell Governor
Gregoire to allow voters to vote on increasing taxes to help balance budget.
Tell all
congress members to include a public insurance plan alternative to private
insurance plans.
Tell
your senators to not reduce President Obama’s proposed international affairs
budget
Tell
Senator Arlen Specter to support the Workers Free Choice Act.
Tell
Attorney General Eric Holder to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate
American torture.
Commentaries
From Our Members
Ray McBain
Recommends Commentary about Government Actions
I trust Obama to try to do the right
thing. I do not trust the people he has
picked re. financial woes.
Read this to gain some understanding of what's going on in government. Ray
McBain
Rich Austin:
Health Care Dialogue Results in Anti-Health Reform Agenda
This report, Health Reform Dialogue, contains a few modest but obvious recommendations that any reasonable
reform effort must include. Much more important is that the primary theme of
this report, as exemplified by the sampling of recommendations listed above, is
that we should continue with the status quo, dumping more of our dollars into
our dysfunctional, wasteful, inefficient, fragmented system of financing health
care. So why should we pay any attention
at all to this worthless contribution to the national dialogue on health care
reform? It is because it exposes the blatant lie that we are close to agreeing
on reform that would bring affordable, high quality care to all residents of
the
This highly touted, closed door process has been taking place over the
past half year. Theoretically all important stakeholders were included (except
patients). They agreed that we have finally come to the time that reform is an
absolute imperative. Through intensive negotiations behind closed doors in a
(symbolically) smoke-filled room, they finally agreed... that smoking is bad
for your health (and a couple of other points of less significance). There is absolutely no mention of a single
payer national health program or Medicare for All. That option was discarded
before anyone walked into the room.
The compromise position to which the progressives had agreed would be to
offer a public, Medicare-like insurance program to compete in the market of
private plans. "Health Reform Dialogue" remains silent on such an
option. In a decision to exclude the
progressive community from playing any serious role in reform, moderates are
now proposing a government-sponsored, managed care PPO program, insulted by a
double firewall from the government, so that it must compete on a "fair
playing field" with the private plans. "Health Reform Dialogue"
even remains silent on the possibility of offering a government PPO that would
be required to include the same perverse policies that are inherent features of
the private health plan models.
Look again at the organizations that signed on to this report. Two
organizations that participated in the process are conspicuously absent:
American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) and the
Service Employees International Union (SEIU). At the end of this process, they
refused to sign on to a document that would have even less impact than a no
smoking pledge. Look again at the list
and decide which organizations actually controlled the process. Yes, those are
the same organizations that have an ownership position in the Congress of the
Unless Americans are ready to march on
Liberals
and Democrats
Obama Watch – Week 10
Also go to Whitehouse.gov.
President Obama’s Organizational
Discipline
Our
present administration is more
disciplined than any previous administration. White House officials meet weekly to decide
their agenda for coming weeks. A limited
number of important meetings are held and they are disciplined. President Obama reserves time for thinking
and mingling. The results are both
effective and efficient. Especially
compared with recent administrations.
Read
about Obama’s marketing strategy.
Obama’s
boldness with cautions is confusing both his critics and supporters.
If
our economy doesn’t quickly begin to recover, opponents of our economic
stimulus-investment package will say it isn’t working and should be
repealed. If our economy does quickly
begin to recover, opponents will say our package isn’t needed and should be
repealed.
President Obama: Here, There, Everywhere
On
Wednesday, President Obama appeared at a Wednesday evening fundraiser.
On
Thursday, he held a virtual
town meeting.
On
Friday, he
met with executives of large banks. For
more.
On
Saturday, his
weekly address extolled volunteerism. For
more.
Since
President Obama became president, his campaign for public support continues.
President
Obama’s diversified media strategy is maintaining his popularity
When people are picking at
President Obama from all directions, can he be wrong?
March
31 NY
congressional race is a referendum on President Obama’s economic policies
2010 Budget
President
Obama’s 2010 budget is being approved by congress. For
more. 2010
budget appropriation bills may need with only 50 votes to pass senate. The biggest threat to passing Obama’s
proposals is unruly
Democratic congress members. For
more. For
more.
Republican budget
outline reduces taxes for rich, increases taxes for the rest of us. For more. Democratic
ad lampoons Republicans so-called budget (video). By contrast, James Galbraith calls for an economic
revitalization program similar to wartime mobilization.
Legislation
Congress
passed and President Obama signed a Wilderness
Protection bill which adds more than 2 million acres to
The Serve
America bill has been passed by both houses of congress. It awaits President Obama’s signature when he
returns from
Binding
mercury emissions control treaty results from Obama administration efforts.
Policy
Tim
Geithner and Ben Bernanke propose comprehensive regulation of financial
companies.
President
Obama is forcing General Motors to become much smaller if it is to
survive. Chrysler is again becoming part
of a foreign company. For
more.
Our
Transportation Dept. announced tougher mileage standards, the first in 25
years. Government
may provide cash to those who trade in clunkers for more fuel efficient new
cars.
On
March 27, Obama announced an
Afghanistan/Pakistan strategy to prevent either from being a safe haven for
Al Qaeda, including military, diplomatic and development aid components. For
more. For
more. Is Obama overestimating
the danger that
President Obama plans a
late April Climate Summit with representatives of 16 major countries.
European Trip
Since Barack Obama was inaugurated on Tuesday, January
20th, I have been counting weeks as running from Tuesday through the
next Tuesday. So we will report the
Obama’s European trip next week (week 11).
Here is his itinerary:
Tuesday: Travels to
Thursday: Attends G-20
economic summit in
Friday: Goes to NATO
summit in
Saturday: Travels to
April 5: Travels to
April 6: Visits
April 7: Returns to
Here
are preliminary commentaries: one. Two. Three. Four. In spite of
President
Obama gave Queen Elizabeth an iPod. More
appropriately, he might have given her two former colonies. Perhaps
Major Political Battles to Come
Strong
lobbies will resist health care reform, cap and trade climate emissions
control, military spending reductions, and measures which promote
unionization. Our Obama administration
has so far delayed or indicated compromise on these various issues. Unless these hard fought issues are resolved
to produce necessary reforms, our deficits may be much greater and corporations
will continue to create for financial inequality.
Health Care
While
there
is widespread agreement that health reform is needed now, there is disagreement
about various aspects. Particularly
whether public health insurance should at least be an option to private health
insurance. This
and other issues are being negotiated now by White House and Congressional
participants.
In
any event, we will learn that a system which includes private health insurance
will be unaffordable, even if other problems of access and complexity can be
solved. For
more. For
more. Any money saved will come
later, so how
to pay for health reform?
Cap and Trade
Coal
interests strongly oppose Cap and Trade legislation which will reduce the use
of coal. They and their Republican
supporters argue that, like a tax increase, it will increase costs for
consumers. But the money obtained can be
given back to consumers, who will benefit in the longer run from cheaper
alternative energies, less pollution and less global warming. House
Democratic leaders have introduced a plan. For more. For
more.
Reduce Military Spending
Our
Obama administration’s budget proposal includes a 4%
increase in military expenditures. Cutting these expenditures is necessary to
obtain money for domestic infrastructure and safety net programs. Just as important, a large military with many
hundreds of foreign bases, tempts us to an imperial foreign policy, including
military action and the alienation of other countries and their peoples.
Promoting Unionization
Businesses
are strenuously opposing legislation and other measures to make unionization
easier.
Unions
insist that they have sufficient congressional support. But so far the Obama administration and
congress have delayed action.
Key
to resolving these issues are the Obama administration’s policies and the votes
of our often inconsistently Liberal Democratic Congress Members. Our readers should respond to our petitions
to tell our congress members to strongly support these reforms.
Liberals and Progressives
I
find John Podesta’s attempts to differentiate Liberals and Progressives
unconvincing. I believe that Liberals
agree with all the principles and strategies that he suggests are unique to
Progressives. And vice versa. But I have come to believe that there is
value in having people who identify with either label. It provides a healthy competition between
their various adherents. It also makes
it more difficult for the Conservative remnant to focus their attacks. For
more.
Let
me also put here: “the only people listening to Rush Limbaugh are elderly, balding
men who weahttp://thehill.com/leading-the-news/dems-split-over-best-way-to-push-health-agenda-2009-03-26.htmlr
dentures and have erectile dysfunction, prostate issues and heat rash.” For
more. See the comments.
Here’s the Beef
Fair Elections Now
Act introduced in congress to provide public campaign financing.
Various
legislation to protect people from corporate exploitation should be passed.
President
Obama’s budget eliminates bank participation in providing student loans.
Senate rejects
amendment which would have funded anti-choice pregnancy centers.
Neo-Conservatives are still
proposing that the U.S. extend our empire.
More
Republican congress members will be vulnerable in 2010.
When
Conservatives flee a Socialist America, where will they go?
State
and Local
Toward Tax Reform
In
Following Governor Gregoire’s lead, our state
senate has produced a budget with no tax increases. Our state senate has proposed that our
current budget contain $1,380 million less for education (both K-12 and higher
education) than is necessary to continue our previous spending pattern. $786 less would be spent on health care
oriented largely to our poorest people. Other
cuts would harm our disabled. For more. If enacted, our economy will be less efficient
and our safety net less effective. The house
budget is similar. Senate leader
Lisa Brown has at least posed the question of whether we need to raise more
revenue. I wonder if our budget would be
different if she were governor.
Conservatives and our media continually emphasize that
spending has increased by a third over the last four years. But spending four years ago was depressed due
to the dot.com bubble collapse. Compared
with 1990s budgets, our recent budgets have not been higher than to account for
inflation and changing needs. The only
way to maintain and improve our infrastructure and safety net (in the way they
have traditionally been maintained and improved) is to substitute a fairer tax
structure which produces more revenue, especially during recessions. This requires substituting a progressive
income tax for some of our regressive sales and property taxes.
Tax reform depends upon advocacy by prominent citizens
and citizen groups. This depends upon
educating their members and members of the general public. This newsletter and a few other Liberal
organizations are doing our part. But
many other plastic Liberal organizations focus upon small issues while ignoring
the major obstacles to achieving our Liberal vision for
"Now more than ever we need our public structures
to provide security and opportunity to help people through these dark
times," said Tony Lee, Advocacy Director at Solid Ground. Lee and
other advocates are urging lawmakers to propose a reasonable solution to our
budget crisis by considering all options, including
raising revenue, in order to protect the economic security and health of
our families, communities and the state.
Various Educational
Associations and Labor Organizations have met to discuss tax increases, but
apparently disagree about whether to increase existing regressive taxes or add
a progressive income tax. For more.
The Washington State Budget & Policy Center
says the state needs leadership from our policymakers that includes bold action on raising the revenue
necessary to invest in education, community, health, and security. For More.
Fuse Washington finally says, “Urge
them (legislators) to consider raising revenue to reduce the size of cuts to
critical programs.” in an email, but not on their website.
HorsesAss blog and many who comment on it support a progressive income tax. Majority
Rules Blog includes King County LAC resolution asking Governor Gregoire to
consider tax increases. Chad Lukas wrote
petition to Governor Gregoire to allow voters to decide about increasing taxes.
A Vision for
In recent years (under the leadership of Frank Chopp),
Democratic legislators have focused upon becoming a majority. Carefully choosing legislation to pass which
would build their support. They have
succeeded. But in spite of the national
and
At our national level, voters have responded to the
shared vision offered by President Obama.
At our state level, our Democratic organization, Congress members,
Executive and Legislative candidates offer no such vision. Instead our Democratic political candidates
and officials are individual political entrepreneurs who focus upon their
particular narrow interests. They tout
their specific accomplishments instead of expressing a vision for our
state. We virtually never see joint
manifestos by all or many of our Democratic congress members or our Democratic
state legislators.
No long run strategy appears to improve our state or
to remain in power. They don’t even
cooperate to play offense against potential Republican candidates for major
offices, such as Rob McKenna, Reagan Dunn and Dan Roach. Our governor and state legislators were
largely blindsided by our economic recession and resulting state revenue shortfalls. They appear to have no significantly
different strategy for coping with it than we would expect from
Republicans. If so, they haven’t told us
what these differences are.
Focusing upon short term winning is the Old Politics
that Barack Obama denounced. Expressing
and implementing a vision for improving our country and state is the New
Politics that he is bringing to the other
Featured Advocacy Group --------
Futurewise -------------------------------------
Futurewise
is a statewide public interest group working to promote healthy communities and
cities while protecting farmland, forests and shorelines today and for future
generations.
We are the only statewide group in
Futurewise has established an impressive
track record on growth management issues as the state's primary advocate for
smart growth policies. Recent
accomplishments include:
Building Healthy, Attractive Communities
· Futurewise's work has led nine different cities to
eliminate sprawl zoning and accommodate thousands of additional homes.
· Futurewise has strengthened protections for
environmentally sensitive areas in cities across the state.
· Futurewise is evaluating and supporting reforms that
reduce the barriers to and create incentives for desirable development.
· Futurewise worked with the City of
· Futurewise negotiated an agreement with the City of
Improving Transportation Choices
· Futurewise convinced the Legislature to approve $750
million in new funding for transportation choices in 2005, including $58
million for a new safe routes to schools program, $50 million for special needs
transit and a new Office of Mobility at the Department of Transportation.
· Futurewise spearheaded the successful effort to defeat
I-745 (an initiative that would have diverted
· Futurewise defended funding for light rail and other
transit investments by defeating legislation aimed at forcing Sound Transit to
spend nearly $60 million subsidizing utility companies.
· Futurewise successfully refocused state level efforts
to spend billions of dollars on wasteful freeway expansions into critical
safety and maintenance projects.
Saving Open Spaces and Natural Places
· In
· In
· In
The people of
Your voice is needed to protect our drinking water, farmlands and
quality of life. The success of state and local land use issues rests on people
like you who are active in their communities. Citizens can write letters to the
editor of their newspapers; call, e-mail or meet with legislators; send written
comments to their city and county; and testify at public hearings. When cities
and counties choose not to comply with the law, it is up to citizens or citizen
groups to appeal the plan.
There are many ways to get involved at Futurewise and with the
work it does - please join it! Sign up
to be a part of its activist network and have your voice heard. Legislators,
council members, and agency staff need to hear what you think as they make
decisions about the future of your community.
·
Email chieu@futurewise.org to sign up for Action Alerts: Futurewise
e-mails 1-2 alerts a month on issues that matter to you in your community.
·
Current Action Alerts: Learn
about important issues and how to take action.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Here’s the Beef
Fuse opposes cuts to education, but
doesn’t suggest how to obtain funds to avoid cuts.
John
Burbank supports professionalizing childcare workers.
Newspapers
decline partly due to decreased investigative reporting.
Opinions
differ concerning route of Eastside light rail into Bellevue City Center.
Bellingham
shows the way to using sustainable local resources and products.
Our State Dept.
of Agriculture has certified first organic restaurant: Olympia’s ‘The Mark’
Green
jobs may include loggers who preserve instead of cut trees.
Green
dairies have many environmental and economic benefits.
New
report cites many increasing costs that would result in Washington from climate
warming.
Department
of Energy will spend $2 billion stimulus money to clean up Hanford.
It
may be impossible to clean up after a major oil spill in Puget Sound.
House Committee
and Senate have approved a bill giving all marriage rights to domestic
partners.
Nation
and World
Federal Budgeting for Dummies
In general, funds for Federal Government programs
must be authorized by an authorizing
committee through enactment of legislation. Then, through subsequent acts
by Congress, budget authority is then appropriated by the Appropriations Committees of the House and Senate. In principle,
committees with jurisdiction to authorize programs make policy decisions, while
the Appropriations Committees decide on funding levels, limited to a program's
authorized funding level, though the amount may be any amount less than the
limit.
In practice, the separation between policy making
and funding, and the division between appropriations and authorization
activities are imperfect. Authorizations for many programs have long lapsed,
yet still receive appropriated amounts. Other programs that are authorized
receive no funds at all. In
addition, policy language -- that is legislative text changing permanent law --
is included in appropriation measures.
The way
Congress develops tax and spending legislation is guided by a set of specific
procedures laid out in the Congressional Budget Act of 1974. The centerpiece of
the Budget Act is the requirement that Congress each year develop a “budget
resolution” setting aggregate limits on spending and targets for federal
revenue. The limits set by the budget resolution, along with a companion
“pay-as-you-go” rule, apply to all tax or spending legislation developed by
individual committees as well as to any amendments offered on the House or
Senate floor.
· The annual federal budget process
begins with a detailed proposal from the President in February. For more detail.
· Congress next develops an authorizing blueprint called a budget
resolution that sets limits on how much each committee can spend (or reduce
revenues) over the course of the year.
This authorizing budget resolution is for guiding congressional
appropriations committees and is not subject to presidential approval.
· The terms of the budget
resolution are then enforced against individual appropriations, entitlement bills, and tax bills on the House and
Senate floors.
· In addition, Congress sometimes
uses a special procedure called “reconciliation” to facilitate the passage of
deficit reduction legislation or other major entitlement or tax legislation.
· Finally, a companion PAYGO rule
helps ensure that tax cuts and entitlement increases are paid for and do not
add to the deficit. However, the PAYGO
rule is not now in effect. It may be
reinstituted after our economy recovers.
President Obama’s Budget
Less
than two months after taking office, President Obama has presented his preliminary 2010 budget, which
provides the rationale for the 2010 budget, including 10 year projections, with
proposed budget amounts for 2010 and following years. Our house and senate are now deciding upon
authorizing budgetary limits. The budget
resolution should be passed by April 15th.
For
our 2010 budget year, the limits that
are being decided appear to be largely in agreement with President Obama’s
proposals. Congress members who are
most concerned about large budget deficits, even if temporary, have
proposed eliminating or delaying authorizing 2011 funds for health care reform
and cap and trade emissions control system.
Depending upon economic recovery and politics, these funds might be
restored next year when the 2011 budget is decided. They are also attempting to reduce
the 2010 budget by about $100 billion.
In
May, President Obama will present a much more detailed budget. Congressional appropriations committees are
already deliberating authorizations.
Congress hopes to pass all of its appropriations bills by the August
recess. Or at least before the October 1st
beginning of our 2010 fiscal year. If
some bills are not passed by then (as has been typical in recent years),
continuing resolutions will be passed to continue spending much as they were
during the 2009 budget year.
So
far it appears that the Republicans will just say no to Democratic proposals,
such that the budget will be decided by Democrats. If enough Republican senators can not be
found to reach 60 votes, a
procedure may be used which requires only 51 votes, with our vice president
voting to break a tie.
Robert Kuttner: Essential Policies to Reform Our
Economy
There
are several radical remedies that cry out for presidential leadership. Some of
them are essential if we are to get the economy into recovery. Others are
long-deferred reforms that
·
Use Direct Government Loans to Refinance Mortgages.
·
Put Insolvent Banks into Government Receivership.
·
Nationalize the Federal Reserve.
·
Pass a Tobin Tax.
·
Put Tax and Regulatory Havens out of Business.
·
Enact a Carbon Tax.
·
Pass Comprehensive Pre-Kindergarten and High-Quality Child Care.
·
Guarantee Workers the Right to Join a
·
Provide Health Insurance For All.
·
Use Very Large-Scale Public Works.
All of these ideas have four things in
common. They are essential if we are to restore broadly shared prosperity. They
are at the far fringes of political debate. They require dislodging the
political influence of powerful lobbies. And they would be supported by a
majority of Americans if a president decided to lead.
You will hear over and over from the
political right that Obama is spreading himself too thin. They said that about
Social Security was an impossibly radical
idea until it was enacted. So was Medicare. And so were the great civil-rights
acts of the 1960s. Then they suddenly became utterly main stream, so well
entrenched in the hearts of Americans that they proved impossible to dislodge.
But before they could be enacted, a titanic struggle was required, and a
president had to decide to put his prestige on the line. That's the essence of
progressive leadership. To
read Robert Kuttner’s entire commentary.
The following are excerpts from a commentary
by Sanford M. Jacoby and Sally Kohn.
While
Why? Despite some changes in recent years, most large
Japanese corporations still practice a form of capitalism in which different
groups with a stake in the enterprise — owners, employees, managers, suppliers,
creditors — work together to create value. Cooperation is possible because the various stakeholders have made
long-term commitments to the firm. The result is a more holistic
corporation, balancing short-term opportunities with long-term needs.
A large company in
American corporations (including banks), under
pressure from speculative investors, prioritize driving up short-term stock
prices and dividends. Executives are "aligned" with shareholder
interests through stock-based compensation. But this creates an incentive for
executives to boost their own compensation by taking excessive risks and by
manipulating share prices. Ultimately this harms the long-term health of
companies and thus the long-term health of
In stakeholder
capitalism, employees participate in corporate decision-making. While unions in both
And when corporations function as teams, fairness
becomes an instinctive priority. In the United States in 2006, the average CEO
earned more than 364 times the
average U.S. worker — a huge increase from, say, 1980, when the differential
was just 40 times more.
Measurements of economic inequality find that wealth,
too, is less unequally distributed in
Of course,
Nevertheless, lessons from
But we need to go further. For example, we need to
revamp corporate charter laws to mandate stakeholder governance and corporate
accountability, to adopt laws like the Employee Free Choice Act to strengthen
employee representation and to tax unearned income at the same rates applied to
wages and salaries.
Building Our New Economy
The following
are excerpts from commentaries by Kurt
Anderson and Harold
Meyerson.
1950s and 1960s: Producing and Investing
When
manufacturing companies dominated what was still a national economy in the
1950s and '60s, they favored and profited from improvements in
1980s through 2008:
Borrowing and Spending
From 1980 to 2007, the median price of a new American home
quadrupled. The Dow Jones industrial average climbed from 803 in the summer of
1982 to 14,165 in the fall of 2007. From the beginning of the '80s through
2007, the share of disposable income that each household spent servicing its
mortgage and consumer debt increased 35%. Back in 1982, the average household
saved 11% of its disposable income. By 2007 that number was less than 1%.
Until the late '80s, only
Now everything really has changed.
More than a year into the Great Recession, we still aren't sure if
there's a bottom in sight, and six months after the financial system began
imploding, it's still iffy. The party is finally, definitely over. Sustainability is going to be shaping
individual and public-policy decisions.
Annual increases of 10% and 15% in real estate prices were not
sustainable; endlessly lowering taxes and expanding government isn't
sustainable; Medicare and the war on drugs as currently constituted are not
sustainable.
Now What?
So
what kind of capitalism shall we craft? Now that the market fundamentalism to
which we've adhered for the past 30 years has -- by its own criterion of
increasing shareholder value -- totally failed?
The German Example
Manufacturing
has become too global to permit the
So does
The Scandinavian Example
In addition to
bolstering industry, we should take a cue from
Stimulating Higher Earning
Making such
changes here would require laws easing unionization (such as the Employee Free
Choice Act, which was introduced this week in Congress) and policies that
professionalize jobs in child care, elder care and private security. To be
sure, this form of capitalism requires a larger public sector than we have had
in recent years. But investing in more highly trained and paid teachers, nurses
and child-care workers is more likely to produce sustained prosperity than
investing in the asset bubbles to which Wall Street was so fatally attracted.
Would such
changes reduce the dynamism of the American economy? Not necessarily,
particularly since Wall Street often mistook deal-making for dynamism. Indeed,
since finance eclipsed manufacturing as our dominant sector, our rates of
intergenerational mobility have fallen behind those in presumably less dynamic
For a Sustainable Economy, we need:
Education,
public and private investment to improve productivity
Unionization
and income support to improve earnings
Affordable
housing near jobs, accessible health care and conservation to reduce waste
Simpler
lives less dependent upon consumption
Global recession
provides opportunity to reverse culture of consumerism.
Providing Adequate Pensions
The following are
excerpts from a commentary
by Marie Cocco.
Most Americans
now working can expect to have less income security in retirement than their
parents.
The average
annual Social Security benefit among current retirees now stands at $13,864 --
roughly what a minimum-wage worker earns in a year. Half of all people 65 and
older have incomes of less than $17,382 a year.
Still,
millions in the current Social Security generation have traditional pensions
from unions or big corporations, which once took pride in offering a retirement
plan that guaranteed a lifelong, monthly income to former workers. But today,
such pensions are all but extinct, pushed into oblivion by a corporate strategy
of lowering costs by shifting to 401(k) plans in which workers save for their
own retirement and manage their own investments. No need to point out how this
has worked: The median balance in family retirement accounts was $45,000 in
2007, according to the Federal Reserve. Now even those have shriveled with the
stock market slide. And many employers have temporarily halted their matching
contributions to 401(k)s as they weather the recession.
Labor unions
and pension-rights activists are beginning to work together in much the same
way that advocates of universal health care organized more than two decades
ago: by compiling the cruel facts and trying to force policymakers to confront
them. The
If this sounds
a lot like the only functioning part of the current retirement system -- Social
Security -- that's because it is. If common sense were applied to the pension
problem, we would find a way to use the current Social Security system -- which
already is mandatory, portable between employers and has an administrative
system for payroll deductions and benefits already in place -- and enrich its
benefits.
Here’s the Beef
New clean elections bills
have been introduced into congress.
Legislation
introduced in congress to curtail Patriot Act’s abuses.
Many contracts
require replacing rights to a fair trial with often unfair binding arbitration.
Amnesty International
says Summit of the Americans should strongly support human rights.
Commercial
media doesn’t correct false Conservative statements.
Investigative
journalism need not depend upon commercial media.
Evangelical
Christianity isn’t sustainable.
Consumer
spending increases slightly.
Hemp
can provide economic stimulus through green jobs.
Medical
house calls provide many advantages.
Infrastructure
improvement requires more money, planning, technology and citizen involvement.
20,000
hedge funds may fold by end of 2009.
Our Federal Reserve needs
fixing.
An
immigration raid destroys a local community’s economy.
Plenty
of racial inequalities persist.
Our Labor
Department is failing to enforce minimum wage.
Main
Street wages are crucial to creating a sustainable economy.
Health and Human
Services Dept. reports health reform must stop increasing costs & reduced quality.
More funding for
public defenders is needed to ensure justice.
Legislation
introduced to prohibit predatory lending practices.
KBR’s lousy wiring of
Iraq bathrooms is killing U.S. military personnel.
Spain
and England are investigating torture, which may include U.S. officials.
In
Spite of President Obama’s global popularity, our U.S. has lost a lot of
credence.
Our
Liberal Spirit
Thinking and Talking
In response to a gotcha
question at the March 24th press conference, President Obama said, “It took us
a couple of days because I like to know what I'm talking about before I speak.” Some have recently commented that Obama often
uses a teleprompter to present prepared addresses to live and electronic
audiences. When members of his audience
ask him questions, he often hesitates and stammers a bit as he decides his
response. The result is that through all
of his many addresses during the last several years, he has made surprisingly
few gaffes. Responding to his situation,
he carefully presents (without clichés) answers that address issues in ways
that his audiences appreciate.
This is a welcome contrast to television and radio talk
shows in which pundits respond immediately, interrupting each other obviously
not thinking through their thoughts. If
you like dramatic shouting matches in which the objective is for participants
to one-up each other, you’ll like television and radio talk shows. The nightly interviews, Bill Moyer’s
interviews and Washington Week which appear on public television are
exceptions.
As
young children, we learn many scripts, including both cooperative and
competitive approaches to interaction.
We learn cooperative ways to interact with others to exchange
information and learn together. We learn
competitive ways to show that we are more intelligent and know more than the
people with whom we interact. We differ
in the extent and circumstances in which we use these approaches.
I
suspect most of us would admit that we sometimes talk without thinking. We then find that we often say things that
don’t reflect our considered ideas, irritate other people and regret that we
spoke to swiftly. Often after a
conversation is over, we imagine what we wish we had said. We may or may not apologize later and
attempt to correct what we said. We
could benefit from adopting Obama’s emphasis upon getting it right the first
time.
Recommended Books – See our list of books for liberals
Paul Wellstone, 2001, The Conscience of a Liberal
John Podesta, 2008, The Power of Progress. How
Paul
Wellstone presents his model for Liberal integrity, with grassroots
campaigning. Barack Obama did a superb
job of grassroots campaigning, was less stridently Liberal in advancing his
Liberal proposals.
John
Podesta attempts to differentiate Liberals and Progressives. He describes Bill Clinton as a Progressive,
although
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