Thursday, Dec. 15th, 12:30 p.m., at UFCW 21,
5030 First Avenue South,
we will feast, enjoy each others’ company, and do the necessary business of PSARA!
Bring a small (or big) bag of food to donate to the King County Labor Agency Food Bank. Bring your own favorite dish or drink to share at our potluck.
Come to listen to and question Congressman Jay Inslee (provided Congress is not in session) as he returns from the 2011 Congress and makes his case as to why he should be the next Governor of Washington. Hear a report on the 2011 Special Session and PSARA’s proposed legislative agenda for the 2012 Legislative session. Let us know if you approve.
Learn about a new resolution supporting the Caring Across Generations campaign we will be asking the Seattle City Council to pass.
Help us elect our President and Administrative Vice President for the next two years. Also hear about the proposal to expand our Executive Board and elect new and/or returning members to the Executive Board.
The Executive Board has proposed some By – Law changes necessary for our IRS application for 501c4 status. We will need the approval of our members for these changes to the By – Laws.
Please join us on December 15th. Help us build PSARA as we celebrate and prepare ourselves for the work that lies ahead.
Wednesday, November 30, 2011
More cuts won't work: revenue needed now!
By Lynne Dodson
For the past two legislative sessions we have seen all-cuts budgets. Over the last three sessions $10 billion of cuts have been made. As we head into the special session on November 28, the state is deeper in debt (to the tune of more than $2 billion), unemployment still hovers over 9%, our classrooms are overcrowded, our most vulnerable citizens have lost services, small businesses are suffering, Boeing probably still isn’t paying federal taxes, and we’ve got Occupy groups in cities and towns from Aberdeen to Moses Lake, Bellingham to Vancouver, Seattle to Richland. Across the state the populace is demanding change.
Something isn’t working. Deep cuts, continued tax exemptions, no new revenue… clearly, these policy decisions aren’t actually doing anything to spur the economy. As we head into the special session, any legislator who is talking about following the same, old “no-new revenue, let’s cut our way out of this deficit” is using the same tools that haven’t worked so far. What’s different? Why would they work now?
But there is talk of new revenue in Olympia. Unfortunately, because Tim Eyman’s Initiative 1053 requires a two-thirds majority in the legislature to raise revenue, making it nearly impossible for the legislature to solve our revenue/budget crisis, our elected representatives and senators will need to put a revenue package on the ballot for a citizen vote in order to raise money to protect our basic and essential services.
We urge them to do so. The sooner the better because while they dither, cuts will be made and the hole we’re in will deepen. But there are better and worse ways to raise revenue for the state. The best ways are those that not only fill budget holes, but also stimulate the economy by creating jobs. When people don’t have jobs, when their wages stagnate, when they are worried about losing their jobs, they don’t spend money in their communities. They cut back, eat out less, vacation less, spend less money at their local restaurants, retailers, garden shops. And stuff doesn’t get done. Our schools, public health clinics, roads, bridges—our infrastructure falls into disrepair.
Revenue options that increase jobs are possible and smart. For example, our legislators could put a state general obligation bond on the ballot. The bond could be specifically for building infrastructure – improving our schools, public buildings, roads. This not only would put people back to work, with 20% of our retail sales tax coming from the construction industry, we could actually help grow the economy when we most need it.
Billions of dollars in tax giveaways in our state means billions of dollars that aren’t available to meet the needs of Washington residents. Last year, over $4.5 billion a year in cuts were made to education, health care, human services and other programs. People were hurt. Yet, only two tax breaks were ended, bringing in about $10 million each per year.
Worse yet, tax expenditures (loopholes) are not even considered part of the budget. Yet they are revenues that the state chooses not to collect and therefore ought to be part of budget decisions. Exposing tax giveaways, sun-setting those that don’t actually result in the creation of jobs, evaluating the actual benefit of those dollars to the state, and eliminating wasteful exemptions would restore that money to the state for rebuilding our economy.
Working people, the vast numbers of unemployed, our most vulnerable, disabled, mentally ill, our state’s children, our young women and men who worked and studied hard only now to find the American dream out of reach, those who were born here and those who came here looking for a better life, small businesses struggling to survive… we all need solutions that will enrich our lives here in Washington, not further degrade them. More cuts won’t work. We can, and we must see solutions that create jobs and build the economy. For all of us.
(Lynne Dodson is Secretary-Treasurer of the Washington State Labor Council, AFL-CIO. She’s also a member of PSARA.)
For the past two legislative sessions we have seen all-cuts budgets. Over the last three sessions $10 billion of cuts have been made. As we head into the special session on November 28, the state is deeper in debt (to the tune of more than $2 billion), unemployment still hovers over 9%, our classrooms are overcrowded, our most vulnerable citizens have lost services, small businesses are suffering, Boeing probably still isn’t paying federal taxes, and we’ve got Occupy groups in cities and towns from Aberdeen to Moses Lake, Bellingham to Vancouver, Seattle to Richland. Across the state the populace is demanding change.
Something isn’t working. Deep cuts, continued tax exemptions, no new revenue… clearly, these policy decisions aren’t actually doing anything to spur the economy. As we head into the special session, any legislator who is talking about following the same, old “no-new revenue, let’s cut our way out of this deficit” is using the same tools that haven’t worked so far. What’s different? Why would they work now?
But there is talk of new revenue in Olympia. Unfortunately, because Tim Eyman’s Initiative 1053 requires a two-thirds majority in the legislature to raise revenue, making it nearly impossible for the legislature to solve our revenue/budget crisis, our elected representatives and senators will need to put a revenue package on the ballot for a citizen vote in order to raise money to protect our basic and essential services.
We urge them to do so. The sooner the better because while they dither, cuts will be made and the hole we’re in will deepen. But there are better and worse ways to raise revenue for the state. The best ways are those that not only fill budget holes, but also stimulate the economy by creating jobs. When people don’t have jobs, when their wages stagnate, when they are worried about losing their jobs, they don’t spend money in their communities. They cut back, eat out less, vacation less, spend less money at their local restaurants, retailers, garden shops. And stuff doesn’t get done. Our schools, public health clinics, roads, bridges—our infrastructure falls into disrepair.
Revenue options that increase jobs are possible and smart. For example, our legislators could put a state general obligation bond on the ballot. The bond could be specifically for building infrastructure – improving our schools, public buildings, roads. This not only would put people back to work, with 20% of our retail sales tax coming from the construction industry, we could actually help grow the economy when we most need it.
Billions of dollars in tax giveaways in our state means billions of dollars that aren’t available to meet the needs of Washington residents. Last year, over $4.5 billion a year in cuts were made to education, health care, human services and other programs. People were hurt. Yet, only two tax breaks were ended, bringing in about $10 million each per year.
Worse yet, tax expenditures (loopholes) are not even considered part of the budget. Yet they are revenues that the state chooses not to collect and therefore ought to be part of budget decisions. Exposing tax giveaways, sun-setting those that don’t actually result in the creation of jobs, evaluating the actual benefit of those dollars to the state, and eliminating wasteful exemptions would restore that money to the state for rebuilding our economy.
Working people, the vast numbers of unemployed, our most vulnerable, disabled, mentally ill, our state’s children, our young women and men who worked and studied hard only now to find the American dream out of reach, those who were born here and those who came here looking for a better life, small businesses struggling to survive… we all need solutions that will enrich our lives here in Washington, not further degrade them. More cuts won’t work. We can, and we must see solutions that create jobs and build the economy. For all of us.
(Lynne Dodson is Secretary-Treasurer of the Washington State Labor Council, AFL-CIO. She’s also a member of PSARA.)
I-502 reforms marijuana law
Initiative 502, a proposal for marijuana law reform, is currently being circulated for signatures by New Approach Washington. The goal is 241, 153 valid signatures by December 30, when it would be submitted to the legislature. Unless the legislature passes it, I-502 will go to the general election ballot in November of next year.
The Puget Sound Alliance for Retired Americans Executive Board has endorsed I-502. We encourage our members to sign the petition and support the campaign. The measure has also been endorsed by prominent legal, medical and civic leaders.
The measure replaces the prohibition of marijuana with a public health approach that allows adults 21 and older to purchase limited quantities from stand-alone stores that would be privately owned and operated, but licensed and regulated by the state.
The initiative taxes marijuana and directs the new revenue -- estimated in the hundreds of millions of dollars annually – to drug abuse prevention, research and education, as well as to the state general fund and local governments.
For petitions, call the campaign headquarters at (206) 633-2012.
The Puget Sound Alliance for Retired Americans Executive Board has endorsed I-502. We encourage our members to sign the petition and support the campaign. The measure has also been endorsed by prominent legal, medical and civic leaders.
The measure replaces the prohibition of marijuana with a public health approach that allows adults 21 and older to purchase limited quantities from stand-alone stores that would be privately owned and operated, but licensed and regulated by the state.
The initiative taxes marijuana and directs the new revenue -- estimated in the hundreds of millions of dollars annually – to drug abuse prevention, research and education, as well as to the state general fund and local governments.
For petitions, call the campaign headquarters at (206) 633-2012.
Shopping simplified
You don’t have to don muffler and gloves and go out in the snow…
You don’t have to battle the holiday shopping crowds…
You don’t even have to gift-wrap it…unless you want to…
And you’ll be sending a monthly gift, January through December, twelve big newsletters, crammed with news, comment and analysis on the issues that concern us all.
If you’ve already guessed we’re suggesting a year’s gift membership in PSARA for someone close to you – aren’t you the quick study!
Talk about easy holiday shopping! Just clip the coupon on the inside back page of this newsletter, enter the name and address of that friend, neighbor, relative or workmate. Then send the coupon with your $15 check to PSARA, Room 208, 1800 First Avenue, Seattle, WA 98121
By good old US Mail – long may it flourish!.
You’ll do that person a great favor. You’ll be adding to PSARA’s political muscle as we enter a critical Election Year.
And how proud you’ll be, as you sit there, sipping your holiday eggnog!
You don’t have to battle the holiday shopping crowds…
You don’t even have to gift-wrap it…unless you want to…
And you’ll be sending a monthly gift, January through December, twelve big newsletters, crammed with news, comment and analysis on the issues that concern us all.
If you’ve already guessed we’re suggesting a year’s gift membership in PSARA for someone close to you – aren’t you the quick study!
Talk about easy holiday shopping! Just clip the coupon on the inside back page of this newsletter, enter the name and address of that friend, neighbor, relative or workmate. Then send the coupon with your $15 check to PSARA, Room 208, 1800 First Avenue, Seattle, WA 98121
By good old US Mail – long may it flourish!.
You’ll do that person a great favor. You’ll be adding to PSARA’s political muscle as we enter a critical Election Year.
And how proud you’ll be, as you sit there, sipping your holiday eggnog!
Keep those offices open!
By Sharon Maeda
The Social Security Administration intends to close its heavily-used Seattle neighborhood offices and require persons seeking any of the agency’s many services to go instead to a single office in the Federal Building.
The move is strongly opposed by community organizations and by 7th District Congressman Jim McDermott. Their concerns about the forbidding requirements to even get into the Federal Building have yet to be addressed by Social Security.
The existing Belltown office at Ninth Avenue and Lenora Street and the International District office at 675 South Lane Street serve about 300 persons per day. Both offices are readily accessible to a clientele that includes immigrants, the elderly, people with disabilities, troubled veterans and the mentally ill. Interpreter services are available.
The Federal Building is a whole other thing.
Can you imagine immigrants, people with disabilities, and folks with PTSD even entering this Level IV high security facility? Valid state or federal identification is demanded. All who enter must pass through a magnetometer. All must pass their belongings though an X-ray machine. Security guards are ever present.
The guards presumably speak only English – a serious problem for elderly immigrants being asked to put their purses, backpacks or wallets on the conveyor belt, or to submit to an electric wand being run all around their bodies. If it’s intimidating to us, what about our elders?
How would innocent persons, seeking only information about their benefits, respond to having an electric want run all around their bodies?
On the streets outside there are just two handicapped parking spaces. Commercial parking is expensive. Even when a friend or family member offers to drive, there’s no place to park!
At the long-established neighborhood offices, valid identification is not needed. There are no magnetometers or x-ray machines. Employees can interpret for non-English speaking visitors in several languages. Telephone interpreter service is also available. There is plenty of free or low-cost parking nearby.
Low-income visitors who can’t afford a state identification card, clients with disabilities and those with limited or no ability to speak English deserve to be served in their communities.
The change in offices would guarantee that many innocent persons, fearful of running the Federal Building gauntlet, would forfeit not only the information they need, but the benefits they may be entitled to.
PSARA is strongly opposing the move to the Federal Building. There’s still time to rescind this harsh, bureaucratic decision. Call Social Security Regional Commissioner Stanley Friendship at 206-615-2100. Urge that low-income visitors who cannot afford to purchase a state ID card, clients with disabilities, and those with limited or no English continue to be served in their own communities.
It’s simple justice.
The Social Security Administration intends to close its heavily-used Seattle neighborhood offices and require persons seeking any of the agency’s many services to go instead to a single office in the Federal Building.
The move is strongly opposed by community organizations and by 7th District Congressman Jim McDermott. Their concerns about the forbidding requirements to even get into the Federal Building have yet to be addressed by Social Security.
The existing Belltown office at Ninth Avenue and Lenora Street and the International District office at 675 South Lane Street serve about 300 persons per day. Both offices are readily accessible to a clientele that includes immigrants, the elderly, people with disabilities, troubled veterans and the mentally ill. Interpreter services are available.
The Federal Building is a whole other thing.
Can you imagine immigrants, people with disabilities, and folks with PTSD even entering this Level IV high security facility? Valid state or federal identification is demanded. All who enter must pass through a magnetometer. All must pass their belongings though an X-ray machine. Security guards are ever present.
The guards presumably speak only English – a serious problem for elderly immigrants being asked to put their purses, backpacks or wallets on the conveyor belt, or to submit to an electric wand being run all around their bodies. If it’s intimidating to us, what about our elders?
How would innocent persons, seeking only information about their benefits, respond to having an electric want run all around their bodies?
On the streets outside there are just two handicapped parking spaces. Commercial parking is expensive. Even when a friend or family member offers to drive, there’s no place to park!
At the long-established neighborhood offices, valid identification is not needed. There are no magnetometers or x-ray machines. Employees can interpret for non-English speaking visitors in several languages. Telephone interpreter service is also available. There is plenty of free or low-cost parking nearby.
Low-income visitors who can’t afford a state identification card, clients with disabilities and those with limited or no ability to speak English deserve to be served in their communities.
The change in offices would guarantee that many innocent persons, fearful of running the Federal Building gauntlet, would forfeit not only the information they need, but the benefits they may be entitled to.
PSARA is strongly opposing the move to the Federal Building. There’s still time to rescind this harsh, bureaucratic decision. Call Social Security Regional Commissioner Stanley Friendship at 206-615-2100. Urge that low-income visitors who cannot afford to purchase a state ID card, clients with disabilities, and those with limited or no English continue to be served in their own communities.
It’s simple justice.
As 2012 Approaches
by Robby Stern
The last half of 2011 is a precursor to what promises to be a very challenging and potentially exciting 2012. This morning I watched a dramatic video of the Chancellor of U.C. Davis walking through a phalanx of students sitting in absolute silence on the ground as she exited a meeting to walk to her car. Their silence was a powerful condemnation of the immorality of the Chancellor and her campus police force that attacked nonviolent sit in protestors on the U.C. Davis campus over the weekend. The shocking film of two campus policemen spraying students as they sat on the ground has been broadcast worldwide.
Also broadcast worldwide is the picture of 84 year old PSARA member Dorli Rainey, as the pepper spray drips from her hair and face. One must ask why the Seattle police chose to pepper spray Dorli and the others with her. If the police believed that the street needed to be cleared, then the appropriate action was to arrest these nonviolent activists who were acting in solidarity with Occupy Wall Street, which had also been subjected to a brutal attack. To Dorli’s credit, she used the opportunity presented by the national and international media to focus on the issue of the 1 % and the 99% rather than allowing the discussion to be about police tactics. We send our thanks and admiration to Dorli for her bravery and determination.
It is impossible to miss that the level of physical violence being exerted on Occupiers and their supporters has escalated. There is now coordination among local officials around the country to contain and perhaps eliminate the Occupy movement. At the same time, there is talk of escalating economic activity by the grassroots. Occupy Oakland have called for a total west coast port shutdown on December 12th. This is a tall order and may not come to fruition, but the fact that it can even be discussed in realistic terms suggests the economic power that may be building at the grassroots level. As the labor song says, “We Do the Work” and we create the wealth.
Meanwhile, another unprecedented event has occurred in Washington. To quote from “The Stand”, the online news service of the Washington State Labor Council, “After consulting with its affiliated unions and community allies, the Washington State Labor Council will try something new in the special legislative session that begins Nov. 28 and the 2012 session. The WSLC will pursue a budget agenda in coordination with community, religious and small business groups that share labor’s concerns about all-cuts budgets harming our families and Washington’s economic future, and that agree that significant investment in public infrastructure is needed to create jobs now.”
The article goes on to say, “The Wall Street Recession continues to decimate Washington state’s economy and harm families. Our state budget has been slashed by $10 billion in the past three years — eliminating thousands of jobs, costing families their health care coverage, increasing school class sizes, sending college tuitions skyrocketing, and shredding our social safety net. Unemployment remains high; near 9% statewide and up to 60% in certain construction trades. And state economists say we are only halfway through this ‘Second Great Depression.’”
Labor is joining with these other forces to demand that the state protect our communities by investing in jobs and public necessities, like education and health care. They have agreed on the following common agenda:
“1. Substantially increase revenue and utilize revenue bonding to protect critical services and jobs in education, health care and public safety.
2. Create 30,000 direct jobs, and many more indirectly, by building and repairing community assets — including public buildings, bridges, state parks, water and irrigation systems, and college campuses — with a $2 billion general obligation bond on the spring ballot.
3. End unjustified tax breaks that don’t create jobs, and reform our tax break system to make it more transparent and accountable.”
In the past, these organizations enter the legislative session with their own legislative agendas. While cooperation on agreed upon proposals happens frequently, never, to my knowledge, has there been an agreement before hand to enter a legislative session with an agreed upon common agenda. This level of engagement between organized labor and other sectors could presage a very powerful force in our state. PSARA strongly endorses this legislative program.
Finally, we can all celebrate the failure of the Super Committee to come to an agreement. It is horrifying, if it is true, that the Democrats were prepared to make cuts in Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid in order to reach an agreement with the Republicans. Evidently, the Republicans were trying to drive a deal the Democrats could not stomach. Thank goodness no agreement was reached. We need to make our voices heard that the cut in the Social Security payroll tax must be allowed to expire and not be renewed at the end of December, 2011. It imperils Social Security.
In addition, we will insist that the debate around the 2012 election be about who will be served, the 1 % or the 99%. The Bush tax cuts for the wealthy must be allowed to expire at the end of 2012, and besides government job creation, the payroll cap on Social Security contributions must be scrapped so we can create an even better and stronger Social Security system for our children and grandchildren.
The last half of 2011 is a precursor to what promises to be a very challenging and potentially exciting 2012. This morning I watched a dramatic video of the Chancellor of U.C. Davis walking through a phalanx of students sitting in absolute silence on the ground as she exited a meeting to walk to her car. Their silence was a powerful condemnation of the immorality of the Chancellor and her campus police force that attacked nonviolent sit in protestors on the U.C. Davis campus over the weekend. The shocking film of two campus policemen spraying students as they sat on the ground has been broadcast worldwide.
Also broadcast worldwide is the picture of 84 year old PSARA member Dorli Rainey, as the pepper spray drips from her hair and face. One must ask why the Seattle police chose to pepper spray Dorli and the others with her. If the police believed that the street needed to be cleared, then the appropriate action was to arrest these nonviolent activists who were acting in solidarity with Occupy Wall Street, which had also been subjected to a brutal attack. To Dorli’s credit, she used the opportunity presented by the national and international media to focus on the issue of the 1 % and the 99% rather than allowing the discussion to be about police tactics. We send our thanks and admiration to Dorli for her bravery and determination.
It is impossible to miss that the level of physical violence being exerted on Occupiers and their supporters has escalated. There is now coordination among local officials around the country to contain and perhaps eliminate the Occupy movement. At the same time, there is talk of escalating economic activity by the grassroots. Occupy Oakland have called for a total west coast port shutdown on December 12th. This is a tall order and may not come to fruition, but the fact that it can even be discussed in realistic terms suggests the economic power that may be building at the grassroots level. As the labor song says, “We Do the Work” and we create the wealth.
Meanwhile, another unprecedented event has occurred in Washington. To quote from “The Stand”, the online news service of the Washington State Labor Council, “After consulting with its affiliated unions and community allies, the Washington State Labor Council will try something new in the special legislative session that begins Nov. 28 and the 2012 session. The WSLC will pursue a budget agenda in coordination with community, religious and small business groups that share labor’s concerns about all-cuts budgets harming our families and Washington’s economic future, and that agree that significant investment in public infrastructure is needed to create jobs now.”
The article goes on to say, “The Wall Street Recession continues to decimate Washington state’s economy and harm families. Our state budget has been slashed by $10 billion in the past three years — eliminating thousands of jobs, costing families their health care coverage, increasing school class sizes, sending college tuitions skyrocketing, and shredding our social safety net. Unemployment remains high; near 9% statewide and up to 60% in certain construction trades. And state economists say we are only halfway through this ‘Second Great Depression.’”
Labor is joining with these other forces to demand that the state protect our communities by investing in jobs and public necessities, like education and health care. They have agreed on the following common agenda:
“1. Substantially increase revenue and utilize revenue bonding to protect critical services and jobs in education, health care and public safety.
2. Create 30,000 direct jobs, and many more indirectly, by building and repairing community assets — including public buildings, bridges, state parks, water and irrigation systems, and college campuses — with a $2 billion general obligation bond on the spring ballot.
3. End unjustified tax breaks that don’t create jobs, and reform our tax break system to make it more transparent and accountable.”
In the past, these organizations enter the legislative session with their own legislative agendas. While cooperation on agreed upon proposals happens frequently, never, to my knowledge, has there been an agreement before hand to enter a legislative session with an agreed upon common agenda. This level of engagement between organized labor and other sectors could presage a very powerful force in our state. PSARA strongly endorses this legislative program.
Finally, we can all celebrate the failure of the Super Committee to come to an agreement. It is horrifying, if it is true, that the Democrats were prepared to make cuts in Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid in order to reach an agreement with the Republicans. Evidently, the Republicans were trying to drive a deal the Democrats could not stomach. Thank goodness no agreement was reached. We need to make our voices heard that the cut in the Social Security payroll tax must be allowed to expire and not be renewed at the end of December, 2011. It imperils Social Security.
In addition, we will insist that the debate around the 2012 election be about who will be served, the 1 % or the 99%. The Bush tax cuts for the wealthy must be allowed to expire at the end of 2012, and besides government job creation, the payroll cap on Social Security contributions must be scrapped so we can create an even better and stronger Social Security system for our children and grandchildren.
OWS: Where do we go from here?
By Michael Moore
This past weekend I participated in a four-hour meeting of Occupy Wall Street activists whose job it is to come up with the vision and goals of the movement. The discussion was both inspiring and invigorating. Here is what we ended up proposing as the movement's "vision statement" to the General Assembly of Occupy Wall Street:
We Envision:
[1] a truly free, democratic, and just society;
[2] where we, the people, come together and solve our problems by consensus;
[3] where people are encouraged to take personal and collective responsibility and participate in decision making;
[4] where we learn to live in harmony and embrace principles of toleration and respect for diversity and the differing views of others;
[5] where we secure the civil and human rights of all from violation by tyrannical forces and unjust governments;
[6] where political and economic institutions work to benefit all, not just the privileged few;
[7] where we provide full and free education to everyone, not merely to get jobs but to grow and flourish as human beings;
[8] where we value human needs over monetary gain, to ensure decent standards of living without which effective democracy is impossible;
[9] where we work together to protect the global environment to ensure that future generations will have safe and clean air, water and food supplies, and will be able to enjoy the beauty and bounty of nature that past generations have enjoyed.
The next step will be to develop a specific list of goals and demands. I would like to respectfully offer my suggestions of what we can all get behind now to wrestle the control of our country out of the hands of the 1% and place it squarely with the 99% majority.
Here is what I will propose to the General Assembly of Occupy Wall Street:
1. Eradicate the Bush tax cuts for the rich and institute new taxes on the wealthiest Americans and on corporations, including a tax on all trading on Wall Street (where they currently pay 0%).
2. Assess a penalty tax on any corporation that moves American jobs to other countries when that company is already making profits in America. Our jobs are the most important national treasure and they cannot be removed from the country simply because someone wants to make more money.
3. Require that all Americans pay the same Social Security tax on all of their earnings (Normally, the middle class pays about 6% of their income to Social Security; someone making $1 million a year pays about 0.6% (or 90% less than the average person). This law would simply make the rich pay what everyone else pays.
4. Reinstate the Glass-Steagall Act, placing serious regulations on how business is conducted by Wall Street and the banks.
5. Investigate the Crash of 2008, and bring to justice those who committed any crimes.
6. Reorder our nation's spending priorities (including the ending of all foreign wars and their cost of over $2 billion a week). This will re-open libraries, reinstate band and art and civics classes in our schools, fix our roads and bridges and infrastructure, wire the entire country for 21st century internet, and support scientific research that improves our lives.
7. Join the rest of the free world and create a single-payer, free and universal health care system that covers all Americans all of the time.
8. Immediately reduce carbon emissions that are destroying the planet and discover ways to live without the oil that will be depleted and gone by the end of this century.
9. Require corporations with more than 10,000 employees to restructure their board of directors so that 50% of its members are elected by the company’s workers. We can never have a real democracy as long as most people have no say in what happens at the place they spend most of their time: their job. Germany has a law like this and it has helped to make Germany the world’s leading manufacturing exporter.)
10. We, the people, must pass three constitutional amendments that will go a long way toward fixing the core problems we now have:
a) A constitutional amendment that fixes our broken electoral system by 1) completely removing campaign contributions from the political process; 2) requiring all elections to be publicly financed; 3) moving election day to the weekend to increase voter turnout; 4) making all Americans registered voters at the moment of their birth; 5) banning computerized voting and requiring that all elections take place on paper ballots.
b) A constitutional amendment declaring that corporations are not people and do not have the constitutional rights of citizens. This amendment should also state that the interests of the general public and society must always come before the interests of corporations.
c) A constitutional amendment that will act as a "second bill of rights" as proposed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt: that every American has a human right to employment, to health care, to a free and full education, to breathe clean air, drink clean water and eat safe food, and to be cared for with dignity and respect in their old age.
Occupy Wall Street enjoys the support of millions. It is a movement that cannot be stopped. Become part of it by sharing your thoughts with me or online (at OccupyWallSt.org). Get involved in (or start!) your own local Occupy movement. Make some noise. You don't have to pitch a tent in lower Manhattan to be an Occupier. You are one just by saying you are. This movement has no singular leader or spokesperson; every participant is a leader in their neighborhood, their school, their place of work. Each of you is a spokesperson to those whom you encounter. There are no dues to pay, no permission to seek in order to create an action.
We are but ten weeks old, yet we have already changed the national conversation. This is our moment, the one we've been hoping for, waiting for. If it's going to happen it has to happen now. Don't sit this one out. This is the real deal. This is it.
This past weekend I participated in a four-hour meeting of Occupy Wall Street activists whose job it is to come up with the vision and goals of the movement. The discussion was both inspiring and invigorating. Here is what we ended up proposing as the movement's "vision statement" to the General Assembly of Occupy Wall Street:
We Envision:
[1] a truly free, democratic, and just society;
[2] where we, the people, come together and solve our problems by consensus;
[3] where people are encouraged to take personal and collective responsibility and participate in decision making;
[4] where we learn to live in harmony and embrace principles of toleration and respect for diversity and the differing views of others;
[5] where we secure the civil and human rights of all from violation by tyrannical forces and unjust governments;
[6] where political and economic institutions work to benefit all, not just the privileged few;
[7] where we provide full and free education to everyone, not merely to get jobs but to grow and flourish as human beings;
[8] where we value human needs over monetary gain, to ensure decent standards of living without which effective democracy is impossible;
[9] where we work together to protect the global environment to ensure that future generations will have safe and clean air, water and food supplies, and will be able to enjoy the beauty and bounty of nature that past generations have enjoyed.
The next step will be to develop a specific list of goals and demands. I would like to respectfully offer my suggestions of what we can all get behind now to wrestle the control of our country out of the hands of the 1% and place it squarely with the 99% majority.
Here is what I will propose to the General Assembly of Occupy Wall Street:
1. Eradicate the Bush tax cuts for the rich and institute new taxes on the wealthiest Americans and on corporations, including a tax on all trading on Wall Street (where they currently pay 0%).
2. Assess a penalty tax on any corporation that moves American jobs to other countries when that company is already making profits in America. Our jobs are the most important national treasure and they cannot be removed from the country simply because someone wants to make more money.
3. Require that all Americans pay the same Social Security tax on all of their earnings (Normally, the middle class pays about 6% of their income to Social Security; someone making $1 million a year pays about 0.6% (or 90% less than the average person). This law would simply make the rich pay what everyone else pays.
4. Reinstate the Glass-Steagall Act, placing serious regulations on how business is conducted by Wall Street and the banks.
5. Investigate the Crash of 2008, and bring to justice those who committed any crimes.
6. Reorder our nation's spending priorities (including the ending of all foreign wars and their cost of over $2 billion a week). This will re-open libraries, reinstate band and art and civics classes in our schools, fix our roads and bridges and infrastructure, wire the entire country for 21st century internet, and support scientific research that improves our lives.
7. Join the rest of the free world and create a single-payer, free and universal health care system that covers all Americans all of the time.
8. Immediately reduce carbon emissions that are destroying the planet and discover ways to live without the oil that will be depleted and gone by the end of this century.
9. Require corporations with more than 10,000 employees to restructure their board of directors so that 50% of its members are elected by the company’s workers. We can never have a real democracy as long as most people have no say in what happens at the place they spend most of their time: their job. Germany has a law like this and it has helped to make Germany the world’s leading manufacturing exporter.)
10. We, the people, must pass three constitutional amendments that will go a long way toward fixing the core problems we now have:
a) A constitutional amendment that fixes our broken electoral system by 1) completely removing campaign contributions from the political process; 2) requiring all elections to be publicly financed; 3) moving election day to the weekend to increase voter turnout; 4) making all Americans registered voters at the moment of their birth; 5) banning computerized voting and requiring that all elections take place on paper ballots.
b) A constitutional amendment declaring that corporations are not people and do not have the constitutional rights of citizens. This amendment should also state that the interests of the general public and society must always come before the interests of corporations.
c) A constitutional amendment that will act as a "second bill of rights" as proposed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt: that every American has a human right to employment, to health care, to a free and full education, to breathe clean air, drink clean water and eat safe food, and to be cared for with dignity and respect in their old age.
Occupy Wall Street enjoys the support of millions. It is a movement that cannot be stopped. Become part of it by sharing your thoughts with me or online (at OccupyWallSt.org). Get involved in (or start!) your own local Occupy movement. Make some noise. You don't have to pitch a tent in lower Manhattan to be an Occupier. You are one just by saying you are. This movement has no singular leader or spokesperson; every participant is a leader in their neighborhood, their school, their place of work. Each of you is a spokesperson to those whom you encounter. There are no dues to pay, no permission to seek in order to create an action.
We are but ten weeks old, yet we have already changed the national conversation. This is our moment, the one we've been hoping for, waiting for. If it's going to happen it has to happen now. Don't sit this one out. This is the real deal. This is it.
KEYSTONE XL: The pipeline from Hades
By Will Parry
The determined intervention of scientists, public figures and rank-and-file environmentalists has delayed for a full year a decision on the horrific Keystone XL pipeline, intended to run its oily 1,700-mile course from the tar sands of Alberta, Canada, across sensitive U.S. aquifers to the Gulf of Mexico.
On November 6, the activists, twelve thousand strong, took the pipeline issue directly to the White House. In possibly the largest civil disobedience in U.S. history, 1,250 were arrested. President Obama, who will make the ultimate decision, then announced that he will defer action until early 2013.
The best scientific opinion says Obama’s decision could well determine whether our planet survives as a viable habitat for most living creatures.
Among those arrested at the White House was James Hanson, director of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies. Hanson, who has focused his work for decades on the impact of fossil fuels on the environment, is considered a foremost authority on global warming.
Hanson has a blunt two-word summary for the significance of the campaign to block the Keystone XL pipeline: If the pipeline is built, it’s “Game over” for the environment, he says.
Obama’s one-year delay was a major victory, said Bill McKibben, the legendary founder of the grassroots campaign “350.org,” which has coordinated 15,000 “save the planet” rallies in 189 countries over the past three years. The “350” refers to the maximum number of parts per million of carbon dioxide a breathable atmosphere may tolerate.
McKibben cited an October poll of “energy insiders,” conducted by the National Journal, that found “virtually all” of those polled expected easy approval of the pipeline. TransCanada, the would-be builder, was moving huge quantities of pipe across the border and seizing land by eminent domain. The mighty propaganda engine of the petroleum industry was in high gear. The fix was in. The deal was done.
Except it wasn’t. Not yet. A year of titanic struggle is in prospect, with the environmentalist legions arrayed against the riches of the petroleum industry and its vast network of stooges in Congress, the media and the regulatory agencies.
The industry is transfixed by the gleam of gold in the tar sands of Alberta. To seize it, they must build the pipeline from Hades.
The U.S. Department of Energy reports that in 2010 humanity (especially the U.S., China and onrushing India) pumped more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere than at any time since the start of the industrial revolution – 564 million tons more than in 2009.
That’s more CO2 than in the worst case scenario outlined by climate experts just four years ago.
“We’re talking more greenhouse gases than have entered the Earth’s atmosphere in tens of millions of years,” says McKibben.
Fatih Birol, chief economist at the International Energy Agency, says that without an effective international agreement to staunch greenhouse gases within five years, the door will close on preventing a potentially disastrous rise in the planet’s temperature.
To keep that door open, ministers and mothers will lie down in the path of bulldozers. Earth’s children are at risk. We’ll have more –- much more – to say on this subject. Our next article will deal with the tragic downstream effects of BP’s Gulf oil spill.
The determined intervention of scientists, public figures and rank-and-file environmentalists has delayed for a full year a decision on the horrific Keystone XL pipeline, intended to run its oily 1,700-mile course from the tar sands of Alberta, Canada, across sensitive U.S. aquifers to the Gulf of Mexico.
On November 6, the activists, twelve thousand strong, took the pipeline issue directly to the White House. In possibly the largest civil disobedience in U.S. history, 1,250 were arrested. President Obama, who will make the ultimate decision, then announced that he will defer action until early 2013.
The best scientific opinion says Obama’s decision could well determine whether our planet survives as a viable habitat for most living creatures.
Among those arrested at the White House was James Hanson, director of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies. Hanson, who has focused his work for decades on the impact of fossil fuels on the environment, is considered a foremost authority on global warming.
Hanson has a blunt two-word summary for the significance of the campaign to block the Keystone XL pipeline: If the pipeline is built, it’s “Game over” for the environment, he says.
Obama’s one-year delay was a major victory, said Bill McKibben, the legendary founder of the grassroots campaign “350.org,” which has coordinated 15,000 “save the planet” rallies in 189 countries over the past three years. The “350” refers to the maximum number of parts per million of carbon dioxide a breathable atmosphere may tolerate.
McKibben cited an October poll of “energy insiders,” conducted by the National Journal, that found “virtually all” of those polled expected easy approval of the pipeline. TransCanada, the would-be builder, was moving huge quantities of pipe across the border and seizing land by eminent domain. The mighty propaganda engine of the petroleum industry was in high gear. The fix was in. The deal was done.
Except it wasn’t. Not yet. A year of titanic struggle is in prospect, with the environmentalist legions arrayed against the riches of the petroleum industry and its vast network of stooges in Congress, the media and the regulatory agencies.
The industry is transfixed by the gleam of gold in the tar sands of Alberta. To seize it, they must build the pipeline from Hades.
The U.S. Department of Energy reports that in 2010 humanity (especially the U.S., China and onrushing India) pumped more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere than at any time since the start of the industrial revolution – 564 million tons more than in 2009.
That’s more CO2 than in the worst case scenario outlined by climate experts just four years ago.
“We’re talking more greenhouse gases than have entered the Earth’s atmosphere in tens of millions of years,” says McKibben.
Fatih Birol, chief economist at the International Energy Agency, says that without an effective international agreement to staunch greenhouse gases within five years, the door will close on preventing a potentially disastrous rise in the planet’s temperature.
To keep that door open, ministers and mothers will lie down in the path of bulldozers. Earth’s children are at risk. We’ll have more –- much more – to say on this subject. Our next article will deal with the tragic downstream effects of BP’s Gulf oil spill.
Distributing the dollars up!
By Mike Andrew
Income inequality in the United States is at its highest level since the “Gilded Age” of trusts, monopolies, and Robber Barons.
The numbers are staggering.
In 1915, a time when the likes of John D. Rockefeller and J.P. Morgan dominated the US economy, the richest 1% of Americans pulled in roughly 18% of all income. Today, the top 1% account for 24% of all income.
A CBO study in 2011 found that the top 1% increased their incomes 275% over the period 1979-2007. During that same period, the incomes of the bottom 80% actually declined.
In 1980, top-paid US CEOs made 42 times more than the average worker. By 2007 they made 531 times more.
As of 2006, the US had one of the highest levels of income inequality among similar high-income, developed countries. It is one of only a few developed countries where inequality has increased since 1980.
According to Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman, income inequality in the US was very high from 1870 to sometime around 1937. In part as a result of the New Deal – and also because government spending on World War II acted as a massive stimulus package – inequality dropped dramatically between 1937 and 1947.
The level of inequality remained fairly steady for about three decades until the late 1970s when income again began to become more concentrated in the hands of the richest Americans.
Inequality increased during the 1980s – the Reagan era – decreased slightly during the late 1990s, and has since continued its overall increasing trend.
The productivity of US workers continues to be one of the economic wonders of the world, increasing steadily year by year.
Real wages, on the other hand, have stagnated during the same period. By some measures, they have actually declined.
The steadily increasing gap between the “productivity” line and the “real wage” line represents, in graphic form, wealth flowing from working people to corporate employers.
Part of that stream of wealth goes to pay CEOs more and more lavish wages and bonuses, increasing income inequality even as workers produce more than ever.
“Real compensation,” by the way, includes benefits as well as wages, and much of the increase in that category can be accounted for by increases in healthcare premiums. In other words, insurance companies and healthcare providers benefit from increases in “real compensation” but workers might not.
All of this amounts to a huge redistribution of income – but a redistribution upwards, favoring the richest Americans at the expense of working families.
Along with this redistribution of wealth has come a dramatic shift in the structure of the US economy.
In 1950, 70% of US workers were employed in manufacturing, generally high-paid jobs. Some 20% were employed in generally low-paid service industries. One-third of US workers at that time were union members.
Within the space of a single lifetime, the situation has been reversed. Today, only 21% of the workforce is in the manufacturing sector while 70% work in service industries.
In the same period, union membership has declined to a mere 11%, and less than 9% in the private sector. In other words, workers are losing both their fair share of the national wealth, and their ability to fight back against income inequality.
No wonder the Occupy movement has struck such a chord!
Income inequality in the United States is at its highest level since the “Gilded Age” of trusts, monopolies, and Robber Barons.
The numbers are staggering.
In 1915, a time when the likes of John D. Rockefeller and J.P. Morgan dominated the US economy, the richest 1% of Americans pulled in roughly 18% of all income. Today, the top 1% account for 24% of all income.
A CBO study in 2011 found that the top 1% increased their incomes 275% over the period 1979-2007. During that same period, the incomes of the bottom 80% actually declined.
In 1980, top-paid US CEOs made 42 times more than the average worker. By 2007 they made 531 times more.
As of 2006, the US had one of the highest levels of income inequality among similar high-income, developed countries. It is one of only a few developed countries where inequality has increased since 1980.
According to Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman, income inequality in the US was very high from 1870 to sometime around 1937. In part as a result of the New Deal – and also because government spending on World War II acted as a massive stimulus package – inequality dropped dramatically between 1937 and 1947.
The level of inequality remained fairly steady for about three decades until the late 1970s when income again began to become more concentrated in the hands of the richest Americans.
Inequality increased during the 1980s – the Reagan era – decreased slightly during the late 1990s, and has since continued its overall increasing trend.
The productivity of US workers continues to be one of the economic wonders of the world, increasing steadily year by year.
Real wages, on the other hand, have stagnated during the same period. By some measures, they have actually declined.
The steadily increasing gap between the “productivity” line and the “real wage” line represents, in graphic form, wealth flowing from working people to corporate employers.
Part of that stream of wealth goes to pay CEOs more and more lavish wages and bonuses, increasing income inequality even as workers produce more than ever.
“Real compensation,” by the way, includes benefits as well as wages, and much of the increase in that category can be accounted for by increases in healthcare premiums. In other words, insurance companies and healthcare providers benefit from increases in “real compensation” but workers might not.
All of this amounts to a huge redistribution of income – but a redistribution upwards, favoring the richest Americans at the expense of working families.
Along with this redistribution of wealth has come a dramatic shift in the structure of the US economy.
In 1950, 70% of US workers were employed in manufacturing, generally high-paid jobs. Some 20% were employed in generally low-paid service industries. One-third of US workers at that time were union members.
Within the space of a single lifetime, the situation has been reversed. Today, only 21% of the workforce is in the manufacturing sector while 70% work in service industries.
In the same period, union membership has declined to a mere 11%, and less than 9% in the private sector. In other words, workers are losing both their fair share of the national wealth, and their ability to fight back against income inequality.
No wonder the Occupy movement has struck such a chord!
Greece: Bankers bailed out, workers sold out
By Mike Andrew
Greece’s debt crisis came to a head on November 11, when socialist Prime Minister George Papandreou resigned to make way for a coalition “national unity government.”
The new Prime Minister, Lucas Papademos, is a former Vice President of the European Central Bank committed to pushing ahead with the package of austerity measures demanded by European bankers in return for a “bailout” of Greek debts.
This “bailout” properly speaking is not a bailout of Greece, still less a bailout of Greek workers, but a bailout of the German and French banks which invested in Greek bonds and now stand to lose substantial assets if Greece defaults on its debts.
Some 20% of the bailout money Greece receives is slated to go to recapitalize Greek banks, and another 20% must be invested in top-rated AAA bonds that can be used as collateral in future debt-swap deals with lenders.
The austerity program the EU has imposed on Greece is not designed to help Greece repay its debts – or if it is, it is sadly misdirected. In fact, their austerity program is designed to impose the EU economic model which views inflation as the main economic risk.
In an effort to reduce Greece’s deficits and keep inflation below the EU-sanctioned maximum of 2%, the Greek government was compelled to cut wages and pensions, eliminate COLAs, and reduce the number of public sector workers by one-third.
Last year unemployment hit almost 19%, with the rate for workers under 30 going to almost 40%. The Greek economy as a whole contracted by 4.5% in 2010.
If the goal was to reduce Greece’s debt-to-GDP ratio, the austerity program was clearly misdirected.
Papandreou was elected Prime Minister in 2009 on an anti-austerity platform, when the debt crisis was only just breaking.
The right-wing New Democracy Party, which held power from 2004 to 2009, precipitated the debt crisis by cutting income and social security taxes and then cooking the books to conceal the real dimensions of the resulting budget deficit.
Instead of the EU-approved 3% deficit, or the rumored 6% “real” deficit, Papandreou found the deficit was almost 13% when he took office. Unemployment at that time was over 10%.
What made Greece’s situation even worse was that it had joined the Eurozone in 2001, and therefore no longer controlled its own money supply.
Papandreou’s father, the late Andreas Papandreou, who was Prime Minister in 1981-1989 and again in 1993-1996, had brought his country an unprecedented period of economic prosperity by an admittedly inflationary policy – financing public works projects, and wage and pension increases by increasing the money supply.
That option was no longer open in the current crisis, and George Papandreou realized he had no choice but to ask for a restructuring of Greece’s debt, the consequence of which was the austerity package demanded by European bankers.
Papandreou’s seemingly reasonable proposal to put the austerity policy up for a vote was vetoed by Greece’s creditors, including the United States.
The referendum proposal did have one positive result, however. It forced the right-wing opposition into entering a national unity government and accepting shared responsibility for the austerity measures.
The long term future for the Greek economy remains in doubt, as does the issue of whether Greece will retain the Euro or try to return to the drachma, its former national currency.
Greece’s debt crisis came to a head on November 11, when socialist Prime Minister George Papandreou resigned to make way for a coalition “national unity government.”
The new Prime Minister, Lucas Papademos, is a former Vice President of the European Central Bank committed to pushing ahead with the package of austerity measures demanded by European bankers in return for a “bailout” of Greek debts.
This “bailout” properly speaking is not a bailout of Greece, still less a bailout of Greek workers, but a bailout of the German and French banks which invested in Greek bonds and now stand to lose substantial assets if Greece defaults on its debts.
Some 20% of the bailout money Greece receives is slated to go to recapitalize Greek banks, and another 20% must be invested in top-rated AAA bonds that can be used as collateral in future debt-swap deals with lenders.
The austerity program the EU has imposed on Greece is not designed to help Greece repay its debts – or if it is, it is sadly misdirected. In fact, their austerity program is designed to impose the EU economic model which views inflation as the main economic risk.
In an effort to reduce Greece’s deficits and keep inflation below the EU-sanctioned maximum of 2%, the Greek government was compelled to cut wages and pensions, eliminate COLAs, and reduce the number of public sector workers by one-third.
Last year unemployment hit almost 19%, with the rate for workers under 30 going to almost 40%. The Greek economy as a whole contracted by 4.5% in 2010.
If the goal was to reduce Greece’s debt-to-GDP ratio, the austerity program was clearly misdirected.
Papandreou was elected Prime Minister in 2009 on an anti-austerity platform, when the debt crisis was only just breaking.
The right-wing New Democracy Party, which held power from 2004 to 2009, precipitated the debt crisis by cutting income and social security taxes and then cooking the books to conceal the real dimensions of the resulting budget deficit.
Instead of the EU-approved 3% deficit, or the rumored 6% “real” deficit, Papandreou found the deficit was almost 13% when he took office. Unemployment at that time was over 10%.
What made Greece’s situation even worse was that it had joined the Eurozone in 2001, and therefore no longer controlled its own money supply.
Papandreou’s father, the late Andreas Papandreou, who was Prime Minister in 1981-1989 and again in 1993-1996, had brought his country an unprecedented period of economic prosperity by an admittedly inflationary policy – financing public works projects, and wage and pension increases by increasing the money supply.
That option was no longer open in the current crisis, and George Papandreou realized he had no choice but to ask for a restructuring of Greece’s debt, the consequence of which was the austerity package demanded by European bankers.
Papandreou’s seemingly reasonable proposal to put the austerity policy up for a vote was vetoed by Greece’s creditors, including the United States.
The referendum proposal did have one positive result, however. It forced the right-wing opposition into entering a national unity government and accepting shared responsibility for the austerity measures.
The long term future for the Greek economy remains in doubt, as does the issue of whether Greece will retain the Euro or try to return to the drachma, its former national currency.
Super committee not so super
The so-called Super Committee that was supposed to come up with a bipartisan $1.5 trillion deficit reduction package announced on November 21 that they had failed to cut a deal.
No one expected them to fail until they did, and then it became perfectly obvious to everyone why they had to fail.
The assumption behind the Super Committee was that both Democrats and Republicans would be willing and able to put political differences aside in the interests of deficit reduction.
That was the biggest weakness of the whole concept, and the fundamental reason that the Super Committee would fail.
Both sides did, in fact, make concessions. Democrats put social spending cuts on the table. Republicans indicated they were willing to raise revenues.
The problem, however, is that deficit reduction will do nothing to help the sagging economy or put a single unemployed worker back to work. In fact, further cuts in government spending would certainly lead to reduced economic activity and increased unemployment.
In other words, it’s not hard to think of ways to cut the deficit, if that’s your only goal. But it’s impossible to cut the deficit and – at the same time – pull the country out of the Great Recession.
Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee chair Rep. Steve Israel (D-N.Y.) put the problem very simply.
"The American people want an end to this gridlock with a balanced approach to reducing the debt that creates jobs, protects the Medicare guarantee, and brings shared sacrifice from the ultra wealthy and Big Oil," he said in a statement. "Voters have a chance to end this gridlock in November 2012."
You can’t create jobs and guarantee Medicare to all eligible seniors without spending money, and that means – in the short term – you really can’t cut the deficit until the country has recovered from the recession.
But once the country has recovered, it will be much easier to pay down the deficit because employed workers pay taxes, and they don’t need unemployment or other government-financed benefits.
Republicans, of course, still adhere to the old Reagan-style supply-side economics, and believe – against all the evidence – that economic austerity will revive the economy.
Too many Democrats believe this as well, and it was only because the Super Committee negotiations were being conducted against the background of the Occupy movement that the political issues of income inequality and economic justice came to the fore at all.
"After Occupy Wall Street, a month later, you were getting a lot more attention to income inequality, and that's a tremendous change in the politics of the country," said Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.), whose district includes Wall Street.
The failure of the Super Committee is not entirely good news, however.
Assuming that nothing else happens, $1.2 trillion of automatic across-the-board spending cuts will kick-in on October 1, 2012. These will include cuts to the defense department as well as social safety net programs.
The so-called Bush tax cuts will expire for everyone at the end of that year. In addition, the temporary cuts in the payroll tax and the extension of unemployment benefits may not be continued.
This result will undoubtedly be challenging not only to individual working families, but also to the entire national economy, as people pay more in taxes, have less to spend on goods and services, and – if they are still unemployed – see their benefits at risk.
No one expected them to fail until they did, and then it became perfectly obvious to everyone why they had to fail.
The assumption behind the Super Committee was that both Democrats and Republicans would be willing and able to put political differences aside in the interests of deficit reduction.
That was the biggest weakness of the whole concept, and the fundamental reason that the Super Committee would fail.
Both sides did, in fact, make concessions. Democrats put social spending cuts on the table. Republicans indicated they were willing to raise revenues.
The problem, however, is that deficit reduction will do nothing to help the sagging economy or put a single unemployed worker back to work. In fact, further cuts in government spending would certainly lead to reduced economic activity and increased unemployment.
In other words, it’s not hard to think of ways to cut the deficit, if that’s your only goal. But it’s impossible to cut the deficit and – at the same time – pull the country out of the Great Recession.
Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee chair Rep. Steve Israel (D-N.Y.) put the problem very simply.
"The American people want an end to this gridlock with a balanced approach to reducing the debt that creates jobs, protects the Medicare guarantee, and brings shared sacrifice from the ultra wealthy and Big Oil," he said in a statement. "Voters have a chance to end this gridlock in November 2012."
You can’t create jobs and guarantee Medicare to all eligible seniors without spending money, and that means – in the short term – you really can’t cut the deficit until the country has recovered from the recession.
But once the country has recovered, it will be much easier to pay down the deficit because employed workers pay taxes, and they don’t need unemployment or other government-financed benefits.
Republicans, of course, still adhere to the old Reagan-style supply-side economics, and believe – against all the evidence – that economic austerity will revive the economy.
Too many Democrats believe this as well, and it was only because the Super Committee negotiations were being conducted against the background of the Occupy movement that the political issues of income inequality and economic justice came to the fore at all.
"After Occupy Wall Street, a month later, you were getting a lot more attention to income inequality, and that's a tremendous change in the politics of the country," said Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.), whose district includes Wall Street.
The failure of the Super Committee is not entirely good news, however.
Assuming that nothing else happens, $1.2 trillion of automatic across-the-board spending cuts will kick-in on October 1, 2012. These will include cuts to the defense department as well as social safety net programs.
The so-called Bush tax cuts will expire for everyone at the end of that year. In addition, the temporary cuts in the payroll tax and the extension of unemployment benefits may not be continued.
This result will undoubtedly be challenging not only to individual working families, but also to the entire national economy, as people pay more in taxes, have less to spend on goods and services, and – if they are still unemployed – see their benefits at risk.
Fair Trade or ‘Free Trade’ Where is our Congressional delegation?
By Kristen Beifus
Early in 2011, Kim Kyung-Ran of the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions met with staff members of Senators Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell and Representatives Adam Smith, Jay Inslee and Jim McDermott. She advised them that in Korea hundreds of thousands of people have taken to the streets in opposition to the Korea-US Free Trade Agreement.
Over the months that followed, members of the Washington Fair Trade Coalition, including PSARA members and trade justice allies, met with our elected leaders in Washington State and in the District of Columbia, wrote letters as individuals and organizations, made numerous phone calls, attended cyber-town hall meetings, called into radio programs, attended coffees and events with our elected leaders, held rallies, bannered and circulated self-produced educational media.
We worked to educate and activate. We know they heard us. They said as much.
And then on October 12, with the single exception of McDermott's vote against the Colombia Free Trade Agreement, the entire Congressional delegation voted for Free Trade Agreements with South Korea, Colombia and Panama.
We appreciate Rep. McDermott's lone “No” vote. However his “Yes” votes on South Korea and Panama indicates his support for Free Trade.
So-called “Free Trade” is opposed by organized labor and environmental and human rights activists, as well as by millions of people around the world. It makes little sense that elected leaders who are progressive on such issues as health care and Social Security, continue to vote in favor of trade policy that hurts their constituents.
At the moment the views on trade policy of the majority in our state are unrepresented.. With big money dominating politics and an election year on the horizon, it is clear that our state elected leaders are at the mercy of corporate lobbyists when it comes to trade. Campaign finance reform is urgently needed to level the debate on trade policy.
This year, both nationally and in our State, unions have begun to withhold endorsements and contributions from elected officials who do not represent them. In our State, Machinists Local 751 un-invited Senator Cantwell and Rep. Inslee to their political gala after their support of trade deals with South Korea, Panama and Colombia, which directly threaten jobs of their members. IBEW locals, hurt by the reduction in manufacturing jobs, are also withholding contributions because of trade votes.
As Greg Paulson of the Association of Western Pulp and Paper explains: 'It doesn't matter if it is a Republican or a Democrat off-shoring jobs. It is still a lost job and an unemployed worker. Actually it hurts more when it is Democrat because we elected them into office to represent us.'
A 2012 goal for the Washington Fair Trade Coalition is to make is to make fair trade an election year issue.
We are also monitoring the emerging Trans Pacific Free Trade Agreement (TP-FTA), involving the US and 8 other countries: Peru, Chile, New Zealand, Australia, Malaysia, Brunei, Singapore and Vietnam.
As this complex agreement moves through rounds of negotiations with the potential for many more countries to join, one concern is access to generic drugs. Many pharmaceutical corporations are demanding strong investor protections in the TP-FTA. That threatens the public health systems of countries and communities that rely on generics.
The fight for fair trade is an important opportunity to defend our values: the health of our communities, the rights of workers, protection of our natural resources and the rights of indigenous communities. Until those values are incorporated in our trade agreements, those agreements will enable corporations to win while many of us will continue to lose.
(Kristen Beifus is executive director of the Washington Fair Trade Council and a member of PSARA.)
Early in 2011, Kim Kyung-Ran of the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions met with staff members of Senators Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell and Representatives Adam Smith, Jay Inslee and Jim McDermott. She advised them that in Korea hundreds of thousands of people have taken to the streets in opposition to the Korea-US Free Trade Agreement.
Over the months that followed, members of the Washington Fair Trade Coalition, including PSARA members and trade justice allies, met with our elected leaders in Washington State and in the District of Columbia, wrote letters as individuals and organizations, made numerous phone calls, attended cyber-town hall meetings, called into radio programs, attended coffees and events with our elected leaders, held rallies, bannered and circulated self-produced educational media.
We worked to educate and activate. We know they heard us. They said as much.
And then on October 12, with the single exception of McDermott's vote against the Colombia Free Trade Agreement, the entire Congressional delegation voted for Free Trade Agreements with South Korea, Colombia and Panama.
We appreciate Rep. McDermott's lone “No” vote. However his “Yes” votes on South Korea and Panama indicates his support for Free Trade.
So-called “Free Trade” is opposed by organized labor and environmental and human rights activists, as well as by millions of people around the world. It makes little sense that elected leaders who are progressive on such issues as health care and Social Security, continue to vote in favor of trade policy that hurts their constituents.
At the moment the views on trade policy of the majority in our state are unrepresented.. With big money dominating politics and an election year on the horizon, it is clear that our state elected leaders are at the mercy of corporate lobbyists when it comes to trade. Campaign finance reform is urgently needed to level the debate on trade policy.
This year, both nationally and in our State, unions have begun to withhold endorsements and contributions from elected officials who do not represent them. In our State, Machinists Local 751 un-invited Senator Cantwell and Rep. Inslee to their political gala after their support of trade deals with South Korea, Panama and Colombia, which directly threaten jobs of their members. IBEW locals, hurt by the reduction in manufacturing jobs, are also withholding contributions because of trade votes.
As Greg Paulson of the Association of Western Pulp and Paper explains: 'It doesn't matter if it is a Republican or a Democrat off-shoring jobs. It is still a lost job and an unemployed worker. Actually it hurts more when it is Democrat because we elected them into office to represent us.'
A 2012 goal for the Washington Fair Trade Coalition is to make is to make fair trade an election year issue.
We are also monitoring the emerging Trans Pacific Free Trade Agreement (TP-FTA), involving the US and 8 other countries: Peru, Chile, New Zealand, Australia, Malaysia, Brunei, Singapore and Vietnam.
As this complex agreement moves through rounds of negotiations with the potential for many more countries to join, one concern is access to generic drugs. Many pharmaceutical corporations are demanding strong investor protections in the TP-FTA. That threatens the public health systems of countries and communities that rely on generics.
The fight for fair trade is an important opportunity to defend our values: the health of our communities, the rights of workers, protection of our natural resources and the rights of indigenous communities. Until those values are incorporated in our trade agreements, those agreements will enable corporations to win while many of us will continue to lose.
(Kristen Beifus is executive director of the Washington Fair Trade Council and a member of PSARA.)
Thursday, November 3, 2011
The Special Session: A Call to Action
An Editorial
Governor Gregoire has called the Legislature into a Special Session starting November 28. Her goal: To make up for declining revenues with an additional $2 billion in cuts from state programs. The Legislature has already carved a cruel $10 billion from health care, education and other essential services in the past three years. We cannot hold still for even more drastic cuts.
In the next weeks, every PSARA member will be needed in this struggle that will shape our future as a state. You will be asked to call and write your legislators/ To testify about the impact on your life of specific cuts. If possible, to come to Olympia with thousands of others to create a human wall of protest. With our allies from the labor movement and the community, we must make it clear to our legislators that business as usual is a thing of the past.
Plainly, the life-and-death need of the hour is substantial new revenue.
And hidden in hundreds of special-interest tax exemptions, the needed revenue is there to be tapped. The Washington State Budget and Policy Center has identified these tax breaks. They drain $6.5 billion in revenue annually, year after year. They are never examined to see whether they fulfill a useful purpose.
The alternative to new revenue is unthinkable. The governor’s approach, to look for $2 billion in additional cuts, will lay waste to programs that meet fundamental human needs.
The proposals currently on the table would wipe out long term care services for more than 17,000 people, a 29 percent cut from the current case- load. Here’s who would lose the services they depend upon, as reported in the Senior Scene for October:
• 11,700 who would lose homecare assistance
• 1,000 now living in Adult Family Homes
• 2,700 living in assisted living facilities
• 1,000 living in boarding homes
• 450 living in nursing homes
And that’s just one aspect of the reductions in human services, that impacting long-term care. Other proposals include the elimination of the Basic Health Plan, the Disability Lifeline, interpretive services, health care coverage for immigrant children, maternity support services, adult pharmacy benefits – and the list goes on.
In the budget adopted in the 2011 session, funding for long term care was cut by $98.1 million, translating into a 10 percent reduction in personal care hours per patient per month. Many in long term care need assistance around the clock and have nowhere else to turn. No one, least of all elderly men and women, should have to worry about being deprived of the care they need.
In the current economy, the state’s modest safety net programs are needed more than ever. Families and communities are struggling to get by. Unemployment is rampant, people are losing health insurance, homes are heavily mortgaged or are being foreclosed.
Confronted with these multiple challenges, an all-cuts budget is simply indefensible. It shifts the burden of the budget deficit still more oppressively onto the backs of the most vulnerable.
The Legislature must hear from the people.
Governor Gregoire has called the Legislature into a Special Session starting November 28. Her goal: To make up for declining revenues with an additional $2 billion in cuts from state programs. The Legislature has already carved a cruel $10 billion from health care, education and other essential services in the past three years. We cannot hold still for even more drastic cuts.
In the next weeks, every PSARA member will be needed in this struggle that will shape our future as a state. You will be asked to call and write your legislators/ To testify about the impact on your life of specific cuts. If possible, to come to Olympia with thousands of others to create a human wall of protest. With our allies from the labor movement and the community, we must make it clear to our legislators that business as usual is a thing of the past.
Plainly, the life-and-death need of the hour is substantial new revenue.
And hidden in hundreds of special-interest tax exemptions, the needed revenue is there to be tapped. The Washington State Budget and Policy Center has identified these tax breaks. They drain $6.5 billion in revenue annually, year after year. They are never examined to see whether they fulfill a useful purpose.
The alternative to new revenue is unthinkable. The governor’s approach, to look for $2 billion in additional cuts, will lay waste to programs that meet fundamental human needs.
The proposals currently on the table would wipe out long term care services for more than 17,000 people, a 29 percent cut from the current case- load. Here’s who would lose the services they depend upon, as reported in the Senior Scene for October:
• 11,700 who would lose homecare assistance
• 1,000 now living in Adult Family Homes
• 2,700 living in assisted living facilities
• 1,000 living in boarding homes
• 450 living in nursing homes
And that’s just one aspect of the reductions in human services, that impacting long-term care. Other proposals include the elimination of the Basic Health Plan, the Disability Lifeline, interpretive services, health care coverage for immigrant children, maternity support services, adult pharmacy benefits – and the list goes on.
In the budget adopted in the 2011 session, funding for long term care was cut by $98.1 million, translating into a 10 percent reduction in personal care hours per patient per month. Many in long term care need assistance around the clock and have nowhere else to turn. No one, least of all elderly men and women, should have to worry about being deprived of the care they need.
In the current economy, the state’s modest safety net programs are needed more than ever. Families and communities are struggling to get by. Unemployment is rampant, people are losing health insurance, homes are heavily mortgaged or are being foreclosed.
Confronted with these multiple challenges, an all-cuts budget is simply indefensible. It shifts the burden of the budget deficit still more oppressively onto the backs of the most vulnerable.
The Legislature must hear from the people.
Occupy Wall Street:: It's spontaneously explosive
By Will Parry
Occupy Wall Street presents an unprecedented challenge to the corporations and financiers who oppress and exploit people the world over.
It is bigger than big. It is incredibly complex. Now well into its second month, it continues to develop daily and hourly.
This article is an initial appraisal of a dynamic movement whose ultimate impact, though uncertain, carries within it the hopes of humanity. Believe me, it is a subject to be approached with humility.
One report says ongoing demonstrations are taking place in more than 1,500 cities globally. Another report tells of actions in 951 cities in 82 countries. Still another tells of meetings in 1,383 cities in the U.S. alone.
In our own state, 600 in Tacoma took their protest to major banks. Other activists are occupying the streets of Bellingham, Olympia, Spokane, Tri-Cities, Wenatchee and Yakima, as well as Seattle. In Portland, organizers estimated a protest crowd at 10,000. In his monthly column (page 4), PSARA President Robby Stern tells of a meeting of 600 in modest Sequim, Washington.
At least since the Great Depression, nothing as spontaneously explosive as this has come along to shake up the masters of the universe.
The millions who are with the marchers do not have a five-point program. They are not united around a single political demand. What they do share is a common, bone deep anger at an unjust economy, where profit is God, and where 99 percent of the people are bled day in and day out by the wealthiest 1 percent.
“The movement doesn’t need a policy or legislative agenda to send its message,” wrote Katrina Vanden Heuvel in The Nation. “The thrust of what it seeks – fueled both by anger and by deep principles – has moral clarity. It wants corporate money out of politics. It wants the widening gap of income inequality to be narrowed substantially. And it wants meaningful solutions to the jobless crisis. In short, it wants a system that works for the 99 percent.”
“Everybody has different grievances, but we all feel the country is being lost,” said Frank Bader, 44, an unemployed Portland real estate title examiner.
In every major city, the authorities are responding to the non-violent occupations with a police presence. In response, there have been repeated examples of civil disobedience by heroic men and women, in the tradition of those who went to jail over Viet Nam and during the civil rights struggles.
In Oakland, the police were especially ugly, using tear gas and firing “non-lethal” rubber bullets indiscriminately. One victim was hospitalized in serious condition. The next morning the occupiers were back on the street – and the mayor apologized.
In New York, more than 700 were arrested on the Brooklyn Bridge. On another occasion, a police motorcycle ran over the leg of an attorney and video showed police wildly beating protesters with their batons and even charging horses into the crowd.
Also in New York, police strung orange netting across streets to trap protesting groups like schools of fish, a tactic described as “kettling.”
“They put up orange nets and tried to kettle us and we started running and they started tackling random people and handcuffing them. They were herding us like cattle,” said Kelly Brannon, 27.
Everywhere the occupiers’ cameras documented each confrontation.
In Seattle, in New York, everywhere, youth responded in numbers to the call to occupy parks and city squares and other public spaces. Many, including veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan, were jobless and broke. Others were college graduates, over their heads in debt and unable to find a job. At one protest, Nate Smith carried a sign that read, “Seventeen and no future.”
“People want their voices to be heard,” said Peter Kass, 26, who works in a residential treatment facility. “You get strength in numbers. I’ll be a number.”
On October 5, in an organized expression of support, students at 90 U.S. colleges and universities walked out of class and held rallies and teach-ins.
Organized labor, which had already planned a week of intensive lobbying for jobs in the nation’s capital, noted the power of street protests to get the attention of the politicians.
“I think being in the streets and calling attention to issues is sometimes the only recourse you have because, God only knows, you can go to the Hill (Congress) and you can talk to a lot of people and see nothing ever happen,” said AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka..
The occupiers have the attention of those in power. And they plan to stay through a winter that looms raw as a second Valley Forge. This is not a “come to a demonstration and then go home” kind of operation.
We need to do all we can to see that it has staying power. If you can, join the nearest occupation in person. Listed on page ___ are other ways you can help. Young, middle-aged and old, men and women, the occupiers are out there for all of us.
Indeed, “we all have different grievances, but we all feel the country is being lost.”
Occupy Wall Street presents an unprecedented challenge to the corporations and financiers who oppress and exploit people the world over.
It is bigger than big. It is incredibly complex. Now well into its second month, it continues to develop daily and hourly.
This article is an initial appraisal of a dynamic movement whose ultimate impact, though uncertain, carries within it the hopes of humanity. Believe me, it is a subject to be approached with humility.
One report says ongoing demonstrations are taking place in more than 1,500 cities globally. Another report tells of actions in 951 cities in 82 countries. Still another tells of meetings in 1,383 cities in the U.S. alone.
In our own state, 600 in Tacoma took their protest to major banks. Other activists are occupying the streets of Bellingham, Olympia, Spokane, Tri-Cities, Wenatchee and Yakima, as well as Seattle. In Portland, organizers estimated a protest crowd at 10,000. In his monthly column (page 4), PSARA President Robby Stern tells of a meeting of 600 in modest Sequim, Washington.
At least since the Great Depression, nothing as spontaneously explosive as this has come along to shake up the masters of the universe.
The millions who are with the marchers do not have a five-point program. They are not united around a single political demand. What they do share is a common, bone deep anger at an unjust economy, where profit is God, and where 99 percent of the people are bled day in and day out by the wealthiest 1 percent.
“The movement doesn’t need a policy or legislative agenda to send its message,” wrote Katrina Vanden Heuvel in The Nation. “The thrust of what it seeks – fueled both by anger and by deep principles – has moral clarity. It wants corporate money out of politics. It wants the widening gap of income inequality to be narrowed substantially. And it wants meaningful solutions to the jobless crisis. In short, it wants a system that works for the 99 percent.”
“Everybody has different grievances, but we all feel the country is being lost,” said Frank Bader, 44, an unemployed Portland real estate title examiner.
In every major city, the authorities are responding to the non-violent occupations with a police presence. In response, there have been repeated examples of civil disobedience by heroic men and women, in the tradition of those who went to jail over Viet Nam and during the civil rights struggles.
In Oakland, the police were especially ugly, using tear gas and firing “non-lethal” rubber bullets indiscriminately. One victim was hospitalized in serious condition. The next morning the occupiers were back on the street – and the mayor apologized.
In New York, more than 700 were arrested on the Brooklyn Bridge. On another occasion, a police motorcycle ran over the leg of an attorney and video showed police wildly beating protesters with their batons and even charging horses into the crowd.
Also in New York, police strung orange netting across streets to trap protesting groups like schools of fish, a tactic described as “kettling.”
“They put up orange nets and tried to kettle us and we started running and they started tackling random people and handcuffing them. They were herding us like cattle,” said Kelly Brannon, 27.
Everywhere the occupiers’ cameras documented each confrontation.
In Seattle, in New York, everywhere, youth responded in numbers to the call to occupy parks and city squares and other public spaces. Many, including veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan, were jobless and broke. Others were college graduates, over their heads in debt and unable to find a job. At one protest, Nate Smith carried a sign that read, “Seventeen and no future.”
“People want their voices to be heard,” said Peter Kass, 26, who works in a residential treatment facility. “You get strength in numbers. I’ll be a number.”
On October 5, in an organized expression of support, students at 90 U.S. colleges and universities walked out of class and held rallies and teach-ins.
Organized labor, which had already planned a week of intensive lobbying for jobs in the nation’s capital, noted the power of street protests to get the attention of the politicians.
“I think being in the streets and calling attention to issues is sometimes the only recourse you have because, God only knows, you can go to the Hill (Congress) and you can talk to a lot of people and see nothing ever happen,” said AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka..
The occupiers have the attention of those in power. And they plan to stay through a winter that looms raw as a second Valley Forge. This is not a “come to a demonstration and then go home” kind of operation.
We need to do all we can to see that it has staying power. If you can, join the nearest occupation in person. Listed on page ___ are other ways you can help. Young, middle-aged and old, men and women, the occupiers are out there for all of us.
Indeed, “we all have different grievances, but we all feel the country is being lost.”
We are the 99%
One reason the Occupy Movement continues to inspire people and gain support in this country and around the world is that it’s based on truth.
There’s a vast gulf between the 1% who control the world’s wealth and the 99% who produce it.
Even if we’ve never studied political economy, we feel instinctively that we’re part of the 99% and we want to stand with them.
And even if we, personally, can’t camp out in Westlake Plaza or Zucotti Park, we can “occupy” where we actually are – our jobs, our unions, our community centers, our churches – and speak out for our needs, the needs of the 99%.
We have plenty of work that needs doing in this country and millions looking for full-time work. We could use the money being made on Wall Street and in corporate boardrooms across the country to put people back to work, and to strengthen our social safety net for those who can’t work or have retired.
The Retiree Advocate has a role to play. Every month we provide news and hard-hitting analysis to clarify the needs of the 99% and expose the machinations of the 1%.
Will you help us?
If you’re not yet a PSARA member, please join us! Help us give PSARA a strong voice.
If you are a member, please renew your membership. And invite your neighbors and friends to join us as well.
After all, we are the 99%. If we’re informed and organized, no one can stop us.
There’s a vast gulf between the 1% who control the world’s wealth and the 99% who produce it.
Even if we’ve never studied political economy, we feel instinctively that we’re part of the 99% and we want to stand with them.
And even if we, personally, can’t camp out in Westlake Plaza or Zucotti Park, we can “occupy” where we actually are – our jobs, our unions, our community centers, our churches – and speak out for our needs, the needs of the 99%.
We have plenty of work that needs doing in this country and millions looking for full-time work. We could use the money being made on Wall Street and in corporate boardrooms across the country to put people back to work, and to strengthen our social safety net for those who can’t work or have retired.
The Retiree Advocate has a role to play. Every month we provide news and hard-hitting analysis to clarify the needs of the 99% and expose the machinations of the 1%.
Will you help us?
If you’re not yet a PSARA member, please join us! Help us give PSARA a strong voice.
If you are a member, please renew your membership. And invite your neighbors and friends to join us as well.
After all, we are the 99%. If we’re informed and organized, no one can stop us.
‘Something’s happening here’
By Robby Stern
Recently I was invited to speak in Sequim, Washington to a forum sponsored by the Move On Councils in Clallam, Jefferson and Island counties. The event was to be held in the auditorium at Sequim High School. I anticipated an audience of 50 to 60 residents. To my total astonishment, 600 people attended and heard David Korten, publisher and editor of Yes Magazine and Katherine Ottaway, a Port Townsend family practice doctor and a member of “Mad As Hell Doctors”.
The program also included video taping audience comments directed to the Congressional Super Committee whose names and pictures were prominently featured on stage. The message from the audience to the Super Committee was clear: “Don’t you dare cut the safety net programs like Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security.” Additionally, they demanded a genuine political democracy rather than control by corporations and wealthy interests. They demanded an economy that works for the majority (the 99%) rather than for the wealthy few and the corporations. When I mentioned the Occupy movement, they literally clapped and cheered…in Sequim, Washington.
Clearly something is happening and it might be big. It is difficult to predict but PSARA will do all we can to encourage activism, insurgency and the demand for a more progressive and humane country, state, county and city. We will support the demand for an economy that serves the needs of the 99% and a decision-making process that is democratic and not controlled by wealthy corporate interests . We have a long way to go but the opportunities to participate abound.
That brings us to the deliberations of the “Super Committee” at the federal level and the upcoming Special Session that begins November 28 in Olympia. While the “Super Committee” contemplates cuts to Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, the legislature, in special session, will consider cuts to meet the additional $2 billion decline in revenue at the state level. At both the state and federal level, the cuts that are being proposed are devastating and immoral.
There will be significant job losses from these cuts, with a resulting decline in revenue for federal and state governments. There will be deeper cuts by local government. The downward spiral will be unchecked for the foreseeable future.
With other forces in our communities, we are demanding that those responsible for this economic crisis must be made to pay for the tragedy they have brought into the lives of poor people, the vulnerable and working people.
At the federal level, end the tax breaks for the rich and the tax breaks for the corporations. Stop these wars that are literally wasting billions and even trillions of taxpayer dollars.
At the state level, the legislature and Governor must place a halt to the tax breaks they have been handing out like candy over the past decade and a half. While the poor, the vulnerable and the working class suffer mightily, the corporate interests go along their merry way paying huge salaries to their executives while they pretend to cry out for the pain but show a willingness to sacrifice nothing.
Our Congress members and state legislators tell us there is nothing they can do other than make cuts. They argue that in the Congress, the Senate filibuster and the Republican control of the House leaves no alternatives to cuts to our vital safety net programs.
Well, it’s time for some backbone. The Super Committee failing to reach agreement at least assures that 50% of the cuts will be from the defense budget. The defense industry is squealing like stuffed pigs and telling their Congress people why this (sequestration) cannot be allowed to happen. Bull malarkey! They should not have cut the deal in the first place, and now that they cut this “deficit deal” the Democrats had better be accountable. They absolutely must not allow the vital safety net programs to be cut just when they are most needed. They’d better stand their ground or they will pay a huge price (along with the rest of us) in 2012.
At the state level, here’s what they can do:
1. Pass a referendum to the people in the Special Session to raise revenue.
2. It takes a simple majority vote (not two thirds) to issue General Obligation bonds to help fund education and heath care and Revenue Bonds to rebuild our infrastructure and create jobs.
Legislators will protest that the state should not assume additional debt. Our response: If this is not a time to assume increased debt, when is the time? They can create additional revenues to pay off the General Obligation bonds by closing the tax loopholes either in the legislature or by sending a referendum to the people.
Our demands will be clear. They have cut $10 billion dollars over the course of the last three years. It is time to raise revenue to plug this hole. This is not a deficit crisis; it is a revenue crisis created by giving away billions of dollars in tax breaks and Wall Street turning our economy into their private casino. It is time to make a correction.
PSARA will be calling on our members to do everything you can to put pressure on the President, the Congress, state legislators and governor to do the right thing.
Recently I was invited to speak in Sequim, Washington to a forum sponsored by the Move On Councils in Clallam, Jefferson and Island counties. The event was to be held in the auditorium at Sequim High School. I anticipated an audience of 50 to 60 residents. To my total astonishment, 600 people attended and heard David Korten, publisher and editor of Yes Magazine and Katherine Ottaway, a Port Townsend family practice doctor and a member of “Mad As Hell Doctors”.
The program also included video taping audience comments directed to the Congressional Super Committee whose names and pictures were prominently featured on stage. The message from the audience to the Super Committee was clear: “Don’t you dare cut the safety net programs like Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security.” Additionally, they demanded a genuine political democracy rather than control by corporations and wealthy interests. They demanded an economy that works for the majority (the 99%) rather than for the wealthy few and the corporations. When I mentioned the Occupy movement, they literally clapped and cheered…in Sequim, Washington.
Clearly something is happening and it might be big. It is difficult to predict but PSARA will do all we can to encourage activism, insurgency and the demand for a more progressive and humane country, state, county and city. We will support the demand for an economy that serves the needs of the 99% and a decision-making process that is democratic and not controlled by wealthy corporate interests . We have a long way to go but the opportunities to participate abound.
That brings us to the deliberations of the “Super Committee” at the federal level and the upcoming Special Session that begins November 28 in Olympia. While the “Super Committee” contemplates cuts to Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, the legislature, in special session, will consider cuts to meet the additional $2 billion decline in revenue at the state level. At both the state and federal level, the cuts that are being proposed are devastating and immoral.
There will be significant job losses from these cuts, with a resulting decline in revenue for federal and state governments. There will be deeper cuts by local government. The downward spiral will be unchecked for the foreseeable future.
With other forces in our communities, we are demanding that those responsible for this economic crisis must be made to pay for the tragedy they have brought into the lives of poor people, the vulnerable and working people.
At the federal level, end the tax breaks for the rich and the tax breaks for the corporations. Stop these wars that are literally wasting billions and even trillions of taxpayer dollars.
At the state level, the legislature and Governor must place a halt to the tax breaks they have been handing out like candy over the past decade and a half. While the poor, the vulnerable and the working class suffer mightily, the corporate interests go along their merry way paying huge salaries to their executives while they pretend to cry out for the pain but show a willingness to sacrifice nothing.
Our Congress members and state legislators tell us there is nothing they can do other than make cuts. They argue that in the Congress, the Senate filibuster and the Republican control of the House leaves no alternatives to cuts to our vital safety net programs.
Well, it’s time for some backbone. The Super Committee failing to reach agreement at least assures that 50% of the cuts will be from the defense budget. The defense industry is squealing like stuffed pigs and telling their Congress people why this (sequestration) cannot be allowed to happen. Bull malarkey! They should not have cut the deal in the first place, and now that they cut this “deficit deal” the Democrats had better be accountable. They absolutely must not allow the vital safety net programs to be cut just when they are most needed. They’d better stand their ground or they will pay a huge price (along with the rest of us) in 2012.
At the state level, here’s what they can do:
1. Pass a referendum to the people in the Special Session to raise revenue.
2. It takes a simple majority vote (not two thirds) to issue General Obligation bonds to help fund education and heath care and Revenue Bonds to rebuild our infrastructure and create jobs.
Legislators will protest that the state should not assume additional debt. Our response: If this is not a time to assume increased debt, when is the time? They can create additional revenues to pay off the General Obligation bonds by closing the tax loopholes either in the legislature or by sending a referendum to the people.
Our demands will be clear. They have cut $10 billion dollars over the course of the last three years. It is time to raise revenue to plug this hole. This is not a deficit crisis; it is a revenue crisis created by giving away billions of dollars in tax breaks and Wall Street turning our economy into their private casino. It is time to make a correction.
PSARA will be calling on our members to do everything you can to put pressure on the President, the Congress, state legislators and governor to do the right thing.
Caring across generations
By Hilary Stern
Love is not a word you hear much when talking about politics and policy. But in the Caring Across Generations Campaign, love is a four letter word that comes up often and shamelessly.
The Caring Across Generations Campaign is a bold visionary campaign based on love and caring and led by domestic workers who believes that we are all interdependent. A healthy society, like a healthy family, is one that cares for each other and treats those that need care and those that give care with respect and dignity.
I am part of the baby boomer generation, the generation that shook up society with its youthful energy and rebellion in the 60’s and 70’s. Now I am part of the age wave. Every eight seconds someone in this country turns 65. And in 10 years, every eight seconds someone will be turning 75, and ten years later they will be turning 85 and then …. well, you get the picture.
In fact, as we baby boomers age, the number of people needing long-term care is projected to grow from 13 million in 2000 to 27 million by 2050. But now there are only about 3 million long-term care workers. The gap between what we have and what we will soon need is called the Care Gap.
At the same time, direct care and domestic workers filling these care roles are often immigrant workers making poverty wages and working in strenuous conditions with limited support, rights, and training.
We need to take better care of each other. That’s why PSARA has joined with Casa Latina, Washington Community Action Network, and SEIU 775 NW, and others to bring a visionary national campaign, Caring Across Generations, here to Seattle, Washington.
The Caring Across Generations Campaign seeks to provide dignity to our elderly and their caregivers with the “Five Fingers of the Caring Hand”:
1) The creation of new, quality jobs to meet the growing need,
2) Labor standards and improved job quality for existing and new jobs,
3) Training and career ladders for home care workers,
4) A new visa category and path to citizenship for immigrant care workers,
5) Support for individuals and families in need, including a tax credit for people paying out of pocket for care.
Since the campaign began, the limited safety net we have now is being threatened by budget cuts. The rallying cry of the Campaign has become, “Protect what we have and build what we need.” Protect Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. Build up training and support for care workers, as well as for individuals and families that need care.
On October 5, 2011 the Seattle Care Council, our growing local coalition, had its first planning meeting where student groups and community organizations joined PSARA, Casa Latina, SEIU 775 and Washington CAN in envisioning this new campaign. The Seattle Care Council will continue to meet monthly to plan the Seattle Care Congress, a large, town-hall style event at the Greenwood Senior Center, as well as organizing around a local strategy to engage city elected officials around the values of Care.
If you are interested in getting more involved in the Care Council, please contact Robby Stern, who is organizing an internal committee for PSARA. Please also mark your calendars for our Seattle Care Congress on Saturday, February 11 at the Greenwood Senior Center.
In the spirit of the campaign, we extend to the PSARA membership our love and solidarity.
(Hilary Stern is Executive Director of Casa Latina and a PSARA member.)
Love is not a word you hear much when talking about politics and policy. But in the Caring Across Generations Campaign, love is a four letter word that comes up often and shamelessly.
The Caring Across Generations Campaign is a bold visionary campaign based on love and caring and led by domestic workers who believes that we are all interdependent. A healthy society, like a healthy family, is one that cares for each other and treats those that need care and those that give care with respect and dignity.
I am part of the baby boomer generation, the generation that shook up society with its youthful energy and rebellion in the 60’s and 70’s. Now I am part of the age wave. Every eight seconds someone in this country turns 65. And in 10 years, every eight seconds someone will be turning 75, and ten years later they will be turning 85 and then …. well, you get the picture.
In fact, as we baby boomers age, the number of people needing long-term care is projected to grow from 13 million in 2000 to 27 million by 2050. But now there are only about 3 million long-term care workers. The gap between what we have and what we will soon need is called the Care Gap.
At the same time, direct care and domestic workers filling these care roles are often immigrant workers making poverty wages and working in strenuous conditions with limited support, rights, and training.
We need to take better care of each other. That’s why PSARA has joined with Casa Latina, Washington Community Action Network, and SEIU 775 NW, and others to bring a visionary national campaign, Caring Across Generations, here to Seattle, Washington.
The Caring Across Generations Campaign seeks to provide dignity to our elderly and their caregivers with the “Five Fingers of the Caring Hand”:
1) The creation of new, quality jobs to meet the growing need,
2) Labor standards and improved job quality for existing and new jobs,
3) Training and career ladders for home care workers,
4) A new visa category and path to citizenship for immigrant care workers,
5) Support for individuals and families in need, including a tax credit for people paying out of pocket for care.
Since the campaign began, the limited safety net we have now is being threatened by budget cuts. The rallying cry of the Campaign has become, “Protect what we have and build what we need.” Protect Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. Build up training and support for care workers, as well as for individuals and families that need care.
On October 5, 2011 the Seattle Care Council, our growing local coalition, had its first planning meeting where student groups and community organizations joined PSARA, Casa Latina, SEIU 775 and Washington CAN in envisioning this new campaign. The Seattle Care Council will continue to meet monthly to plan the Seattle Care Congress, a large, town-hall style event at the Greenwood Senior Center, as well as organizing around a local strategy to engage city elected officials around the values of Care.
If you are interested in getting more involved in the Care Council, please contact Robby Stern, who is organizing an internal committee for PSARA. Please also mark your calendars for our Seattle Care Congress on Saturday, February 11 at the Greenwood Senior Center.
In the spirit of the campaign, we extend to the PSARA membership our love and solidarity.
(Hilary Stern is Executive Director of Casa Latina and a PSARA member.)
Nurses blitz 61 Congress offices
By Rap Lewis
Aiming squarely at Wall Street greed, an estimated ten thousand nurses and their labor and community allies organized simultaneous demonstrations at 61 Congressional offices in 21 states on September 1.
At each event, they called on senators and representatives to pledge to “support a Wall Street transaction tax that will raise sufficient revenue to make Wall Street pay fos the devastation it has caused on Main Street.”
On the initiative of the 170,000-member National Nurses United (NNU), the demonstrators organized street theater, community speakouts, soup kitchens and old-fashioned picketlines at Congress members’ offices in Boston, San Francisco and Chicago; Corpus Christi, Texa; Marquette, Michigan; Dayton, Ohio, and many other cities.
“America’s nurses every day see broad declines in health and living standards that are a direct result of patients and families struggling with lack of jobs, un-payable medical bills, hunger and homelessness,“ said NNU Co-President Karen Higgins, RN, at a picketline outside the Richmond, Virginia, office of House Majority Leader Eric Cantor.
Wall Street trade in stocks, derivatives, currencies, credit default swaps, and futures/
Because of the great number of Wall Street transactions, even a modest tax on each would generate hundreds of billions of dollars a year to address the social damage for which Wall Street bears the responsibility, the nurses union says.
Aiming squarely at Wall Street greed, an estimated ten thousand nurses and their labor and community allies organized simultaneous demonstrations at 61 Congressional offices in 21 states on September 1.
At each event, they called on senators and representatives to pledge to “support a Wall Street transaction tax that will raise sufficient revenue to make Wall Street pay fos the devastation it has caused on Main Street.”
On the initiative of the 170,000-member National Nurses United (NNU), the demonstrators organized street theater, community speakouts, soup kitchens and old-fashioned picketlines at Congress members’ offices in Boston, San Francisco and Chicago; Corpus Christi, Texa; Marquette, Michigan; Dayton, Ohio, and many other cities.
“America’s nurses every day see broad declines in health and living standards that are a direct result of patients and families struggling with lack of jobs, un-payable medical bills, hunger and homelessness,“ said NNU Co-President Karen Higgins, RN, at a picketline outside the Richmond, Virginia, office of House Majority Leader Eric Cantor.
Wall Street trade in stocks, derivatives, currencies, credit default swaps, and futures/
Because of the great number of Wall Street transactions, even a modest tax on each would generate hundreds of billions of dollars a year to address the social damage for which Wall Street bears the responsibility, the nurses union says.
Terry O’Neil to speak at U.W. forum on Social Security
Terry O’Neil, the highly respected national president of the National Organization for Women (NOW), will address “The Threat to Social Security: An Issue for All Generations” at a forum from 4:30 p.m. to 6 p.m. Thursday,. November 21, at Kane Hall on the University of Washington campus. (See flyer insert.)
Ms. O’Neil will discuss recent Washington D.C. developments concerning Social Security and the steps we can take to protect and improve this vital program.
Ms. O’Neil will headline a trio of speakers at the forum, sponsored by the Social Security Works Washington, a broad coalition of community and labor groups representing people across the state.
Also on the program is Congressman Jim McDermott, co-sponsor of HR 539, a bill to “scrap the cap” on payroll taxes so that high-income earners pay their fair share to keep Social Security fully solvent for the next 75 years. Representative McDermott is knowledgeable, both about how Social Security operates and also about its impact on the lives of everyday people.
A third speaker is Ron Sims, former King County Executive and retired deputy director of the Department of Housing and Urban Affairs. He will discuss the critical role Social Security plays in the lives of people in our communities.
A recent similar forum at Everett Community College drew an audience of 200 persons, about one-third of them under the age of 30. The forum was co-sponsored by Social Security Works WA, the Everett Community College Department of Political Science, and the Snohomish County Labor Council.
The Social Security Works WA Coalition has targeted outreach to three populations: young people, women and seniors. Young people are targeted because many of them know very little about Social Security and have been led to believe it will not be there for them when they get older. The coalition seeks to dispel that myth, and to persuade them to join the fight to preserve and strengthen Social Security so it will be there when they need it.
The coalition seeks to reach women because women live longer, and therefore rely longer on Social Security. In addition, women suffer wage disparities, leading to lower Social Security benefits. They also suffer a significant loss of income with the death of a spouse. Additionally, women heads of household more frequently rely on survivor benefits as a result of a spouse dying.
All these disparity problems could be addressed if the “earnings cap” were eliminated.
Note also that because women vote in greater numbers, they can strongly influence the positions taken by elected representatives.
Finally, seniors as a group are fully aware of the critical role of Social Security in their lives. They are a huge and growing voting block. Politicians are playing with fire if they mess around with Social Security benefits of seniors. Our goal is to rally the senior generation to tell the politicians, “Don’t you dare mess around with Social Security, Medicare or Medicaid.”
Ms. O’Neil will discuss recent Washington D.C. developments concerning Social Security and the steps we can take to protect and improve this vital program.
Ms. O’Neil will headline a trio of speakers at the forum, sponsored by the Social Security Works Washington, a broad coalition of community and labor groups representing people across the state.
Also on the program is Congressman Jim McDermott, co-sponsor of HR 539, a bill to “scrap the cap” on payroll taxes so that high-income earners pay their fair share to keep Social Security fully solvent for the next 75 years. Representative McDermott is knowledgeable, both about how Social Security operates and also about its impact on the lives of everyday people.
A third speaker is Ron Sims, former King County Executive and retired deputy director of the Department of Housing and Urban Affairs. He will discuss the critical role Social Security plays in the lives of people in our communities.
A recent similar forum at Everett Community College drew an audience of 200 persons, about one-third of them under the age of 30. The forum was co-sponsored by Social Security Works WA, the Everett Community College Department of Political Science, and the Snohomish County Labor Council.
The Social Security Works WA Coalition has targeted outreach to three populations: young people, women and seniors. Young people are targeted because many of them know very little about Social Security and have been led to believe it will not be there for them when they get older. The coalition seeks to dispel that myth, and to persuade them to join the fight to preserve and strengthen Social Security so it will be there when they need it.
The coalition seeks to reach women because women live longer, and therefore rely longer on Social Security. In addition, women suffer wage disparities, leading to lower Social Security benefits. They also suffer a significant loss of income with the death of a spouse. Additionally, women heads of household more frequently rely on survivor benefits as a result of a spouse dying.
All these disparity problems could be addressed if the “earnings cap” were eliminated.
Note also that because women vote in greater numbers, they can strongly influence the positions taken by elected representatives.
Finally, seniors as a group are fully aware of the critical role of Social Security in their lives. They are a huge and growing voting block. Politicians are playing with fire if they mess around with Social Security benefits of seniors. Our goal is to rally the senior generation to tell the politicians, “Don’t you dare mess around with Social Security, Medicare or Medicaid.”
Hey, look at Argentina!
By Mike Andrew
“You can’t spend your way out of a recession!”
So say Republicans and all economic conservatives.
And yet Argentina did just that, bouncing back not just from mere recession but from national bankruptcy, in less than 10 years.
In 2001 Argentina defaulted on $100 billion of sovereign debt. Its banks were collapsing like a house of cards. Its people were occupying shut down factories.
In the four years between 1998 and 2002, Argentina’s economy shrank by almost 20%.
The problem was easy to see. Argentina was the victim of a series of right-wing military dictatorships trying one supply-side economic experiment after another, all of them failures.
The solution was a brave gamble by the Argentine government.
First, the government intervened in the currency market to keep the value of its own currency low. This in turn boosted local industry by making Argentina’s exports cheap, while keeping foreign imports expensive.
It then taxed imports and exports, and spent the revenue on a series of public works projects. Today, Argentine government spending is 25% of GDP, compared with only 14% in 2003.
As a result of the government-financed construction projects, the country has 400,000 new low-income housing units, and a new 235-mile highway between the northern cities of Rosario and Córdoba.
The Argentine government also strengthened its social safety net.
The Universal Child Allowance gives 1.9 million low-income families a monthly stipend of about $42 per child, which helps increase consumption. The Allowance began in 2009 with bipartisan support from both the ruling party and the opposition,
Because the amount of the stipend depends in part on the child’s school attendance, the allowance is also a measure to promote public education.
The Argentine economy has grown by over 6% a year for seven of the last eight years, unemployment has been cut to under 8% today from a whopping 20% in 2002, and the poverty level has fallen by almost half over the last decade.
Argentines are expected to buy some 800,000 new vehicles this year. Plasma TVs and BlackBerrys have become common among Argentina’s growing middle class.
Obviously, this policy is inflationary, with the inflation rate now well over 20%. It remains to be seen how well Argentina’s working people will be able to cope with that.
Nevertheless, Argentina is another example that runs counter to the all-cuts austerity response to economic crisis.
“You can’t spend your way out of a recession!”
So say Republicans and all economic conservatives.
And yet Argentina did just that, bouncing back not just from mere recession but from national bankruptcy, in less than 10 years.
In 2001 Argentina defaulted on $100 billion of sovereign debt. Its banks were collapsing like a house of cards. Its people were occupying shut down factories.
In the four years between 1998 and 2002, Argentina’s economy shrank by almost 20%.
The problem was easy to see. Argentina was the victim of a series of right-wing military dictatorships trying one supply-side economic experiment after another, all of them failures.
The solution was a brave gamble by the Argentine government.
First, the government intervened in the currency market to keep the value of its own currency low. This in turn boosted local industry by making Argentina’s exports cheap, while keeping foreign imports expensive.
It then taxed imports and exports, and spent the revenue on a series of public works projects. Today, Argentine government spending is 25% of GDP, compared with only 14% in 2003.
As a result of the government-financed construction projects, the country has 400,000 new low-income housing units, and a new 235-mile highway between the northern cities of Rosario and Córdoba.
The Argentine government also strengthened its social safety net.
The Universal Child Allowance gives 1.9 million low-income families a monthly stipend of about $42 per child, which helps increase consumption. The Allowance began in 2009 with bipartisan support from both the ruling party and the opposition,
Because the amount of the stipend depends in part on the child’s school attendance, the allowance is also a measure to promote public education.
The Argentine economy has grown by over 6% a year for seven of the last eight years, unemployment has been cut to under 8% today from a whopping 20% in 2002, and the poverty level has fallen by almost half over the last decade.
Argentines are expected to buy some 800,000 new vehicles this year. Plasma TVs and BlackBerrys have become common among Argentina’s growing middle class.
Obviously, this policy is inflationary, with the inflation rate now well over 20%. It remains to be seen how well Argentina’s working people will be able to cope with that.
Nevertheless, Argentina is another example that runs counter to the all-cuts austerity response to economic crisis.
The Koch brothers hate Social Security
By Mike Andrew
Charles and David Koch, the right-wing billionaires who financed the Tea Party, have poured millions of dollars into destroying Social Security.
They learned to hate Social Security quite literally at their daddy’s knee. Their father, Fred Koch, was one of the founders and the principal financial backer of the John Birch Society, the secretive ultra-right organization of the Fifties and Sixties.
David and Charles have surpassed their father’s efforts by far, however.
According to Brave New Foundation, a social justice research group, the Koch brothers have spent more than $28 million to create what amounts to an entire anti-Social Security industry.
Koch-financed spokespeople, front groups, think tanks, and academics have produced no fewer than 297 commentaries, 200 reports, 56 studies, and 6 full-length books full of distortions of Social Security’s record of effective service.
The Brave New Foundation investigation reveals Koch-supported policies – and even specific language – repeated in each document they studied, raising the retirement age or eliminating cost of living adjustments, for example.
All of this adds up to “a self-sustaining echo chamber to transform fringe ideas into popular mainstream public policy arguments,” Brave New Foundation says.
This “echo chamber” includes think tanks like the Cato Institute, Heritage Foundation and Mercatus Centre at George Mason University and the Reason Foundation, which owe their existence to Koch backing.
Their distorted message is then reported as fact on TV shows like Fox News’s Hannity, with 3.3 million viewers per episode, or CNBC's Kudlow Report, with 300,000 viewers per episode, night after night after night.
As an article in The Nation magazine points out, when Texas Governor Rick Perry calls Social Security a “Ponzi scheme,” that phrase comes directly from the Koch propaganda machine.
The Koch brothers have even been able to influence the messaging for the AARP. which recently opened the door to cutting Social Security benefits.
Koch Industries spent $857,000 on lobbyists in 2004, the year before George W Bush tried and failed to privatise social security. They also donated $104,660 to his campaign.
While their attacks on Social Security were not successful in 2004, they have not retreated.
Just the opposite, in fact. They have used the country’s economic crisis as an excuse to increase their attacks.
In the first two years of the Obama administration, the Koch brothers spent $20 million on lobbying, according to the Centre for Public Integrity.
"The Koch brothers fund organizations, and you have economists and political scientists working there, and they are very, very good at getting on television," Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) said. "They are very effective in getting their positions out into the media."
The brothers have diversified their donations to Republican leaders, and also to strategic Democrats who oppose revenue increases like Senator Ben Nelson (D-NE) and Governor Andrew Cuomo (D-NY).
Traditional lobbying has now given way to a larger, more insidious propaganda campaign aimed at changing the terms of debate not only on Social Security, but on the role of government and social spending in general.
"The Koch brothers’ job is to do everything they can to dismember government in general," Sen. Sanders says. "If you can destroy social security, you will have gone a long way forward in that effort."
Charles and David Koch, the right-wing billionaires who financed the Tea Party, have poured millions of dollars into destroying Social Security.
They learned to hate Social Security quite literally at their daddy’s knee. Their father, Fred Koch, was one of the founders and the principal financial backer of the John Birch Society, the secretive ultra-right organization of the Fifties and Sixties.
David and Charles have surpassed their father’s efforts by far, however.
According to Brave New Foundation, a social justice research group, the Koch brothers have spent more than $28 million to create what amounts to an entire anti-Social Security industry.
Koch-financed spokespeople, front groups, think tanks, and academics have produced no fewer than 297 commentaries, 200 reports, 56 studies, and 6 full-length books full of distortions of Social Security’s record of effective service.
The Brave New Foundation investigation reveals Koch-supported policies – and even specific language – repeated in each document they studied, raising the retirement age or eliminating cost of living adjustments, for example.
All of this adds up to “a self-sustaining echo chamber to transform fringe ideas into popular mainstream public policy arguments,” Brave New Foundation says.
This “echo chamber” includes think tanks like the Cato Institute, Heritage Foundation and Mercatus Centre at George Mason University and the Reason Foundation, which owe their existence to Koch backing.
Their distorted message is then reported as fact on TV shows like Fox News’s Hannity, with 3.3 million viewers per episode, or CNBC's Kudlow Report, with 300,000 viewers per episode, night after night after night.
As an article in The Nation magazine points out, when Texas Governor Rick Perry calls Social Security a “Ponzi scheme,” that phrase comes directly from the Koch propaganda machine.
The Koch brothers have even been able to influence the messaging for the AARP. which recently opened the door to cutting Social Security benefits.
Koch Industries spent $857,000 on lobbyists in 2004, the year before George W Bush tried and failed to privatise social security. They also donated $104,660 to his campaign.
While their attacks on Social Security were not successful in 2004, they have not retreated.
Just the opposite, in fact. They have used the country’s economic crisis as an excuse to increase their attacks.
In the first two years of the Obama administration, the Koch brothers spent $20 million on lobbying, according to the Centre for Public Integrity.
"The Koch brothers fund organizations, and you have economists and political scientists working there, and they are very, very good at getting on television," Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) said. "They are very effective in getting their positions out into the media."
The brothers have diversified their donations to Republican leaders, and also to strategic Democrats who oppose revenue increases like Senator Ben Nelson (D-NE) and Governor Andrew Cuomo (D-NY).
Traditional lobbying has now given way to a larger, more insidious propaganda campaign aimed at changing the terms of debate not only on Social Security, but on the role of government and social spending in general.
"The Koch brothers’ job is to do everything they can to dismember government in general," Sen. Sanders says. "If you can destroy social security, you will have gone a long way forward in that effort."
All across the country, unions and their members are supporting the Occupy movement in individual cities.
Locally, the Martin Luther King County Labor Council, the Teamsters, and the Seattle Building & Construction Trades Council are teaming up to collect supplies for the Occupy Seattle movement.
If you can donate something, or better yet, if you can get your local, your church, your community organization to help out, here’s what to do…
First check with Max Brown at the Labor Temple (206-963-6195 or 206-441-8510) to see what is needed. Then, bring it to one of the drop-off locations listed here.
DROP-OFF LOCATIONS:
M. L. King County Labor Council, 2800 First Avenue, Suite 206, Seattle, 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. weekdays only. Contact: Max Brown 206-963-6195 or 206-441-8510.
Seattle/King County Building & Construction Trades Council, 6770 E. Marginal Way S., Building E, Suite 360, Seattle. 9 a/m/ to 11:30 a.m. and 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. weekdays only. Contact: Keith Weir 206-795-2993.
Teamsters Hall.\, 14675 Interurban Ave. S., Lobby, Tukwila, 9 am. To 5 p.m. weekdays only. Contact Lily Wilson-Codega 206-794-2606.
Locally, the Martin Luther King County Labor Council, the Teamsters, and the Seattle Building & Construction Trades Council are teaming up to collect supplies for the Occupy Seattle movement.
If you can donate something, or better yet, if you can get your local, your church, your community organization to help out, here’s what to do…
First check with Max Brown at the Labor Temple (206-963-6195 or 206-441-8510) to see what is needed. Then, bring it to one of the drop-off locations listed here.
DROP-OFF LOCATIONS:
M. L. King County Labor Council, 2800 First Avenue, Suite 206, Seattle, 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. weekdays only. Contact: Max Brown 206-963-6195 or 206-441-8510.
Seattle/King County Building & Construction Trades Council, 6770 E. Marginal Way S., Building E, Suite 360, Seattle. 9 a/m/ to 11:30 a.m. and 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. weekdays only. Contact: Keith Weir 206-795-2993.
Teamsters Hall.\, 14675 Interurban Ave. S., Lobby, Tukwila, 9 am. To 5 p.m. weekdays only. Contact Lily Wilson-Codega 206-794-2606.
November Calendar of Events
Monday, Nov. 14, 1:00 p.m.
“The 99% Economy: Getting the Economy Back on Track”:
IAM 751 Hall, 9125 15th Pl. S., Seattle, 98108.
Presentations and discussions about how we respond to the economic crisis and create an economy that serves the majority of people in our country. Sponsored by the WA State Labor Council and WA Community Action Network.
Tuesday, November 15, 5:00 p.m. - 6:30 p.m.
Healthy Washington Coalition Meeting:
UFCW 21, 5030 First Avenue S., Seattle.
The Healthy WA Coalition, of which PSARA is a member, will be leading the fight in Washington state to stop cuts to Medicaid and Medicare and to improve and expand these programs as part of the overall effort to achieve health care for all.
Thursday, November 17th, 1:00 p.m. - 3:00 p.m.
PSARA Executive Board Meeting:
Central Area Senior Center, 500 30th Avenue S., Seattle.
All PSARA members are welcome.
Monday, November 21, 4:30 p.m.
The Threat to Social Security; An Issue for All Generations:
Kane Hall, Room 210, University of Washington
Featuring Terry O’Neill, national President, National Organization for Women, Congressman Jim McDermott and former King County Executive Ron Sims, retired Deputy Director of the Department of Housing & Urban Development.
Sponsored by Social Security Works WA.
Monday, November 28th, 10 a.m.
Special session of Washington State Legislature: Beginning of Occupation of the Capitol demanding that the legislature and Governor raise revenue and make no further cuts. PSARA will be mobilizing our members to participate. Further information will be available on the website and via emails to the list serve.
Thursday, December 15th, 12:30 p.m.
PSARA General Membership Meeting and Holiday Pot Luck:
UFCW 21, Joe Crump Hall, 5030 First Ave South, Seattle.
Great food, featured speaker, Congressman & Gubernatorial Candidate Jay Inslee (contingent on Congress being out of session), PSARA elections and more. Mark your calendars! Bring non perishable food for King County Labor Agency Food Bank.
“The 99% Economy: Getting the Economy Back on Track”:
IAM 751 Hall, 9125 15th Pl. S., Seattle, 98108.
Presentations and discussions about how we respond to the economic crisis and create an economy that serves the majority of people in our country. Sponsored by the WA State Labor Council and WA Community Action Network.
Tuesday, November 15, 5:00 p.m. - 6:30 p.m.
Healthy Washington Coalition Meeting:
UFCW 21, 5030 First Avenue S., Seattle.
The Healthy WA Coalition, of which PSARA is a member, will be leading the fight in Washington state to stop cuts to Medicaid and Medicare and to improve and expand these programs as part of the overall effort to achieve health care for all.
Thursday, November 17th, 1:00 p.m. - 3:00 p.m.
PSARA Executive Board Meeting:
Central Area Senior Center, 500 30th Avenue S., Seattle.
All PSARA members are welcome.
Monday, November 21, 4:30 p.m.
The Threat to Social Security; An Issue for All Generations:
Kane Hall, Room 210, University of Washington
Featuring Terry O’Neill, national President, National Organization for Women, Congressman Jim McDermott and former King County Executive Ron Sims, retired Deputy Director of the Department of Housing & Urban Development.
Sponsored by Social Security Works WA.
Monday, November 28th, 10 a.m.
Special session of Washington State Legislature: Beginning of Occupation of the Capitol demanding that the legislature and Governor raise revenue and make no further cuts. PSARA will be mobilizing our members to participate. Further information will be available on the website and via emails to the list serve.
Thursday, December 15th, 12:30 p.m.
PSARA General Membership Meeting and Holiday Pot Luck:
UFCW 21, Joe Crump Hall, 5030 First Ave South, Seattle.
Great food, featured speaker, Congressman & Gubernatorial Candidate Jay Inslee (contingent on Congress being out of session), PSARA elections and more. Mark your calendars! Bring non perishable food for King County Labor Agency Food Bank.
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