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Through informing and networking Liberals and Liberal Organizations.
Our vision is hundreds of thousands of well-informed
Our Website Our Editor To Unsubscribe Table of
Contents * Featured
Articles Calendars of Events Communication With Our Members Opportunities Petitions Commentaries from Our Members Brenden
Williams:Legislature Is Devastating Education* Aaron Keating: Tuition Increases Are Harmful Rich Austin: Liberals Shouldn’t Endorse Dave Reichert Jack Smith: Eliminate Washington’s Death Penalty Liberals and Democrats Links to the Beef State and Local Links
to the Beef Sales Tax Increase Would Be More Unfair* Washington’s Public
Investment Has Been Declining Featured Advocacy Group: Statewide Poverty Action Nation and World Links to the Beef From Our Old Economy to Our New Economy* Replace our Failed Retirement Investment System How about Severe Penalties for Misuse of Health Info? Preventing Piracy in the Indian Ocean Have Conservatives Tarnished U.S. Christianity? Our Liberal Spirit Our
Political Priorities ·
Fair Clean
Elections and Open Government ·
Fair Taxes and
Competent Spending ·
Investment for
Productivity ·
Quality
Health, Education, Jobs, Income ·
Environmental
Protection and Energy Independence ·
Security and
Equal Rights ·
Justice and
Peace Everywhere ·
International
Cooperation and Leadership Conservatives oppose all of these Let’s
End Our National Nightmare
Let’s
Restore Our American Dream More on Conservative opposition to our
American Dream Washington State’s 5 Major Needs ·
Federal
Funding for Health and Education · Substitute
a Progressive Income Tax · Replacing
Conservative Legislators Quote of the Week They gave me a medal for
my humility. When I wore it, they
took it away. Jack Wood
Calendar of Events
Friday, April 24 (3-9 PM); Saturday, April 25 (9 AM-6 PM); and Sunday,
April 26 (9 AM – 3:30 PM) at Seattle – Camp
Wellstone training for citizen activists, campaign workers and
candidates. $50 - $200. To
register.
Sunday,
April 26 at 1–5 PM at Craven Farms (
Tuesday, April 28 at 7:30 AM
at Sightline Institute (1402 Third Avenue, Suite 500, Seattle) – Meet
veteran Seattle PI reporters Jennifer Langston and Lisa Stiffler who have joined Sightline, over a continental
breakfast to discuss newspaper and other issues affecting our region’s quality
of life.
Wednesday, May 13 (at 8 AM – 6:30 PM) – Thursday, May 14 (at 9 AM – 5 PM)
at
Wednesday, May 13 at 7 PM at Langston Hughes Performing Arts Center
(Yesler and 17th Avenue South, Seattle) – Free Educational Forum:
Afghanistan: Giving Peace a Chance, presented by Abe Keller Peace Education Fund
and SNOW, featuring Tamim Ansary,
Cabeire DeBerghe Robinson and Stephen Zunes.
Co-sponsors: American Friends Service
Committee, Justice and Peace Committee of
Communication
with Our Members
Considering our links as news
commentaries, our weekly newsletter contains as much political news commentary
each week as do typical daily newspapers.
I am spending an increasing amount of time each week, examining half a
dozen commentaries for each one that I provide a link for you. Do you
skim the links and click on the ones that interest you?
Do
you sign any of the petitions? Dave Thomas
Opportunities
and Petitions
Useful
Websites: contacts, maps, community organizing tools, and more.
Access
to jillions of political cartoons.
Download
Sightline Institute’s climate policy primer ‘Cap and Trade 101’. About
Sightline.
Obtain Progressive
States Networks resources for improving many state government services.
Petitions
Tell
your Senators to oppose reducing estate taxes.
Murray & Cantwell support reductions.
Tell
House Committee on Energy and Commerce to support new global warming bill.
Tell
Interior Department Secretary Ken Salazar to keep gray wolves on endangered
list.
Commentaries
From Our Members
Representative Brenden Williams: Our
Legislature Is Devastating Education*
Aaron Keating:
Tuition Increase Has Negative Consequences
Hi Dave, I Wanted to pass on the Economic Opportunity
Institute’s latest policy brief, which analyzes the likely effect of Governor
Gregoire’s proposed 14 percent tuition increase for state schools.
In the world of college finance and financial aid, the
governor’s proposal is known as the “high-tuition/high-aid” model. In theory,
students who can afford higher tuition will pay more; those who cannot will
benefit from larger financial aid packages supported by the tuition increase.
In reality, it preserves neither access to nor quality
of higher education. Several other Research Tier 1 universities (like the
· Enrollment of low-income and
under-represented minority students declines due in part to “sticker shock.”
· Enrollment of high-performing
students declines due to greater competition with private colleges.
· Educational quality decreases as
schools shift funds in the struggle to maintain access.
· Financial aid packages shift to
emphasize loans that contribute to high levels of student debt.
To read the
complete brief. Feel free to contact me with any questions. Thanks, Aaron
Keating, Communications Director, Economic Opportunity Institute
Rich Austin:
Liberal Advocacy Groups Shouldn’t Endorse Dave Reichert
Regarding the comment on the 8th CD
Congressional race, and the lack of political
experience on the part of Darcy Burner and how that hampered her chances to
win, allow me to offer this observation.
Had those who should have philosophical ties to Burner endorsed her and
voted for her instead of Republican Reichert, Darcy might quite well be our 7th
Democratic member of the House from WA.
Do your own research. Personally,
I found one group’s endorsement of Reichert self-serving and repulsive. As they say, the chickens will come home to
roost. Reichert’s NO votes on the
stimulus package are a harbinger of things to come. Who will the renegade group turn to for
support? Reichert has already shown his
colors.
For purposes of full disclosure, I am a union member of 42 years, now
retired. I have no use for those in
labor who break ranks and run their noses up the south ends of anti-worker
politicians heading north! Rich Austin
Jack Smith:
Eliminate
Dear
Friends, I sent this message to the Governor today. While the thoughts
against the death penalty are important to me, the prayers of Easter Peace and
Love go out to you. In all respects, I hope you will join me in the efforts for
a better world. Jack Smith
Dear Governor Gregoire; Yesterday was Good Friday, the day we remember
when Jesus Christ was executed on a tree between two criminals. They died reminding of the importance of Christ's
actions and his teachings. Including non-violence. Most of our modern world has
adapted non-violence with respect to execution. The
Liberals
and Democrats
Obama Watch – Week 12 (April 7 – 14)
Also go to Whitehouse.gov.
Foreign Policy
Copying a strategy
used successfully in Iraq, U.S. is recruiting local militias in Afghanistan.
President
Obama’s Foreign Policy
President
Obama and the United Nations For
more. For
more. For
more.
President Obama vowed to
cooperate with other countries to counteract piracy. For
more.
President
Obama relaxes restrictions on travel and gifts to Cuba.
President
Obama plans trip to Latin American summit.
Stimulus-Investment Package
Infrastructure
projects costing less than expected, allowing more of them.
On
Tuesday at Georgetown University, President Obama described 5 pillars of
recovery (video). More. For
more.
Health Care Reform
Max
Baucus leads struggle for health reform.
Largest
battle will be whether to include public health insurance option.
Arguments
for including a public health insurance option in health reform package.
House
Liberals may insist upon including a public health insurance option in health
reform package. For
More.
Health care costs can’t
be cut by other measures than replacing private with public health insurance. For more.
People
without health care insurance aren’t an organized advocacy group.
Other Initiatives
President
Obama promotes refinancing mortgages
Attorney
General Eric Holder restores disclosures required by freedom of information
act.
Carol
Browner is promoting President Obama’s Energy and Climate Initiatives.
Various
political alternatives exist for dealing with climate change. Unclear which will prevail.
Environmental
Protection Agency is reversing Bush Administration environmental policies.
Obama
Administration will rewrite regulations to better protect spotted owls.
White
House is reaching out to Washington, DC schools and students.
Obama’s
weekly address All weekly addresses.
President Obama’s continues to be
popular at 68%. Republicans unpopularity
is 66%. For
more.
Organizing
for America (successor to Obama’s campaign organization) is off to a slow
start.
Here’s the Beef
Obama’s tax proposals
(in 2010 budget proposal) should be more progressive and raise more money.
Troubled financial
firms mount extensive lobbying effort.
FBI
investigates Lobbying firms which shut down causing large decline in campaign
donations.
Corporate
executives obtain enormous remuneration while opposing increased worker wages.
Supporters of Workers
Free Choice Act are mounting campaign to convince congress.
New
Way Forward is organizing
demonstrations to promote nationalizing, reorganizing and decentralizing banks.
Robert
Kuttner discusses supporting Obama’s many initiatives, but not his bailout
plans.
Seven
ways to increase revenue to pay for our recovery initiatives. For
more.
Will
the SDR (special drawing right) replace the U.S. dollar as the world’s reserve
currency?
Supporters of
immigration reform don’t want to wait until 2010.
Most
illegal immigrants are here to stay.
Many communities depend economically upon them.
Corporate lobbyists are
organizing tea party protests. For
more.
State
and Local
Sales Tax Increase Would Be More Unfair
On March 2nd, our Seattle PI called
for a state income tax. On March 9th,
four
prominent civic leaders called for a tax on high incomes. I hoped that other civic leaders and advocacy
organizations would join them to create a movement for fair tax reform, which
must include a progressive income tax.
This hasn’t happened.
Legislative leaders are preparing a budget which
severely reduces our infrastructure and safety net. Various advocacy organizations are promoting
funding for their concerns, like buzzards fighting over a carcass.
With 2 weeks left in our legislative session, various
advocacy groups (Fuse, Planned Parenthood Votes, SEIU Local 925, Statewide
Poverty Action Network, Tax Fairness Coalition, Washington Association of
Churches, and Washington Low Income Housing Alliance) are finally asking that ways
be found to increase revenue.
Legislative leaders are indicating that our voters
may be offered a choice to temporarily increase our sales tax by 0.3% to
raise $644 million over two years to fund health care programs that would
otherwise be eliminated. For
more. For more. A poll
indicates that a 1% sales tax increase would be rejected by Washington voters.
A sales tax increase would increase the percentage of
income spent on taxes more for low and moderate income than for high income
people, thus making our tax system still more unfair. Some of this unfairness could be mitigated by
funding the Working
Family Tax Credit, but this would reduce the funds available for funding
safety net programs. So, our lower
income people will suffer with or without a sales tax increase, and with or
without a working family tax credit.
Failure of Advocacy
Two organizations which advocate for our public
interest are Washington CAN and Statewide Poverty Action Network. Yet they have little clout with our state
legislature, especially compared with corporate lobbyists who advocate for
private interests.
Educational associations and organizations and labor
unions typically lobby for their special interests instead of for broader
reforms oriented toward our public interests.
Neither is having much success with our legislature during our present
fiscal crisis.
Most of our churches have caring task groups that
concern provision of food, clothing, housing and other services to people which
fail to obtain these through their own efforts or our safety net. Some of our churches have a few advocacy
groups, which are usually concerned with national and international concerns
such as justice and peace. Few of our
churches provide the type of advocacy exemplified by Martin Luther King’s
activities.
Nor do we find many civic leaders that advocate for
our public interest, as Jim Ellis did some 40 years ago with Forward
Thrust. Most of our northwest bloggers
pay little attention to state issues and those that do, give more attention to
candidates than to issues and to specific issues instead of general
reforms. Our legislators advocate for specific
public interest legislation, but do not cooperate to present a vision of our
public interest and an approach to realizing it.
Conservatives have often suggested that reforms should
be done at state instead of federal levels.
At the state level, they argue for doing reform at the local level. At the local level, they argue for doing it
through voluntary associations. On the
boards of voluntary organizations, they argue that reform should be left to
individual initiative.
I agree that reform at lower levels of government and
private organization might be more sensitive to local needs. But this does not typically occur. Our best efforts toward health, education,
infrastructure, safety net, tax, political and other reforms are occurring at
our federal level, led by the Obama Administration. Let’s support these efforts. Let’s also hope and work for a similar
visionary political and economic reform movement in
Washington State’s
Public Investment Has Been Declining for over a Decade
When looking at state fiscal trends, the standard methodology is
to compare state spending and revenue to total personal income.* This provides
insight on the resources we have to fund public investments and also recognizes
that the cost of government grows along with economic and demographic trends.
This graph looks at spending
(the green line) and revenue (the blue line) as a share of personal income from
1995-97 to the legislative budget proposals for 2009-11. Some key facts to
note:
· Revenue had been eroding before the
current economic recession because of significant tax cuts, spending
limitations, and a tax system that doesn’t grow along with the economy even
during good times.**
· The decrease in revenue in the current
biennium is twice as large as previous declines.
· State spending has been fairly flat for a
decade.
· The proposed budget cuts for 2009-11 are
significantly deeper relative to the economy than any other budget over this
time. They would result in a much smaller investment in public priorities.
*Personal income is an estimate of the
total income received by all Washingtonians from all sources (employment,
dividends, interest, etc.). For more, see the Bureau of Economic Analysis.
**Wonder why revenue increased in 2005-07?
The housing market.
Featured Advocacy Group -- Statewide
Poverty Action Network ----------------
Statewide Poverty Action
Network fights to ensure everyone in
·
Creating Change – Poverty Action is
a statewide network of individuals and organizations pushing for innovative
policy solutions.
·
Speaking Truth – Poverty Action
strives to ensure the public, the media and decision makers get the straight
story.
·
Reclaiming Democracy – Poverty
Action mobilizes its members to come together, get educated and act.
Statewide Poverty Action
Network acts to reduce poverty through the following priorities:
·
Giving all a
voice in democracy including voting and advocacy
·
Responsible
government which includes fair taxation and legislation which provides a safety
net and consumer protection
·
Meeting basic
needs for food, housing, clothing, health care, child care and transportation
·
Providing
opportunities to prosper including education, work, income and savings for
investment
At present, Tax
Fairness Is Particularly Relevant
Additionally, many wealthy
corporations are getting out of paying their taxes to the state through legal
tax breaks. In 2002 and 2003 the legislature passed 43 tax breaks that cost
$214 million. In 2004 they passed several more tax breaks that cost $109
million that year, which will grow to $323 million in the 2005-07 budget cycle.
Over the same period people with
lower incomes have seen over $1 billion in cuts to health care and human services
programs that help them meet their basic needs. These cuts include the state’s
Basic Health Plan, emergency care for the Medically Indigent, eliminating some
dental services for the disabled and seniors on Medicaid, cuts to General
Assistance Unemployable, and the list goes on. These cuts undermine our ability
to meet the growing needs of people struggling in our economy, more and more
families without health care, childcare and basic needs assistance.
Poverty Action supports tax reform in
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Here’s the Beef
Eastern
Washington family farmers are threatened by industrial farmers.
Large
tidal-energy project likely at Admiralty Inlet between Port Townsend and
Whidbey Island.
BPA
and utilities planning a Pacific NW smart grid demonstration project.
State legislation
will ban urban growth on floodplains.
A blogger supports a progressive income tax.
Washington
same sex domestic partners given same state rights as married couples.
Nation
and World
From Our Old Economy to Our New Economy
We
need to change from Borrow, Consume and
Speculate to Earn, Conserve and
Invest. Through increased
unionization and earning supplements (increased minimum wage and earned income
tax credits), we need to increase earnings.
We need to return to more equity financing and less business borrowing,
to allow more revenue to go to earnings and less to interest payments. We
need to change our mindset, not just our behavior. Our
increasing millennium generation may push the change. For
more. For
more. Frugality Strategies.
Our
stock market needs to maintain typical P/E ratios at 15%. Our median housing prices need to be 3-3.5
time median incomes, with reduced housing sizes, and more affordable housing
available near jobs. Our annual
automobile sales should be no more than 11 million (instead of recent 16
million sales) with people typically replacing their car every 6 or more years
instead of every 4 ½ years. It should be
more difficult to obtain credit cards, which should have lower borrowing
limits, lower interest rates and fewer and lower fees.
Some
of us are enjoying our new frugality.
We Need to Replace Our Failed Retirement Investment System
Seeking
high returns, people with 401(k) retirement accounts have speculated in funds
holding risky securities, and lost a significant portion of the funds they
expected for retirement. What is needed
are portable public retirement accounts into which employees and willing
employers can place funds. These
retirement accounts would provide secure returns which would provide retirement
payments in addition to social security.
For
more. Our Economic Opportunity
Institute has proposed a similar system (called Washington
Voluntary Accounts) at the state level.
How about Severe Penalties for Misuse of Health Info?
There
are enormous advantages to electronic health records for each person, which are
shared by the person and all the health providers that attend to them. Each provider can see all of the person’s
health situation and the care that is being given by other providers. Preventive care is easier, incompatible care
can be avoided and cost-beneficial care can be more easily assessed. Currently, this is one of the main advantage
of health maintenance organizations, especially non-profit consumer based HMOs
such as
One
of the concerns is that patient health records will be misused by
pharmaceuticals for marketing, health insurers for disqualifying people from
coverage, and employers for hiring. If
health insurers are barred from disqualifying people for pre-existing
conditions, there is no reason they should have access to any person’s health
record before insuring them. Afterwards,
the only reason for access is to ensure that a person receives an insured
treatment of a valid illness.
Pharmaceuticals
and employers should be barred from
having health records, with strict enforcement and expensive
penalties. Insurers should be barred from having health records for anyone they
don’t already insure. For those they
insure, they should only be allowed
temporary access to those portions of health records which they use to validate
insurance claims. Hopefully, most
people will secure their basic health insurance through universal public
insurance. And most providers will be
consumer based non-profit HMOs. For
more. Dave Thomas
Preventing Piracy in the
It
is astonishing that piracy in the
How
about stationing fast (
Conservative Christians May Have Tarnished American
Christianity
The proportion of Americans who are
Christians is declining, especially among our growing numbers of young
people. This is at least in part due to
the identification of Christianity with intolerant Conservative Christianity. The result may be a decline in political
struggles concerning such issues as gay marriage, creationism, prayer in the
schools, display of Christian messages in public places and more.
Here’s the Beef
Worker
Free Choice Act is necessary to increase earnings.
Many
unemployed receive no unemployment benefits.
Squatters
temporarily occupy foreclosed homes.
For
more.
Some
urban freight may be better carried by bike.
Gainesville
FL ordinance stimulates installation of solar roof panels.
Part of $10 billion
stimulus funds for plug-in vehicles can build solar fuel stations.
As more
food is imported, our food safety system is failing.
Reusing gray water
reduces need for drinkable water.
Our
prison-industrial complex lobbies for harsh laws to produce more prisoners.
Ten
ways to oppose the war in Afghanistan.
Our
Liberal Spirit
Humiliation
comes in many forms. It often occurs
when we realize that our expectations don’t fit reality. When something occurs that exposes our
misconception. We feel humiliated that
we were wrong. Or humiliation occurs
when our wishes won’t come true. That
our passion and efforts won’t pay off.
For
over a year, I have believed that a progressive income tax is required to
fairly produce enough revenue to maintain excellent public services in
On
March 2nd, our Seattle PI endorsed
a progressive income tax. On March 9th,
our Seattle
PI published a letter by Bill Gates Sr., Aubrey Davis,
I am
humiliated that my hopes produced unreal expectations. I still believe that a progressive income tax
is necessary. As with most necessary
things, I believe it will happen some time.
I will still act to hasten that time.
But I now recognize that our budget crisis is not stimulating prominent
citizens, advocacy groups or our legislature to act to produce tax reform. Where do you go to give up? To give up your unreal expectations? Dave Thomas
Recommended Books – See our list of books for liberals
John Kenneth Galbraith, 2004, The Economics of
Innocent Fraud. Truth for our Time
This book contains nothing
that Galbraith hasn’t published before.
It briefly and clearly repeats analyses that are relevant to our present
economic mess.
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