AlterPolitics New Post

Green Party Presidential Candidate Jill Stein Addresses The 5 Most Important Issues Facing The U.S.

by on Thursday, November 3, 2011 at 7:05 pm EDT in Election 2012, Politics

On October 24, at the historic State House in Boston, The Green Party’s Dr. Jill Stein announced her candidacy for President of the United States. She is running as the alternative to the two ‘Wall Street’ parties that have remained steadfast in selling out the interests of the American people for the enrichment of the corporatocracy.

A couple months before her Presidential announcement, Dr. Stein was asked to identify five pressing issues facing our nation, and how she would resolve them as President of the United States:

Jobs:

CREATE JOBS THROUGH A GREEN NEW DEAL – an emergency program to achieve full employment and jump start a green economic recovery. This would provide a Manhattan Project/WWII scale mobilization to transition to clean renewables and related green sectors of the economy (including local food and recycling manufacturing) to avert climate catastrophe while achieving energy independence, improving trade balances and meeting urgent transportation, energy, housing and environmental infrastructure needs for the 21st century.

It will be funded by taxing the rich and large corporations, through trillion dollar savings from single payer health care and the associated reduction of health care inflation, and through downsizing the bloated military.

The Green New Deal will get economic help directly to people – and end the Obama/Bush trickle-down philosophy that forces ordinary people to subsidize the massive transfer of wealth and power to the super-rich.

Restoring the American Dream:

The Green New Deal will include an ECONOMIC BILL OF RIGHTS, including the right to living wage jobs, health care, quality education, retirement security, and affordable housing.

Endless Wars:

PEACE NOW – End the needless wars that have drained America of the resources we need to fund our communities. Bring the troops and war dollars home now. Reduce the bloated military budget to provide defense not empire building.

Imperiled U.S. Democracy & Civil Liberties:

RESCUE DEMOCRACY — Restore our freedom of political expression, our imperiled civil liberties, and protections from government surveillance by the swollen Homeland Security complex.

End the hijacking of political speech by the biggest spender, (resulting from the Citizens United and Buckley v Valeo supreme court decisions).

Create real freedom of political expression, full public participation, and informed voter choice – free from fear and intimidation – at the polls through policy reforms including: publicly funded elections, free access to public airwaves for all legitimate candidates, instant runoff voting and proportional representation, fair ballot access for all political parties and candidates, safeguards against electronic election fraud, and an end to voter suppression schemes, the corporate-electoral revolving door, and rampant influence-peddling by lobbyists.

Health Care:

SINGLE PAYER HEALTH CARE (improved Medicare-for-all) to provide quality, comprehensive health care to all as a human right.

Single payer saves money by ending the 30% administrative overhead of private insurance and by controlling the runaway health care inflation that is bankrupting families, business, and all levels of government. And it puts an end to insurance company meddling in personal health care decisions and choice of doctor.

For those who wish to learn more about Dr. Stein’s policy positions, she did a Q&A session this week with the CA Independent Voter Network, where she expounds on her vision for a new America. In the interview, she addresses the importance of the Occupy Wall Street movement, the commonalities between the Green Party and the Ron Paul wing of the Tea Party, RomneyCare and ObamaCare, how Bush and Obama have egregiously abused their executive powers, and how both Presidents have violated our civil liberties in ways that signal the beginnings of a ‘proto-fascist state.’

More information on Jill Stein can be found on her website, and by following her on Twitter.

Ralph Nader: President Obama Will Be Primaried

by on Thursday, December 9, 2010 at 2:32 pm EDT in Election 2012, Politics

Though he hasn’t ruled out a 2012 run himself, Ralph Nader reveals to The Hill that he’d prefer to have a fresh new face to challenge the Democratic President from the Left:

“… it’s time for someone else to continue. I’ve done it so many times. When I go around the country, I’m telling people they need to find somebody.”

He cites Obama’s recent deal with the Republicans to extend the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest 2% of Americans — which would add $700 billion to the national debt — to be the “last straw”.

Nader’s anger seems to reflect that of many from Obama’s own progressive base.  Sam Stein of the Huffington Post reports that the House Democratic Caucus passed a motion this morning to reject Obama’s deal with the Republicans.  Though the vote is nonbinding, it stands as a clear repudiation of Obama’s broken campaign promise to end Bush’s tax cuts for the very wealthy, as well as his backroom deal making, which always seems to preclude progressives.

Nader states:

“There will be a primary.  Just a question of how prominent a person [will run against Obama]. This deal is the last straw.”

“Obama’s position has been that the liberal, progressive wing has nowhere to go, therefore they can’t turn their back on the administration. But a challenge will hold his feet to the fire and signal that we do have somewhere to go.”

Nader goes on to question Obama’s character — now a familiar conversation piece within Progressive circles:

“[Obama] has no fixed principles. He’s opportunistic — he goes for expedience, like Clinton. Some call him temperamentally conflict-averse. If you want to be harsher, you say he has no principles and he’s opportunistic. [..]

“He’s a con man. I have no use for him,” Nader said. […]

“These are majoritarian positions. The polling shows that. Living wage, single payer, cracking down on corporate crime. … It’s time for someone to continue this.”

It will be interesting to see whether a champion of progressive ideals decides — like Nader — “enough is enough,” to then boldly throw his hat into the ring for 2012.  But to do so will mean to taking on the deep-pocketed, establishment wing of the Democratic Party.  And this means taking on the entrenched interests Obama has been cutting deals with since his inauguration.

Even with a disapproval rate now at 53%, defeating an incumbent Obama will be no cakewalk.

A Final Nail In The Public Option Coffin: Nancy Pelosi

by on Tuesday, January 5, 2010 at 5:36 pm EDT in Healthcare, Politics

The Democratic Party’s betrayal of the Left is effectively complete:

Speaker Pelosi (D-Calif.) showed flexibility Tuesday on the public option, acknowledging the political reality that such a plan probably couldn’t make it through the Senate.

A public plan, Speaker Pelosi said at a press conference, is meant to “hold insurance companies accountable and increase competition,” but Pelosi added that “there are other ways to do that.”

[…]

Good luck in 2010!  You’re gonna need it …

UPDATE:

Thought, I’d add a clip of Pelosi taking a little shot at the President, when she was asked about allowing C-SPAN to film the Senate-House negotiations in the Conference Committee, since Obama had promised this while on the campaign trail.  Pelosi responded:

Really?  There were a number of things we was ‘for’ on the Campaign trail.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lxUud3yOsSk[/youtube]

War Of Words: Why Failed Theories, Like Reaganomics, Continue To Linger

by on Tuesday, December 1, 2009 at 2:55 pm EDT in Politics

The Republicans have long engaged in historic revisionism as a means of covering up a long record of failed policies and blunders.  Some of their most disastrous ideological experiments over the years, like Reaganomics, have been successfully re-framed into mythological successes.  Democrats have no one to blame for this, but themselves.  They’ve done next to […]