POLITICAL DISPATCH
OCTOBER 2011
Public Policy Committee
Elizabeth Spiro Clark, Chair
2012 ELECTIONS
I . CANDIDATE WATCH LAUNCHES
WNDC has launched its “Candidate Watch” for the
2012 elections. See WNDC webpage for link.
– Shelly Livingston
II. A POLITICAL DISPATCH FEATURE: TO TELL THE TRUTH
WRONG: REPUBLICAN “FACTS”
Low tax rates on wealthy essential for economic growth
FACTS
1. No evidence that lower rates in the 2000s stimulated economic
growth
2. Growth was more robust in 80s and 90s when average and
marginal tax rates on the rich were higher.
3. According to estimates by the Congressional Research Service the
effect on economic growth of allowing the Bush tax cuts to expire in
2010 would have been virtually non existent.
WRONG: REPUBLICAN “FACTS”
New Voter ID Requirements are Necessary to Prevent Fraud
FACTS:
Testifying before a Congressional committee, experts report that instances of fraud are extraordinarily rare and that limiting the way people identify themselves at the polls will do nothing to address such fraud as exists.
WRONG: REPUBLICAN POLICIES
1. To wind down the government’s longstanding guarantee of health care to the elderly and the poor and incinerate the Democrats’ new promise to cover the uninsured;
2. To abolish the Department of Education and its effort to raise national standards;
3. To stop virtually all regulation of the environment and the financial industry;
4. To reimpose military discrimination against gays and lesbians, deport immigrants, cut unemployment insurance and nutrition programs;
5. To raise taxes on the poor and lower them for the rich.
(see Editorial, Washington Post, 9/30)
PUBLIC POLICY AT THE WNDC
1. WNDC joins Campaign to Stop Gun Violence (www.csgv.org)
2. WNDC urges Attorney General Holder to protect Voting Rights Act
against measures in states taken to restrict the Constitutional right
to vote.
REPORTS FROM THE PUBLIC POLICY TASK FORCE CHAIRS
GLOBAL WOMEN
With King Abdullah’s backing, women there have finally won the right to
vote and run for many elected offices in Saudi Arabia. BUT they still don’t
have the right to drive. Sign the petition to King Abdullah to give them
this right at
www.change.org/petitions/king-abdullah-grant-saudi-women-the-right-to-drive
HUMAN RIGHTS AND INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS
Robert Bernstein, the founding chairman of Human Rights Watch, in his oped
Deaf Ears to Hate Speech” (WP, 9/29) discusses Palestinian bid for UN membership, taking human rights groups to task for “ignoring hate speech and incitement to genocide, not only against Israel but against all Jews ….whitewashing Hamas’ desire to eliminate a whole country as just bluster and meaningless words.” Bernstein is right that “words matter” and a nation seeking to become a member of the UN should be held accountable for positions of important leaders that are anti-peace.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/why-do-human-rights-groups-ignore-palestinians-war-of-words/2011/09/26/gIQAWU5y2K_story.html
–Elizabeth Spiro Clark
LABOR
Mr. President–this is NOT math THIS IS Class Warfare
The Haves
The media empire of Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp has just released its executive pay figures for the fiscal year ended June 30. CEO Murdoch, his son James and Fox News chief Roger Alles averaged $22.1 million, a take-home up 41 percent over 2010.
In 2010, Brian T. Moynihan received $1,940, in total compensation. By comparison, the median worker in the US made $33,840 in 2010. Brian T. Moynihan made 57 times the median worker’s pay. (AFL-CIO Web site). In September, Bank of America says it will lay off 30,000 workers in the next few years.
The Have-Nots
Last week the US Census Bureau released new data on poverty in 2010. The damaging impact of the Great Recession and weak labor market is stark: 46.2 million Americans lived below the poverty line—less than $22,314 annually for a family of four—which translates to nearly one in six Americans. This is the highest number on record in fifty-two years of poverty estimates. More than every fifth child in this country is now mired in poverty, and a record 20 million people are living in deep poverty—less than about $11,000 for a family of four—including an astonishing 9.9 percent of children.
The Postal Service
The Postal Service has announced that it lost up to $ 6 billion this fiscal year, a historic sum triggered by declining mail volume and growing labor costs. The shortfall is forcing postal officials to renege on mandatory annual payments of about $5.5 billion required to prefund future retirement benefits.
What does this mean for the average American? What does this mean for the 1,000s of postal workers?
The operable word is PREFUND. Since the 1990s, the Republican Party has wanted to privatize the Postal Service. This did not happen because there was political pushback especially by rural voters who need postal delivery but also where the post office is one of their most active and social places to gather. Instead what Congress legislated was that the Postal Service must prefund health and social benefits covering 50 years OVER ten years. If this was required for any other private company, the company would go broke and suffer sever losses.
The Postal Service has an existing fund of $42 billion available to cover these future obligations that cannot be touched.
– Marcie Cohen
SOCIAL SECURITY
Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders has a new bill “Keeping Our Social Security Promises Act” (S 1558). It perfectly incorporates one of WNDC’s major positions on Social Security . His bill calls for lifting the cap on payroll taxes for Social Security as a fairer tax and a practical way to address long term funding and solvency of Social Security.
The Sanders proposal is straightforward. Currently 94 percent of Americans pay into Social Security on the basis of their whole salary — but the wealthiest 6 percent of Americans do not. Individual income up to $106.800 is taxed for Social Security – the payroll tax. But wealthy Americans making millions or billions pay the same amount of tax for Social Security – a tax on their income up to $106,800 – but zero Social Security tax on their huge additional income.
Introduced in mid- September, the “Keep Our Social Security Promises Act” (S 1558) already has nine co-sponsors: Akaka (HI), Leahy (VT), Boxer (CA), McCaskill (MO), Whitehouse (RI), Franken (MN), Blumenthal (CT), Mikulski (MD) and Klobuchar (MN). It deserves more!
While Social Security is meant to provide basic income in retirement, it is also America’s most significant anti-poverty program. It stands as our national commitment to provide some economic security for men and women and children across generations. It is a primary source of income for older women and Social Security provides disability and survivor benefits for millions of women and children – over 6.5 million children receive some of their family income from Social Security.
We all have relatives and friends living and voting in other states. This is a timely bill to tell them about! Pick up the phone or send an email and urge them to contact their Democratic senators to become co-sponsors of the “Keep Our Social Security Promises Act” .
Of course constituents should advise their Republican senators that this is a bill they think their senators should support. / or / And let Republican senators know that their constituents support this bill and think their senators should too.
(Call Capitol Switchboard 202.224.3121 and ask for Senator’s office).
It’s time to act!
– Marion Mudd
ENVIRONMENT AND ENERGY
The Symposium, “Militarism on a Sick Planet,” held in Nebraska City, Nebraska, August 9-12, undertook a daunting task. It was organized by Maureen McCue MD PhD, President of the Iowa Chapter Physicians for Social Responsibility (PSR) and her husband, John Rachow PhD MD, 2011 National PSR President. The goal of the three-day symposium was two-fold: first, to assess the health impacts of “the long arm of the military” and, second, to put this health focus on military activity into the public domain. Greatly increasing the complexity of the discussion, and unique to this symposium, was the triangulation of connections it set out to consider. The final title on the Symposium program read, “Advancing the Right to Health on a Sick Planet: Redefining Security & the Role of Militarism in a Changing Climate.” Thus, the participants were obliged to take into account not just the connections between military activities and health, but also the dynamic of these connections in the context of a planet “sickened” by climate change.
From the beginning, the organizers planned to screen Alice and Lincoln Day’s documentary film, Scarred Lands and Wounded Lives: The Environmental Footprint of War, as a special feature of the proceedings. It was scheduled for the first day of the symposium, Friday evening after dinner, from 7 to 9, which allowed almost a full hour for discussion. The Days say the Q and A was the liveliest and most appreciative of any of the many they have conducted after viewings of their film. A large number in the audience bought DVDs of the film and said they planned to show it in their communities when they returned home.
The Opening Panel, Friday morning, wasted no time in addressing the key questions: Conjoined Threats to the Human Right to Health, Global Security and Survival, The Changing Climate, A Degraded Environment, War & Violent Conflict. Most of the forty-five participants were doctors, but there were also some sociologists, psychologists, social workers, and “activists.” Following each panel, attendees divided into groups to discuss how to reach out to the public to encourage new ways of thinking and new strategies for action.
The Days think PSR should be congratulated for addressing such an important and timely topic. They will keep WNDC members apprised of reports and actions generated by the symposium.
– Alice Day
LINK FOR WNDC BLOG (wndcpd.wordpress.com)
