The non-DLC agenda: Who could get on board, even in part?

[Lydia Leftcoast]

Health Care

Universally available single-payer health care based on the best features of systems that have worked throughout the industrialized world and saving money by emphasizing prevention and early detection of problems instead of high-tech treatments for advanced conditions.

The Military

Cut the military budget by eliminating all foreign bases (we're defending Germany from whom?), all weapons programs aimed at enemies who no longer exist (Star Wars), and all sweetheart deals with politically-connected contractors (are you listening Haliburton?). Force the Pentagon to account for the trillions that have gone missing in the past twenty years.
Reduce the CIA and NSA to intelligence gathering only and cut out all black ops.
Make it an impeachable offense for the president to send in troops without a formal declaration of war from Congress. Let "crises" be handled with military forces from the region affected, if, in fact, they really are crises.

Foreign Policy

Emphasize peaceful solutions to conflicts that recognize that everyone has "legitimate interests."
Don't go looking for trouble, e.g. Iraq.
Allow other countries to experiment with their own economic and political systems as long as they aren't threatening their neighbors or committing massive human rights violations. If aggression or genocide seems a possibility, try to have that country's neighbors take deal with the matter first instead of sending in the troops or the CIA.
Restructure foreign aid so that it consists mostly of grants rather than loans and that most of the money goes to local constractors, if any are available. Emphasize appropriate technology and making goods for local or regional consumption. Invest more heavily in microcredit loans. Keep as much money as possible out of the hands of government officials and the local elites.
No military aid to anyone, and try to get the other countries to go along with this.
Make foreign aid contingent on having (or at least working toward) universal access to primary education for both boys and girls and any adult who wants to learn to read.

Employment

Use the savings from the cuts in the Pentagon budget to rebuild and remodel the infrastructures of our major metropolitan areas, which kills two birds with one stone: doing a job that needs to be done and providing living wage jobs for blue collar workers. You can build an urban rail line for the price of a B-1 bomber, and putting world-class transit systems in all our major cities would go a long way toward reducing dependence on oil. In addition, certain cities have special needs: earthquake proofing on the West Coast, replacement of aging sewer and water mains on the East Coast, etc.

Revise the labor laws to ban permanent replacement of strikers. There is de facto no right to strike if your employer can fire you for striking.

Maintain free trade agreements only with countries of similar economic status, not with the Third World. Encourage Third World countries to form their own free-trade blocs so that they can build on their respective strengths and enjoy more orderly growth.

When handing out government contracts, give preference to companies that have the majority of their workforce in the U.S.

Place confiscatory fines on employers who hire illegal immigrants so that it becomes cheaper to pay legal residents a decent wage.

Energy Policy and the Environment

Start a crash program of research into replacing the non-transportation uses of petroleum, especially plastics and agricultural chemicals.

Raise the fuel efficiency requirements for all passenger vehicles to 50 mpg within a given time frame.

Build a world-class intercity rail system and geographically appropriate mass transit in every metropolitan area. Facilitate safe and convenient cycling. When possible, retrofit suburban areas to make it easy for residents to walk, cycle, or take transit to their destinations. Encourage in-fill construction in existing metro areas and the building of new housing and businesses inside existing towns instead of on agricultural land.

Encourage sustainable agriculture, forestry, and wildlife management.

Ban factory farms.

Civil Rights

Repeal the Patriot Act.

Affirm that citizens and non-citizens are both protected by principles of human rights if they are in U.S. territory or in the custody of U.S. authorities.

End the war on drugs, legalize and tax marijuana, make mere use or possession of other drugs a misdemeanor, and use the money saved from prisons to fund drug treatment programs.

Affirm reproductive rights.

Affirm the equality under the law of all Americans, no matter what their race, ethnicity, religion, physical or mental condition, age, gender, or sexual orientation.

Follow the example of many European and Asian countries and give legal standing only to civil marriages, which will be open to both heterosexual and homosexual couples, with religious ceremonies as an add-on for those who want them and with religions remaining free to decide who qualifies for their particular ceremony.

Education

Fund to the per-pupil level of private schools and reduce class size to 15 on the K-3 level, 20 on the 4-8 level, and 25 on the 9-12 level.

No vouchers for private education, but extend open enrollment to all public schools in each state up to the "carrying capacity" of the school. Encourage public schools to meet the needs of different types of students through magnet programs.

Make community college free to all students enrolled in a vocational or transfer degree program and subsidize state colleges and universities enough to make it possible for students to work their way through.

Taxes

Repeal the Bush tax cuts. Keep the inheritance tax as is, adjusted for inflation every ten years.

Return income taxes to the levels (adjusted for inflation) that obtained before the Reagan tax cuts of 1986.

Tax earned and unearned income at the same levels to eliminate as many tax shelters as possible.

Adjust tax brackets for inflation automatically.

Exempt the first $10,000 of earned income from FICA (a real tax cut for the working poor) but raise the ceiling on FICA to $200,000. Again, adjust for inflation periodically.

Politics

States may use voting machines in order to give quick results to the news media (why else are they needed?) but only the results according to voter-verified, hand-counted paper ballots will have any legal standing.

Instant runoff voting to give a fair chance to minor parties or candidates who may have just the ideas that are needed.

Primaries will be rotated among the states.

Campaigns will be publicly financed to a set figure, based on the number of potential consituents for that office. They will qualify for public funds by getting a certain number (proportional to the number of constituents) of $25 contributions from individuals. Once they have qualified for public financing, they will be prohibited from using any other funds, whether from their own pockets or from donors.

I feel that this agenda actually goes toward meeting this country's needs and compensating for its deficiencies, unlike the DLC's agenda which seems like some sort of Beltway fantasy for the cocktail party set.

[SteppingRazor]

1. I agree to part of it -- heck, most of it.

Doubt you'll find anyone to agree with you 100%, but that's democracy, no? :)

[Lydia Leftcoast]

5. Yes, I'm mostly throwing out ideas that speak to

the actual issues facing this country instead of some timid PR nonsense dreamed up by Beltway hacks who THINK they know what "the people" want.

[mattclearing]

2. It looks pretty good to me. nt

[IndianaGreen]

39. Better than that DLC Republicat crap being peddled around here!

A vision of a better America, not a light version of Bush's Orwellian nightmare.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

40. That was the intention, IG!

I wanted to counter the charge that we on the left jjust sit around complaining about the DLC and never have any ideas of our own.

:hi:

[getmeouttahere]

3. I'm on board with a vast majority of it...

Here is something from Dennis Kucinich's website, which I think could be another component to this, and I believe in it strongly...a corporate charter:

"We cannot stand by idly while powerful economic engines -- virtually unregulated corporations -- violate workers' rights, human rights, and the environment, sweeping aside antitrust laws, eliminating competition.

We need a new relationship between our government and corporate America, an arms-length relationship, so that our elected leaders are capable of independently affirming and safeguarding the public interest. Just as our founders understood the need for separation of church and state, we need to institutionalize the separation of corporations and the state. This begins with government taking the responsibility to establish the conditions under which corporations can do business in the United States, including the establishment of a federal corporate charter that describes and clearly delineates corporate rights and responsibilities.

Corporations must be compelled to pay a fair share of taxes. If corporations shift profits offshore to avoid paying taxes, they should not be permitted to operate in the United States. The decrease in corporate tax responsibility is an indication of the rise of corporate power. Corporations pay three and half times less in taxes now than they did in the 1950s. Working families have to make up the difference."

[Lydia Leftcoast]

4. Well, I couldn't think of everything in the half hour it took me

to write this, but I'm a big fan of Dennis Kucinich, and yes, there should be a clause about making corporations pay their fair share of taxes.

A lot of the nonsensical arguments against corporate taxation seem plausible because the average American doesn't know that corporations are taxed only on what's left over AFTER they've met all legitimate business expenses, such as wages and benefits, R&D, maintenance, buying equipment, etc.

No corporation could be "killed" or even hobbled very much by income taxes. In fact, during the period when Japanese corporations were growing the fastest, Japanese corporate income taxes were so high that the companies saw no reason to declare a profit and plowed their earnings back into R&D and expansion of their plants and workforces.

[Hell Hath No Fury]

6. I'm easily 90% there with you...

much of it looks very good and would be an agenda I could support with enthusiasm.

I would add tax incentives/credits for companies who keep their businesses in the US, especially manufacturing companies. And I would stress FAIR trade, even with the countries that have similar economic status -- fair trade, to me, means quaranteed workers rights, environmental protections, etc.

And all that you proposed is why I voted for Kucinich in the primaries. :)

[Lydia Leftcoast]

7. dupe

:-)

[Lydia Leftcoast]

8. So did I

and our group of volunteers was VERY diverse. :-)

Volunteering for that campaign was a real eye-opener about how the MSM serves as gatekeeper for the information that gets out to the public.

We had to badger the local newspapers into covering Kucinich's three visits, and of the four network TV stations, only one ever gave any coverage, about 15 seconds on one occasion.

Given the lack of coverage, we were very proud that DK got 27% in the Twin Cities during the Dem caucuses and 17% statewide.

[welshTerrier2]

9. great ... expand on the "domestic" labor issue ...

you wrote: "When handing out government contracts, give preference to companies that have the majority of their workforce in the U.S."

i agree with this but think incentives to use American labor needs to go well beyond this idea ...

the battle between American labor and foreign labor is driven by cost, greed and profits ... ultimately, it is a struggle between American workers and American stockholders ... stockholders seek greater returns by lowering labor costs ... they have no allegiance to America or Americans; only to their own bloated bank accounts ... they are inherently un-American ...

so what do our tax policies do? we allow the very same lower capital gain tax rates on profits made from investments in companies that export jobs as we do for profits from companies that use a mostly American workforce ... essentially, we are subsidizing the export of American jobs ...

my proposal? don't allow a blanket reduced capital gains tax rate for all investments ... whatever "capital gains discount" is used (if any) should be diluted by the percentage of foreign labor the company uses ... by removing the tax incentive to invest in companies that export jobs, more jobs will be kept in the US ...

[Lydia Leftcoast]

12. Good point!

If a company sends jobs overseas, give it a huge income tax surcharge, or something like that.

[Solo_in_MD]

10. Taxes part is a non starter

Current tax policy sucks. Its a drag on the economy and has created a huge infrastructure of the IRS, CPAs, and tax attorneys. Rolling back the rules won't help. If you are going to propose such large changes in all the other areas, rethink you tax approach. It needs to be:

- Not used for social engineering (No sin taxes or investment incentives)
- Usage/consumption based (transportation taxes fund transportation, not schools)
- Equitable (flat if not progressive, basic items exempt)
- Only taxed once (no tax on dividends)
- Easy to pay (Automates easily, kills off the tax bureaucracy)
- Uniform across the country (different rates if needed, same structure)

Not sure if the answer is some sort of VAT or flat tax (anything that Forbes endorses makes me nervous) but todays complicated system has to go.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

11. "Only taxed once"

That's a typical bit of libertarian nonsense. It sounds reasonable until you actually think it through.

Taxes are levied on people, not on individual dollar bills.

You pay income tax on your salary. You use part of what's left to pay the plumber to fix your sink. The plumber pays income tax on the money earned by fixing your sink.

When the money passes from one person or organization's custody to another's, it's no longer "the same" for tax purposes.

A corporation gives you dividends out of its after-tax income. It's no longer theirs; it's yours, and therefore it's fair game for taxation again.

Also, I'm all for taxes for social engineering, because tax policy is about the only means that will get some of those terminally selfish Reagan-era MBA yuppies to do something besides enrich themselves so they can buy a newer Lexus.

[Solo_in_MD]

13. Disagree...

2 reasons, one philosopical, the other pragmatic

1) As a stock holder I am an partial owner of the company. You are taxing me on my earnings 2x.

2) Real growth comes from a society that accumulates capital and invests it. We need to encourage more of that. Given the rush to defined contribution from defined benefit, most of us are going to retire on dividend income. And yes its the one part of my vision on taxes that is social engineering.

I think the real answer lies in consumption based taxes with a basic staples exempted and tieing specific taxes to specific consumption where practical.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

14. 1) No, you and the corporation are separate entities

for tax purposes. Your total income from all sources is not included on the corporation's tax return. The corporation's income is not included on your 1040 (for which you should be grateful).

2) The Republicans have done nothing but cut taxes since the early 1980s. To paraphrase Dr. Phil in his ONE bit of wisdom, "How's that workin' for us?"

[Solo_in_MD]

15. You are making the corporation is a person argument

and its not without some validity. We will never agree on that one point. I would agree that interest paid on corporate bonds should be taxable since it was deductible as a business expense by the company.
Other than that I support pretty much of the rest of your platform.

I never said anything about rates. They clearly need to be high enough to cover Gov expenses without long term borrowing to pay daily expenses. In some areas that is not true today. For example CA is going to hurt for a long time for doing that reason. If everyone was paying fairly, which is not happening today due to the convoluted tax system, the high income earners/consumers would be paying much more that they are today.

The real key is elimination of incentives in the tax code, some of which were well meant attempts at social engineering. That will force much more corporate income to be taxed. By taxing end use consumption, private individuals who make more and therefore spend more end up paying a larger and fairer taxes than they do today.

Like I said earlier, when I start agreeing with the likes of Forbes it scares me, but something clearly has to be done.

[1932]

19. Something like 50% of Americans own stocks, but 10% own 90% of stocks

Tax free dividend income would be a gift to the richest Americans to the huge cost of all the rest.

Most Americans who will benefit from dividend income during retirement will pay very little tax on that income either because it'll be from Roth-IRA or because, even if taxed, it will be taxed at 15% or less.

The solution to your concern is obvioulsy to have a progressive tax on dividend income -- say, the first 40,000 taxed at 5%, and then increasing at various appropriate steps to at least 33%, and ideally 39%-45% for incredibly high income levels (say, 1.2 million or 2.5 million in dividend income).

[1932]

18. Hmmm.

- What's wrong with using the tax code for "social engineering"? What's wrong with encouraging America to reproduce itself by not making it less of a financial burden to have kids? What's wrong with encouraging home ownership, one of the best ways for people with few assets to build wealth safely? What's wrong with encouraging people to save for retirement? Or get an education (one of the few ways for people without capital to maximize the value of their labor)?

- Usage and consumption taxes shift tax burden on to people who spend more of their income. You might as well have a declining income tax, say from 50% on the lowest quintile to .001% on the wealthiest 1% of Americans.

- Flat is not equitable. The whole point of progressive income taxes is to equalize the burden. The more money you have, the easier it is to make more money, which is why people with more money aren't charged exactly the same tax on another dollar of income.

- Only taxed once? No money is only taxed once. It's taxed when it moves. If you tax money once, and not the next time it moves or the time after that, you'll shift the burden off people who have money and on to people who are getting money for the first time.

- Easy to pay? I'm all for that. Withhold more money at its source and file a return only when you're due a refund. That would be the easiest way.

- Uniform across the country? Federal tax is uniform across the country, no?

I think the "corporate personhood" argument is a red herring. That's not the issue here.

[welshTerrier2]

26. "only taxed once" ...

well, that's always an interesting topic for discussion ...

so, let's start out talking about "fairness" ... implicitly, you consider taxing income more than one time as unfair ... i'll assume that is why you object to what you're calling "double taxation" ... if you oppose it for other reasons, feel free to elaborate ...

but ultimately, shouldn't fairness be based on each person's ability to pay? shouldn't it be based on the idea that each citizen should contribute to the national priorities according to their ability to do so?

which brings us to a discussion of taxing income versus taxing wealth ... take an extreme case ... one guy is a multi-billionaire ... each of his three estates are worth billions of dollars ... the only income he has is unearned income from dividends and various tax-sheltered investments ... he has zero earned income ... the other guy earns $30K per year and pays taxes on his income ...

what's wrong with this picture? the billionaire could easily be paying tens of millions in taxes without any infringement on his lifestyle ... the working man, graduated rates notwithstanding, doles out some of his very limited savings to support the national agenda ...

so before we get all entangled with terms like "double taxation", why not consider taxing each citizen based on their wealth?? ... not only would we tax the billionaire's income in the first year, we would tax his "nest egg" every year thereafter ... or would you consider that unfair? i'm not for double taxation, i'm for infinite taxation ...

ability to pay should be the standard ... that often has very little to do with one's annual income ... and if encouraging more saving is the objective, a certain proportion of wealth based on annual income could be exempted from taxation ... that piece of the puzzle would be easily remedied ...

if you're arguing for tax fairness, taxing wealth or taxing a combination of wealth and income is a much fairer system than the current nonsense we have ...

[wellst0nev0ter]

16. I Dunno If We Sould Ban Outright Factory Farms

I'd suggest forcing them to be more environmentally and sanitarily responsible, and subject them to anti-trust laws.

But otherwise, a very good list. I'd also suggest some type of tax-fairness amendment so that blue states like right here doesn't donate all its federal tax monies to North and South Dakota.

[SaveElmer]

23. An example of where there is disagreement...

I applaud much (though not all of the DLC's) agenda...

However I do think factory farms should be outlawed...they are unnecessary and dangerous to human health.

And they are also inhumane and subject the animals to unspeakable misery!!!

If you want a good organization to learn more about it...go here...well worth a look

www.hfa.org

[Lydia Leftcoast]

44. I'm not sure how you'd do that, but it's a good idea

:shrug:

[1932]

17. Non-DCL agenda: tilt balance back in favor of consumers & workers, and

ask superlarge corps and superwealthy to share more of the burden of making sure America works for everyone.

Also, stop exploiting foreign workers through CAFTA, NAFTA, FTAA, etc. (which I've seen unions and some Dem leaders talk more about in last few weeks).

[Lydia Leftcoast]

21. Yeah, that just about sums it up

:-)

[MsTryska]

20. brilliant ideas....

i'd like to add one more to the politics section:


In order to keep their broadcast licenses, all media outlets subject to FCC regulations must provide free commercial time for the various candidates running.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

22. I'll take that as a friendly amendment

:-)

[Hell Hath No Fury]

24. In that vein...

bring back the dabnabbit Fairness Doctrine!!!

[ihaveaquestion]

25. I can agree with about 80 - 90 %

Very nice. When and where are you running for office?

[Lydia Leftcoast]

28. Alas, I'm a lousy public speaker, and I hate to beg for money

But I'd love to be a speech writer or idea person for a candidate.

[ihaveaquestion]

31. I totally understand.

It takes a special kind of insanity to put yourself up as a target - er, uh, I mean candidate.
:9

[Hippo_Tron]

27. Here's the problem with your military cuts

Like it or not, the military industrial complex has been institutionalized and it has been institutionalized for quite some time. Thousands, if not millions of people, will lose their jobs if we just start drastically cutting military spending all at once. The improvements in civillian infrastructure will only be a temporary solution, because unlike B-1 bombers, there's only so much infrastructure that we can build. I agree with cutting military spending and cutting crap that we don't need like "Star Wars" is a great place to start. But it is something that we need to do slowly, perhaps over a period of 10-20 years, not all at once.

Also, I don't think that we should eliminate all foreign bases. I think that the military does have legitimate reasons to be operating in allied countries. Should we probably get rid of some of the bases, absolutely.

As far as foreign policy goes, I don't like the idea of no military aid to anyone, if it suggests what I think you are suggesting. I don't like the idea that we are a superpower and that we can act as the world's police, but at the same time, if there's genocide and we have the ability to stop it, I think that we should.

As far as trade goes, I have less of a problem with us trading with countries of lesser economic status than us, IF workers are paid a living wage and are treated to the same human rights standards and working conditions as the US.

You also forgot eliminating gerrymandering and eliminating the death penalty.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

29. No, it couldn't happen all at once, but

we'd have to start a program of peacetime conversion. Put the weapons labs to work developing things for civilian use and alternative energy sources. Retool the factories to produce necessary goods.

The infrastructure program would put money in people's pockets, especially in the pockets of the working poor, who have plenty of pent-up demand. This would be a boon for retailers and service industries and, in turn, for manufacturers. These jobs would gradually replace others that dropped off as the infrastructure program ended within ten to twenty years.

[bvar22]

34. This is just dreaming, but

I would like to see a large, well financed Corp of Peacetime Engineers who would travel to distressed 3rd World Countries, and without getting involved in local politics, do things like:

*build and stock hospitals and schools,

*build desalination plants in distressed desert areas.

*Build Alternative Energy Power Plants

*Drill Water Well systems and connect them with aqueducts

*Reclaim wasted lands, rejuvenate them, and irrigate them for local farming

*dredge harbors and build modern facilities

*Build modern waste and water treatment plants

After our Corp of Peace Engineers finish a project, they train locals to operate it AND THEN LEAVE. NO CHARGE. NO POLITICAL DEMANDS. NO QUID PRO QUO. JUST LEAVE. If the locals break it, we come back and fix it no questions asked, no demands, no charge.

Members of the Corp could earn college credits and a Civil Engineering degree in the Corp in addition to trades marketable in the States.

This would do wonders for our international reputation.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

36. Imagine if the U.S. govt. had done THAT in Afghanistan

(except for the harbor part--I think the country is landlocked) instead of invading Iraq.

Japan developed during the nineteenth century by inviting foreigners to come in, build infrastructure, teach the Japanese to take advantage of it, and LEAVE.

[bvar22]

38. If we had done that in Afghanistan:

*We would be over $300 Billion Dollars richer

*Our population would be 1800 Americans larger

*120,000 innocent Iraqis would still be alive

*The radical Terrorist Movement would be discredited

*America would be loved and respected around the World

*We could still pursue and capture the Al-Qaeda criminals; grateful Afghanis probably would have given him up

*George bush* would be a hero instead of a War Criminal (hey, the Law of Unintended Consequences. Every Silver Cloud has a dark lining)

[Mairead]

30. I think your thesis is ignoring some things

If we pulled the plug on a big piece of the military-industrial complex, we could buffer job loss in 2 major ways:

• re-purpose that portion of the budget, which would immediately create replacement jobs.
• afford an extended benefit package that would include retraining or early retirement for the minority of people whose skills don't translate well between industries

The extended benefit scheme is the one the Labor Party proposes for their Just Health Care scheme, to take care of anyone who'd be made redundant by a national switch to non-profit single-payer.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

32. Thanks, Mairead!

:hi:

[Mairead]

33. You're welcome!

:hi:

[Hippo_Tron]

43. I wasn't ignoring the fact that we could create many new jobs...

And the extended benefits package is also a good idea. However, once the employees are re-trained, where can they go exactly? There are people with years of college experience who currently can't find jobs. I'm not saying that we shouldn't work to end the military industrial complex, it's a horrible system that is screwing over the country. But doing it all at once simply isn't practical. We can create SOME new jobs by re-investing the money elsewhere and we can get some of the people re-employed elsewhere if we re-train them, but the amount of people that are employed in the defense industry is still very high. The re-training and re-locating will work much better if we do it over a period of time.

[Mairead]

45. The problem I see with "over a period of time" is that

funding the MIC is basically 'pouring the money down a rathole', as the saying goes.

Someone recently pointed out that one of the reasons the Japanese do so well technologically despite having a tiny, overcrowed, and desperately resource-poor landmass is that they commit their research budget to civilian purposes, not to military ones. So they end up building very capable robots while we build things like, for Goddess's sake, jeep-replacements that are huge, expensive, and swill gasolene as though they were tanks (which they positively are not!); and aircraft like the Osprey that, because they depend on ignoring fundamental physical law, have only 2 operational states: death-trap and pending death-trap.

I'd agree that it's probably not possible to constructively pull the plug all in one go, but I think our mindset ought to be that no dollar feeds a MIC boondoggle if it can go somewhere more productive.

[Mairead]

35. "there's only so much infrastructure that we can build"

Why do you think that's true? When I think about everything we need in the USA, I come up with a laundry list that could easily absorb every person-hour in the nation for a good 3 generations, no worries. And by 'every person-hour' I mean anyone from pre-teens to great-grans who wanted to work could be given meaningful work, 2080 hours p.a.

So why do you think we'd run out of things to be done?

[Lydia Leftcoast]

37. Just rebuilding our older cities and converting abandoned

housing and industrial sites to affordable housing and job sites would take a lot of work.

There are decrepit schools to be replaced, bridges to be repaired, highways to be repaired, train tracks that need to be put back into action, a never-ending list.

And by the time we finished upgrading the eastern cities, the western cities would be ready for repairs and upgrades.

[eridani]

64. End corporate globalization and genocide automatically stops

The genocides in Africa are Malthusian, period. The people perpetrating them don't have imperial armies out grabbing more than their share of the world's resources, so they are stuck with only what they already have, which can't feed populations where women have 8 kids on average apiece. If rich countries weren't screwing them with IMF and WTO, they'd at least have a chance.

Yugoslavia would never have broken up without the imposition of neoliberalism after years of getting all sorts of bennies from Europe and America just because Tito told Stalin where he could stick it. Privatization of state and worker-owned enterprises was a demand made of Serbia before the Kosovo war, in which those enterprises were targetted for bombing.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

72. I don't know about "stops," but "lessens," certainly

The Rwandan genocide stems back to the days when the Belgians played the two dominant tribes off against each other, but competition for scarce resources is certainly part of it.

One has to wonder how different Africa would be today if the countries had been allowed to spend their resources on education, healthcare, infrastructure, and development of industries for indigenous and regional consumption.

Yet neoliberal rags like the Economist keep harping on the same old tune of Africa needing more "globalization."

The ONE thing I like about Dr. Phil is his phrase, "How's that workin' for you?" and it certainly applies to the advocates of corporate globalization.

In forty years, they've turned Africa from one of the most promising places on the planet to one of the most desperate. But what do they do? They blame the Africans for "incompetence" and prescribe yet more "free" trade and globalization.

It's insanity to think you can keep someone from drowning by adding more water.

[eridani]

73. I'll accept that correction

With a major chunk of the world's talent and effort turned toward inventing the post oil economy, the resulting sense of hope and engagement should greatly reduce the alienation that leads to terrorism.

The good news is that fewer than 0.1% of our total population is sociopathic enough to go that route. The bad news is that 0.1% of 6 billion is 6 million.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

74. If you haven't read Confessions of an Economic Hitman, please do.

I didn't realize until I read that book that much of our highly vaunted "foreign aid" goes not to the countries themselves but to American companies that get sweetheart deals on civil engineering projects. Yet the countries have to pay back every penny of money that they never even see--with interest!

I've heard American commentators accuse the Japanese of doing stuff like that, and no doubt they do, although I do translation in the field of ODA (overseas development assistance), and so I know that they also do things like bringing medical personnel to Japan for training or advising would-be exporters of local food products on how to meet international standards. In addition, as I learned when I was a student there, they give away thousands of fully-funded undergraduate and graduate fellowships for Third World students to study technical fields, including two years just to concentrate on learning Japanese.

Even the Chinese bring Third World people to their country for free schooling.

[ElsewheresDaughter]

41. i'm up with that!

[Lydia Leftcoast]

42. Thank you!

:-)

[ulysses]

46. count me in!

:thumbsup:

[Lydia Leftcoast]

47. Why am I not surprised?

:-)

[ulysses]

48. heh!

:hi:

[prairierose]

49. Thanks, Lydia...

it generally is comprehensive and progressive. I can't think too long to make coherent suggestions right now but overall, I think that you have hit the most important issues with ideas that make sense.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

51. Well, I tried

:shrug:

Whether anyone adopts my points or not, this is the TYPE of thing that the Democrats should be doing.

Bush is driving the country off a cliff at 60 mph. The DLC wants to slow it down to 30 miles an hour and call it an improvement.

I want to turn left and avoid the cliff entirely.

[prairierose]

70. Absolutely..if the Democratic party...

doesn't stand for SOMETHING...then it stands for nothing & repub lite gets us nowhere.

Thanks for your work & thought.

[ulysses]

50. a wee

:kick:

[LittleClarkie]

52. Not so much THE non-DLC agenda as A non-DLC agenda

one that may lean a bit too far to the left for me.

You've heard of the Third Way? Well, I'm looking for something more 3.5ish. Not DLC but not "The Department of Fluffy Bunnies" either.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

53. I wrote THE because it's the only one I have

As far as "fluffy bunnies" are concerned, it would take one tough-minded set of politicians to implement such an agenda, ones who weren't worried about what the Republicans think.

[LittleClarkie]

57. One question

who did you support in the last primary.

I have a guess, but I want to see if I'm right.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

58. Kucinich, and it was the proudest vote I ever cast

which you would know if you had read farther up the thread. :-)

[LittleClarkie]

61. Ah hah. I didn't need to read upthread

I could tell from your platform. Very Kucinich-ish. That's why I asked. I wanted to see if I was right.

[BreweryYardRat]

54. I like a lot of it...

...gotta disagree with you about a few things, but on the whole you've come up with an excellent plan.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

55. Well, the only person who's going to agree with me consistently

on every single point is...me, so don't worry about it.

[tnlefty]

56. Count me in!

:dem:

[Lydia Leftcoast]

59. Thank you!

:-)

[Zhade]

60. Nice list - and I see you start with universal health care.

An issue a majority of Americans support that the DLC does NOT.

Why does it run away from a winning issue like this, if as they claim they're all about winning?

[Lydia Leftcoast]

62. It's a constant concern for us

self-employed people, but neither patients nor doctors seem satisfied with the current non-system.

[Zhade]

63. And even though a majority of Americans back it, the DLC doesn't.

Makes you wonder why.

[eridani]

65. I'm on board.

Now all we have to do is get all the Kucinich/Wellstone Dems participating in electoral politics.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

66. Yes, and all the people who don't vote

because neither party represents them.

[Robeson]

67. I think its an outstanding platform....

...However, I would raise the taxes on the wealthiest more than you are proposing. Otherwise, great job.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

68. Kennedy era rates would be great, but

even pre-Reagan rates would be a huge improvement.

[Don1]

69. Nice

Lydia Leftcoast 2008

[Lydia Leftcoast]

71. I'm flattered, but see post #28

for why I have no plans for public office.

I'd love to be a policy wonk or speech writer for a progressive candidate, though. :-)

[dolstein]

75. Excuse me, but what "legitimate interests" does Al Quaeda have?

<<Emphasize peaceful solutions to conflicts that recognize that everyone has "legitimate interests.">>


WTF????

[AntiCoup2K4]

76. Osama once said that his biggest beef with the US was troops on holy land.

That's a legitmate concern. Though it by no means justifies his method of "voicing his grievances"

[Lydia Leftcoast]

77. I was talking about countries, not wacko fanatics

Countries may have legitimate NEEDS that conflict with U.S. WANTS.

But even so, there would be no Osama bin Laden the Terrorist, just Osama bin Laden the jaded Saudi playboy, if the U.S. hadn't played that wretched game in Afghanistan of funding Islamic guerillas against the Marxist government for months before the Soviets moved in (at the invitation of the Marxist government, which was losing against the Islamic guerillas).

Do you know which issue originally set the guerillas off? The Marxist government's announcement that schooling was going to be compulsory for both boys and girls.

I had no sympathy whatsoever for the Mujahadeen after I learned that.

Osama bin Laden and his friends in the Taliban are a prime example of blowback. This is not to justify what they did (BTW, the wacko leftists were complaining about the Taliban while the DLC's own Bill Clinton was allowing the CIA to support them), only to say that what goes around comes around.

If you mess where you're neither wanted nor needed or treat countries and human populations as if it's all one big game of Risk, you're going to bring trouble upon yourself. Call it "visiting the sins of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generation," call it bad karma, call it natural consequences, but no one escapes.

For all the European countries' fretting about their problems with Muslim immigrants, they wouldn't have significant Muslim populations today if their grandfathers and great-grandfathers hadn't gone around the world colonizing Islamic countries.

I shudder to think of the karmic payback for the Iraq War, especially since those of us who opposed it will probably pay the same price as the supporters. I cannot see any good outcome.

[Tigress DEM]

78. My Platform is Simple ---- NO MORE LIES

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=1966840&mesg_id=1966840

What do you think?

[Lydia Leftcoast]

79. That's a great start, but in order not to appear merely oppositional

we have to decide which truths we're going to emphasize. :-)

[Zorra]

80. Sounds good, but

although I believe that revamping and redirecting the military and intelligence is a great idea, and holding any government agency strictly accountable for spending is very important, it is still necessary to maintain a powerful military that no other world power would ever want to mess with.

There are a lot of nasty, ruthless, violent, conscienceless people in this world. Maybe someday human beings will finally evolve to the point where war becomes obsolete. I would love to see many of the agendas in the OP be set in motion in order to begin this evolution toward world accord for a permanent peace.

But until then, we really do need to protect ourselves through maintaining an accountable, highly superior, non-offensive, non-imperialistic military power and a well-manned widespread and effective, non-violent, non-hostile intelligence community. Make sure any would be intruders see the crocodiles in the moat and that big mean nasty old dog out there in the yard.

Otherwise, everything else on the non-DLC agenda looks pretty much like a slice of heaven on earth to me.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

84. Since the U.S. already spends more than the rest of the world put

together, we could cut back quite a bit and not hurt anything.

Beyond the Iraq War, there are billions of dollars of useless weapons systems, as well as the 1.3 trillion dollars that have simply gone missing since the Reagan administration. Were they embezzled or used for black ops? Officially, no one knows, or at least, no one who does know is telling. Probably a bit of both.

I'd say no more budget increases for the Pentagon until they come clean about that missing money.

"We gave you a trillion dollars last year. What did you do with it?" :-)

[election_2004]

81. And reopen U.S. bases that were closed....

Keep our non-deployed soldiers closer to home.

[unlawflcombatnt]

82. Good Platform

Lydia,

That's a great platform, most of which I would agree with. Some of your points really hit home.

TRADE:
Maintaining free trade agreements only with countries of similar economic status is an outstanding idea. That way we would be trading with countries that can actually afford to buy our products, instead of countries that can only supply Corporate America with cheap labor. Countries like Japan, Korea, Germany, and Britain have high enough worker incomes to actually buy U.S. products. None of the CAFTA countries will ever buy much from us, with a total GDP of $32 billion (less than 1/2 % of our $12 trillion GDP.) Chinese workers making 33 cents/hour aren't going to buy many American goods either. Your trade suggestion would convert "free" trade into "fair" trade.

IMMIGRATION:
I completely agree that large fines and penalties on employers is the solution to reducing illegal immigration. It's the only approach that will work. Employers have a lot to lose, and they can be easily located and prosecuted. Though we currently have laws against hiring illegal immigrants, we need to dramatically increase penalties against employers. And we need to enforce those laws. This would certainly make it "cheaper" for employers to hire legal residents.

EXEMPTING THE 1st $10,000 OF INCOME FROM SOCIAL SECURITY, AND RAISING THE CAP:
Exempting the 1st $10,000 is an outstanding idea, and one I'd never thought of. However, I would raise the cap on contributions more, or eliminate it altogether.

GOVERNMENT CONTRACTS & OUTSOURCING:
I like your idea here, but I might go farther. I would make it illegal to give them to any company that didn't have at least 90% of their production done in the United States.

REPEALING BUSH TAX CUTS:
Absolutely!

There are a lot more good ideas here. These are the ones that really caught my eye.

unlawflcombatnt

[Lydia Leftcoast]

83. The reason I capped FICA at $200,000 was that

it's probably the largest amount we could reasonably hope to collect on.

If it were unlimited, the super rich would simply have their companies provide them with non-salaried income, such as shares of stock, long-term "loans," and all sorts of "allowances" for housing, cars, travel, and whatever else their little hearts desired.

[Mairead]

85. Think bigger, Lydia :-)

Make FICA apply to any sort of constructive income, however derived. That's how it's done today, applied to the peons: if the company provides you meals or housing or whatever, it's income to you unless done for the convenience of the company...but that claim must be justified.