I’ve applied for endorsement by the Progressive Democrats of America, and the application questionnaire was the most in-depth I have ever read or filled out. So, I thought I’d share it here.
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Economic and Social Justice:
1) How would you differentiate between “free” trade and “fair” trade? What is your position on these differences?
• Free trade as practiced is fraudulent. It empowers corporations and impoverishes workers by allowing free flow of capital across borders while restricting the flow of people. That’s exactly backward. Fair trade policies empower workers, small businesses and communities by ensuring that producers get a reasonable payment for their labor. Fair trade laws would address environmental and labor issues in partner countries so that environmental damage isn’t shifted from wealthy countries to poor and so that unregulated sweat shop labor isn’t put in competition with workers in countries where human rights are protected.
2) What is your broad-outline idea of a fair taxation policy for individuals and corporations in the United States? What is your opinion of a financial transaction tax on securities trades on Wall Street, to fund a job-creation/training program?
• Income taxes should apply equally across the board, regardless of whether income is from labor or capital gain. At minimum, taxes should be equitable across the range from middle to high income. The rich must pay at the same rate as the rest of us.
We need to implement a financial transactions tax to help dampen the tendency toward investment bubbles, as well as to garner income for the government. Government spending is, automatically, a job creation program, so the question becomes what jobs should we create? We should be funding a new WPA and CCC, building high speed rail, nationwide broadband and a smart grid, for starters, as well as putting more teachers in classrooms, more fire fighters in trucks and more health care workers into clinics and hospitals.
3) If elected, what legislation would you sponsor to improve the lives of working people, especially minorities, in the United States?
The “Restore the American Dream Act for the 99 percent” would get my full support. We should ensure that discriminatory lending is punished to the full extent of the law, that civil rights laws are fully enforced and that affirmative action plans are in place wherever a pattern of discrimination has been revealed.
4) Working men and women are under attack by state legislatures over their rights to organize and collectively bargain. As a member of Congress, how will unions play a part in working with you to develop labor policy and legislation? What do you intend to do to protect the rights of working families in the jobs marketplace?
I support Card Check and offer full support for unions. (I am a union member.) Unions inject democracy into the workplace, and I currently look to union leadership on several City issues (despite the fact that North Carolina is about as anti-union a state as exists in this country.)
5) Data from many sources indicate that success in gaining and maintaining full time jobs at decent wages is strongly biased toward levels of education and that levels of academic achievement are strongly biased toward available family income. Especially during the current unemployment siege, these disparities cut across all employment categories, both public and private sector. Yet, budget shortfalls at the national, state and local levels continue to be met by terribly erosive cuts in funding for public education, including jobs and per pupil spending, from pre-school through 16, as well as for post graduate training. Data also document that privatization “solutions”, overall, have failed to deliver on improving academic achievement, even by methods currently used to assess achievement. If elected, what specific legislative acts would you co-sponsor, or oppose, to ensure access to quality public education for all, independent of race, class, gender or family income?
• I am pro-education. I believe that current strategies (viz: no child left behind) have generally failed. Obama’s race to the top is showing some promise. I’d support deep and significant shifts to programs that are more successful. Local districts, schools and teachers should be accorded more latitiude in creating new paradigms. This country can and should afford free public education from pre-K through four years of college or trade school. I oppose the use of vouchers to divert public money to private schools, and I would encourage adoption of year-round school schedules. (Low income students lose more over the summer than high income students, due to the paucity of enrichment materials and programs in their lives. Year round school plans have been shown to reduce the disparity in learning.)
6) As with all communities, the Lesbian-Gay-Bisexual-Transgender (LGBT) community has a range of complex issues that must be addressed to improve the present and future lives for LGBT people. What steps do you believe should be taken to address the challenges of the homeless problem facing LGBT youth and economic inequality and discrimination in housing and basic sustenance for LGBT people, as well as to educate LGBT youth on their culture and history and foster an appreciation for the LGBT contribution to our society within the larger regional and national community?
• As a member of Asheville City Council I have advanced domestic partner benefits for city employees, created a partnership registry to establish legal relationships, and backed anti-bullying legislation. Homelessness needs to be addressed regardless of gender identification, and the housing-first model seems to be the best. Ultimately, of course, the wealth gap is systemic and needs to be addressed in tax law, investment regulation and via an industrial policy. LGBT humans should be identified as a protected class under civil rights law. I’m not at all clear that gender identification has anything more to do with contribution to our society than race, ethnicity, faith, or country of national origin, or that there is an identifiable separate “culture.” However the story of the gender identity poltical struggle should be taught as part of American history: APA removal of homosexuality from DSM-II, Stonewall Riots, Harvey Milk, DADT, etc.
7) What is your position on current immigration policy: Specifically, what works and what doesn’t work? What would you do to address the root causes that drive millions of people to enter the US illegally? Explain your position on the issue of a program for legal residency and path to citizenship for the 13 plus million undocumented in the U.S.
• Deportation doesn’t work. Immigrants who find jobs should quickly qualify for work permits (green cards) and those who choose to stay should be able to gain citizenship in a reasonable lenght of time—perhaps two years. Employers who hire undocumented workers should thereafter be heavily fined. The reason employers hire undocumented workers is that they will work cheaper and can’t seek redress of grievances. Documented workers will qualify for full protection under our labor laws, will drive up wages, pay taxes and become full members of society in very short order. Of course food will cost more. You get what you pay for.
In what ways would ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment enhance America’s full economic recovery, peace-keeping efforts and global competitiveness in the future? If elected, what priority (Top, Medium, Low) would you give to urging Congress’s removal of any deadline for ERA’s ratification in the final three states needed? How would you publicize your commitment beginning now?
• Support for passage of the ERA has been on my Web site since the beginning of my campaign (and has been my position for decades), so I’ve already been publicizing my support. I believe it should be passed as quickly as possible regardless of its potential effect on any other issue. (Honestly, “economic recovery” is about as overworked as “the peace process” – a phrase that can be bent to support anything or nothing.) I would vote for removal of any deadline in a heartbeat.
War and Peace:
1) Do you believe that the severity of the ongoing economic crisis has created budget shortfalls that require us to reexamine our national spending priorities in regard to the U.S. occupations in Afghanistan and Iraq? If so, what would you cut or reduce from the military budget, and how would you redirect those funds to domestic needs? Would you vote against further funding for these occupations?
• War is beggaring the United States. Exit Afghanistan yesterday, if not sooner. Reduce the number of bases around the globe—we are not and ought not to be the world’s policeman. Eliminate our nuclear weapons program. Eliminate redundancy: it’s fine to have a sufficient Air Force for defense, but we don’t need the Navy to be the second biggest air force in the world. End arms sales to foreign nations—they often end up being used against us or our allies. The truth is that “arms sales” are often paid for by our taxes, in the form of foreign aid (this is particularly true of Israel.)
2) Many people believe that the U.S. military presence in Afghanistan attempts to legitimize a corrupt Karzai government, which is largely viewed as unrepresentative of and unresponsive to the people of Afghanistan. They also believe that the U.S. military presence has not improved security, and, therefore, the poor economy continues to erode. Do you agree or disagree? Please explain your answer and give possible solutions.
• Afghanistan is only a country on an imaginary British map from the era of the Raj. Perhaps in the very long run it will cohere, but it might just as easily become three nations or lose territory to neighbors. Attempting to fashion that collection of tribes and factions into a nation by force is a fool’s errand. We should never have invaded, and we need to execute as swift and orderly a withdrawal as possible. The only (and exceedingly lame) argument for invasion was to bring bin Laden to justice, and there were credible reports that Bush rebuffed Taliban efforts to turn him over to us in order to justify a war of choice. We failed to bring bin Laden to court and assassinated him instead. So the mission is over. Time to pack it in and head home.
3) Many people believe the main obstacle to a fair settlement in the Middle East has been U.S. policies in the region. Specifically, they point to aggressive policies favoring Israel and antagonistic attitudes towards the Arab population, advanced by a U.S. Congress greatly influenced by the Israeli lobby. Please explain your agreement or disagreement with this analysis. Also, have you accepted campaign donations from AIPAC and/or other Israeli lobbies?
• I will not accept donations from AIPAC or any other organization lobbying for any other nation’s interest. (Nor will I accept corporate or corporate PAC donations, but that’s another matter.)
We need to make our aid to Israel contingent on ending expansion of Israeli settlements in occupied territory, recognition of Palestine as a nation, and provision of adequate water to the Palestinian state. (The Six-Day War was principally a water grab.) We must sharply curb our military support for Israel as well. As I mentioned in an answer above, “the peace process” is a meaningless euphemism. As long as Israel is heavily dependent on U.S. aid, we have the leverage and the right to demand a swift resolution of Israeli/Palestinian issues. Obviously, we have not done so to date, or this question would be irrelevant.
4) Given that U.S. military bases in foreign countries may be necessary for strategic and defense purposes, do you believe that we are currently spending too much or too little for military bases all over the world? Do you believe we should maintain bases in Iraq and Afghanistan? What do you think determines “too many” or “too few” bases?
• We could do with far fewer bases for actual defense. Mostly we maintain foreign bases to project our influence, i.e. to impose our will on others. We are spending far too much on that effort. If we look to history, Rome collapsed due to environmental despoliation and its attempt to impose its rule over too broad an area. We should exit Iraq and Afghanistan entirely, except for a normal ambassadorship in each. (Not a mega-embassy posing as “normal.”) We should aim for reduction by half the current 700+ over the next decade. The 38 large bases we maintain for our air and naval forces would probably be sufficient as a final goal. (It’s noteworthy that Rome maintained 37 bases at its peak, and the British empire 38. Neither survived their hubris and overreach.)
Corporate Rule:
1) What would you do to curb the undue influence of corporations on our political process and our society?
• For starters, I will not accept donations from corporations, corporate PACs, or anonymous SuperPACs. I only take donations from real people, within the constraints of federal election law.
We should overturn Citizens United v. FEC via legislation. Pass a constitutional amendment stipulating that a person under the law is only a natural person. Mandate public financing of all elections with no private or corporate funding of any sort. Return to the rules imposed on corporations in the early years of our nation: charters to be renewed every seven years with a requirement that the corporation justify its existence as a matter of public good. We grant immunity from personal liability to corporate owners, we can and should demand public benefit in return.
2) Explain your position on limiting the rights of corporations to participate in our democracy and expanding affirmative rights for people, as well as your opinion of Citizens United v. FEC.
See above.
Healthcare:
1) Do you support a single-payer, Medicare-for-all solution for our health funding and health delivery crises? Why or why not? If not, what do you propose to do at the national level to eliminate the waste, fraud, and abuse of our current for-profit payment model, and to achieve guaranteed high-quality universal healthcare?
• Yes, as my campaign banner has it, “Medicare is the public option that works!” With 3 percent overhead, Medicare has proven its worth vis-a-vis private insurers. We are the only industrial democracy without some version of single-payer and we are falling behind the world in health outcomes. (47th in life expectancy at present) The experimental plan within Medicare to pay for outcomes instead of procedures looks very promising. The mandate under the Affordable Care Act that requires private insurers to pay 80 percent of premium receipts for actual medical care (85 in large group plans) will help push private insurers out of the market and pave the way for single payer. The recently introduced “Restore the American Dream Act for the 99 percent,” includes a public option, and I fully endorse that bill.
2) Given the reality of single-payer campaigns’ making significant headway in numerous states, do you support enabling legislation that will allow states to innovate immediately, bypassing legal challenges emanating from ERISA, and/or states’ capacity to capture Medicare, Medicaid, VA, CHIPS, and other federal dollars to finance state-based “Medicare for All”? Please explain.
• Since I live in a benighted state that hasn’t broached this subject, I am not really up to speed on this one. My immediate reaction is that we’d be better off pushing for a nationwide plan, rather than fragmenting coverage—given the high mobility of American citizens. But I’m open to argument about the benefit of allowing state innovation.
3) Please explain how you intend to preserve Social Security for future generations.
• Raise the cap on Social Security payroll taxes or eliminate it entirely. Implement a further tiering of the system so that people can retire earlier with lower benefits and later with higher benefits. (We already do this, but we could expand the window.) The recently introduced “Restore the American Dream Act for the 99 percent,” includes dropping the cap, and as stated previously, I fully support that bill.
4) Women’s control over their own reproductive health and decisions continues to be threatened by paternalism masquerading as morality. What would you do to protect and strengthen women’s access to reproductive health services, as well as to prevent the further erosion of a woman’s right to choose?
• I am a staunch supporter of women’s absolute control over their own reproductive decisions. (I have been a volunteer escort at our local abortion clinic for many years, both before and after the 1999 bombing.) I am an active supporter of Planned Parenthood. The best way to reduce the number of abortions is through comprehensive sex education and widespread availability of birth control information and methods. I oppose every effort to restrict any woman’s right to control her own body. I oppose any effort to define a fertilized egg as a human being. Independent viability needs to be the test of humanness, and in the event of a medical emergency the life of the mother must be given primacy over the life of an unborn child.
Energy and Environment
1) To many, climate disruption, more commonly and innocuously referred to as Global Warming, is often referenced as the greatest threat civilization has ever faced. Although many currently elected officials campaigned aggressively on this issue—promoting a green economy, alternative energy solutions, carbon emission reductions and carbon tax legislation—there has been little to no action or legislation pushed forward. The earth continues to warm as CO2 concentrations continue to rise. Campaigns to create doubt around climate science are well funded, well organized, and effective. Please share your view on the science of climate disruption, your view on how it should be addressed, and where you would rank this as a personal priority.
• It’s hard to rank climate change versus campaign finance reform, since we probably need the latter before we’ll seriously address the former, but I’d put them both at the very top of my list. The science is incontrovertible and frightening. As a green builder since the 1970s (and one who lived off-the-grid on solar power for over 20 years) I was an early advocate for carbon reduction. Following McKibben’s and Gore’s popularization of the issue around 1990 I became even more active, starting an environmental journal at Warren Wilson College and lecturing at schools and universities about the issue. On City Council I have successfully implemented a plan to reduce city government carbon emissions by 80 percent below 2006 levels by 2020, and am advocating a plan to do the same citywide.
2) Because fossil fuels are the cheapest form of energy, we are burning far more than the Earth’s atmosphere and climate can assimilate. How would you change the economic incentives to discourage fossil fuel use and encourage renewables and efficiency? Does a revenue-neutral carbon tax used to fund cuts in payroll taxes make sense to you? Do you agree with the Defense Department’s recent assessment that global warming poses substantial security threats? How do we get beyond climate science denial?
• Given that much of our global military intrusion is directed at protecting oil supply lines, I would love to shift a substantial portion of military funding to a gas tax (with concommitant reduction in income taxes). Politically more practical would be the bill already advanced in the U.S. Senate for a cap-and-dividend system that would force fossil fuel companies to pay a carbon tax that would be distributed to every American. Fuel prices would go up, but it would be left to the marketplace to adjust use. Left to their own choice, people would radically curb fossil fuel use and alternatives would become relatively much more affordable. As for the security threats outlined in recent DOD studies, well, “doh?” If Lovelock’s calculations are correct, a multi-foot rise in sea level by the end of this century will threaten a lot more than simple “security.” And if the Greenland ice sheet slides off into the Atlantic, it’ll be Katy-bar-the-door on a global scale.
3) In order to meet America’s energy demands, a number of options are utilized. What’s your view on hydro-fracking for natural gas, the development of tar sands and the associated pipeline, mountain-top mining, and building new nuclear power plants (Germany is phasing theirs out in light of the Fukushima disaster) and safely managing the spent fuel that’s already been generated?
• I support fusion energy right where it has always been generated, in our local star. Nuclear power is too expensive to be a viable alternative (absent government subsidy, no one builds nukes.) Hydro-fracking should be banned. The tar sands should be left where they are pending future technology that solves environmental problems associated with extraction and use. (I went to Washington to protest the XL pipeline.)
Per Rocky Mountain Institute: if every state were as efficient as the 10 most efficient states, we could start shutting down power plants tomorrow. My immediate goal in Asheville is to stop the coal trains coming here by reducing the community electrical demand to the point that our coal-fired plant is uneconomical to fire up. Having lived on solar power for decades, I know conservation is the cheapest form of power. We are spendthrift as a nation when it comes to energy use.
Fair and Transparent Elections
1) What are you willing to do to ensure that all registered voters are able to vote without undue obstruction, hardship and expense, and are able to witness and participate in all phases of the election–from voting procedure and protecting the chain of custody for secure transmission of their votes, to counting the votes and reporting the results transparently, accurately and securely?
• I was part of the group that successfully advocated for paper ballots here when our touch screen machines were shown to be fraught with problems. I have voted to extend early voting here as a member of City Council. I am active with Common Cause, NC Voters for Clean Elections and openly advocate for voting rights. I opposed the NC voter I.D. law rammed through our General Assembly by GOP ideologues last session. Voting is a fundamental right and ballot access must be free and fair.
2) Explain your position on the use of taxpayer dollars to finance political campaigns directly and equitably, with some expenditures offset by taxing some of the massive profits derived by broadcast media from their free use of the frequency spectrum owned by the people.
• Yes. That is my position exactly. We must move to public financing of all elections. Currently some judgeships and some members of the Council of State in North Carolina have public financing available, as do legislative candidates in Arizona and Maine. Taxing broadcast media would be a good source for funds, but we’d also save tax money by not funding useless pork barrel projects and mineral subsidies advanced by corporate financiers of our current system.
3) Do you support efforts to end deceptive practices that deliberately mislead or intimidate traditionally disenfranchised communities to include minority voters, Seniors and young people through voter I.D. challenges and other forms of voter intimidation to fraudulently prevent turnout in targeted communities?
• Absolutely. Anyone found guilty of using deceptive practices (like the direct mail that told black voters in Florida that the election was on a different day, etc.) should be jailed, not simply fined. We should welcome U.N. observers to judge the fairness of our electoral practices, in the same way that we insist on outside observers in other nations. We are not above scrutiny, and the level of fraud perpetrated in, for example, Ohio in 2000 and 2004 is intolerable.
