Reform

LA Teachers Strike Shows There Is Little Difference Between Dems & Repubs On Corporatized Education

January 16, 2019 Steven Singer, Gadflyonthewallblog.com Resist! Education, Electoral Politics, Los Angeles, Reform, Strikes, Teachers

On Monday more than 30,000 teachers at 900 schools in Los Angeles, California, will be on strike. And unlike the wave of teachers strikes last year in red states like West Virginia, this time educators are taking to the streets due to the policies of Democrats. At issue are things like lowering class sizes and providing more nurses, librarians and counselors. But behind these issues lies one of the most important facts about our country. When you get right down to it, there is very little difference between many Democratic policymakers and their Republican counterparts.

The Green New Deal New York Needs, From Its Original Source

January 16, 2019 By Howie Hawkins, Gothamgazette.com Educate! Environment, Green New Deal, New York (NY), Reform

In outlining his agenda for the first 100 days of his third term, Governor Cuomo said in December he would launch a Green New Deal. I have been calling for a Green New Deal since 2010 in three Green Party gubernatorial campaigns against him. Cuomo has already nominally adopted a number of my platform planks, including the fracking ban, marriage equality, a $15 minimum wage, tuition-free public college, paid family leave, and legalization of marijuana. Unfortunately, the implementation of some of these measures fall short of full realization and the same appears to be true for what will be Cuomo’s Green New Deal.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s Tax Proposal Could Raise $720 Billion Over The Next 10 Years

January 15, 2019 Ruth Milka, Nationofchange.org Educate! Electoral Politics, Liberals, Reform, Revisionism, Taxes

Such a high tax rate is not unheard of and higher rates used to be the norm during a large portion of the 20th century. Why was this the case? Because higher tax rates on the wealthy generated huge revenue. As Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez proposes, the revenue from raising taxes on the wealthy could be spent to fund the Green New Deal, a proposal that would implement radical policy in order to eliminate fossil fuels and carbon emissions within the next 12 years. Prior to the 1980s, when President Ronald Reagan slashed tax rates for the wealthiest, the tax rate for any taxpayer that made more than $216,000 a year was 70 percent.

The Return Of Reefer Madness

January 15, 2019 Ari Paul, Fair.org Educate! Legalization, Marijuana, Reform

Nationwide, marijuana legalization is becoming more normal. Colorado’s dispensaries are hailed as an economic success story, and other states are following suit—New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo has indicated he’ll support legalization after New York City’s choice to gradually decriminalize the drug. The trend is global: Canada recently joined Uruguay in fully legalizing cannabis, and Lebanon is also mulling legalization. Marijuana legalization has always had its opponents—including the alcohol lobby, which wants to protect its monopoly on legal intoxicants, and the prison/industrial complex, which fears a decrease in the number of nonviolent drug offenders who keep jail cells full.

Tax The Rich? History Proves Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez May Be Correct

January 12, 2019 By David Schultz, Counterpunch.org Create! Electoral Politics, New Economy, Reform, Taxes

Taxes impede economic growth and high taxes kill the economy, right?. This is the belief among many who criticize Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s proposal to raise taxes on the wealthy to 70% or more. But what does the evidence really tell us? Do high taxes really hurt the economy as much as they believe, and will lowering them have much of an impact on stimulating it? The economic literature is clear — tax breaks to encourage economic relocation or investment decisions are inefficient and wasteful. Hundreds of studies reach this conclusion. When businesses are surveyed regarding factors important to their investment decisions, taxes often come in behind proximity to markets, suppliers, and the quality of the labor force.

Degeneration And Regeneration In Worker Cooperatives

January 11, 2019 Tim Armstrong, Geo.coop Create! Capitalism, Cooperatives, New Economy, Reform

Like all businesses, cooperatives can fail. Cooperatives can go bankrupt, but they can fail in another way too. Over time, cooperatives can degenerate. Cooperatives are said to degenerate when, under economic pressure, they abandon their cooperative principles and start adopting capitalist business practices and structures. In the worst case, given enough time and economic pressure, cooperatives can fully degenerate into privately-owned, capitalist businesses. Such businesses might still be economically viable ― they will have avoided bankruptcy ― but they can no longer be considered successful cooperatives.

The Election Circus Begins

January 9, 2019 Chris Hedges, Truthdig.com Educate! Electoral Politics, presidential elections, Reform, United States

It is January 2019. This signals the start of the 2020 election circus. Sen. Elizabeth Warren is the first big-name Democrat on stage. But we will soon be deluged with candidates, bizarre antics and endless commentary by fatuous TV and radio pundits. The hyperventilating, the constant polling, the updates on who has the largest campaign war chest, the hypothetical matches between this hopeful and that hopeful, the mocking tweets by Donald Trump, will, as we saw in the 2016 election campaign, have as much relevance to our lives and political future as the speculation on cable sports channels about next year’s football season. This farce takes the place of genuine political life.

A Green New Deal Vs. Revolutionary Ecosocialism

January 8, 2019 Wayne Price, Blackrosefed.org Educate! Electoral Politics, Environment, Reform

The idea of a “Green New Deal” has been raised in response to the threat of climate and ecological catastrophe. Two such proposals are analyzed here and counter-posed to the program of revolutionary libertarian ecosocialism. According to the climate scientists, industrial civilization has at most a dozen years until global warming is irreversible. This will cause (and is already causing) extremes of weather, accelerating extermination of species, droughts and floods, loss of useable water, vast storms, rising sea levels which will destroy islands and coastal cities, raging wildfires, loss of crops, and, overall, environmental conditions in which neither humans nor other organisms evolved to exist.

Senate’s First Bill: Protect Israel From BDS

January 8, 2019 Ryan Grim and Glenn Greenwald, Theintercept.com Educate! BDS, Electoral Politics, Israel, Reform

WHEN EACH NEW Congress is gaveled into session, the chambers attach symbolic importance to the first piece of legislation to be considered. For that reason, it bears the lofty designation of H.R.1 in the House and S.1 in the Senate. In the newly controlled Democratic House, H.R.1 — meant to signal the new majority’s priorities — is an anti-corruption bill that combines election and campaign finance reform, strengthening of voting rights, and matching public funds for small-dollar candidates. In the 2017 Senate, the GOP-controlled S.1 was a bill, called the “Tax Cuts and Jobs Act,” that, among other provisions, cut various forms of corporate taxes.

Sunrise Movement Plans National Tour To Build Grassroots Support For Green New Deal

January 8, 2019 Alexander C. Kaufman, Huffingtonpost.com Organize! Climate Change, Electoral Politics, Environment, Reform

It’s been a whirlwind two months since the youth activists of the Sunrise Movement staged protests in Democratic leaders’ offices, bringing into the mainstream calls for a Green New Deal ― a sweeping federal policy that would mandate 100 percent renewable energy and provide good-paying sustainable jobs to millions of Americans. Now the Sunrise Movement, likely the nation’s fastest-growing climate advocacy group, is planning a 14-stop tour meant to drum up grassroots support for a Green New Deal across multiple states, HuffPost has learned. It’s the first leg of the group’s effort to make the policy the defining issue of the 2020 election.

Federal Marijuana Prosecutions Down 20% Since Sessions Allowed Prosecutions of ‘Legal’ Marijuana

January 5, 2019 By Kyle Jaeger, Marijuanamoment.net Educate! Electoral Politics, Jeff Sessions, Marijuana Legalization, Reform

Exactly one year ago, then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions stoked fears in the marijuana industry by rescinding an Obama-era Justice Department memo that encouraged federal prosecutors to generally not interfere with state cannabis legalization laws. But in the year since, the government has not launched a crackdown, five more states legalized cannabis in some form—with Vermont lawmakers voting to do so on the very same day Sessions made his move—and federal prosecutions for marijuana-related offenses during the 2018 fiscal year, which ended in September, declined by almost a fifth. While the Obama guidance, known as the Cole memo, provided the legal industry with some sense of comfort, advising U.S. attorneys to exercise discretion and enforce federal law in a limited number of circumstances...

“Prison Reform” Is Not Enough. In 2019, Let’s Fight For Decarceration.

January 4, 2019 By Dan Berger, Truthout.org Strategize! Mass Incarceration, Prisons, Reform

Prison reform is now in vogue, but police power remains as brutal as ever. Policing in the US continues to include the power to cage as well as the power to kill — a reality that is spectacularly evident at the southern US border. By all accounts, 2019 promises to be another brutal year in the arena of prisons and policing. President Trump signed the First Step Act in late December, while threatening a government shutdown to secure funding for a border wall. The act makes it easier for some federal prisoners to seek early release, widens federal judicial discretion in some low-level sentencing issues and limits some mandatory minimum sentences in federal cases.

Ocasio-Cortez Rips Dem Leadership For Treating Planet-Saving Green New Deal As ‘Controversial’

January 2, 2019 By Andrea Germanos, Commondreams.org Resist! Climate Change, Electoral Politics, Environment, Reform

"We simply don’t have any other choice. If it's radical to propose a solution on the scale of the problem, so be it." Incoming Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez took aim at the Democratic Party on Monday over the newly-announced climate crisis committee—a body she and other progressives say lacks the teeth needed to avert planetary disaster. In a Twitter thread, Ocasio-Cortez said that her proposal for a select committee on a Green New Deal—a key demand of the youth-led Sunrise Movement—contained "3 simple elements: 1. No fossil fuel money on climate cmte 2. Offer solutions for impacted communities 3. Draft sample #GreenNewDeal."

As Tax Scam Turns One, Critics Say Law Is ‘One Of The Biggest Transfers Of Wealth To Richest 1% In US History’

December 21, 2018 By Jake Johnson, Commondreams.org Educate! Reform, Ruling Class, Tax cuts for the rich

"A year later, we can safely say that Republicans' tax overhaul was a huge payoff to donors, and a scam for average Americans." Massive corporations are "flush with leftover cash" and Wall Street banks are raking in enormous profits. CEOs and the wealthiest Americans are getting even richer. Average workers are seeing crumbs. That is the state of the American economy on the one-year anniversary of the passage of the GOP's $1.5 trillion dollar tax scam, which Americans for Tax Fairness said on Tuesday will go down as "one of the biggest transfers of wealth to the richest one percent in U.S. history."

Council Approves Bills For ‘Fair Workweek’ And $15/hr. Wage Hike

December 8, 2018 Juliana Feliciano Reyes, Philly.com Create! Legislation, New Economy, Reform, Wages

The 24-year-old graduate of Olney High School left his job at a Target store two weeks ago because the company couldn’t accommodate his schedule — he’s only able to work daytime hours because in the evenings, he has to take care of a nephew who has cerebral palsy. Now, he works at Ross on City Avenue, where he’s in charge of making sure people don’t steal. But because he’s only getting 25 hours, he makes about $200 each week. His managers said they’re trying to make him full-time. If he could even get 32 hours a week, he said, it would make a big difference to his relatives, including his grandmother, who has cancer.

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