Censored Whig Letters

Democratic Legislative Priorities Demanded By Voters

Congressional Democrats are on notice. They must pass legislation in a few key areas quickly to keep their jobs. The anger shown by voters in defeating Republican incumbents will be turned on Democrats if they fail to address key issues.

Of course, we need to get out of Iraq. This issue has seen plenty of attention by other pundits and the mainstream media so this column will not cover it in depth.

We should increase the minimum wage and index future increases to inflation. The goal must be to have all American workers earn a living wage. The American nation needs to address the plight of the working poor.

Congress has to dramatically increase financial aid for college students in the form of scholarships and grants. We must reduce the debt burden faced by college students from student loans.

Democrats in Congress will have to pass legislation that requires broadcasters to conform to the Fairness Doctrine. They must reduce the ability of the FCC to exempt corporations from regulations concerning monopoly ownership in media markets. Laws need to be passed that encourage local media ownership, content diversity and minority ownership.

National standards for voting machines and uniform practices should be mandated by Congress. Verified voting procedures, with easy recounts in close races, must be required by law in every election. The right to have all votes counted should be formalized in law. Public officeholders whose actions deny voting rights to large groups of voters should face serious felony criminal charges and long sentences in prison

We must expand the healthcare rights of all citizens. We need to rapidly move toward single-payer, government provided universal healthcare under Medicare. It is a national disgrace that Americans spend so much of our national wealth on healthcare for such meager results. We are the last major industrialized nation on the planet not to have government provided universal healthcare.

Our national economy must reverse course on outsourcing of good paying American jobs. We must rebuild our industrial base or face a rapid decline of our international power. Our national security is being threatened by an insane trade policy. The self-interest of our nation must come before the profits of large international corporations.

America must move rapidly to expanded alternative and renewable energy sources. Our national energy policy cannot be designed by the oil industry. We need a national push for ethanol production, solar power, bio-diesel and wind power. Our tax codes should massively reward energy efficient building practices.

Stricter limits must be placed on the role of money in American politics. We must find a way to halt campaign money flowing from large corporations and corrupting our political system.

If Democrats move quickly to take action on these problems, we can dominant American politics for a generation or more. If not, we will have difficulty in retaining majority control of Congress.

Written by Stephen Crockett (co-host of Democratic Talk Radio http://www.DemocraticTalkRadio.com .) Mail: P.O. Box 283, Earleville, Maryland 21919. Phone: 443-907-2367. Email: midsouthcm@aol.com .

Feel free to publish without prior permission at no charge.

Carville Simply Wrong on Howard Dean and DNC

I find it difficult to express my severe disappointment with my former hero, James Carville. When Carville appeared on the national political scene, he was a real breathe of fresh air. The Cajun Democratic dynamo was a real man of the people speaking in the language of the average man on the street and talking about real world issues.

Carville appears to have slowly been captured by the system. He is now talking like an inside the Beltway politician and spewing the normal venom of the Washington insiders against the populist leader of the Democratic Party, Howard Dean.

Carville seems to think that Dean should be replaced because the Democratic gain in Congress was not bigger than the landslide it was. (No seriously, he has been making statements to that effect. I am not making this up.) Carville and other Washington insider critics believe that the Democratic National Committee could have won around a dozen more seats in Congress by putting more money into those House races.

Dean has been focused on a real 50 state strategy of Party building that has already helped Democrats gain control of Congress and the US Senate. We made impressive gains in Governorships and state legislatures. We made impressive gains in the West and Northeast. The decline of Democratic prospects in the South has been halted and significant future gains appear likely.

It is true that more money would have produced victories in certain campaigns had they received more national support. The campaign of Chris Bell in the Texas Governor race is a prime example. The Ford Senate campaign in Tennessee really needed more national financial support. The House seats not won are important but targeting the right ones would have been difficult if not impossible to determine. Money pulled from other DNC efforts might have resulted in losses elsewhere in this election cycle and future elections.

Carville seems to be excessively focused on short-term gains. This kind of thinking is largely responsible for the decline of the Democratic Party in the pre-Dean era. The Washington power elite had been playing insider politics as a zero sum game looking for immediate gains at the expense of the future before Dean became DNC Chairman.

Our entire nation has been suffering from this kind of short-term thinking from the elite in DC and Wall Street. As a nation and a political party, we need to relearn the concept of sacrificing now and investing to produce a more bountiful future. Howard Dean gets it!

Carville has lost touch with his populist roots. Dean has not. Dean would spend money building a grassroots Democratic structure in places like Mississippi, Iowa, Montana, Kansas, Colorado, Alabama, Georgia, New Hampshire, Wyoming, Utah and Idaho. He would make the Republicans fight to hold their geographic base instead of always being on the defense trying to protect a shrinking Democratic geographic turf.

The Democratic Party needs to be a truly national Party with a truly national leadership. We have that kind of leadership at the Democratic National Committee. We have a national leader who wants to recruit and strengthen our Party at the county, town and city level everywhere. He will not write-off places like Licking County, Ohio or Lincoln County, Tennessee or Cecil County, Maryland. He will not surrender Valdez, Alaska or Lynchburg, Virginia or West Jefferson, North Carolina to uncontested Republican dominance.

Dean will fight for our great Democratic Party in all 50 states and not just a dozen or so competitive Congressional Districts. Democrats will fight in those Districts and another 400 more in 2008. We will fight again in 2010 and 2012. This fight is eternal. We need a Party organization that is permanently vigilant and not based just on individual candidate campaigns during election years. Dean gets it!

The great Democratic tide is still rising. It is a populist tide. The Washington insiders and power elite in the Democratic Party can join the effort or be swept away. The 2006 Election was the beginning and not the crest. This new populism is based on a struggling middle class given national power by the Internet and the rise of new organizations. This populism is closely tied by issues and background with the grassroots of the labor union movement and local civic reform movements. It has deep roots in the FDR New Deal traditions of the Democratic Party. Dean gets it!

In the heartland, the Democratic Party has shown surprising new life in recent years. The Red heartland has started to become Purple and looks headed Blue. This development can be seen in activities like My Rural America.org http://myruralamerica.org .

Carville needs to get out into the heartland and start talking to local Democratic leaders. Carville needs more Kansas and less DC. Dean has not been captured by the system. I still have hope for Carville. I will be praying for him. I hope he can learn from Howard Dean and reconnect with his roots in the populist tradition of the Democratic Party.

Written by Stephen Crockett (co-host of Democratic Talk Radio http://www.DemocraticTalkRadio.com .) Mail: P.O. Box 283, Earleville, Maryland 21919. Phone: 443-907-2367. Email: midsouthcm@aol.com .

Feel free to publish without prior approval at no charge.

The Rise of a New Populist Movement

American politics is experiencing a historic challenge by average citizens to the Corporate control of American politics. The old Left-Right division has largely been eclipsed as a realistic way of analyzing American politics. Corporatism is now being seriously challenged by a new populism.

This populism cuts across the normal political divide in surprising ways. Tax policy, public spending, legal rights, immigration, environment, civil liberties, government secrecy, healthcare, campaign financing, trade policies, public debt, minimum wage, outsourcing, media concentration, anti-monopoly policies, government contracting, worker rights, foreign policy, the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan are all seriously driven by the financial and political power of the largest corporations. Small businesses, workers, consumers, small investors, taxpayers and the poor are all being negatively impacted by the Corporate Agenda on these and many other issues.

Under the Bush Republicans, large corporations have completely captured our federal government and almost all the major media outlets. The middle-class in America has seen their lifestyles undermined by the greed and power of the Corporatists. A real backlash has developed. It can be seen by numerous ballot initiatives, candidacies and growing grassroots organizations.

The Democratic Party has started to shake off the corrupting influence of corporate money as a result of a grassroots rebellion among Party activists. The Lamont Democratic Primary victory in the Connecticut Senate race is one good example of a growing populist trend in Democratic circles. The Tester Senate candidacy in Montana is another great example of the rising populist tide in Democratic politics. Howard Dean serving as Democratic National Committee Chairman was one of the first examples. Democrats are winning the battle for the soul of their Party.

The Shuler Congressional candidacy in North Carolina, the Curtis Congressional candidacy in Florida, the Seals Congressional candidacy in Illinois, the Trupiano Congressional candidacy in Michigan and hundreds of other grassroots based candidacies show the trend is truly national in scope. The amazing growth of organizations, like Move-On, Democracy for America, Democrats.com and the Progressive Democrats of America (especially at the local chapter level) show that grassroots populism has become institutionalized.

While grassroots Republicans and traditional conservatives have started to rebel against the corrupting influence of large corporations, their hopes of reclaiming the soul of the Republican Party are basically stillborn. Large international corporations have almost completely bought control of the Republican Party at the national and state level. Their power is starting to reach down to the county level in many areas.

Examples of the growing power and corrupting influences of large corporations at the state and county levels can be seen in races in Delaware and Maryland. In the Delaware Attorney General race, the Republican candidate Wharton, who is running against US Senator Biden’s son, has been funded largely by soft money from drug companies, casino operators, tobacco companies, etc. The corrupting potential of this money on state-funded lawsuits on behalf of taxpayers, consumers, workers, etc. is obvious.

Even in a local Sheriff race (Cecil County, Maryland), corporate money has been following to the Republican candidate, Barry Janney. Large corporations receiving huge contracts from the Sheriff Department have given thousands to Janney. Janney has raised more than double the amount of funding than his Democratic challenger, Chris Sutton. The Sutton campaign has been a truly populist effort. Sutton has many more very small donors but many fewer large money donors. This race is much closer than the campaign donation figures indicate.

Populist candidates will not always win. However, huge money advantages by Corporate candidates are no longer as decisive as in past elections. The trend is with the populist candidacies instead of the Big Money campaigns. Voters want officeholders who vote for policies that benefit the vast majority instead of just the powerful elite.

Voters do not want their rights to sue large corporations over injustices limited by corporate money. Voters do not want good jobs sent outside our borders by large corporations. Americans want healthcare for all citizens to be provided by our government even if it means higher taxes. Private corporate profit should not come at the expense of the health of American citizens.

We want elections based on ideas instead of campaign money. We want community control of our media and media diversity. We want strong environmental protection. We do not want to lose our manufacturing base to a flood of cheap imports. We want open government, competitive bidding for government contracts and high ethical standards by officeholders.

We want the large corporations to start paying a larger percentage share of the tax burden instead of just individual taxpayers. We want to reduce the level of public debt and corporate raiding of public tax money. We want easier voting procedures and less opportunity for mucking with the voter rolls by politicians. We want honest vote counts.

Americans want foreign policies that serve national interests instead of corporate interests. Oil companies should not be setting government energy policy. Drug companies should not be designing prescription drug policies under Medicare for maximum private profit instead of maximum public good. Taxpayers and seniors should be getting more resources for the amount of money being spent.

As Democrats move toward a more populist viewpoint, third parties like the Populist, Reform and Green Parties may merge their political efforts with the populist Democrats. As Republicans become more disgusted with Corporate control of their Party, third parties like the Constitution, the American or Libertarian Parties may benefit. Many Republicans will simply become Democratic voters.

Republican social wedge issues are declining in importance to American voters because they ignore the real threat of Corporatism to the American way of life. Corporate corruption has turned-off many Christian voters once loyal to the Republican Party.

The 2006 Election is just the beginning of realignment along Populist-Corporatist lines. Economic necessity and hard reality is trumping spin. Politicians from all segments of American politics and all geographic regions need to start examining this change. The people are moving with or without the politicians. We can always get new political leaders.

Written by Stephen Crockett (co-host of Democratic Talk Radio http://www.DemocraticTalkradio.com ). Mail: P.O. Box 283, Earleville, Maryland 21919. Email: midsouthcm@aol.com .

Feel free to publish without prior permission. There is no charge for publication of the full text.

We have an ethics crisis in American government. Cecil County voters have a chance to take a stand for a higher standard of ethical behavior from our elected officeholders. While both major Parties are sometimes ethically challenged, the crisis seems more widespread among Republican politicians.

Bob Ehrlich has been in the pockets of large corporations for most of his political career. Look at his campaign donations from Big Business. His performance as Governor has been disgraceful. This has been demonstrated in actions from state government employment practices to vetoing legislation on behalf of the Wal-Mart.

Our Sheriff Barry Janney has taken campaign donations from businesses that received huge contracts from the Department he runs. He has been found guilty of ethical violations by the Maryland State Ethics Board for using the office he holds to promote select local businesses in their advertising their businesses.

Even Congressman Wayne Gilchrest contributes to the crisis. Look at his campaign donations and you can see his ties to the large corporations. He has not taken a leadership position in fighting the spreading culture of corruption in Congress.

I am not saying these Republicans are outright crooks like Congressman Cunningham (R-CA) and Congressman Ney (R-OH). They have not been accused of crimes like Governor Taft (R-OH) and Congressman Delay (R-TX), or obscene behavior like Congressman Foley (R-FL). However, they do not seem to give ethics a high priority.

If you are not part of the solution in public office, you are part of the problem.

Sincerely,

Stephen Crockett

P.O. Box 283
Earleville, Maryland 21919