The Progressive Vision… a Level Playing-Field

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“We want to give every one of our citizens, men and women, young and old, greater opportunity to find work, save and spend money, pursue happiness — and ultimately live up to their God-given potential.”                                                                                                                                                                        Hillary Rodham Clinton

America once boasted occupation of the higher ground, in a world in which much of Asia and Eastern Europe lived in fear of totalitarian dictatorships under which citizens were jailed without due process for simply questioning their government.  We were once proud of our two-party system, holding it up to those living in oppression behind the Iron Curtain, a beacon of hope, a goal towards which they might strive for a better life, for themselves and their children.

One party would be elected into power in the White House, or to Congress, and the Loyal Opposition would support and defend the United States of America, the best interests of its fellow Americans always in the fore, while keeping the ruling party accountable for its actions…  Each elected representative would answer to those who voted him into office, lest he incur the collective wrath of us all, come the first Tuesday in November… on the basis of One Man, One Vote.

The two-party system in America is broken now… it seems that we have two factions of a single party, bought and paid for by an entrenched and increasingly powerful Corporate Oligarchy, empowered by a Supreme Court that turned its back on the American people with its infamous decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, 558 U.S. 08-205 (2010), when it endowed the American Corporation with all the rights of citizens, and the unrestrained right to influence the electoral process with obscene sums of money.  We now have a system of legal and open bribery of every candidate from either of the two Major Parties.  Political assassination of one party by another now takes priority over the best interests of the voters, and the American electorate is disgusted, as Congressional approval ratings have fallen to an abysmal 10% in September, 2011 polls.

Constituent coalition components that elected Barack Obama to the White House, with the hopes and dreams of forwarding the Progressive Agenda have been gravely disappointed, betrayed by the Democratic Party that sponsored him, and the political hacks with whom he unwittingly surrounded himself.  Obama’s promise to bring a grassroots participation to the process of government has from the outset been sabotaged from within, and it is the system of wholesale purchase of both parties by the corporate oligarchy that is to blame.

And so, for the vast majority of Americans, those of us who still maintain a progressive vision for America… of a Nation that is a level playing-field for all its citizens, and not just the privileged few… of an America with universal access to quality health care, regardless of ability to pay… of an electorate with equal and open access to a higher education, regardless of financial means… of a society whose every citizen has full access to legal representation in every court in the land, regardless of depth of pocket… of a Nation where every American has the inalienable right to a productive job, at a living wage, regardless of his or her race, color, creed or gender…  there is but one answer remaining.

The only hope for America is a viable, vibrant, accountable Third Party… a Party that holds itself above the interests of Business, and Money, but instead works in the interests of our Children, and the Family.  Yes, a Party that represents ‘We, the People’ and not corporate lobbying interests, nor the aristocracy of wealth, power and influence.

Join with us now, as we expand and develop a functional, achievable progressive agenda, that will level the playing-field for all Americans.  Volunteer with us to register voters, and bring the marginalized, the unemployed, the oppressed and the abused into the fold.  Let no citizen be left behind.  Help us to organize, select and support candidates who will carry the Progressive Agenda to every county seat, to every state legislature, and to the halls of Congress.  Help us to inspire a Presidential Candidate who can wield that once-powerful, broad spectrum of coalition components, to wrest power from the Corporate Oligarchy, and carry the Progressive Agenda into the White House, to lead a committed body of Congressional Representatives and Senators.

Stand with us now, as we take back our government from this latest round of Robber Barons, and the Citizens’ United Corporate Oligarchy, and return the United States government to one Of the People, By the People, and For the People… ALL of the People, and not just the wealthy, the empowered, and the politically connected.

We recognize that political organization MUST begin at the local level.  If you have an Occupy Movement in your hometown, encourage them to embrace the ideals of a level playing field for every American family, for every American household.  Encourage the most passionate among them to run for county and city elected offices.  Throw your own hat into the political arena, and run yourself.  Network with national progressive organizations such as this one, and with tabling organizations and their legions of people who are there to assist you with running local progressive campaigns.  Contact me personally, here if you need help finding resources in your area.

A Social-Capitalist Approach to Health Care Delivery

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“Perhaps the single most pressing issue facing every parent today is providing our children with quality, best-money-can-buy health care when they need it.”

An Historical Perspective

Since the 1950’s when Blue Cross and Blue Shield came into their own, health care in America has been administrated by the private insurance industry.  Other nations chose health care systems administrated by the government, and generally speaking sacrificed a certain amount of quality of care, and certainly ease of access to that care, in exchange for universal availability to all its citizens.

Here in the US, facility-based and professional providers alike subsequently enjoyed higher reimbursement levels, quite naturally attracting the best and the brightest physicians from the world over.  It is undeniable that high reimbursement levels in the United States contributed substantially to the quality of care enjoyed here, as compared to the quality of the National Health Service in the UK, or even of Canadian socialized medicine.

During the heated debate regarding health care reform preceding passage of the Affordable Care Act, proposals were heard involving conversion of the American health care system to a “single payer” Medicaid-type model, and similarly, a model to provide “Medicare for all”, both based on European-style systems, and the “public option”, essentially a variation of “Medicare for all”.  In fairness, it is perhaps appropriate to consider the relative merits of such proposals, before rejecting them outright; for there are fundamental issues with our Medicaid and Medicare systems as they exist today that need the light of day shed on them anyway.  Of primary concern is the fact that neither Medicaid nor Medicare reimburse providers, neither facility-based nor professional, at cost-reimbursement levels.

Every facility in the US completes an annual cost report, essentially a balance-sheet detailing its expenses, the number of patients served, the types of services provided, and so on, which it submits to its state’s Blue Cross plan.  For more than fifty-years, Blue Cross has analyzed each facility’s annual cost report, and based its “charge screens”, or how much would be allowed in reimbursement, on the cost of providing those services.  Everyone recognized that if a hospital’s costs were not covered, they would soon go out of business, and no one would have health care.  Allowable charge screens typically represent “cost-plus”, generally from 3-5% over costs, to allow growth and expansion of services to meet the needs of a growing population, and a growing economy.

The bulk of health insurance coverage was supplied by employers, as part of a benefits package, begun during WWII, and continuing unabated into the 60’s.  Those who were unemployable notwithstanding, those who had worked their whole lives, and were now retired, no longer had employers to provide coverage.  Providers were obliged to treat the elderly, increasing in numbers and with inherently greater health issues, for free… along with the unemployable.  Employers were quite naturally reluctant to pay increasing premiums to cover these two growing segments of the population, and pressure was felt by Congress to enact Medicare as the logical first step.

From an historical perspective, Medicare as it was originally enacted reimbursed both provider types based on the cost-reimbursement formula.  Physicians were reimbursed based on the Usual, Customary, and Reasonable rates representing what they charged Blue Shield and other insured patients for similar services.  Early on, Blue Cross and Blue Shield served as Medicare intermediaries, and everything ran very smoothly… providers were quite happy with the program, and it gained a strong foothold.

The growing indigent population prompted the Medicaid program, sold to providers under the premise that any reimbursement was better than no reimbursement at all.  For the first time in history, reimbursement was paid to hospital and physician providers, below the cost-reimbursement level.  It was begrudgingly accepted, as sold: twenty-cents on the dollar was indeed better than no reimbursement at all.

And in that moment, the system began to unravel…

Congress, in its infinite wisdom, decided that if providers were willing to take less than cost for services provided to Medicaid patients, and it was OK to pass on the unpaid costs to everyone else, as indeed it had been done for years before either Medicare or Medicaid existed, then why wouldn’t it be OK to reimburse providers for services provided to Medicare patients under the cost-reimbursement threshold too… and the Diagnostic Related Groups methodology was born.

Popular opinion held that hospitals and doctors were getting paid far too much, and Congress was witness to the fact the Medicare program was going broke, its budget growing every year.  Baby-boomers were retiring and living longer, increasing the program’s costs.  Providers could be paid less than cost, as represented by Blue Cross charge screens, and they would simply tighten their belts and make do with less.

What happened in reality, was what would happen in any other business… as reimbursement from the “fixed payers” went down, the balances remaining were simply shifted to other payers, and the “retail price” of services went up.  Pretty much the same occurred with physicians… they simply raised the UCR to cover the overhead of running the office, in order to maintain a constant income-stream.

And of course, as provider pricing rose, insurance premiums rose along with them, and employers were faced with higher labor costs.  Insurance companies began experimenting with alternative products, negotiating lower rates with area providers on behalf of big-contract employers… and the era of Preferred Provider Organizations was ushered in.  Hospitals in markets with competition could ill afford to have the biggest employers in the region cut them out of the loop, and deals were inked under which reimbursement for large chunks of what once constituted their lifeblood, fell below the level of cost as well…

Again, this was reflected in the cost reports, and premiums went up again.  People began screaming about the “spiraling cost” of health care in America, when in reality, costs were actually being cut to the bone, with nurses and those who worked in the field feeling the crunch in years of salary and benefits packages that did not keep pace with inflation.  No, it was the retail price of health care that was spiraling out of control, precipitated by employers fleeing traditional insurance coverage plans in favor of those that paid less than cost.

The Affordable Care Act

During President Barack Obama’s tenure, his signature achievement has been the Affordable Care Act.  Nicknamed “Obama-care”, the ACA represented the President’s vision for health care reform, and was designed to provide universal access to health care to every American Family.  One particularly contentious provision of the Act required individuals to buy health insurance under penalty of law, raising the ire of many Republican and Tea Party conservatives.  On September 13, 2011, Federal Judge Christopher C. Conner struck down that requirement, declaring it unconstitutional.

On balance, the mandate was perhaps an error in judgment.  Instead of mandating that every American household purchase health insurance, the ACA perhaps might have offered every American tax-filer the option to purchase health insurance, using an Earned Income Tax Credit to do so.

The original purpose of the ACA was to provide universal access to health care for every American.  That means Everyone, and it means regardless of ability to pay for it.  If we start from that assumption, that access to health care shall be the Right of Every American, there is no need to further debate the morality of the issue… all that remains to be decided is the logistics of delivery.

There are so many advantages to American families’ choosing their own health insurance plan, and paying for it themselves, that a delivery strategy that employs these components is certain to gain maximum support from the public.  Whether supported in fact or not, Americans recoil at the very suggestion of socialism, even given that in reality, Medicare and Medicaid represent exactly that.

The Affordable Care Act can be amended to allow every tax-filer to purchase health insurance for himself and all dependents, with zero-deductible and zero-copay, in order to ensure truly equal access even for those with no financial means.  To further ensure equal access, the health insurance industry must be allowed under the Act to borrow the cost of every family’s premium from private sector sources.

An interest rate likely to ensure the participation of Wall Street banks in such a funding scheme might represent a quarter-percent over the 24-month Treasury yield, backed by the federal government through the EITC written into the tax-code.  (At the time of this writing, 0.20% interest is about average for 2-year Treasuries; the rate for funding the Act would calculate out to 0.45% interest over 18-months.)

In practice, the Affordable Care Act, amended in such a manner, would essentially “gift” the health insurance industry what amounts to 100% national market penetration, just like the electric company in your community is handed 100% market penetration.  In exchange, your electric service provider is tightly regulated by a Public Utilities Commission, such that profits are kept very low, on the order of 3-4%.  Communities sometimes allow tax-free dividends or other perqs to attract investors’ money to utilities, keeping the doors open and the cost of electricity as low as possible.

Health insurance companies should be regulated in precisely the same manner. The ACA actually allows health insurance companies profit margins well above what we allow electric companies in exchange for universal access to the market. The Affordable Care Act might be further amended to limit the health insurance industry to levels of profit similar to those allowed public utilities, in exchange for 100% market penetration.  The Act already grants oversight responsibilities to each state’s Insurance Commissioner, who might require audited cost-reports from licensed insurers.

One of the highlights of the Affordable Care Act is the 180-degree reversal of the American health insurance company business plan, with the September 1st, 2011, implementation of provisions that regulate insurance company premium levels, setting statutory maximums at a fixed-ratio to benefits paid-out…

Previous to implementation of these regulations, the market allowed insurance companies to charge “what the traffic would bear” in premiums; what was not paid out in benefits was then retained as profit.  This model provided incentive for the denial of every claim, and then requiring beneficiaries to submit additional paperwork and make telephone calls to appeal the initial decision.

In stark contrast, the ACA-imposed model provides profit-driven incentive for blanket approval of every claim, and the immediate cessation of policy cancellations, as insurers will recognize that bottom-lines are directly proportional to the total value of benefits paid.  Health insurance companies are now likely to prioritize high-risk policy applicants with pre-existing conditions, and to treasure policies belonging to beneficiaries who succumb to catastrophic illness.

Further regulation of the health insurance industry is likely not necessary, with the lone caveat that it may one day come to pass that we need to constrain health insurance companies from paying out more than is reasonable, in an effort to boost profits.

Oversight might be achieved by requiring every licensed health insurance company to submit an independent audit to its governing state Insurance Commissioner, detailing the total amount of benefits paid out, and comparing the statutory allowance made for overhead and profit to the actual retained premium revenue after payment of all claim benefits.  The Commissioner might then file a summary report to the Secretary of HHS on November 1st, who shall present to the President’s Office of Management and Budget an Affordable Care Act Cost Report.

As an added benefit, the OMB could then determine from summary report data, the total number of households projected to be eligible for the EITC, and thereby health insurance benefits, as well as the total monetary value of the health care sector of GDP, to determine the Universal Family Health Insurance Premium most likely to balance the books for the coming calendar year.

In keeping with the public utility synesthetic model outlined above, it might be recommended that health insurance company profits be classified as tax-free, as should shareholder dividends, in order to keep profit-margins at their absolute minimum.

Hospital costs are already contained quite well by Blue Cross plans in every state, as every facility-based provider must file an annual cost report upon which hospital rates are based.  While oversight of hospital rates might fall to each state’s Health Department, the system has functioned adequately for more than fifty-years.

The Benefits

As for the economics of this elegantly simple plan, the benefits include massive federal deficit cuts in the first year, the creation of millions of new middle-class jobs in the health care sector, and increased competitiveness of American labor in every sector.

One obvious major benefit is the elimination of further need of Medicare or Medicaid.  Total Medicare spending reached $599 billion in 2008, and amounted to 20% of all federal spending.  In the first year of implementation, the federal budget would be reduced by more than $600 Billion.  And while the Medicaid program is less costly at the Federal level, it represents an additional $204 Billion in federal outlay.  Perhaps more importantly, the states provide approximately equal funding of the program, which has resulted in nearly bankrupting them all.  Without the burden of Medicaid, every state’s budget will balance, allowing them to reinstate recent cuts in citizen services once more.

Because the plan provides for zero-deductible, zero-copayment, and the relative prestige of commercial insurance policies over socialized federal programs, the out-of-pocket benefits are likely to gain immediate popular support among the public.

To quote Wikipedia, “The present value of unfunded obligations under all parts of Medicare during FY 2009 over an infinite horizon is approximately $36 trillion.”  Such a massive deficit reduction alone is likely to afford broad-based appeal to a new wave of political conservatives in the United States.

Broad-based, cross-sector economic stimulus will likely result from allowing health insurance companies to fund premiums from private sector funds that Wall Street is now sitting on, “waiting for a quality investment”.  This year’s health care sector of GDP is likely to total $2.5 Trillion, including dental, mental health, and virtually anything and everything remotely related to health care, prevention and maintenance.  Those funds would appear on the industry’s Balance Sheet on January of Year One.  The federal government would have until July of Year Two, to balance the books and reconcile the EITC’s, allowing a full 18-months for funds to funnel into the sector.

The health care sector currently represents 17.6% of GDP.  It has been estimated that it will expand to 23% or more, in the first year alone, were we to achieve universal access for all American families.  This increase represents an $800 Billion expansion.

The American Hospital Association states that 52.5% of hospital budgets nationwide, is spent directly on the cost of labor… health care workers.  Of the projected $800 Billion expansion of the sector, health care labor costs must, by definition, represent $420 Billion.  Using $60K as the average annual wages and salary earned by a “middle-class” worker, the expansion is projected to create 7-Million new middle-class jobs in the first year alone.

As 7-million new health care workers spend revenue into local economies, the increase in household consumer demand will generate a multiplier-effect, contributing substantively to broader growth throughout the general economy.

Of perhaps greatest importance to the American business community, and certainly to the US Chamber of Commerce, is the lifting of the burden of providing health insurance benefits to employees from America’s employers.  As an immediate result, the competitiveness of American labor will increase sharply.  In light of increasing consumer demand from the health care sector alone, we may perhaps witness a reduction in our long-term 23% unemployment rate.

Projected Sources of Support

Wall Street, the investment community… will likely participate in what will amount to a government-backed, 18-month instrument that will carry an interest rate set at the 18-month Treasury Bill yield, plus one-quarter percent.  The aggregate face-value will equal the entire total of benefits paid, essentially the health care sector of GDP, currently estimated at $2.5 Trillion, and expected to expand to $3.3 Trillion with universal access.

America’s Health Insurance Plans… the health insurance industry will likely participate fully, being granted what amounts to an industry “franchise”, affording 100% market penetration, at a profit-margin to be determined.  With the recognition that the industry will serve as intermediary for the entire health care sector of GDP, perhaps a tax-free 5% of that total, representing corporate profit after overhead and allowed expenses might be an appropriate place to start.  It is apparent that the number of personnel handling the claims process can be held to a minimum, as there will be no issuance of denials, nor determinations of appropriate reimbursement amounts on any give claim, as the current cost-report format that works for Blue Cross and Blue Shield will serve the balance of the  industry equally well.

The American Medical Association’s, and the American Hospital Association’s  memberships… will likely find 100% commercial health insurance reimbursement for every patient refreshing, and are likely to participate enthusiastically.

The US Chamber of Commerce… its membership comprises the bulk of America’s employers.  As the burden of providing health insurance benefits to workers has been lifted completely, it is likely that American business will participate enthusiastically.

The estimated 36 million unemployed Americans… expansion of the health care sector of GDP promises to create on the order of 7 million new, long-term jobs, and to provide the stimulus to consumer household demand necessary to generate production increases and renewed hiring across all sectors of the US economy.

The Tea Party conservative movement… The sudden deletion of $36 Trillion from the long-term deficit, and the elimination of $800 Billion from the federal budget in the first year of implementation, amount to the kind of spending and deficit cuts that the conservative movement has been demanding.

The American electorate… the first key step in leveling the playing-field for every American family, and its children will be in place.  Every man, woman, and child in America will be able to access the best care in the world, as full participants in the American Health Care System.  Rather than lower the quality of health care in America to the lowest common denominator, in a government-mediated socialized framework, the plan elevates the level of quality for all Americans, to what only the wealthiest of Americans now enjoy…

In the end, while the achievement of social goals through capitalistic means is decidedly outside the box, creative innovation has been an American tradition throughout this nation’s history.

A Progressive Higher Education Agenda

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While the American Progressive health care reform agenda must necessarily command our attention as the most pressing to every American family, we recognize the need to develop a parallel agenda for the reform of the American higher-education model, consistent with the principles and mandates of the progressive components of the health care reform agenda…

When the Nation has recognized the elegant simplicity, and comprehensive effectiveness of incorporating the American Progressive health care delivery model into the fabric of American society, the potential for the successful application of the components of that model into a synesthetic restructuring of America’s higher-education delivery model will be all too apparent…

Specifically, it shall become universally obvious that, as the right to quality health care for all US citizens is an inalienable one, so is the right to attain the highest level of secondary and post-secondary education within one’s capabilities, an inalienable one.

As such, it shall become abundantly clear that, while the cost of health care insurance premiums, for the purpose of providing full and comprehensive health care benefits to himself and all dependents, shall and must constitute a primary and mandatory deduction for each and every tax-filer’s tax bill in every tax-year, the cost of tuition, room and/or board, incurred in the pursuit of any level of secondary or post-secondary education, by himself and all dependents, regardless of the field of endeavor, shall and must constitute a first-secondary and mandatory deduction for each and every tax-filer’s tax bill in every tax year.

The outcomes anticipated from this application of progressive principles to expand to universal, American citizens’ access to higher-education, and thereby the education sector of GDP, is similar to those realized by the application of progressive principles to the health care sector of GDP.

To wit, we will experience significant growth in demand for services, leading to an expansion of facilities and faculties, as well as the creation of new programs, new universities and colleges, and new private secondary schools.  The result will be, in addition to a general elevation of teacher salaries throughout the US, the creation of millions of new middle-class teaching jobs, text- and other book publishing jobs, construction jobs both in facility and student-housing projects.

As the perceived cost of health care reform was by and large offset by economic gains produced in the conversion of our economy from a post-manufacturing, largely unemployed labor-base, to a vibrant, fully-employed service-oriented labor-base… so shall the cost of increased access to higher-education be offset by substantial increases in middle-class salary-and-benefits packages.  Moreover, the added bonus to society of across-the-board increases in lifetime income-levels for all Americans, contributing substantively to the federal income tax rolls over those lifetimes as well.

For expenses incurred in the pursuit of education, at any level, is NEVER a cost… it is ALWAYS an investment.

A Progressive Legal Services Agenda

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As universal access to health care is achieved through implementation of private-sector assets to the benefit of American society, followed by universal access to higher-education for all Americans, achieved through similar methodologies, it shall become abundantly clear that one more area of American society remains elusive to American tax-filers with limited financial resources, resulting in a tragically slanted, unbalanced “playing-field” for America’s poor…

For it is a sad reality that in the United States of America, depth of pocket is the primary determinant of successful navigation of our law enforcement, and our criminal and civil judicial systems.  As the federal income tax credit provided logistical support of universal access to health care and education, so shall the federal income tax credit provide logistical support for what We, the People of the United States of America shall add to the list of inalienable rights of all American citizens… the right to equal access to quality legal services, regardless of the cost, and regardless of the cause, be it criminal or civil, in any jursidiction in the United States.

Interestingly, we feel that this agenda item has the least likelihood of opposition by any legislative body, at any level, as universal access to legal services presents an obvious boon to the legal profession, creating an overnight, significant increase in the demand for the services of licensed legal professionals.  And, frankly, we’re OK with that…

A Brief Foray into US Federal Income Tax Reform

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We, the People of the United States of America recognize the complexity of the federal income tax code, as it applies both to individuals and families, and to corporations and other business entities.

As American Progressives, we recognize the need for every American to have equal treatment under the law, including federal tax law.  We also recognize that there are several approaches to the same measure of equality…

While the conversion of our current model to a flat-tax model will accomplish such equality, by simplifying the code to the point a child can understand it, we also recognize that this would effectively add the nation’s 370,000 CPA’s, not to mention their staffs, estimated at perhaps five-times that figure, for a total of 2,220,000 middle-class jobs with benefits, to the ranks of the nation’s unemployed.  For this reason, we do not support conversion of the system to a flat-tax.

Instead, flushed with success in the federal tax-credit principle’s having successfully provided all Americans with equal access to health care, education, and legal services, We, as American Progressives would propose another tax-credit, to cover the cost of the services of an accounting professional, with much the same results.

Additionally, we recognize the need for us as a Great Nation to stimulate the creation of manufacturing jobs here in the US.  We recognize that companies that procure raw materials and manufactured components from American companies, and that manufacture products it sells to markets in the US and around the globe, are displaying Heroic Patriotism, and should be rewarded for their commitment to society.

We also recognize that corporate taxes on profits, pre-distribution to its shareholders, who already pay taxes on post-distribution profits in the form of dividends, lead to thin profit-margins, and the incentive to cut costs wherever possible… leading to outsourcing of critical US jobs.

We recommend a graduated corporate income-tax-credit schedule, based on the percentage of manufacturing costs a company spends in the US.  If a company spends 100% of its manufacturing budget in the United States, it’s tax bill will be reduced by 50%.  If a company spends acquires 100% of the raw materials and manufactured components it uses in its manufacturing operations, as well, it will pay NO federal income tax, as a reward for its 100% Made in America policy decision.

Rather than encourage US-based manufacturing operations through the application of protective tariffs, which have been clearly demonstrated are counter-productive to a healthy, vibrant and growing economy, the elimination of corporate taxes will lead to lower consumer pricing, and more successful, more profitable companies and a decrease in national unemployment.

A Progressive Drug Policy Agenda

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We, the People of the United States of America recognize that the very foundation of the Progressive Agenda lies in our ability as a society to find common cause in every American Family.  It is the duty of every American to “be his brother’s keeper”, to protect the rights of our neighbors as well as our own, to keep them safe and secure, so that they might too achieve the basic goals towards which we all strive.

The War on Drugs represents the worst of the worst of what went wrong in America during what will one-day be called the Great Oppression under the rise of the Corporate Oligarchy… The profit-driven interests of the pharmaceutical, brewers’ and distillers’ industries are the most obvious participants in the conspiracy that spawned this War effort.  The law enforcement and corrections communities that exploded in size during the campaign, providing millions of new jobs at the expense of the oppressed, were complicit in prolonging the War, despite a growing body of evidence that our government’s policy of prosecuting drug users was wholly ineffective in achieving the War’s original goals of reducing consumption in the US.

In the shadows, the banking industry generated millions in profits laundering Mexican cartel drug-money.  Yet deeper in the shadows, American public opinion was manipulated by elements of the mainstream media, itself manipulated by Rupert Murdoch and others, on behalf of an ultra-conservative agenda.  Nightly stories on the evening news depicted a rising tide of street crime, escaping from inner-city ghettos and into White America, frightening the American public into accepting an escalating Tough on Crime political agenda, the precursor to the War itself.  We find an underlying motivation in the disenfranchisement of women, black and Hispanic Americans…

“In The New Jim Crow, Michelle Alexander contends that the U.S. incarceration system works to bar black men from voting. She writes ‘there are more African Americans under correctional control — in prison or jail, on probation or parole — than were enslaved in 1850, a decade before the Civil War began.’”

We recognize also that the 40,000 murders that have been committed in Mexico since President Felipe Calderón implemented our War on Drugs agenda in his country, are directly attributable to the prohibition of street drugs in the United States.  One need only look to our own history of alcohol prohibition in Chicago, or Harlem, where the inevitable creation of a black market gave rise to bootlegging, a cutthroat and highly competitive endeavor, to understand this direct correlation.  We recognize also that the repeal of alcohol prohibition in America put an end to the gangland violence that took so many innocent lives in our own country, as the repeal of drug prohibition will put an end to cartel violence in Mexico.

We hereby condemn the American War on Drugs, and its constituent politically-motivated drug laws, at-length demonstrated to be wholly ineffective in achieving its original goals and intent, and moreover clearly calculated to target non-conservative, non-WASP electoral groups, with far-reaching consequences of racially- and gender-targeted disenfranchisement, and disconnection not only from the electoral process, but generally from American society and the inalienable right of every citizen to full and equal participation in the American Dream.

We thereby, as American Progressives propose the decriminalization of use and possession of the entire Federal Controlled Substances Schedule, effective immediately, with the clear understanding that without the black market profit incentive, organized criminal involvement in supply-chain infrastructure will soon cease to exist without further intervention.

We recognize also that substance abuse and addictive behaviors are treatable medical conditions, rather than criminal activities, and further propose to allow the US health care delivery infrastructure brought about by implementation of the Progressive Health Care Agenda to provide rehabilitation and treatment of substance-abuse issues as they are identified, on an individual basis.

A Progressive Immigration Policy Agenda

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We, the People of the United States of America recognize that our nation from its very beginnings, our nation has been one of cultural and ethnic diversity. Throughout its history, the United States has embraced wave after wave of immigrants from every corner of the globe.  At the gateway to New York Harbor, the principal entry-point for millions of hopeful families dreaming of a better life for their children, stands the Statue of Liberty, with the American mantra engraved at its base…

“Give me your tired, your poor… your huddled masses yearning to breathe free… the wretched refuse of your teeming shore.  Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me!  I lift my lamp beside the Golden Door…”

As each generation of immigrants arrived in this Golden Land of Opportunity, it was met by resistance from those who had arrived earlier.  Violence and xenophobia have accompanied this process from the beginning.  As each cultural group integrated into American society, through hard work, education, and a commitment that each generation’s children would have a better life than the one before it, it took its rightful place alongside the rest in the Great Melting Pot.

Many waves of immigrants had the misfortune to come to America in times of economic hardship, and high rates of unemployment.  Feelings of displacement on the part of America’s unemployed workforce, and the perception that the influx of immigration was at least, in part, the cause of all their troubles, gave rise to the predictable racial profiling, mistrust and hatred by those hard-pressed to take personal responsibility for their own economic distress.

For the last two decades, the American manufacturing and industrial base has been eroding, for reasons that are perhaps best discussed in other forums, leading to economic uncertainty and high unemployment rates.  It is understandable that those unfortunate Americans in the ranks of the unemployed, in the throes of despair amid fears of homelessness and starvation for themselves and their families, should perceive any increase in the American workforce as direct threats to their very survival, and harbor resentment to whole cultural groups seen as potential competition for any available job.

Because of our immediate proximity to Mexico, the length of our common border, and the long-standing lack of opportunities for upward economic mobility among the vast majority of Mexican citizens, the lure of a better life for one’s children in the United States has been irresistible for many generations.  As of 2009 there were 31.7 million Mexican American citizens in the US, accounting for 10.3% of our total population.  In addition, as of 2008 there were approximately 7,000,000 undocumented Mexicans living in the United States which if included in the count would increase the US share to over 28% of the world’s Mexican origin population, surpassing Mexico itself with only 22%.

Many Americans believe that illegal immigrants choose to enter the country illegally simply to avoid the legal process, or perhaps to avoid registration and paying taxes in this country.  Those Americans often state that Mexican nationals should simply wait their turn, under the rules of the Diversity Immigrant Visa Program (aka, the Immigration Lottery), or make use of the many available options for legal immigration into the United States.

Mexican nationals are not eligible to participate in the Diversity Immigrant Visa Program for 2012 (DV-2012), nor were they eligible under DV-2011.  Mexican nationals have only three available options to attain permanent resident status in the US.  Two of those options require substantial investments in US companies: $500,000 if the company is located in an approved EB-5 zone, or $1 Million in a company of the applicant’s choosing, outside an EB-5 zone.  The third option requires “Exceptional Ability”, as evidenced by international acclaim in some field of endeavor, i.e., a sports superstar.

A “high-level immigration official” estinmates that it costs $12,500 to arrest, detain and deport each person removed from the U.S.  The Pew Hispanic Center reports that 2007 median household income of unauthorized immigrant workers was $36,000.

It is currently estimated that 11.2 million undocumented foreign nationals are working in the United States.  As American Progressives, we recognize the political potential of this incredibly large bloc of votes.  We recognize that an effective strategy to integrate 11.2 million new, and grateful voters into the mainstream would represent a powerful collective voice, indeed.  We also recognize the potential for gaining the collateral support of America’s Latino community (and perhaps the Asian community as well) as a whole, should such an integration strategy result in citizenship for 11.2 million undocumented foreign nationals.

Many undocumented workers send nearly all money earned in the US home to Mexico, perhaps as much as $30,000 of that estimated average household income, as their families must remain behind because of the dangers of concentration-camp detention, inherent in living “under the radar”.  We support families joining their workers here in the US, as it would result in a significant amount of household income spent here into the US economy, rather than in their country of origin.  Were this to occur, more than $200 Billion currently leaving the country might be spent here instead, contributing substantively to growth of the American economy.

Were America to deport 11.2 million undocumented foreign nationals, the estimated cost would be $140 Billion.  We oppose routine deportation of undocumented workers.  On the contrary, we propose a restructuring of US immigration policy, to eliminate “being in the United States without documentation” as cause for deportation.  We propose to limit deportation to cases in which an undocumented foreign national has been convicted of a felony crime in the US.

We propose a 90-day moratorium on prosecution of undocumented foreign nationals currently in the United States, and the placement of a work-visa desk in every Passport Office for the purpose of processing work-visa applications.

We propose that restructuring also include the establishment of work-visa sections in all US diplomatic and consular locations throughout Latin America, with the intent to provide work-visas to any and all foreign nationals who wish to emigrate to the United States to work.

We propose to amend US minimum wage laws such that they would apply only to US citizens, thereby allowing employers of work-visa workers to continue to pay at current wage levels, without penalty.

Employers would be held responsible to register all foreign national workers, and to withhold federal taxes and every tax-filer’s health insurance tax credit withholding, in a timely manner.  Employers would be required to relinquish any work-visa job to any US citizen who makes application for that position, and is willing to accept the current rate of pay.  Employers would be responsible for withholding federal income tax, with no exemptions or deduction allowances, another benefit reserved for US citizens only.  At the national average income level, 11.2 million workers would contribute approximately $22.5 Billion annually in federal income taxes.

US federal income tax returns must be filed by all foreign nationals working under such visas in the United States, under penalty of a 100% increase in withholding until delinquent returns are filed.  Citizenship may be challenged by examination, available to most language speakers in their native tongue, after five consecutive years tax-returns filed by a foreign national applicant, or three consecutive returns by any couple filing jointly.

We would encourage foreign nationals working under work-visas in America to pursue full citizenship, in order to be afforded the many benefits of the US Citizenship Track… attainable by any foreign national who wants to pitch in on very big team effort.

A Progressive Agenda for the US Military

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“The military budget is that portion of the United States discretionary federal budget that is allocated to the Department of Defense, or more broadly, the portion of the budget that goes to any defense-related expenditures. This military budget pays the salaries, training, and health care of uniformed and civilian personnel, maintains arms, equipment and facilities, funds operations, and develops and buys new equipment. The budget funds all branches of the U.S. military: Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps and Coast Guard.

“For the 2010 fiscal year, the Department of Defense’s budget signed into law on October 28, 2009, was $680 billion.  An additional $37 billion supplemental bill to support the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan brought the total 2010 budget to $717 Billion.”

It is recognized that the US Defense budget is the single largest expenditure of US tax revenues…

From Foreign Policy in Focus, we read, in regards to the number of foreign US military bases currently exist:

“Officially the Pentagon counts 865 base sites, but this notoriously unreliable number omits all our bases in Iraq (likely over 100) and Afghanistan (80 and counting), among many other well-known and secretive bases. More than half a century after World War II and the Korean War, we still have 268 bases in Germany, 124 in Japan, and 87 in South Korea. Others are scattered around the globe in places like Aruba and Australia, Bulgaria and Bahrain, Colombia and Greece, Djibouti, Egypt, Kuwait, Qatar, Romania, Singapore, and of course, Guantánamo Bay, Cuba — just to name a few. Among the installations considered critical to our national security are a ski center in the Bavarian Alps, resorts in Seoul and Tokyo, and 234 golf courses the Pentagon runs worldwide.

“Unlike domestic bases, which set off local alarms when threatened by closure, our collection of overseas bases is particularly galling because almost all our taxpayer money leaves the United States (much goes to enriching private base contractors like corruption-plagued former Halliburton subsidiary KBR). One part of the massive Ramstein airbase near Landstuhl, Germany, has an estimated value of $3.3 billion. Just think how local communities could use that kind of money to make investments in schools, hospitals, jobs, and infrastructure.

“Even the Bush administration saw the wastefulness of our overseas basing network. In 2004, then-Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld announced plans to close more than one-third of the nation’s overseas installations, moving 70,000 troops and 100,000 family members and civilians back to the United States. National Security Adviser Jim Jones, then commander of U.S. forces in Europe, called for closing 20% of our bases in Europe.  According to Rumsfeld’s estimates, we could save at least $12 billion by closing 200 to 300 bases alone. While the closures were derailed by claims that closing bases could cost us in the short term, even if this is true, it’s no reason to continue our profligate ways in the longer term.”

In defense of Defense, We, the People of the United States of America also recognize that the ridiculous amount of tax money spent on redundant and/or unneeded weapons systems, and the rife and rampant fraud and corruption perpetrated by unscrupulous and unpatriotic, if not downright treasonous military contractors, all notwithstanding, the Department of Defense budget also employs 3,218,542 Americans in various capacities, the bulk of which represent middle-class jobs with benefits packages.

We find that in these trying economic times, the need to curtail the overseas activities of the United States military, and indeed the Department of Defense.  We support earlier efforts to move foreign-based personnel back onto American soil, the expansion of existing military bases on American soil, and the creation of new military bases to absorb military personnel so relocated.

This commitment must necessarily entail the immediate and complete cessation of US military involvement in any and all conflicts at any location outside the confines of the United States of America, unless US military support has been specifically requested by a democratically-elected sovereign.

In addition, the US Intelligence community must immediately and completely cease operations at any location outside the confines of the United States of America, unless US intelligence support has been specifically requested by a democratically-elected sovereign.

Finally, as American Progressives we recognize that current personnel numbers may exceed the domestic needs of the Department of Defense, and hereby commit to undertake the retraining, and/or integration into the private sector, any an all Defense Department personnel as the Department might find redundant.

Proof Obama will sign NDAA 1031 Citizen Imprisonment Law in a few days…

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December 18, 2011

A video bearing the above title was posted on YouTube months ago, when the Senate version of the “NDAA for FY2012″ was being debated on the floor, having recently come out of committee.  The video quality was excellent, and featured Senator Carl Levin, D-Michigan and chairman of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, detailing the short history of the uber-controversial “US citizen detention provision” that was initially removed, and later re-inserted into the bill at the insistence of the White House.

I took the liberty of… well, “liberating” it before it was removed just yesterday from YouTube in what can only be described as a “precipitous manner”, ostensibly by its author only one-day after the House passed H.R. 1540 (the NDAA bill’s official title in its final incarnation) and it was sent to the White House for signature.  You conspiracy theorists out there can draw your own conclusions regarding the seeming coincidence…

Regardless, I offer it for your consideration here…

 

January 1, 2012

By way of update… yesterday, on New Year’s Eve, President Obama did indeed sign H.R. 1540, while issuing an accompanying signing statement addressing his reservations in doing so.  While the ACLU’s attorneys insist that the legislative language is vague enough to allow the indefinite detention of US citizens by the military, under a claim as nebulous as constituting a “terrorist threat”, there are conflicting reports from other sources.

This from Mother Jones, a source I normally trust for accuracy and truth in reporting…

“So what exactly does the bill do? It says that the president has to hold a foreign Al Qaeda suspect captured on US soil in military detention—except it leaves enough procedural loopholes that someone like convicted underwear bomber and Nigerian citizen Umar Abdulmutallab could actually go from capture to trial without ever being held by the military. It does not, contrary to what many media outlets have reported, authorize the president to indefinitely detain without trial an American citizen suspected of terrorism who is captured in the US.”

In general, I tend to prefer raw data to Anyone’s interpretation of Anything, including legislative language contained in a bill, and especially a bill as controversial as this one.  For those like-minded readers, I offer this link to the complete text of H.R. 1540, the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012, with encouragement to consider the language, and decide for yourself.

 

Progressive Criminal Corrections Reform

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We, the People of the United States of America, through our law enforcement communities, our court system, and our criminal corrections system are party to one of the great social embarrassments in the history of humanity.

“The United States of American has an incarceration rate of 743 per 100,000 of national population (as of 2009), the highest in the world.  In comparison, Russia, post Soviet-Union, has the second highest 577 per 100,000.  Canada’s rate is 117 per 100,000, and China’s 120 per 100,000.  While Americans only represent about 5 percent of the world’s population, one-quarter of the entire world’s inmates are incarcerated in the United States.

“According to a US Department of Justice report published in 2006, over 7.2 million people were at that time in prison, on probation, or on parole.  That means that roughly 1 in every 32 Americans are held by the criminal corrections industry, on behalf of the criminal justice system.  According to the International Centre for Prison Studies (ICPS) at King’s College, London, of that 7.2 million, 2.3 million are in prison. The People’s Republic of China comes in second place with 1.6 million, despite its population being over four-times that of the United States.

“The United States imprisons more of its racial minorities than any other country in the world. In Washington D.C., three out of every four young black men are expected to serve some time in prison. In major cities across the country, 80% of young African Americans now have criminal records.

“As the War on Drugs proceeds, more and more people are being convicted for nonviolent offenses. When looking at female rates, by 2003, 58% of all women in federal prison were convicted of drug offenses. Women of color are disproportionately affected by the War on Drugs. African American women’s incarceration rates for all crimes, largely driven by drug convictions, have increased by 800% since 1986, compared to an increase of 400% for women of other races.  Convictions have also widened to include women who are not only directly involved in the drug trade but those who are indirectly involved either through their spouses, families, or communities.

“As of 2006, 49.3% of state prisoners, or 656,000 individuals, were incarcerated for non-violent drug offenses. As of 2008, 90.7% of federal prisoners, or 165,457 individuals, were incarcerated for non-violent drug offenses. Drug offenses account for two-thirds of the federal inmate population; approximately 500,000 people are in prison for a drug offense today compared to 40,000 in 1981—an increase of 1,100 percent.”

“In The New Jim Crow , Michelle Alexander contends that the U.S. incarceration system works to bar black men from voting. She writes ‘there are more African Americans under correctional control — in prison or jail, on probation or parole — than were enslaved in 1850, a decade before the Civil War began.’”

We, the People of the Unites States of America, do hereby condemn politically-motivated drug laws, at-length demonstrated to be wholly ineffective in achieving their original goals and intent, and moreover clearly calculated to target non-conservative, non-WASP electoral groups, with consequences of racially- and gender-targeted disenfranchisement, and disconnection not only from the electoral process, but generally from American society and the inalienable right of every citizen to full and equal participation in the American Dream. We thereby, as American Progressives do hereby commit our efforts to the decriminalization of use and possession of the entire Federal Controlled Substances Schedule.

As for the thousands of non-drug offenders currently incarcerated at any level, it is recognized that the commission of a crime for the purpose of financial gain, has its roots in an essential socio-economic inequality in America.  As such, We, as American Progressives, propose that sentencing guidelines be amended such that mandatory first-offense sentencing be restricted to pursue and complete a program of higher-education, and any such remedial programs as may be necessary to the successful completion of such a sentence.  We in addition, propose that sentencing guidelines be amended such taht mandatory repeat-offense sentencing be restricted to a full and complete psychiatric in-patient evaluation and treatment, prior to release to mandatory first-offense sentencing execution.  Finally, We propose that sentencing guidelines for violent, and/or sexual offenses be restricted to mandatory in-patient psychiatric evaluation and treatment, with release criteria to be determined by a qualified panel of psychiatric medical professionals.  Under no circumstances shall any US citizen be incarcerated within any correctional facility in the United States of American, as such treatment by any law enforcement agency or judicial jurisdiction shall henceforth be considered ‘cruel and unusual punishment’, and thereby un-Constitutional.