Platform for a New Political Party for the General Prosperity

Even liberal pundits now seem disappointed with President  Obama:

(Maureen Dowd -" Withholder- in chief"rhttp://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/10/opinion/withholder-in-chief.html?_r=1&ref=opinion), Drew Westen - "What Happened to Obama?"
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/07/opinion/sunday/what-happened-to-obamas-passion.html?scp=1&sq=what%20happened%20to%20Obama&st=Search

Given that the democratic party under the leadership has abandoned its New Deal legacy and collaborated with the republicans and conservatives, to continue the move toward rule by the wealthy, it is time for a third party effort.

Traditionally third parties do not win.  However, the lesson of the Ross Perot candidacy in 1992 can not be ignored. Perot ran on the issue of that era's deficit.  He changed the calculus of the election and shortly after Clinton's election the deficit was addressed, successfully.  It must be noted that as soon as the budget was passed the stock market took off and we headed into a recovery and expansion that resulted in budget surplus.

A platform for a third party.

1. Government on all levels must do all it can to stimulate economic growth.  This means stimulating consumer demand.  It is only demand that stimulates employment.  It does not matter how much cash companies have on hand.  They will not and should not hire workers to do nothing. No matter many service cuts are made and how much taxes might be raised, it is only economic growth that will achieve lowered deficits and national debt.  It is only economic growth that will create full employment. 

2. Stimulating consumer demand requires people have cash to spend.  Ways this can be achieved are:

• continuing unemployment compensation until unemployment falls back to normal levels.
• continuing the benefits of the social safety net
• After demand rises, targeted tax breaks for businesses that invest in expansion both by hiring and equipment and plant.
• completion of critical infrastructure projects
• continue to support education at the highest levels possible

3. Raise taxes back to the levels at the end of the Clinton administration.  This includes not only the wealthy, but the middle class as well.  We are going to need increased revenues to fund the growth initiatives.  It is of no use to isolate the wealthy.

4. End our involvement in wars of choice in Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya as soon as possible without adding to chaos.  The era of American use of power continuously around the world must end.

5. Create a new foreign policy to deal with international terrorism without having to invade countries to insure our safety. (More detail on this to come)

6. Create a government mechanism to address the runaway cost of health care. In all the discussion of the last three years there has been little effort to deal with rising costs beyond the idea of cutting benefits.  Almost every attempt to add mechanisms to investigate ways to reduce costs was defeated. The present fee for service method cannot be the most efficient way to fund health care.  The present astronomical and still rising cost of drugs is not justified and unsustainable.

This effort is stimulated by two important issues The first is the terrible economic mess that is not addressed by our present government.  The second is that the entire congress and the president have colluded to defy the 14th amendment of the constitution.  In my opinion they have lost their legitimacy. In our system(since the civil war) we do not turn to violence to make change.  The only option is politics. 

Melvyn Polatchek


 

It is Time to Finally Fight Back.

As a senior citizen I lived my whole life I knowing America was far from perfect.  I knew the flag wavers and uber patriots exaggerated the greatness of America to aid in their agendas of acquisition.  But I also knew that unlike most nations our system was designed with the capacity to improve and develop.  I saw with my own eyes the passage of civil rights laws.  I participated in an anti-war movement that was not crushed by rolling tanks and guns as would have happened in so many other nations. I saw a nation begin to protect its water and its atmosphere and recently even the weather.  And I saw health care for the poor, for the elderly and finally an attempt at providing for everyone. Even before I was born there was social security which provided a financial floor for everyone. 

All these were bitterly opposed by the republicans. From the time of the votes on social security they opposed every one of these advances.  The basic republican/conservative philosophy is to allow no imposed sharing.

Now after the so-called compromise on the debt ceiling crisis, the credit rating of the United States of America, my nation, our nation has been lowered.

The United States was not threatened with a downgrade in our credit rating until the republicans created the debt ceiling crisis and the democrats went along.  Our deficits are a real concern but the ratings agencies were not threatening. Downgrade was not on any one's radar.  It can not the have been the amount of debt that stimulated the downgrade. The unconstitutional willingness to call into question the public debt of the United States has caused real fear that congress could actually decide to default and that U.S. Treasury bonds might not be redeemed.
We have a president who still believe he got a compromise.  He is likely to continue on his outreach to republicans.  Where is the American leader who will demand victory over those who created this crisis and are destroying the America I have know my whole life.

We are all in for a tougher struggle.  The elderly will need to work longer, if they can find employment. Our adult children who are already struggling with employment will push on with the knowledge that they will not have even the social benefits their parents enjoyed.

I have always been a proud American.  I would have always defended our homeland.  Now we have been attacked from within.  The only legacy I can leave my children and grandchildren is to fight back.  There is no compromise with an enemy who is on the attack.  And the republicans and the democratic fellow travelers who have attacked my America are now my enemies.

Melvyn Polatchek

The Final Surrender

Some months ago the president caved in to the republican demands to extend the tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans.  Today we are told that the republican and democratic leaders of the senate and house along the president have a plan to avoid default.  This plan includes no revenue enhancement whatever.  It does include some trillions of dollars in cuts in government spending.  We have heard so many plans and speculations, we won't know exactly what will happen for some time.  We will hear different interpretations. The democrats will try to make the cuts sound benign. The republicans will try to make it sound like a blow for freedom.  The tea party activists will tell us it is a betrayal of core conservative principles.  They may even still try to block it.  They have not failed yet.  Whatever it is, it is not a compromise.  The democrats have given away everything.  Defense will be cut in time of war.  The social safety net will be cut.  Even if benefits are not cut directly in the first round(no guarantee) the welfare of those who need medicare, medicaid and social security is compromised. Of course all these cuts mean layoffs in the midst of the jobs recession we are still enduring.  They mean further erosion of the tax base and further loss of consumer spending to drive recovery.

This is more than a surrender.  The democrats, under President Obama did not fight for their core constituency.  There is no more damage that could have been done to America than what the two parties have accomplished in the past three terms of the presidency. 

Melvyn Polatchek

The Coming Financial Tsunami

The Washington Post headline reads"  "CBO: Reid plan saves more than Boehner’s". Now the democrats are actually ahead of the republicans in using cuts in what they call discretionary spending as the only means to limit the deficit.  Discretionary spending means the social safety net, social security, medicaid, medicare.  Chuck Schumer, the "progressive" senator from New York, spoke today about the democratic plan which raises the debt ceiling through 2012 with no increased revenue.

Schumer went on to say that it is a matter of getting the leadership to agree on a plan.  This means he believes no democratic representatives or senators will object.

Everyone who is not independently wealthy is being thrown under the bus.  It is no longer a debate about shared sacrifice. There will be no sharing. It is only a debate about which financial tsunami will wash over us, the U.S default or the rollback of all social programs since the New Deal. Guess which.

Melvyn Polatchek

Response to David Brooks. "The President has faltered"

The president keeps saying that cuts only without revenue will too harshly harm the entitlements we all care about.  The fact is that the republicans don't care about them and never did.  They have always thought the social safety net was a mistake. It has never been about the arithmetic of the deficit. It has always been about that view of America that says everyone takes care of themselves and themselves only and the government should never ask for taxes to assume a social responsibility.  David Brooks defends this view to the end.
He is correct that the president has faltered, but not from any battle with the republicans. Rather he has joined the republicans in offering massive cuts to the social safety net.  The only question for the president and David Brooks is whether there will be some revenue enhancement. And David Brooks only wants it so a deal will be made and he can "think big" and write about it.  And what about Harry Reid, who sounded like a whipped puppy today as he completely surrendered to the republicans, offering trillions of dollars in cuts and no revenue enhancement whatsoever. The republicans are going to cut the social safety net out of their original malice and the democrats are cutting  it out of continuing fecklessness. What is the difference.  For the first time in my life, I am hoping for an independent candidate.  Obviously the fix is in. I suppose we will hear from David Brooks some rationale from Edmund Burke soon enough.

The Great Betrayal

If there is a compromise on the debt ceiling extension, it will be a blow to the social safety net.  We can hope there will at least be a tax increase at the upper end so that the wealthy don't get a free ride, but still there is no doubt that in the face of republican intransigence, the president has put the social safety net on the line.

While the democrats in congress will instinctively oppose this plan because of their long standing support and election promises, in the end they will have little choice but to go along.  Breaking the full faith and credit of the United States will be a worse blow to everyone and especially those depending upon the social safety net.

I believe the president has, under the constitution, the power to borrow to pay any bills upon the government. The 14th Amendment, says that “the validity of the public debt of the United States … shall not be questioned.”  The would need a great deal of political courage to endure the wrath of congress.  Given that he willingly put the social safety net on the table quite a while ago his only concern seems to be how much of a tax increase he can get out of the republicans.  This laudable goal still ends up a betrayal to all who depend upon the social safety net.






 
After this betrayal is in place, the battle of 2012 will shape up not as a struggle to preserve what is left, it will be a struggle to stop further republican predations and further fecklessness by the democrats.

Melvyn Polatchek

If my children, when they are senior citizens do not have adequate health care, what will it matter to them if at one time the U.S. reneged and defaulted on its loans.

For weeks now we have been exposed to political theater.  I say political theater because as Katrina Vanden Heuvel says in the Washington Post. "
President Obama may find that there is only one course left to avoid a global economic calamity: Invoke Section 4 of the 14th Amendment, which says that “the validity of the public debt of the United States … shall not be questioned.” This constitutional option is one that the president alone may exercise.
If the Aug. 2 deadline arrives and no deal has been made, Obama could use a plain reading of that text to conclude — statutory debt ceiling or not — that he is constitutionally required to order the Treasury to continue paying America’s bills. In that sense, this is not just a constitutional option, it is a constitutional obligation, one even the Tea Party will have trouble denying.  http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/invoke-the-14th--and-end-the-debt-standoff/2011/07/01/gHQAUif8yH_story.html
So all the politicans involved know the President has the power to act.  In the meantime for whatever political calculation he is making, he is apparently bargaining hard. He has offered as much as four trillion dollars in cuts, largely from the social safety net. While the republicans are "just saying no" to the slightest tax increases.  The grand bargain that will finally be passed will include massive cuts in government spending and perhaps some small increases on wealthy taxpayers and possibly no tax increases if the President folds completely.

What I want to know is, if my children, when they reach senior citizen status do not have adequate health care, what will it matter to them if at one time the U.S. reneged and defaulted on its loans.

Mel Polatchek