Friends-- I'm about to leave the East coast for three months in California, where I'll be campaigning for the green presidential nomination. I'll be most likely out of e-mail contact for the next week or so. Here is the most recent version of my platform. It remains--will always be--a work in progress. I welcome your comments and reactions.
Happy New Year! (I don't accept that millenium stuff) joel
Presidential Platform-
TO OVERCOME THE EMPIRE OF GLOBAL CAPITAL, TO BUILD DEMOCRACY AND ECOLOGICAL PRODUCTION, FOR THE PEOPLE, FOR THE EARTH, FOR THE FUTURE OF OUR CHILDREN, FOR THE CHILDREN OF THE FUTURE . . .
I believe
* In the inherent dignity and worth of all beings; * That humanity is part of nature; * That human society took a wrong turn millennia ago, when the introduction of patriarchy and class set going a regime of domination and empire; * That the present stage of this regime is the global capitalist system;
* That the United States is the cockpit of the world system; * That the present world system is unsustainable as well as unjust, and must be overcome and replaced by one worthy of humanity and nature if we and our children are to have a worthwhile future; * That the greens can play a decisive role in this transformation, as its political agent; * Therefore, that the green program should prefigure an ecological society in harmony with nature.
These principles underlie my presidential campaign. Although we cannot rebuild the world in the here and now, we can point a way to a better world through the address of particular reforms. This approach underlies the formulation of the following planks in my platform:
1. Universal, democratically administered health care as a human right, through abolition of the managed-care HMO system and its replacement by a single-payer, tax-financed structure, with community control and access to alternative healing systems. 2. All-out assault on the causes of global warming, beginning with ratification of the Kyoto Protocols, and extending through a Comprehensive Ecological Transformation Act, to foster the creation of non-polluting technologies grounded in renewable energy sources; also to create and train for new jobs, and a renewal of urban space as the location of these new centers of ecological production. The transition to be financed through carbon taxes (borne by corporate producers); Tobin taxes on transnational capital flows; increase in corporate income taxes and confiscatory taxes on great concentrations of wealth; and revenue diverted from military. 3. Protection from the ecologically devastating effects of global capital: repeal of NAFTA, sharp restrictions on IMF, WTO, World Bank, leading to their replacement by democratically chosen bodies responsive to needs of labor and the environment. Specifically, banning importation of child-labor and sweatshop-produced commodities; immediate moratorium on genetic engineering. 4. Democratic empowerment, through banning soft money and large contributions, providing public funding for qualified candidates; free and equal air-time for all qualified candidates; establishing Proportional Representation. 5. A t least fifty percent cuts in military budget; abolition of the CIA; all-out effort to eliminate nuclear weapons (and power plants); no anti-missile program. 6. Repeal of Clinton's Welfare Act. Replacement with jobs programs (viz. plank # 2), guaranteed income, along with income ceiling so that differential between most and least paid members of society is 4:1; minimum wage of $9/hour, with federal subsidies to small businesses to bear costs; comprehensive community care of mentally ill; massive assault on all causes of homelessness. 7. Empowerment of labor; make replacing striking workers illegal. 8. Full civil rights for "illegal aliens," including enforcment of minimum wage; accelerated citizenship status for all who demonstrate a useful role in society. 9. Democratization of speech. Rewriting of 14th Amendment to deny corporations status as persons; building democratic and community media, funded by a 2% tax on advertisments. 10. Dismantle the Prison-Industrial Complex. Moratorium on new prison construction; funding for comprehensive, degree-granting education for inmates; early-release for non-violent offenders. Abolish the death penalty. 11. Defense of full reproductive rights and full civil rights for sexual minorities, including legalization of gay marriage. 12. Decriminalization of marijuana, with government controlled distribution to eliminate profiteering; legalization of hemp. 13. Support for small-scale ecological activities: tax-breaks for organic agriculture, permaculture; financial incentives for credit unions, community banks, local currencies; encouragement of usufruct, for example, squatters, community gardens on abandoned property.