Issues and my positions

The gap between the wealthy and the rest of us continues to grow wider.  The US is engaged in wars and other military actions around the world.  The climate crisis continues to worsen.  The too-big-to-fail banks grow larger.

With these and many more problems, we can find solutions, but it takes acting together for the common good. This is something we can do but we must confront corporate power to make it happen. 

Remember that the issue is not the individual issues but the whole system.  Solutions come from that realization.

No to the TPP and other corporate trade agreements

Since NAFTA, these "Free" Trade Agreements have not served our country.  They are not intended to.  Their purpose is to undermine our democracy (soverignity) and reduce environmental & labor protections.  We have lost good, family wages jobs as manufacturing work has been sent overseas.  Oregon alone has lost over 50,000 jobs due to NAFTA. These agreements have similar affects in the other signatory countries.

Healthcare is a human right

The Affordable Care Act has improved access to health insurance.  But we don't need health insurance. We need universal, affordable access to health care.  I suppose the current Congressional proposals for an improved single payer program to replace the current health "system".  Such a system has been proposed in prior Congresses as HR 676. . 

I support this statement by Physicians For A National Health Program:
"We propose to replace the ACA with a publicly financed National Health Program that would fully cover medical care for all Americans, while lowering costs by eliminating the profit driven private insurance industry with its massive overhead".

End corporate personhood/money is speech

To address Citizens United and other US Supreme Court decisions which have given corporations our human rights, we need a 28th Constitutional amendment.  Such an amendment has been proposed - HJR48, the We The People Amendment.  I would sign on immediately as a co-sponsor.

Additionally, we need an effective system of public funding for candidates running for federal offices.  Therefore, I support passage of Government By the People Act (H.R.20) and the Fair Elections Now Act (S.1538).

See also my responses to
Oregon League of Women Voters questionnaire. 
Click here.

• $15 Federal Minimum Wage
  
• Health Care is a right; make it affordable and universal
• No cuts to social security; expand benefits; apply SS tax to all income
• Amend US Constitution: Corporations are not people; money is not speech
• Amend US Constitution to provide a constitutional right to vote with all votes counted accurately
• End the wars in the Middle East
• Climate crisis: Enact a federal fee & dividend program
• End all private prisons; reform the criminal justice system
• Keep fossil fuels in the ground