Friends,
The people's candidate in this election (the one not running with the two parties but in opposition to them) is Eric Sundwall. He could really use our help getting on the ballot. He needs about 5,000 - 6,000 signatures of registered voters from our congressional district to satisfy the Board Of Elections. This may also allow corporate media to pay a small amount of attention to him. More voices, more choices, right?
Please contact me at mattfuniciello@earthlink.net and I will send his petition pdf file to you ...
Eric is MY candidate. So, even if you do not intend to vote for him, I know that you value our democracy and that its unlikely that you do not want me (or other independent voters) to have our choice represented. In that vein, I am asking you to do me a favor.
1 - Print out one (or more) of the attached ballot petitions.
2 - Have some of your family and friends take five seconds out of their busy day to apply their pen to the paper for you (as long as they vote in CD 20).
3 - Sign it as a witness and be sure that all information is correct. Remember that the two parties will challenge everything on a petition they can get away with.
3 - Mail the ballot to Eric Sundwall immediately and directly at his address listed in Niverville, NY. The deadline is March 6th so mail it by Tuesday just to be sure.
4 - Rest easy in the knowledge that you have just braced the divide between spectator and participant in our "democratic" process and that I, and Eric, thank you!
If you have any questions at all, please feel free to call me at (518) 361-6278.
Sincerely,
Matt
Showing posts with label congress. Show all posts
Showing posts with label congress. Show all posts
Saturday, February 28, 2009
Thursday, February 5, 2009
Yet Again, Lets Ignore The Plan That Makes Sense
Tax The Speculators by Ralph Nader
Let's start with a fairness point. Why should you pay a 5 to 6 percent sales tax for buying the necessities of life, when tomorrow, some speculator on Wall Street can buy $100 million worth of Exxon derivatives and not pay one penny in sales tax? Let's further add a point of common sense. The basic premise of taxation should be to first tax what society likes the least or dislikes the most, before it taxes honest labor or human needs.
In that way, revenues can be raised at the same time as the taxes discourage those activities which are least valued, such as the most speculative stock market trades, pollution (a carbon tax), gambling, and the addictive industries that sicken or destroy health and amass large costs.
So, your member of Congress, who is grappling these days with gigantic deficits on the backs of your children at the same time as that deep recession and tax cuts reduce revenues and increase torrents of red ink, should be championing such transaction taxes.
Yet apart from a small number of legislators, most notably Congressman Peter Welch (Dem. VT) and Peter DeFazio (Dem. OR), the biggest revenue producer of all - a tax on stock derivative transactions - essentially bets on bets - and other mystifying gambles by casino capitalism - is at best corridor talk on Capitol Hill.
There are differing estimates of how much such Wall Street transaction taxes can raise each year. A transaction tax would, however, certainly raise enough to make the Wall Street crooks and gamblers pay for their own Washington bailout. Lets scan some figures economists put forth.
The most discussed and popular one is a simple sales tax on currency trades across borders. Called the Tobin Tax after its originator, the late James Tobin, a Nobel laureate economist at Yale University, 10 to 25 cents per hundred dollars of the huge amounts of dollars traded each day across bordered would produce from $100 to $300 billion per year.
There are scores of civic, labor, environmental, development, poverty and law groups all over the world pressing for such laws in their countries. (see tobintaxcall.free.fr).
According the University of Massachusetts economist, Robert Pollin, various kinds of securities-trading taxes are on the books in about forty countries, including Japan, the UK and Brazil.
Pollin writes in the current issue of the estimable Boston Review: "A small tax on all financial-market transactions, comparable to a sales tax, would raise the costs on short-term speculative trading while having negligible effect on people who trade infrequently. It would thus discourage speculation and channel funds toward productive investment." He adds that after the 1987 stock market crash, securities-trading taxes "or similar measures" were endorsed by then Senate Minority Leader Bob Dole and even the first President Bush. Professor Pollin estimates that a one-half of one percent tax would raise about $350 billion a year. That seems conservative. The Wall Street Journal once mentioned about $500 trillion in derivatives trades alone in 2008-the most speculative of transactions. A one tenth of one percent tax would raise $500 billion dollars a year, assuming that level of trading.
Economist Dean Baker says a "modest financial transactions tax would be enough to "finance a 10% across-the-board reduction in the income tax on labor.
The stock transaction tax goes back a long way. A version helped fund the Civil War and the imperial Spanish-American War. The famous British economist, John Maynard Keynes, extolled in 1936 a securities transaction tax as having the effect of "mitigating the predominance of speculation over enterprise." The U.S. had some kind of transaction tax from 1914 to 1966.
The corporate history scholar (read his excellent book, Unequal Protection) Thom Hartmann, turned three-hour-a-day talk-show-host on Air America (airamerica.com/thomvision), had discussed the long evolution of what he calls a "securities turnover excise tax" to "tamp down toxic speculation, while encouraging healthy investment."
So, why don't we have such a mega-revenue generator and lighten the income tax load on today and tomorrow's American worker? (It was one of the most popular ideas I campaigned on last year. People got it.) Because American workers need to learn about this proposed tax policy and ram it through Congress. Tell your Senators and Representatives-no ifs, ands or buts. Otherwise, Wall Street will keep rampaging over people's pensions and mutual fund savings, destabilize their jobs and hand them the bailout bill, as is occurring now.
A few minutes spent lobbying members of Congress by millions of Americans (call, write or e-mail, visit or picket) will produce one big Change for the better. Contact your member of Congress. The current financial mess makes this the right time for action.
Ralph Nader is a consumer advocate, lawyer, and author. His most recent book is The Seventeen Traditions.
Let's start with a fairness point. Why should you pay a 5 to 6 percent sales tax for buying the necessities of life, when tomorrow, some speculator on Wall Street can buy $100 million worth of Exxon derivatives and not pay one penny in sales tax? Let's further add a point of common sense. The basic premise of taxation should be to first tax what society likes the least or dislikes the most, before it taxes honest labor or human needs.
In that way, revenues can be raised at the same time as the taxes discourage those activities which are least valued, such as the most speculative stock market trades, pollution (a carbon tax), gambling, and the addictive industries that sicken or destroy health and amass large costs.
So, your member of Congress, who is grappling these days with gigantic deficits on the backs of your children at the same time as that deep recession and tax cuts reduce revenues and increase torrents of red ink, should be championing such transaction taxes.
Yet apart from a small number of legislators, most notably Congressman Peter Welch (Dem. VT) and Peter DeFazio (Dem. OR), the biggest revenue producer of all - a tax on stock derivative transactions - essentially bets on bets - and other mystifying gambles by casino capitalism - is at best corridor talk on Capitol Hill.
There are differing estimates of how much such Wall Street transaction taxes can raise each year. A transaction tax would, however, certainly raise enough to make the Wall Street crooks and gamblers pay for their own Washington bailout. Lets scan some figures economists put forth.
The most discussed and popular one is a simple sales tax on currency trades across borders. Called the Tobin Tax after its originator, the late James Tobin, a Nobel laureate economist at Yale University, 10 to 25 cents per hundred dollars of the huge amounts of dollars traded each day across bordered would produce from $100 to $300 billion per year.
There are scores of civic, labor, environmental, development, poverty and law groups all over the world pressing for such laws in their countries. (see tobintaxcall.free.fr).
According the University of Massachusetts economist, Robert Pollin, various kinds of securities-trading taxes are on the books in about forty countries, including Japan, the UK and Brazil.
Pollin writes in the current issue of the estimable Boston Review: "A small tax on all financial-market transactions, comparable to a sales tax, would raise the costs on short-term speculative trading while having negligible effect on people who trade infrequently. It would thus discourage speculation and channel funds toward productive investment." He adds that after the 1987 stock market crash, securities-trading taxes "or similar measures" were endorsed by then Senate Minority Leader Bob Dole and even the first President Bush. Professor Pollin estimates that a one-half of one percent tax would raise about $350 billion a year. That seems conservative. The Wall Street Journal once mentioned about $500 trillion in derivatives trades alone in 2008-the most speculative of transactions. A one tenth of one percent tax would raise $500 billion dollars a year, assuming that level of trading.
Economist Dean Baker says a "modest financial transactions tax would be enough to "finance a 10% across-the-board reduction in the income tax on labor.
The stock transaction tax goes back a long way. A version helped fund the Civil War and the imperial Spanish-American War. The famous British economist, John Maynard Keynes, extolled in 1936 a securities transaction tax as having the effect of "mitigating the predominance of speculation over enterprise." The U.S. had some kind of transaction tax from 1914 to 1966.
The corporate history scholar (read his excellent book, Unequal Protection) Thom Hartmann, turned three-hour-a-day talk-show-host on Air America (airamerica.com/thomvision), had discussed the long evolution of what he calls a "securities turnover excise tax" to "tamp down toxic speculation, while encouraging healthy investment."
So, why don't we have such a mega-revenue generator and lighten the income tax load on today and tomorrow's American worker? (It was one of the most popular ideas I campaigned on last year. People got it.) Because American workers need to learn about this proposed tax policy and ram it through Congress. Tell your Senators and Representatives-no ifs, ands or buts. Otherwise, Wall Street will keep rampaging over people's pensions and mutual fund savings, destabilize their jobs and hand them the bailout bill, as is occurring now.
A few minutes spent lobbying members of Congress by millions of Americans (call, write or e-mail, visit or picket) will produce one big Change for the better. Contact your member of Congress. The current financial mess makes this the right time for action.
Ralph Nader is a consumer advocate, lawyer, and author. His most recent book is The Seventeen Traditions.
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
Sundwall For Congress
Greetings Fellow Independents and Progressives!
I have great news for all of us engaged in the fight against the two-party corporate system and also for those looking for a way to fight it locally!
Most of you are well aware that I a pretty independently-minded person (politically anyway). As such, I have considered the options carefully in this special election in this congressional district (CD 20) and have decided to support Eric Sundwall, who is the Libertarian candidate. Eric will be in Glens Falls next week to meet with us and formally ask for our support. I hope that you will come out and show him that he's got plenty!
I do not mean this support as a disrespect to my Green friends or compatriots. The Green Party's platform is the one I am in closest agreement with and I am still, very much, a Green. However, much like my support for Ralph Nader, I make decisions on who to support based on which non-corporate candidate seems most able to get on the ballot and mobilize a serious race. I believe that Eric is that candidate in this special election.
Bolstered by his state and national party's support, Eric has announced his intent to run. Even though there are a few issues on which I do not agree with the Libertarians, I know Eric, himself, to be a very good person and I believe that he will be able to raise money and organize a campaign that will collect enough signatures to get on the ballot in this special election. I believe that our commonalities and our desire to shake up the two-party system should trump our minor political differences.
As independents and third party advocates, we are all regularly engaged in the fight for ballot access in New York. Eric understands this fully and has often spoken fo his desire to see a coalition of Libertarians and other alternative parties. He really needs our help and he will be at Rock Hill Cafe next week to talk to us about his goals and to answer any questions you may have about him or his campaign. This will be a great opportunity to hear him speak and to sign up to help him get on the ballot.
Please make time next Wednesday at 7:00 pm to meet Eric at Rock Hill Cafe 19 Exchange Street Glens Falls, NY about a block from from Glens Falls Hospital.
Below is Eric's website and a link to the Post-Star's recent story on his candidacy.
www.sundwall4congress.org
http://www.poststar.com/blogs/?p=16988&cat=#comment-2277150
If you have any questions or comments, please feel free to call me at (518) 361-6278.
I have great news for all of us engaged in the fight against the two-party corporate system and also for those looking for a way to fight it locally!
Most of you are well aware that I a pretty independently-minded person (politically anyway). As such, I have considered the options carefully in this special election in this congressional district (CD 20) and have decided to support Eric Sundwall, who is the Libertarian candidate. Eric will be in Glens Falls next week to meet with us and formally ask for our support. I hope that you will come out and show him that he's got plenty!
I do not mean this support as a disrespect to my Green friends or compatriots. The Green Party's platform is the one I am in closest agreement with and I am still, very much, a Green. However, much like my support for Ralph Nader, I make decisions on who to support based on which non-corporate candidate seems most able to get on the ballot and mobilize a serious race. I believe that Eric is that candidate in this special election.
Bolstered by his state and national party's support, Eric has announced his intent to run. Even though there are a few issues on which I do not agree with the Libertarians, I know Eric, himself, to be a very good person and I believe that he will be able to raise money and organize a campaign that will collect enough signatures to get on the ballot in this special election. I believe that our commonalities and our desire to shake up the two-party system should trump our minor political differences.
As independents and third party advocates, we are all regularly engaged in the fight for ballot access in New York. Eric understands this fully and has often spoken fo his desire to see a coalition of Libertarians and other alternative parties. He really needs our help and he will be at Rock Hill Cafe next week to talk to us about his goals and to answer any questions you may have about him or his campaign. This will be a great opportunity to hear him speak and to sign up to help him get on the ballot.
Please make time next Wednesday at 7:00 pm to meet Eric at Rock Hill Cafe 19 Exchange Street Glens Falls, NY about a block from from Glens Falls Hospital.
Below is Eric's website and a link to the Post-Star's recent story on his candidacy.
www.sundwall4congress.org
http://www.poststar.com/blogs/?p=16988&cat=#comment-2277150
If you have any questions or comments, please feel free to call me at (518) 361-6278.
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