Category: National
Jackson Tennessee Central Labor Council Supports HR 676
| February 20, 2015 | 8:34 pm | Economy, Health Care, Labor, National, political struggle | Comments closed

 

On January 5, 2015, the Jackson Central Labor Council meeting in regular session “voted unanimously to endorse and support HR 676, the National Single Payer Legislation,” reports Joe Coleman, President of the CLC.  Art Sutherland III, MD, of Physicians for a National Health Program and Terry Hash of PAX Chrisiti in Memphis spoke at an earlier meeting and urged the CLC to endorse this legislation.

The CLC resolution states, “Unions have battled to achieve the highest standards of health care for members and their families, and those gains have lifted up health benefits for all workers, even those who have no union.  All of these achievements are now under constant attack as costs rise and employers seek to shift those costs to workers.”

“HR 676 will save hundreds of billions annually by eliminating the high overhead and profits of the private health insurance industry and by using our purshasing power to rein in the drug companies,” the resolution continues.

“By standing up for all working people and leading the effort to win healthcare for all, we will affirm labor’s rightful role as a leader in the fight for social justice.  Bold action by our unions can rally the nation to pass HR 676,” the resolution concludes.

CLC President Coleman said “The Jackson Central Labor Council is grateful for the dedication and perseverance of all who work tirelessly to forge the support that keeps this vital legislation at the forefront of organized labor,”

Working with Physicians for a National Health Program, Unions for Single Payer will provide speakers to unions and other labor organizations interested in learning more about single payer health care.  Just contact us using the information below.

_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

HR 676 would institute a single payer health care system by expanding a greatly improved Medicare to everyone residing in the U. S.  Patients will choose their own physicians and hospitals.

HR 676 would cover every person for all necessary medical care including prescription drugs, hospital, surgical, outpatient services, primary and preventive care, emergency services, dental (including oral surgery,
periodontics, endodontics), mental health, home health, physical therapy, rehabilitation (including for substance abuse), vision care and correction, hearing services including hearing aids, chiropractic, durable
medical equipment, palliative care, podiatric care, and long term care.

HR 676 ends deductibles and co-payments.  HR 676 would save hundreds of billions annually by eliminating the high overhead and profits of the private health insurance industry and HMOs.

In the current Congress, HR 676 has 47 co-sponsors in addition to Congressman Conyers.

HR 676 has been endorsed by 617 union organizations including 149 Central Labor Councils/Area Labor Federations and 44 state AFL-CIO’s (KY, PA, CT, OH, DE, ND, WA, SC, WY, VT, FL, WI, WV, SD, NC, MO, MN, ME, AR, MD-DC, TX, IA, AZ, TN, OR, GA, OK, KS, CO, IN, AL, CA, AK, MI, MT, NE, NJ, NY, NV, MA, RI, NH, ID & NM).

For further information, a list of union endorsers, or a sample endorsement resolution, contact:

Kay Tillow
All Unions Committee for Single Payer Health Care–HR 676
c/o Nurses Professional Organization (NPO)
1169 Eastern Parkway, Suite 2218
Louisville, KY 40217
(502) 636 1551

Email: nursenpo@aol.com
http://unionsforsinglepayer.org

https://www.facebook.com/unionsforsinglepayer 

02/16/2015

H.R. 676, Single Payer, Reintroduced into Current (114th) Congress
| February 20, 2015 | 8:30 pm | Action, Health Care, National, political struggle | Comments closed

Washington, DC.    On Tuesday, February 3, 2015, Congressman John Conyers, Jr. (D-MI) reintroduced HR 676, his single payer Improved Medicare for All  legislation, in the current 114th session of Congress.  The bill was introduced with 44 co-sponsors in addition to Conyers. 

Calls to congressional offices by supporters of single payer healthcare have already increased the number of co-sponsors to 46.

“Under H.R. 676, every resident of the United States would receive a card at birth that would guarantee access to a full range of medically-necessary services that include primary care, dental, prescription drugs, mental health and long term care,” said Conyers.  The bill assures to all patients free choice of physician or health care provider.

Kay Tillow, coordinator of the All Unions Committee for Single Payer Healthcare HR 676, urged everyone to call their congressperson or email them asking that they sign on as a co-sponsor of HR 676.

You can call the Capitol Switchboard at (202) 224-3121 and ask for your representative by name. If you cannot speak to the representative, leave a message and request a response.

You can look up representatives by zip code here:  http://www.house.gov/representatives/find/ 

A complete list of co-sponsors of HR 676 can be found here. https://www.congress.gov/bill/114th-congress/house-bill/676/cosponsors?q=%7B%22search%22%3A%5B%22HR+676%22%5D%7D  

The Physicians for a National Health Program news release is here.

Doctors group hails reintroduction of Medicare-for-all bill

Single-payer health program would cover all 42 million uninsured, upgrade everyone’s benefits and save $400 billion annually on bureaucracy, physicians say

 

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE, February 4, 2015

 

Contact:
Mark Almberg, PNHP communications director, mark@pnhp.org

 

A national physicians group today hailed the reintroduction of a federal bill that would upgrade the Medicare program and swiftly expand it to cover the entire population.

 

The “Expanded and Improved Medicare for All Act,” H.R. 676, introduced last night by Rep. John Conyers Jr., D-Mich., with 44 other House members, would replace today’s welter of private health insurance companies with a single, streamlined public agency that would pay all medical claims, much like Medicare works for seniors today. The full text of the bill is available here.

 

Proponents say a Medicare-for-all system, also known as a single-payer system, would vastly simplify how the nation pays for care, improve patient health, restore free choice of physician, eliminate copays and deductibles, and yield substantial savings for individuals, families and the national economy.

 

“The global evidence is very clear: single-payer financing systems are the most equitable and cost-effective way to assure that everyone, without exception, gets high-quality care,” said Dr. Robert Zarr, president of Physicians for a National Health Program, a nonprofit research and educational group of 19,000 doctors nationwide.

 

“Medicare is a good model to build on, and what better way to observe Medicare’s 50th anniversary year than to improve and extend the program and its benefits to people of all ages?”

 

Zarr, a Washington, D.C.-based pediatrician, continued: “An expanded and improved Medicare-for-All program would assure truly universal coverage, cover all necessary services, and knock down the growing financial barriers to care – high premiums, co-pays, deductibles and coinsurance – that our nation’s patients and their families are increasingly running up against, often with calamitous results.

 

“Such a plan would save over $400 billion a year currently wasted on private-insurance-related bureaucracy, paperwork and marketing. That’s enough money to provide first-dollar coverage for everyone in the country – without increasing U.S. health spending by a single penny.

 

“Such a program would also have the financial clout to negotiate with drug and medical equipment suppliers for lower prices, and would further save money through lump-sum budgeting for hospitals.

 

“In short,” Zarr said, “the enactment of Rep. Conyers’ bill would take us much further down the road to a humane, just and sustainable health care system than the 2010 health law, which, despite its modest benefits, will not be able to control costs and will still leave 31 million people uninsured in 2024, according to the Congressional Budget Office. Millions more will be inadequately insured, with skimpy coverage.”

 

Zarr pointed out that the Census Bureau reports there were 5.9 million uninsured children in 2013.

 

“Surveys have repeatedly shown that about two-thirds of the public supports a Medicare-for-all approach,” he said, “and recent surveys show physician support is also strong and growing. Hundreds of labor, civic and faith-based organizations have endorsed this model of deep-going reform.

 

“As a doctor who sees the children of hard-pressed parents every day, I can tell you that the need for fundamental health care reform has never been greater,” he said. “It’s time to stop putting the interests of private insurance companies and Big Pharma over patient needs. It’s time to adopt a single-payer, improved-Medicare-for-all program in the United States.”

 

A summary of the basic provisions of H.R. 676 is available here.

 

http://www.pnhp.org/news/2015/february/doctors-group-hails-reintroduction-of-medicare-for-all-bill

Issued by:

Kay Tillow
All Unions Committee for Single Payer Health Care–HR 676
c/o Nurses Professional Organization (NPO)
1169 Eastern Parkway, Suite 2218
Louisville, KY 40217
(502) 636 1551

Email: nursenpo@aol.com 
http://unionsforsinglepayer.org

https://www.facebook.com/unionsforsinglepayer

02/09/2015

Freedom Rider: An Angry White Man Kills Again
| February 20, 2015 | 8:03 pm | Analysis, National, political struggle, Struggle for African American equality, Texas "Open Carry" | Comments closed
http://blackagendareport.com/node/14678
by Margaret Kimberley on Wed, 02/18/2015 – 15:17

Freedom Rider: An Angry White Man Kills Again

by BAR editor and senior columnist Margaret Kimberley

“The stand your ground and open carry laws are a return to the days when white supremacy was openly expressed through conquest of the native population, slavery, and lynch law terror.”

Craig Hicks was a human time bomb [5] in his Chapel Hill, North Carolina neighborhood. He was constantly spoiling for a fight, about noise or parking or anything else that he found irritating. Hicks was always armed, a resident of an “open carry” state which allowed him to wear a holstered gun anywhere at any time. On February 10, 2015, Hicks turned himself in to the police and confessed to murdering three people that day.

The victims were identified as Deah Shaddy Barakat, his wife Yusor Abu-Salha, and her sister Razan Abu-Salha. Hicks had argued with the family about parking spaces but it seems any reason to pull the trigger would have been good enough.

Hicks motive for the killing is murky. Some of his political views could be called liberal and others conservative. But more than anything Hicks was serious about being a white man. He loved his guns and he asserted his right to be armed at all times. It is likely that he had mental health issues, but the sickness did not emerge solely from this particular individual.

Where Hicks fell on the political spectrum is really beside the point. He expressed support for the right to bear arms, marriage equality and abortion rights but more than anything he supported his right to be violent. Because of their passivity everyone around him did as well.

His neighbors are now telling the media about his constant arguments and confrontations while being armed but there are no reports of anyone ever calling the police about his behavior. The Barakats told relatives they feared Hicks but ultimately decided not to call the police either. Hicks’ neighbors discussed their concerns among themselves but took no other action. The complicity led to unintentional enabling and that made the killings inevitable.

“Open carry laws are obviously reserved for white people only.”

The inaction stands in stark contrast to the treatment meted out to black people who are at risk of being killed even when they don’t threaten anyone. North Carolina allows open carry of firearms but so does the state of Ohio. That fact didn’t keep John Crawford or Tamir Rice from being shot down in Dayton and Cleveland respectively. They had toy guns and weren’t a danger to anyone. Yet both of them are now on the long list of black people killed by the police. Open carry laws are obviously reserved for white people only.

It is important to ask if the Hicks murders were a hate crime but there are questions which must be explored and they may be harder to deal with than legal definitions. The most fundamental questions is this. Why are white people seen as benign and their behavior as normative, no matter what they do?

Try to imagine a black man picking fights with his neighbors while armed. Then try to imagine that no one ever calls the police in this hypothetical scenario. In Tampa, Florida a black man named Clarence Daniels [6] was legally carrying a gun when he walked into a Walmart. A white man took it upon himself to confront and assault Daniels. The white assailant was arrested but as a black man Daniels was lucky not to have ended up dead.

Hicks got the kid glove treatment despite the obvious risk he posed to other people. Fealty to whiteness trumps all else including the desire for safety. In 2014 a Nevada rancher named Cliven Bundy [7] sparked a white power movement which threatened the lives of federal marshals. Bundy owed the government thousands of dollars in payment for his cattle grazing on federal land. He didn’t just refuse to pay. He gathered a group of armed followers. Two of them, Jerad and Amanda Miller, went on to kill two police officers [8].

“Fealty to whiteness trumps all else including the desire for safety.”

At least one person knew that the Millers were armed and dangerous. She saw their arsenal of weapons and heard them say they were going to start a revolution. “I should have called the cops,” was the lame admission. That much is obvious but the expression of regret doesn’t explain very much.

The stand your ground and open carry laws are a return to the days when white supremacy was openly expressed through conquest of the native population, slavery, and lynch law terror. Those acts should not be seen as events of long ago history. They became part of this country’s DNA and give angry, unstable white people a pass to do what they want. They aren’t thought of as potential killers or terrorists as they should be. Bystanders aren’t sufficiently concerned because they too give white people the benefit of the doubt even when they don’t deserve it.

Hicks strongly believed in the right to bear arms and had four handguns, two shotguns and six rifles in his home at the time of the killings. No one knows what twisted thoughts finally sparked the violence but the sickness of this country’s history helped him to carry it out. There are thousands of dangerous people like him who call themselves patriots or sovereign citizens or doomsday preppers. But mostly they just believe in being white.

Margaret Kimberley’s Freedom Rider column appears weekly in BAR, and is widely reprinted elsewhere. She maintains a frequently updated blog as well as at http://freedomrider.blogspot.com [9]. Ms. Kimberley lives in New York City, and can be reached via e-Mail at Margaret.Kimberley(at)BlackAgendaReport.com.
Books Instead Of Bombs: Bernie Sanders Proposes Massive College Tuition Cut
| February 19, 2015 | 9:53 pm | Bernie Sanders, National, political struggle | Comments closed
By: Jason Easley

Thursday, February, 19th, 2015
Source: PoliticusUSA
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) tonight a plan to take some of the proposed increases in military spending and spend it on a 55% cut in tuition for students at all public colleges and universities.
Sen Sanders’s will announce his proposal during a town hall at the University of Iowa:
“If the federal government were to invest $18 billion a year, with a dollar-for-dollar match from state governments, we would slash college tuition in the United States by more than half.
Many of my colleagues in Washington would look at that number – $18 billion a year – and tell you that we can’t afford to make that kind of
investment in our nation’s young people. To put it simply, they are wrong.
In the budget proposal President Obama released two weeks ago, he requested $561 billion for the Department of Defense – $38 billion over budget caps that are currently in place.
If we were to reduce the President’s proposed increase in military spending by less than half, and instead invest that money in educational opportunities for today’s college students, we could cut tuition by 55%. So I challenge all of you… ask yourselves, where should our priorities lie?”
The Pentagon doesn’t need all of the proposed increases in military spending. There is a lot of military spending that is nothing more than red state welfare programs disguised as national security.
The country needs lower college tuition costs more than it needs a few billion dollars thrown at the Pentagon. This is a proposal that makes sense, but Republicans will definitely oppose it by claiming that it is too expensive.
The GOP would rather see a nation of college graduates drowning in debt, and the doors of economic opportunity bolted shut before they would consider doing anything to lower the cost of tuition.
Sen. Sanders has a powerful common sense message to offer. The fact that the issue of the cost of higher education is being discussed is serious progress. The Republican motto of you’re on your own isn’t going to cut it.
Exclusive: Interview With Maximilien Sánchez Arveláiz, Venezuelan Ambassador-Designate to the U.S.
| February 19, 2015 | 9:15 pm | Analysis, International, Latin America, National, political struggle, Venezuela | Comments closed

Posted: Updated:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dan-kovalik/exclusive-interview-with-_26_b_6704780.html
Dan Kovalik
Human rights attorney

2015-02-18-Max.jpg
Photo of Maximilien Sánchez Arveláiz (Courtesy of Venezuelan Embassy)

Dan: I was just reading that, even with the economic problems in Venezuela, the government has decided to press forward in fully funding its social programs.

MA: Yes definitely, we want to keep and maintain our social programs, and that is our priority, to take care of Venezuelan families. We already have some progress to show and we want to maintain that. . . . [W]hat’s going on in Venezuela for the last 10 years, and longer, and in the rest of the region, is a bit like The New Deal . . . and to a certain extent the Civil Rights Movement. We are talking about economic, social inclusion and political inclusion. . . .

Dan: And there has been a real decline in poverty and extreme poverty in Venezuela in the last 15 years?

MA: Yes, definitely. Remember when Chavez was elected in 1999, at that time . . . the poverty rate at that time stood around 42-45% and I think right now it has been reduced to 25%. And extreme poverty rate that fell [from 23.4%] to 7% and I think it was last year when the UN Food and Agriculture Organization recognized Venezuela as the leader in Latin America for the eradication of hunger. I think in 2014 again you have this Gini coefficient . . . [t]hat shows again that inequality fell even more in 2014. So, we are moving in the right direction. . . . See, World Bank figures.

Dan: I have recently been reading comparisons between Venezuela now and Chile in 1973, and I wonder if you think that is a fair comparison.

MA: Definitely, you know that wonderful documentary done by Patricio Guzman, The Battle of Chile? Maybe at that time it was in black and white, and now it is in color. But if you see some of the images, some of the sequences on that documentary and you look to Caracas now, you could find some similarities . . . for example, what President Maduro just denounced – the sabotage; the same recipe with the same ingredient. So, right now, they are trying to promote a coup on our economy. For the last two years, we have been facing hording, contraband and many forms of fraud in order to destabilize the distribution of food and obviously create the sensation of chaos and then you have all these pictures of people in long queues waiting to go the market. Again, the same trick. . . . I hope that we will not be able to make a “Battle of Venezuela,” or, if yes, the result in the end would be better.

Dan: Can you talk about the U.S.’s recently-imposed sanctions against Venezuela?

M.A.: In Venezuela, the sanctions could be seen as a green light for certain sectors of the opposition. So we will see what happens. In April, we will have the Summit of the Americas in Panama. So that’s going to be quite interesting to see where we are then. A few days ago at the CELAC (the Community of Latin American and Caribbean states) meeting in Costa Rica, there was a unanimous resolution condemning the unilateral imposition of sanctions by the U.S. upon Venezuela. All of the governments, all of the delegations, that were part of that summit, we are talking about all of the regions of Latin America, condemn it. . . .

Dan: I wonder if you could comment on Noam Chomsky’s statement that Chavez led the historic liberation of Latin America.

M.A.: I understand what Chomsky was saying, but I think that Chavez did not think of himself as a leader of the movement, but rather as a part of a cultural struggle to bring progress and provide for the basic necessities of the Venezuelan, and to some extent, all of the Latin American people. Now, it was true that when Chavez was elected in 1999, we were maybe the only ones in the region, with the clear exception of Cuba, who saw themselves as part of this struggle. But then after Chavez, and maybe because we were the avant-garde to some extent, you had other leaders who were elected — like Lula in Brazil, Rafael Correa in Ecuador, Evo Morales in Bolivia — leaders that have been promoting social and political inclusion which are key elements to guaranteeing social development and democracy. So, yes, Chavez was an amazing leader. . . . You know, he was born in a mud hut. . . . He came from the very lower classes, and he never forgot where he came from. And, all his life he dedicated himself to help the poor and to improve their lives, and to some extent we can say that he died because of that and for them. . . . Similarly, Nicolas Maduro was a bus driver, he had a working class background, and he is somebody again who knows where he comes from as well, and will never forget that. . . . And, it is unfortunate that some people can’t accept that somebody that doesn’t come from the higher classes can lead their country.

Dan: When you refer to the Civil Rights Movement, it reminds me that when I was in Caracas during the elections in April 2013, I witnessed a pro-Maduro rally and what struck me was that nearly everyone at that rally was black. People in this country don’t think about the historic oppression of Afro-Venezuelans, and what the Chavista revolution has done for them.

MA: Yes, we are talking about people who were disenfranchised citizens, second-class citizens and they have now become a real part of society. Again, when we are talking about the Civil Rights movement in the 60’s it was quite violent actually here the reaction against this movement. Yes, you know, so you can understand how you could have sectors of Venezuelan society who might react in a certain violent manner against this process of inclusion. . . .

Obama Destroyed Libya
| February 18, 2015 | 8:55 pm | Analysis, International, National, political struggle | Comments closed

By Ted Rall

February 17, 2015 “ICH” -  Barack Obama destroyed Libya.

What he did to Libya is as bad as what Bush did to Iraq and Afghanistan. He doesn’t deserve a historical pass.

When Obama took office in 2009, Libya was under the clutches of longtime dictator Colonel Muammar Gaddafi. But things were looking up.

Bush and Gaddafi had cut a deal to lift Western trade sanctions in exchange for Libya acknowledging and paying restitution for its role in the bombing of Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland. In a rare triumph for Bush, Libya also agreed to give up its nuclear weapons research program. Libyan and Western analysts anticipated that Gaddafi’s dictatorship would be forced to accept liberal reforms, perhaps even free elections and rival political parties, in order to attract Western investment.

Libya in 2009 was prosperous. As citizens of a major oil- and natural gas-exporting nation, Libyans enjoyed high salaries, low living expenses, generous social benefits, not to mention law and order. It seems like a mirage today.

Looking back, many Libyans miss their former tyrant. “Muammar Gaddafi inherited one of the poorest nations in Africa,” notes Garikai Chengu of the Du Bois Institute for African Research at Harvard University. “However, by the time he was assassinated, Libya was unquestionably Africa’s most prosperous nation. Libya had the highest GDP per capita and life expectancy in Africa and less people lived below the poverty line than in the Netherlands.”

As a dictator, Gaddafi was guilty of horrendous human rights abuses. But life was better then than now. Women enjoyed more rights in Libya than in any other Arab country, particularly after the United States overthrew Saddam Hussein in Iraq. By regional standards, Libya was a relatively sweet place to live.

In February 2011, militant Islamists based in the eastern city of Benghazi launched an armed insurgency against Gaddafi’s central government in the capital of Tripoli. The rebels were linked in the imaginations of American newsmedia and U.S. foreign policy officials to the Arab Spring uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt’s Tahrir Square. But the Benghazi-based rebels, with close ties to Al Qaeda, were ideologically closer to the Free Syrian Army fighters who eventually metastasized into ISIS.

Within the CIA and Defense Departments, no one was sure who the insurgents were or what they wanted. Nonetheless the Obama administration covertly supplied them with at least $1 billion in cash and weapons. CIA agents and U.S. Special Forces served as “boots on the ground,” training opposition fighters how to use sophisticated new weapons.

Obama threw Gaddafi, whose regime was secular and by all accounts had been cooperative and held up his end of the deals with U.S., under the bus.

American forces jammed Libyan military communications. The U.S. fired missiles to intercept Libyan missiles fired at rebel targets. The U.S. led numerous airstrikes against units loyal to Gaddafi. U.S. intervention turned the tide in favor of the Benghazi-based rebels.

In October 2011, one of Obama’s killer robot drones participated in Gaddafi’s assassination. Game over.

Before invading Iraq, then Secretary of State Colin Powell warned Bush about his “Pottery Barn rule“: If you break it, you own it.

Obama has broken the hell out of Libya.  

The New York Times now describes Libya as “veer[ing] toward complete chaos.”

In 2015, the UK Guardian reports, Libya is in danger of meeting the official international definition of a failed state: “Libya is wracked by violence, factionalism and political polarization – and by the growing menace of jihadi extremism. Two rival governments, parliaments, prime ministers and military forces claim legitimacy. One side is the Islamist-dominated Libya Dawn coalition in Tripoli, the capital. The other camp, Dignity, which is recognized internationally, is based in Tobruk and Bayda. Hundreds of rival militias exist across the country. In recent months the homegrown fighters of Ansar al-Sharia have been challenged by Islamic State (Isis), who released a video showing the beheading of 21 Egyptian Christians. Oil production, the source of most state revenues, has declined massively. Cash is running out and basic services are facing collapse as the financial situation deteriorates. Hopes for change generated by the Arab spring and the demise of Gaddafi’s dictatorship have faded into despair and dysfunction.”

“Libya is falling apart. Politically, financially, the economic situation is disastrous,” says UN envoy Bernardino León.

To Obama’s credit, he admits that he screwed up in Libya. Unfortunately, he drew the wrong lesson. In 2014, he told an interviewer that a large ground invasion force might have helped Libya’s post-Gaddafi government succeed. Because that worked so well in Iraq and Afghanistan. But if he really believes that, why doesn’t he order in the troops?

Obama’s real mistake was to depose a secular socialist autocrat and allow him to be replaced by a bunch of crazy religious fundamentalist militias whose factionalism ensured they’d never be able to govern.

Bush committed this error in Iraq. Obama made it in Libya. And now he’s doing it again in Syria.


Ted Rall is the author of  “Silk Road to Ruin: Is Central Asia the New Middle East?,” and “The Anti-American Manifesto” . His website is www.tedrall.com .

The billionaire Governor goes after workers
| February 18, 2015 | 8:32 pm | Analysis, Labor, National, political struggle | Comments closed

http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/02/18/the-billionaire-governor-goes-after-workers/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=the-billionaire-governor-goes-after-workers

February 18, 2015

by JESSE JACKSON
Source:Counterpunch:
In November, Illinois voters narrowly decided – after one of the most expensive gubernatorial elections in the nation’s history – to elect Bruce Rauner, a hedge fund billionaire, to lead the state. Consider it an experiment in class politics. How would a man of the 0.01% address Illinois’ many challenges?
Rauner donned populist garb for the campaign. Pumping some $27.5 million of his own money into the campaign,
He promised voters what he knew they wanted:
“We’ll get a booming economy with more jobs. We’ll get the best schools in America. We’ll bring down the tax burden. And we’re going to rip this patronage system, and this cronyism system out of Springfield.”
Voters wanted someone who would clean up the corruption. Rauner was an uneasy choice, partly because his hedge fund was a leading investor of Illinois’ pension funds, a line of business infamous for corruption and rip-offs.
And partly because the promises didn’t add up:  better schools, better infrastructure, less debt, and lower taxes – how does that work?  But enough voters decided to take the risk.
So what is Rauner’s first act? He declared war on Illinois’ public unions.
He devoted his state of the state address blaming unions for Illinois’ problems.  Public employees had the nerve to negotiate for decent pay and pensions.  Their retirees expected that the contractual promises to pay the compensation promised would be honored.  Their unions contributed volunteers and money to political campaigns.  They were bankrupting the state.
So Rauner urged localities to pass so-called “right to work” laws, that would disembowel unions.  Then he issued an executive order – declared illegal by the Illinois Attorney General – to weaken state unions by barring them from assessing fees on some of the workers they represent –and benefit – in collective bargaining.
In a unionized workplace, union negotiated wages and benefits apply to workers who aren’t members of the union.  Non-members – about 15% of the unionized workplaces – don’t have to pay union dues or support union political activities.  But under Illinois law, they pay a fair-share fee, to cover the cost of collective bargaining and enforcement from which they directly benefit.
Fair share fees don’t contribute to Illinois fiscal problems.  Rauner is waging a war on unions.  He hopes to cripple those who opposed him in his last election.  But the stakes are larger than that:  what Rauner is proposing is to inflict trickle down economics on Illinois.
We haven’t seen Rauner’s budget yet, but we know what is coming.  Income taxes will be lowered on the rich; sales taxes extended on working people, making Illinois’ already regressive state tax structure even more unfair.
Rauner has already frozen all “non-essential” state spending and hiring, with an exemption, apparently, for a $100,000 a year Chief of Staff for his spouse.
The war on public workers will be accompanied by a continued assault on public schools. The piecemeal privatization of public education will be accompanied by piecemeal privatization of more public services.  Rauner has already teed up Medicaid – health services for the impoverished –for cuts.  Pension funds imbalances– caused by irresponsible officials refusing to make promised contributions and by hedge fund geniuses pocketing big fees for paltry returns – will be corrected by breaking the contractual promise to retirees.  Rauner clearly would lower the minimum wage if he could.
Rauner will peddle this toxic potion as a charm for Illinois’ ills.  Austerity, he’ll argue, will unleash jobs and growth.  Breaking unions will balance budgets.  Charters will lift kids.  Medicaid cuts will focus on the unworthy.  Everyone will sacrifice; everyone will benefit.
But the reality is predictable – as Wisconsin and Kansas have discovered.  The wealthy – a leading source of the corruption that plagues Illinois – will get tax breaks.  The middle class will get paycuts.  The poor will get less help. The schools will be cut; good teachers will leave.
Illinois voters were sensible enough not to give Rauner a free rein:  Democrats still control the legislature.  Rauner is making it clear where he stands.  Now Democrats will have to decide which side they are on.
Jesse Jackson is the founder of Rainbow/PUSH.
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