For those of us who loved and admired Ted Kennedy, Mike Capuano would be a great choice.
Like Ted, Mike is a passionate and joyful warrior for the people and for democracy.
Like Ted, Mike is a man of principle, a man who speaks truth to power, a man who doesn't ask which way the wind is blowing before he casts a vote.
And Like Ted, Mike is becoming a master of strategy, of working the system to make things happen, from a position of principle.
Like Ted, Mike has a great BS detector, and listens to it.
Like Ted, Mike is unafraid to stand against war when war is not truly needed, and when the pack is baying for blood; someone who stands his ground when those around him are panicking and dodging for cover.
Like Ted, Mike sees democracy as meaning everybody in, nobody out. Everyone working together and supporting each other, not some of us trying to secure what we have by keeping others down. Everyone's children and everyone's grandparents equally precious.
Like Ted, Mike is unafraid to stand with Labor, and unafraid to work for the success and growth of business in Massachusetts, from the position of someone who represents and speaks for the working people who elected him.
And like Ted, for Mike none of this a strategy or a calculation; it is straight from the heart, from who he is.
But unlike Ted, Mike is not a child of wealth and privilege. He may have been educated in Ivy League schools, but he is one of us. The torch he carries is not that of one who has descended from the mountain to be among us - it is the flame in the heart of the "ordinary" working people of Massachusetts, longing for opportunity, respect, fair play and dignity for ourselves, for our children and for our children's children.
It is the flame of the American Dream.
Everyone says no one can replace Ted Kennedy. That may indeed be so, but in his way, Mike Capuano could prove to be an even greater Senator. The People's Senator.
Monday, December 7, 2009
Sunday, December 6, 2009
Capuano
We need Mike Capuano in the Senate.
He is an experienced legislator with 11 years on Capitol Hill, with a proven track record, who knows how to get things done and can hit the ground running.
He is a straight-forward, passionate man who speaks and acts from his heart. He's had some fancy education, but he's still one of us, and speaks for us.
He is brave. His votes against the Iraq War and the Patriot Act, at a time when the country was in a panic, were votes of principle, as is his opposition to the escalation in Afghanistan.
His vote against the No Child Left Behind Act - he foresaw that it would not be funded and would become a setup for breaking the public schools - was another act of courage.
He's willing to play political hardball to get respect for the progressives, and for all the people who voted for Obama and Change last year.
For example, he has been a supporter of Medicare for All - Single Payer - since the beginning, and has worked hard to keep a strong public option in the Health Reform Bill. But he has joined with 40 other Representatives in pledging to vote against the bill if it comes out of the final committee with the Stupak amendment, which would strip tens of millions of families of the coverage they now have to support a woman's ability to choose whether to bear a child.
Our own Rep. McGovern and five other Mass. Representatives have endorsed him, as have many other state leaders, thirty state labor bodies and a great many local unions. His voting record on the Hill is nearly 100% in line with the positions of the Democratic Party, and the AFL/CIO rates his labor voting record at 97%.
This is not the result of a calculation or strategy. He belongs to us, but no one owns him. I have talked to him face to face, questioned him and studied his record. I am totally convinced that it comes straight from his heart, from who he is and from his deepest commitments.
Capuano.
Polls are open on Tuesday, 7 am to 8 pm. Be there.
He is an experienced legislator with 11 years on Capitol Hill, with a proven track record, who knows how to get things done and can hit the ground running.
He is a straight-forward, passionate man who speaks and acts from his heart. He's had some fancy education, but he's still one of us, and speaks for us.
He is brave. His votes against the Iraq War and the Patriot Act, at a time when the country was in a panic, were votes of principle, as is his opposition to the escalation in Afghanistan.
His vote against the No Child Left Behind Act - he foresaw that it would not be funded and would become a setup for breaking the public schools - was another act of courage.
He's willing to play political hardball to get respect for the progressives, and for all the people who voted for Obama and Change last year.
For example, he has been a supporter of Medicare for All - Single Payer - since the beginning, and has worked hard to keep a strong public option in the Health Reform Bill. But he has joined with 40 other Representatives in pledging to vote against the bill if it comes out of the final committee with the Stupak amendment, which would strip tens of millions of families of the coverage they now have to support a woman's ability to choose whether to bear a child.
Our own Rep. McGovern and five other Mass. Representatives have endorsed him, as have many other state leaders, thirty state labor bodies and a great many local unions. His voting record on the Hill is nearly 100% in line with the positions of the Democratic Party, and the AFL/CIO rates his labor voting record at 97%.
This is not the result of a calculation or strategy. He belongs to us, but no one owns him. I have talked to him face to face, questioned him and studied his record. I am totally convinced that it comes straight from his heart, from who he is and from his deepest commitments.
Capuano.
Polls are open on Tuesday, 7 am to 8 pm. Be there.
Property Tax Crisis
This latest looming crisis underscores the need to greatly reduce reliance on property taxes to fund city services.
(See Nick's column: http://www.telegram.com/article/20091206/COLUMN27/912060415)
Property taxes are the most arbitrary and regressive way of raising revenue. How property is valued often has only a loose relationship to people's ability to pay - witness the agony of retired workers who can no longer pay the taxes on their homes. Entire towns or regions which become unaffordable to the families who have lived in them for generations, because of "gentrification" leading to rising property values driving up taxes. For example, the families that had lived on Nantucket since the Vikings are largely gone now, driven out by the taxes.
And this crisis reminds us of how very unstable property values can be, and the chaos that can happen as assessors scramble to keep up with fluctuations - and owners struggle to cope with the unanticipated revaluations.
Studies over the years of who ultimately pays a tax indicate that landlords are able to (and must) pass along the entire burden of property taxes to their tenants, so that people in Green Island, who may pay half their income in rent, effectively pay a much larger portion of their income on taxes than people living in trophy homes in Princeton. This is invisible to them, but it is very real. Yet the inequity in the absolute amount of revenue per person between Worcester and Princeton means that the schools in the "hill towns" are much-better funded.
Revenue for schools in particular - the biggest local expense and the greatest source of social inequity - should rest reliably and securely on the state income tax, the fairest and most stable source. The use of property is a kind of income and probably should not be tax-free. But we need to get away from these periodic struggles to save our city services by squeezing more blood from the property-owners, which every few years produces a new disaster.
(See Nick's column: http://www.telegram.com/article/20091206/COLUMN27/912060415)
Property taxes are the most arbitrary and regressive way of raising revenue. How property is valued often has only a loose relationship to people's ability to pay - witness the agony of retired workers who can no longer pay the taxes on their homes. Entire towns or regions which become unaffordable to the families who have lived in them for generations, because of "gentrification" leading to rising property values driving up taxes. For example, the families that had lived on Nantucket since the Vikings are largely gone now, driven out by the taxes.
And this crisis reminds us of how very unstable property values can be, and the chaos that can happen as assessors scramble to keep up with fluctuations - and owners struggle to cope with the unanticipated revaluations.
Studies over the years of who ultimately pays a tax indicate that landlords are able to (and must) pass along the entire burden of property taxes to their tenants, so that people in Green Island, who may pay half their income in rent, effectively pay a much larger portion of their income on taxes than people living in trophy homes in Princeton. This is invisible to them, but it is very real. Yet the inequity in the absolute amount of revenue per person between Worcester and Princeton means that the schools in the "hill towns" are much-better funded.
Revenue for schools in particular - the biggest local expense and the greatest source of social inequity - should rest reliably and securely on the state income tax, the fairest and most stable source. The use of property is a kind of income and probably should not be tax-free. But we need to get away from these periodic struggles to save our city services by squeezing more blood from the property-owners, which every few years produces a new disaster.
Friday, December 4, 2009
Letter to a Democratic Party forum:
>>>>>>>>>>
Enough already about what a threat Afghanistan was or is to us. Everyone is treating that as the one piece of what Bush and Cheney did which is beyond question, but it's horse-ticky, like the rest of their lies.
Did you know that George Bush Jr. when he was in college was a fanatic player of Risk, the Parker Brothers "Game of World Domination"? And that he was notorious for changing the rules when he was losing? That might give some clue to the mentality of the man who allowed 9/11 to happen and then ordered the invasion of Afghanistan.
The Taliban government of Afghanistan, like most CIA-sponsored regimes, was pretty disagreeable from the point of view of a progressive, but the facts are that it did not organize or support any terrorist act against the US, and there was not one Afghani involved in any of them. Bin Laden and supporters had a training camp in Afghanistan - in territory over which the government had only loose control and involving a few hundred people.
The US demanded that Bin Laden and his supporters be arrested and turned over. The Afghan government did what any self-respecting government that valued its independence would do. They asked that the universal standard of protocol in criminal cases be followed: a presentation of evidence and a formal request for extradition. The Bush government branded this failure to obey - and obey quickly - as defiance and impudence, and responded by ordering an invasion. Our corporate media pulled one of its periodic crescendos of "manufactured outrage", and practically our entire Congress pissed all over themselves to be first in line to support it.
The fact that when US forces had Bin laden surrounded and cornered they let him get away is good evidence that the invasion of Afghanistan was never about catching him.
The map I saw yesterday of where US forces are concentrated in Afghanistan casts further doubt on the official line that "fighting terrorism" is the real mission in Afghanistan. The fighting is mostly south and east of Kabul, but nearly half the US forces are in the desert in the south-western provence. There are reliable reports that they have been supplied with large numbers of main battle tanks (useless against the Taliban.) From there it is a straight shot to Teheran - 700 miles or so of desert to the west, with no mountain ranges, rivers or major fields of sand dunes in the way, just one relatively small ridge to cross.
The whole thing stinks of imperialism, one giant Risk game with nuclear-armed players, and with our own towns and cities as hostages.
Our job, as I see it, is to get the American people to demand an end to these foreign wars, and to demand it so strongly that our Democratic representatives and administration will have to give in to it to keep us pacified. The Democrats can then take credit for it, and an energized people will turn out to reelect them.
That dynamic. around this and a range of other issues, can keep the Democrats in power in 2010 and 2012. Without that, the working people will stay home again, as happened in 1994.
So, paradoxically, to save the Obama Administration we (the people) have to unleash our rage at what he's doing, and take it to "the street". Our Rep. Jim McGovern, Rep. Mike Capuano and other representatives from Massachusetts clearly understand this. Pres. Obama has given us many signals that he does too. But we - the people, with the leadership of Democrats who get this - have to make it happen.
Electing Capuano to the Senate on Tuesday will help.
>>>>>>>>>>
Enough already about what a threat Afghanistan was or is to us. Everyone is treating that as the one piece of what Bush and Cheney did which is beyond question, but it's horse-ticky, like the rest of their lies.
Did you know that George Bush Jr. when he was in college was a fanatic player of Risk, the Parker Brothers "Game of World Domination"? And that he was notorious for changing the rules when he was losing? That might give some clue to the mentality of the man who allowed 9/11 to happen and then ordered the invasion of Afghanistan.
The Taliban government of Afghanistan, like most CIA-sponsored regimes, was pretty disagreeable from the point of view of a progressive, but the facts are that it did not organize or support any terrorist act against the US, and there was not one Afghani involved in any of them. Bin Laden and supporters had a training camp in Afghanistan - in territory over which the government had only loose control and involving a few hundred people.
The US demanded that Bin Laden and his supporters be arrested and turned over. The Afghan government did what any self-respecting government that valued its independence would do. They asked that the universal standard of protocol in criminal cases be followed: a presentation of evidence and a formal request for extradition. The Bush government branded this failure to obey - and obey quickly - as defiance and impudence, and responded by ordering an invasion. Our corporate media pulled one of its periodic crescendos of "manufactured outrage", and practically our entire Congress pissed all over themselves to be first in line to support it.
The fact that when US forces had Bin laden surrounded and cornered they let him get away is good evidence that the invasion of Afghanistan was never about catching him.
The map I saw yesterday of where US forces are concentrated in Afghanistan casts further doubt on the official line that "fighting terrorism" is the real mission in Afghanistan. The fighting is mostly south and east of Kabul, but nearly half the US forces are in the desert in the south-western provence. There are reliable reports that they have been supplied with large numbers of main battle tanks (useless against the Taliban.) From there it is a straight shot to Teheran - 700 miles or so of desert to the west, with no mountain ranges, rivers or major fields of sand dunes in the way, just one relatively small ridge to cross.
The whole thing stinks of imperialism, one giant Risk game with nuclear-armed players, and with our own towns and cities as hostages.
Our job, as I see it, is to get the American people to demand an end to these foreign wars, and to demand it so strongly that our Democratic representatives and administration will have to give in to it to keep us pacified. The Democrats can then take credit for it, and an energized people will turn out to reelect them.
That dynamic. around this and a range of other issues, can keep the Democrats in power in 2010 and 2012. Without that, the working people will stay home again, as happened in 1994.
So, paradoxically, to save the Obama Administration we (the people) have to unleash our rage at what he's doing, and take it to "the street". Our Rep. Jim McGovern, Rep. Mike Capuano and other representatives from Massachusetts clearly understand this. Pres. Obama has given us many signals that he does too. But we - the people, with the leadership of Democrats who get this - have to make it happen.
Electing Capuano to the Senate on Tuesday will help.
Wednesday, December 2, 2009
Capuano, Coakley or Khazei?
The civil liberties issue is going to be crucial - as will be the issue of whether our Senator is truly, gut-level, on the side of the working people or is just with us on a collection of issues and ways of doing things.
In case you haven't been paying attention lately, let me remind you that we are in the midst of a profound, world-historical economic, social, political and environmental crisis, and for the people it is continuing to get worse. The American people turned out in '08, in what by US standards (but not by world standards) was large numbers, to elect a Democratic President and Congress running on the promise of change. And they are not seeing it. There are many signs that the "Obama voters" are fed up with the entire political process, and with the failure of Obama and the Democratic Congress to deliver, and that they may not turn out in '10 and '12 to vote at all.
See for example: http://trueslant.com/allisonkilkenny/2009/11/29/new-poll-paints-ugly-2010-picture/
In Hondouras a few days ago, 70% of the adult population failed to show up at the polls, almost al observers agreed that it was a decisive repudiation of the dictatorship that was running the elections. But few here saw it that way when 70% of the voters of Worcester didn't vote last month in City elections, but the meaning is the same. in District 4 only 8% of the adult population participated in a hotly-contested City Council race.
I've been at a lot of doors and in a lot of living rooms recently, talking to people about politics, government and their lives. I couldn't get many out to vote, but I can tell you they are paying attention, and they are getting angrier and more desperate. People stay home as a vote of no confidence - a massive, ongoing vote of no confidence in our whole electoral system, one that has been going on for generations, but no one is paying attention. People are very clear about that. If you doubt it, go out and ask them!
The only thing that can save the Democrats - and perhaps our democracy itself, such as it is - in '10 and '12 will be people taking to the streets and taking other direct action to demand the change we voted for in '08; and then only if the Democratic representatives, the President and the Democratic governors respond to that pressure - and take credit for that - the way Roosevelt did!
And it's going to happen. (The street heat, that is.) The pot is coming to a boil.
The question to ask about the Senator we nominate is: does he or she get it? Will he or she be on the side of the people in the crunch? Or will they side with the "law and order first" crowd and support the impulse to beat the people back with clubs and gas, injunctions, jails and detention camps?
Any sign of anti-union bias is a warning flag. The unions, such as they are, are the only organized voice the working people have right now, and their support for the Democratic Party is critical to our future.
I think Capuano gets this. My best guess is that at a gut level he is - and will be - on the side of the people, the side of democracy.
I have doubts about Khazei, and serious doubts about Coakley.
Ask about Martha: where would she have stood on the Flint sitdown strike, or the civil disobedience of the Civil Rights Movement?
Where would she have stood on Sept. 6, 1774, when 4,722 militia members from 37 towns gathered in the streets of Worcester and stopped the courts from meeting?
If - or rather when - she is forced to choose between the law and the people, between the law and democracy, what does her record show about where she would stand?
In case you haven't been paying attention lately, let me remind you that we are in the midst of a profound, world-historical economic, social, political and environmental crisis, and for the people it is continuing to get worse. The American people turned out in '08, in what by US standards (but not by world standards) was large numbers, to elect a Democratic President and Congress running on the promise of change. And they are not seeing it. There are many signs that the "Obama voters" are fed up with the entire political process, and with the failure of Obama and the Democratic Congress to deliver, and that they may not turn out in '10 and '12 to vote at all.
See for example: http://trueslant.com/allisonkilkenny/2009/11/29/new-poll-paints-ugly-2010-picture/
In Hondouras a few days ago, 70% of the adult population failed to show up at the polls, almost al observers agreed that it was a decisive repudiation of the dictatorship that was running the elections. But few here saw it that way when 70% of the voters of Worcester didn't vote last month in City elections, but the meaning is the same. in District 4 only 8% of the adult population participated in a hotly-contested City Council race.
I've been at a lot of doors and in a lot of living rooms recently, talking to people about politics, government and their lives. I couldn't get many out to vote, but I can tell you they are paying attention, and they are getting angrier and more desperate. People stay home as a vote of no confidence - a massive, ongoing vote of no confidence in our whole electoral system, one that has been going on for generations, but no one is paying attention. People are very clear about that. If you doubt it, go out and ask them!
The only thing that can save the Democrats - and perhaps our democracy itself, such as it is - in '10 and '12 will be people taking to the streets and taking other direct action to demand the change we voted for in '08; and then only if the Democratic representatives, the President and the Democratic governors respond to that pressure - and take credit for that - the way Roosevelt did!
And it's going to happen. (The street heat, that is.) The pot is coming to a boil.
The question to ask about the Senator we nominate is: does he or she get it? Will he or she be on the side of the people in the crunch? Or will they side with the "law and order first" crowd and support the impulse to beat the people back with clubs and gas, injunctions, jails and detention camps?
Any sign of anti-union bias is a warning flag. The unions, such as they are, are the only organized voice the working people have right now, and their support for the Democratic Party is critical to our future.
I think Capuano gets this. My best guess is that at a gut level he is - and will be - on the side of the people, the side of democracy.
I have doubts about Khazei, and serious doubts about Coakley.
Ask about Martha: where would she have stood on the Flint sitdown strike, or the civil disobedience of the Civil Rights Movement?
Where would she have stood on Sept. 6, 1774, when 4,722 militia members from 37 towns gathered in the streets of Worcester and stopped the courts from meeting?
If - or rather when - she is forced to choose between the law and the people, between the law and democracy, what does her record show about where she would stand?
Teachers Vote No Confidence
Re: http://www.telegram.com/article/20091202/NEWS/912020376/1101
Anyone who blames 'the teachers' or 'the unions' for the mess in our schools should try teaching for a week. What the schools *are*, the bottom line, is teachers in a classroom working with students. It is a difficult, demanding and exhausting job. Everything else, everyone else in the school, is just support and structure.
And anyone who thinks being a 'team player' always means going along with the principal, right or wrong, needs to do some re-thinking.
The fact that this is the first time in six years that the staff at a school has voted no confidence in their principal says buckets. I trust Dr. Boone will take this as seriously as it apparently deserves to be taken.
Teachers need and deserve to be respected and supported - and paid - as professionals. They organize in unions when they find they can't get that respect any other way. The union is the teachers. And the teachers are the schools.
Anyone who blames 'the teachers' or 'the unions' for the mess in our schools should try teaching for a week. What the schools *are*, the bottom line, is teachers in a classroom working with students. It is a difficult, demanding and exhausting job. Everything else, everyone else in the school, is just support and structure.
And anyone who thinks being a 'team player' always means going along with the principal, right or wrong, needs to do some re-thinking.
The fact that this is the first time in six years that the staff at a school has voted no confidence in their principal says buckets. I trust Dr. Boone will take this as seriously as it apparently deserves to be taken.
Teachers need and deserve to be respected and supported - and paid - as professionals. They organize in unions when they find they can't get that respect any other way. The union is the teachers. And the teachers are the schools.
Two homeless children broke into an abandoned building and lit a candle that set it on fire, and as it happened six brave fire-fighters died as a result. Dozens of family members were heart-broken, and a whole City shared in the grief. How could the punishment for that action possibly "pay for" what it caused, and still be appropriate to what those children actually did?
If you want to look for fault, why not ask why those children were homeless in the first place.
People forget that there was a time in this country - three decades in fact, the '50's through the '70's - when homelessness was practically unknown. Poor people could always find a room, and get help paying for it. There is no law of God or nature that says "the homeless will always be with us".
But while there are homeless people who need a place to get in out of the cold, and abandoned buildings they can break into, they will get into them - and they will light candles, and make fires to keep warm - and sometimes that will start building fires - and sometimes those fires will kill people.
No threat of possible punishment for something that could possibly happen if they make a mistake that they don't intend to make will stop them.
Now we're closing the PIP Shelter, and there will be even more people with no place to go. There are hundreds of abandoned buildings in the city, and more are being abandoned every week. We have fewer fire-fighters to deal with the fires that wil result, and they have farther to go. So when the next fire comes that takes a fire-fighter's life, whose fault will it be?
Will the blame lie with some homeless child who started it? Or perhaps some broken, homeless old man, who may once have been your fellow worker or your neighbor, but who now is just trying to survive another night?
Or does the blame lie with our failure as a City to deal with these twin disasters of homelessness and building abandonment?
If you want to look for fault, why not ask why those children were homeless in the first place.
People forget that there was a time in this country - three decades in fact, the '50's through the '70's - when homelessness was practically unknown. Poor people could always find a room, and get help paying for it. There is no law of God or nature that says "the homeless will always be with us".
But while there are homeless people who need a place to get in out of the cold, and abandoned buildings they can break into, they will get into them - and they will light candles, and make fires to keep warm - and sometimes that will start building fires - and sometimes those fires will kill people.
No threat of possible punishment for something that could possibly happen if they make a mistake that they don't intend to make will stop them.
Now we're closing the PIP Shelter, and there will be even more people with no place to go. There are hundreds of abandoned buildings in the city, and more are being abandoned every week. We have fewer fire-fighters to deal with the fires that wil result, and they have farther to go. So when the next fire comes that takes a fire-fighter's life, whose fault will it be?
Will the blame lie with some homeless child who started it? Or perhaps some broken, homeless old man, who may once have been your fellow worker or your neighbor, but who now is just trying to survive another night?
Or does the blame lie with our failure as a City to deal with these twin disasters of homelessness and building abandonment?
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