Long-shot Miliband now the favorite to become Britain’s prime minister
STOCKTON-ON-TEES, ENGLAND — Even before the election campaign began, the verdict was in on Ed Miliband: He was too weak and too weird to be Britain’s prime minister.
His approval ratings flirted with the lowest ever recorded for a major party leader. Among his Labor supporters, there were whispers of a coup. And with Britain’s economy recovering from the depths of recession, Conservative Party leader David Cameron seemed to have reelection locked up.
But British voters, not known for their faith in the powers of redemption, have done something unusual over the past month: They’ve given Miliband, the 45-year-old son of Jewish refugees who fled to Britain to escape the Nazis, a second chance.
The Labor leader has seized it, tapping a vein of popular discontent over the widening gap between rich and poor. With just a week to go before the country votes, he’s now a slight favorite to become prime minister once the dust has settled on the closest and most politically fragmented British election in decades. Polls suggest that he is highly unlikely to secure a majority in the Parliament, but may be positioned to lead an informal and potentially fractious coalition of parties from the left. http://www.washingtonpost.com/...
As and old man, I've learned to never underestimate the quickly shifting vagaries of the political process or presume to predict popularity.
And as the Wapo suggests, Milibrand apparently has "tapped a vein of popular discontent over the widening gap between rich and poor," causing a tremendous and rapid swing of public opinion in favor of his candidacy."
This same discontent presently rages in our American streets and sleeps within millions of households; citizens barely getting by, frustrated in no-end jobs, suffering unforgiving debt and enduring the pains of no health care while quietly embracing their children as they witness the destruction of public education on a daily basis: no more band, no more foreign language, no textbooks, crowded classrooms and on and on...
I don't agree with those who discount and handicap Sen. Sanders from the getgo nor those who have annointed Hillary prematurely.
Let's sing the song of common needs from the rooftops and swing our support behind the best candidate in generations, Sen. Sanders.
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AGENDA FOR AMERICA
1) Rebuilding Our Crumbling Infrastructure
We need a major investment to rebuild our crumbling infrastructure: roads, bridges, water systems, waste water plants, airports, railroads and schools. It has been estimated that the cost of the Bush-Cheney Iraq War, a war we should never have waged, will total $3 trillion by the time the last veteran receives needed care. A $1 trillion investment in infrastructure could create 13 million decent paying jobs and make this country more efficient and productive. We need to invest in infrastructure, not more war.
2) Reversing Climate Change
The United States must lead the world in reversing climate change and make certain that this planet is habitable for our children and grandchildren. We must transform our energy system away from fossil fuels and into energy efficiency and sustainable energies. Millions of homes and buildings need to be weatherized, our transportation system needs to be energy efficient and we need to greatly accelerate the progress we are already seeing in wind, solar, geothermal, biomass and other forms of sustainable energy. Transforming our energy system will not only protect the environment, it will create good paying jobs.
3) Creating Worker Co-ops
We need to develop new economic models to increase job creation and productivity. Instead of giving huge tax breaks to corporations which ship our jobs to China and other low-wage countries, we need to provide assistance to workers who want to purchase their own businesses by establishing worker-owned cooperatives. Study after study shows that when workers have an ownership stake in the businesses they work for, productivity goes up, absenteeism goes down and employees are much more satisfied with their jobs.
4) Growing the Trade Union Movement
Union workers who are able to collectively bargain for higher wages and benefits earn substantially more than non-union workers. Today, corporate opposition to union organizing makes it extremely difficult for workers to join a union. We need legislation which makes it clear that when a majority of workers sign cards in support of a union, they can form a union.
5) Raising the Minimum Wage
The current federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour is a starvation wage. We need to raise the minimum wage to a living wage. No one in this country who works 40 hours a week should live in poverty.
6) Pay Equity for Women Workers
Women workers today earn 78 percent of what their male counterparts make. We need pay equity in our country — equal pay for equal work.
7) Trade Policies that Benefit American Workers
Since 2001 we have lost more than 60,000 factories in this country, and more than 4.9 million decent-paying manufacturing jobs. We must end our disastrous trade policies (NAFTA, CAFTA, PNTR with China, etc.) which enable corporate America to shut down plants in this country and move to China and other low-wage countries. We need to end the race to the bottom and develop trade policies which demand that American corporations create jobs here, and not abroad.
8) Making College Affordable for All
In today's highly competitive global economy, millions of Americans are unable to afford the higher education they need in order to get good-paying jobs. Further, with both parents now often at work, most working-class families can't locate the high-quality and affordable child care they need for their kids. Quality education in America, from child care to higher education, must be affordable for all. Without a high-quality and affordable educational system, we will be unable to compete globally and our standard of living will continue to decline.
9) Taking on Wall Street
The function of banking is to facilitate the flow of capital into productive and job-creating activities. Financial institutions cannot be an island unto themselves, standing as huge profit centers outside of the real economy. Today, six huge Wall Street financial institutions have assets equivalent to 61 percent of our gross domestic product - over $9.8 trillion. These institutions underwrite more than half the mortgages in this country and more than two-thirds of the credit cards. The greed, recklessness and illegal behavior of major Wall Street firms plunged this country into the worst financial crisis since the 1930s. They are too powerful to be reformed. They must be broken up.
10) Health Care as a Right for All
The United States must join the rest of the industrialized world and recognize that health care is a right of all, and not a privilege. Despite the fact that more than 40 million Americans have no health insurance, we spend almost twice as much per capita on health care as any other nation. We need to establish a Medicare-for-all, single-payer system.
11) Protecting the Most Vulnerable Americans
Millions of seniors live in poverty and we have the highest rate of childhood poverty of any major country. We must strengthen the social safety net, not weaken it. Instead of cutting Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and nutrition programs, we should be expanding these programs.
12) Real Tax Reform
At a time of massive wealth and income inequality, we need a progressive tax system in this country which is based on ability to pay. It is not acceptable that major profitable corporations have paid nothing in federal income taxes, and that corporate CEOs in this country often enjoy an effective tax rate which is lower than their secretaries. It is absurd that we lose over $100 billion a year in revenue because corporations and the wealthy stash their cash in offshore tax havens around the world. The time is long overdue for real tax reform. http://www.sanders.senate.gov/...
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Thanks for reading and happy Labour Day!
12:11 PM PT: Sen. Dick Durbin, the second highest-ranking Democrat in the U.S. Senate, is ready for Bernie.
In an editorial board interview with the New York Observer today, the Illinois lawmaker likened Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders’ long-shot presidential challenge against Hillary Clinton to President Barack Obama’s come-from-behind victory seven years ago—and said the senator, who is an independent and self-identifies as a socialist, will “be a force” in the Democratic primary.
“Eight years and eight weeks ago I was standing in a freezing day in Springfield with a fellow named Barack Hussein Obama,” Mr. Durbin said. “Things started changing on the ground. Do not underestimate Bernie’s impact. He’s not stuck at a number. He’s starting at a number and I think he will have loyal people who will come to his side.”
Mr. Durbin effusively praised Mr. Sanders, telling the Observer that he is “pure of heart” and a true liberal.” “You go to the word liberal in the dictionary and there’s his picture, and he has an army of followers, just faithful, loyal followers,” he said.
http://observer.com/...
Hat tip unclejohn
4:05 PM PT: Bernie Sanders' nascent presidential campaign announced Friday that it raised more than $1.5 million in its first 24 hours, a number that far outpaces what Republican presidential hopefuls posted in their first day.
Sanders, the independent senator from Vermont who caucuses with Democrats, kicked off his dark horse campaign for the Democratic nomination on Thursday with an email to supporters and a press conference outside the U.S. Capitol. Since then, more than 100,000 people signed up for the campaign and 35,000 people donated money, according to a campaign press release.
Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul's campaign announced that it had raised $800,000 a day in. Texas Sen. Ted Cruz's campaign raised $1 million in the first 24-hours of its existence. And Florida Sen. Marco Rubio's campaign raised $1.25 million in its first day.
http://www.cnn.com/...