The Path to a National Popular Vote

The Path to a National Popular VoteBy David Sirota
Creators Syndicate, 12/28/07

Right now, many are frustrated about Iowa and New Hampshire voters having such oversized influence in America’s presidential elections. In a few months, as the general election campaign unfolds, we will be similarly frustrated about Ohio and Florida. Who arbitrarily gave this handful of states the disproportionate power to determine our national political path?

When it comes to the Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire primary, the answer is the parties. They decide which states select nominees first. In the general election, the culprit is the Electoral College. Most states award their electoral votes on a winner-take-all basis. By no matter what margin presidential candidates win your state, they get all your state’s electoral votes. That means if you don’t live in a “battleground” like Florida or Ohio whose statewide vote is perpetually up for grabs, you are ignored.

The nominating system is easily modified. Parties can add early primary and caucus states if they choose. Changing the general election, on the other hand, looks much harder. The Electoral College and its negative consequences seem locked into the Constitution.

But the operative word is “seem.”

To read the full nationally syndicated newspaper column, go to:
http://www.creators.com/opinion/david-sirota/the-path-to-a-national-popular-vote.html

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Hillary hearts NAFTA.

David Sirota has made a YouTube of Hillary’s response to NAFTA questions at last nights candidate debate on CNN.

Hillary is a DINO for the most part. She is a Rethug in Democratic clothing on many of the important issues. NAFTA expansion is one of THE most important domestic issues facing us today. NAFTA has affected our workforce as no other bill passed by our congress ever has in the last decade or so.. imho.His article about her stance is here. Its short and sweet, so let me give it to ya now:

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Breaking: Obama is a Corporate Shill…

From David Sirota’s blog at WorkingForChange:

BREAKING: Obama Says He Will Vote for NAFTA Expansion

Hot off the presses from MSNBC:

“Obama said he would vote for a Peruvian trade agreement next week, in response to a question from a man in Londonderry, NH who called NAFTA and CAFTA a disaster for American workers. He said he supported the trade agreement with Peru because it contained the labor and environmental standards sought by groups like the AFL-CIO, despite the voter’s protests to the contrary. He also affirmed his support for free trade.”

The voter’s “protests to the contrary” are exactly right. The AFL-CIO does not support the bill expanding NAFTA into Peru, and the much-trumpeted labor/environmental standards leave enforcement up to the Bush administration, rather than empowering third parties to enforce them (like corporations have the power to enforce investor rights provisions in these same trade agreements). Leaving enforcement to the Bush administration - or any administration - is the biggest loophole possible. It is precisely why corporate lobbyists have bragged to reporters that the standards are not enforceable.

Obama is the first presidential candidate to officially declare his/her support for the NAFTA expansion moving through the Congress. His announcement is not necessarily surprising, considering he was the keynote speaker at the launch of the Hamilton Project - a Wall Street front group working to drive a wedge between Democrats and organized labor on globalization issues. His announcement comes just days after a Wall Street Journal poll found strong bipartisan opposition to lobbyist-written NAFTA-style trade policies.

Trade has been known to be a huge issue in Iowa (remember Dick Gephardt in 1988), so this announcement could very well ripple through the 2008 primary.

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Tags: Obama, David Sirota

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These Are Times That Try Progressives’ Souls

This is a reprint of David Sirota’s blogpost at Working Assets.Com

By David Sirota
Working Assets, 10/3/07

It is frustrating being part of the progressive movement these days - truly frustrating. And I say that not because I am on book deadline and exhausted, but because of what I have been reporting on for the book (which is due out in Spring of 2008, for those interested). These past few weeks have felt like a big kick in the teeth - with these last few days a gratuitous kick in the groin.

Let’s step back and look at the effort to end the war. This week we have seen Democratic Reps. David Obey, Jack Murtha and Jim McGovern propose a bill that would force President Bush to raise taxes if he wants to continue spending money on a war in Iraq - a brilliant political move and commonsense policy. In the face of a recent Roll Call story headlined “GOP Forced to Pivot on Taxes - Polls Say Issue Losing Power,” this proposal is stunning only for how modest it is - especially considering that even Sen. Joseph Lieberman has endorsed the concept behind it, as has Republicans like New Hampshire Sen. Judd Gregg and North Carolina Rep. Walter Jones.

Obey has also indicated that as chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, he will use his position to block any blank check war funding bill from coming to the floor of Congress. It shows a recognition of the Tyranny of the Tiny Minority that I outlined in my last syndicated column - the tyranny that means that Congress will need to stop something, rather than pass something, in order to end the war. And stopping funding, incidentally, is an idea that the latest Washington Post poll shows the public supports.

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White House: Wealth Inequality “Is Not A Very Interesting Story”

David Sirota has graciously consented to Sirens reprinting his blogpost from yesterday at WorkingForChange. You can view David’s blog here.

White House: Wealth Inequality “Is Not A Very Interesting Story”

By David Sirota

The New York Times reports that according to new government data, “Americans earned a smaller average income in 2005 than in 2000, the fifth consecutive year that they had to make ends meet with less money than at the peak of the last economic expansion.” As most workers’ wages stagnate, however, the folks in the top two tenths of one percent of income earners are doing quite well. According to the White House’s official statement, in fact, this divergence between the vast majority of Americans and the wealthiest two tenths of one percent “is not a very interesting story.” To them, it is just an annoying distraction from their bigger goal of manipulating the labor market through immigration and globalization policies specifically designed to drive wages down even further.

Here is the excerpt:

“Growth in total incomes was concentrated among those making more than $1 million. The number of such taxpayers grew by more than 26 percent…These individuals, who constitute less than a quarter of 1 percent of all taxpayers, reaped almost 47 percent of the total income gains in 2005, compared with 2000. People with incomes of more than a million dollars also received 62 percent of the savings from the reduced tax rates on long-term capital gains and dividends that President Bush signed into law in 2003… The nearly 90 percent of Americans who make less than $100,000 a year saved on average $318 each on their investments. They collected 5.3 percent of the total savings from reduced tax rates on investment income…Tony Fratto, a White House spokesman, said the fact that nearly all of the growth in incomes was among those in the upper reaches of the income ladder and that the majority of investment tax breaks went to those making more than $1 million ‘is not a very interesting story.’” (emphasis added)

What’s particularly nauseating about the White House’s class warfare is that it is being waged at the very same time the Bush administration is claiming a supposed shortage of workers means it’s AOK to ignore how the H-1B program is being abused to drive down wages. They are also using this labor shortage claim to justify a push to enact a so-called “guest worker” program that deliberately creates a subclass of easily exploitable indentured servants with no basic labor or human rights (notice that the White House isn’t pushing for more legal immigration because legal immigration would give new workers minimum economic rights). Supposedly, our country needs to ignore H-1B abuses and create this “guest worker” subclass because we just don’t have enough workers to do the jobs that need to be done in this country. Except, as none other than Businessweek confirms, that narrative is what I’ve previously termed The Great Labor Shortage Lie - and a lie directly connected to the problem of stagnating wages.

Here’s the analysis - again, it’s from Businessweek quoting Merril Lynch, not exactly two pillars of radical leftist thinking:

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