08-28-2010, 08:41 AM
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The Alvin Greene manifesto for a fairer America
The Alvin Greene manifesto for a fairer America | Alvin Greene | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk
Quote:
Recently, the millionaires' club known as the US senate voted to cut off unemployment benefits for millions of Americans. One senator called unemployment insurance a "necessary evil".
He got that half right.
Do any of these fat cats know what it's like to be unemployed? To not know how you will feed your children and pay your mortgage?
I'm unemployed, and, if elected, I can teach the Harvard rich kids in the White House and the senate a thing or two. I will vote for any law and propose any measure to keep jobs in my state of South Carolina. I will vote for huge tariffs, and, if necessary, vote to ban imports of foreign goods. Millionaire egghead politicians in the pocket of big business talk about "free trade" – and let all of your jobs get shipped overseas.
No more free trade. Your job is not going to Indonesia.
I will stop house foreclosures. Big banks got their bailout. Their debt was forgiven – and you paid for it. Their executives got million-dollar bonuses.
Did they forgive your debt? Did you get a bonus?
Remember the parable of the unmerciful servant: a servant owed the king a large sum, and the king forgave him his debt. But then the servant went to another man who owed him a small amount. The man couldn't pay, so the servant had him thrown into prison. When the king found out, he said, "I canceled all that debt of yours because you begged me to. Shouldn't you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you?" Then the king had the servant tortured until he paid back all he owed.
I will break up the big banks. I will put them out in the street, just as they want to put you out in the street. Those bankers who committed fraud will do hard time.
I will stop debt collectors from calling you. I will make it illegal for a company to sell a debt you have for purposes of collection. You and your family have dignity: you are not cattle to be sold back and forth in the debt marketplace. You know how horrible it is to have those vampires calling you, again and again and again.
I will shut down payday lenders who are sucking you dry.
In America, if you lose your job, and you get sick, you go broke or you die. This happens in no other civilised country. The stories that socialised medicine does not work are lies. Pick your system – Austria, Britain or Canada – but we must have universal health insurance. Healthcare, for free, for everyone.
Until recently, in Britain, where I was stationed as an intelligence analyst for the air force, students paid nothing to attend college. When Prime Minister Tony Blair tried to make students pay up to $4,500 for college, there was a revolt. The University of South Carolina, where I got my degree in political science, costs twice that. College education should be free in America.
Where will the money come from? The department of defence can't say where $1tn went. The army can't locate 56 planes and 32 tanks – how do you lose a plane? Rumour has it, the Pentagon started off as the Hexagon, but one day one of the sides went missing.
A Halliburton truck driver makes $120,000 a year, but that's not what a soldier gets. As an honourably-discharged army veteran who was stationed in Korea, I know how much money is wasted, and how much can be saved.
I'll save your house. I'll save your job.
Half the members of the US senate work for BP. The other half work for Halliburton. Who works for you?
This coming election day, let's teach at least one of those senate millionaires what it's like to be unemployed.
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OK, I've read his manifesto.
I disagree with a lot of his opinions about what he wants to do, but I do agree that it is time to get the millionaires club out of Washington.
Even though I think Mr Greene is somewhat of an idiot, I admire his intestinal fortitude and I find it refreshing that a "common man" has come this far in a senate race.
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