American Forum Op-Ed

AMERICAN FORUM

By David Brodwin

This year, the United States Supreme Court reversed years of precedent limiting how corporations may spend money to influence elections. This decision will substantially increase the importance of corporate influence in politics—both in determining who gets elected and how they decide once they are in office.

As executives, owners, investors, and business professionals involved in sustainable and socially responsible business, we must ask ourselves: Are we helped by this greater freedom to spend our companies’ money to influence campaigns? Or has the Supreme Court handed out some poisoned candy? Is this new ability to buy political support good for business—or does it set us back in our efforts to do business responsibly and promote a vibrant, just, and sustainable economy?

Despite appearances, the gutting of campaign finance rules is more likely to hurt than to help. The main issue is not whether businesses can or cannot spend their money on elections. The main issue is which particular businesses and industries will dominate the spending, and whether the ideas they will promote are good for our businesses and good for the nation.

Unfortunately, opening the floodgates to corporate spending on elections will make it harder, not easier, for sustainable and socially responsible businesses to get what they need--and harder for America to get what it needs from these businesses.

That’s because the money that will flood the political system will not represent the views of companies in green America. Instead, the money that will flood the system will come from organizations like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which is expected to spend more than $200 million this year on lobbying and direct campaign expenditures. This organization and others like it represent companies that don’t value responsible business. Is this the kind of business thinking that we want to dominate our political discourse?

Ask yourself: Which type of business represents the future? Which type of business should speak most loudly in the political debate? We cannot build an economy of the future based on outmoded ideas and values.

As executives, owners, and investors in socially responsible and sustainable businesses, we believe there is a right way and a wrong way to do business. We do not pursue growth at any cost, nor profit without regard to people and planet. We seek economic policies that make it easier and more profitable to do business the right way, and we know that these policies will make it harder and less profitable to do business the wrong way.

Another important business value is transparency. Corporate donations should be fully disclosed. It’s not healthy to force legislators to collect secret donations, for which they then owe secret favors. This “pay to play” system destroys American’s faith in government and can destroy our democracy.

The ranks of sustainable and socially responsible businesses are growing rapidly–but we are still outnumbered by the “business as usual” crowd. Unless we act, corporate money of the wrong kind will swamp campaigns. This money will not represent enlightened business leadership. It will not enhance U.S. competitiveness in the global economy.

Many important initiatives such as reforms that support Main Street over Wall Street, health care and insurance reforms, product safety standards, better public education, and renewable energy advances will all be in jeopardy if we do not improve the election finance system.

So what’s the solution? Congress has introduced the Fair Elections Now Act to neutralize the corrupting influence of special interest donations and make it possible for legislators to focus on the people’s business rather than on fundraising. This bi-partisan measure has been approved in Committee and now awaits passage by the full House of Representatives.

The proposal has been carefully crafted to survive constitutional challenge at the Supreme Court. It does not bar private funding of campaigns, but it provides the option for candidates to run for Congress using a blend of small private donations and limited public funds, including a four-to-one federal match on donations of $100 or less. Candidates could finance a viable campaign based primarily on contributions from their local grassroots base of supporters. Candidates would not need to depend on special interests who expect to obtain influence in exchange for cash.

We can’t build an economy that works if our democracy is broken. Congress needs to pass this vital reform.

Campaign finance reform is a crucial step toward building an economy that supports and rewards responsible and sustainable business. This is essential if we are to create the economy we want and need today, and be proud of what we’re leaving for the generations to come.
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Brodwin is co-founder of the American Sustainable Business Council, a national coalition of business networks that advocates for a vibrant, just and sustainable economy.
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Copyright (C) 2010 by American Forum. 10/10

AMERICAN FORUM

By Susan V. Berresford

The war in Vietnam ended more than 35 years ago, but Trinh Luc, age 18, is still feeling the effects of Agent Orange, a defoliant used by the U.S. military. Totally disabled since birth with mental deficiencies, violent tremors and muscle degeneration, he lives in rural Vietnam with his mother, 59, who was a volunteer cook with Vietnamese troops in the jungle mountains during the war and recalls being sprayed several times. Her skin is still blotched and bumpy with chloracne.

Agent Orange, it seems, is still causing fresh harm to innocent newborns and adults in Vietnam, not to mention its harm to war vets on both sides of the Pacific. The good news is that we can stop this nightmare, and at a reasonable cost.

Doing so would be in the best American tradition of humanitarian care, and would help address the remaining shadow on the relationship between our two countries. An action plan is now in hand that comes out of another valued tradition - a public-private partnership.

By the end of the war in 1975, 2.5 million U.S. military personnel had served in combat zones where many were exposed to Agent Orange's toxic contaminant, dioxin. Upon returning home, many began reporting unusual illnesses: chloracne, several forms of cancer, diabetes, and birth defects in their offspring.

After decades of controversy, advocacy, lawsuits and research, the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs now provides Agent Orange-related benefits to any U.S. military veteran who had "boots on the ground" in Vietnam or served on particular ships offshore and suffers from any of 12 medical conditions. Although exact figures are not available on spending for Agent Orange/dioxin-related conditions, the U.S. Government paid out $15.3 billion last year in disability benefits to more than 1 million Vietnam veterans, many of whom were exposed to herbicides. Debate continues over possible additions to the list of eligible illnesses.

As a recent study by the National Organization on Disability noted, more should be done for these vets, such as outreach to connect them and their families with care providers; medical education for health practitioners and disability-related service agencies; expanded care for affected children and grandchildren; and a new and robust research effort.

But what about Vietnam?

Millions of Vietnamese were exposed like Trinh Luc’s mother to Agent Orange/dioxin, some repeatedly, and 3 million are estimated to have suffered health effects, including 150,000 of today's children who have profound birth defects, like Luc. Dioxin "hot spots" around former U.S. military areas continue to contaminate people. A land area the size of Massachusetts was sprayed and a large proportion is still degraded from the defoliation campaign. Vietnam gives small subsidies to its affected veterans and operates hospitals and clinics, but its resources do not meet the need.

In 2007 I convened a bi-national, public-private coalition of distinguished scientists and citizens, the U.S.-Vietnam Dialogue Group on Agent Orange/Dioxin, to work on the Vietnamese face of the issue. Funded by the Ford Foundation and housed at the Aspen Institute, the group explored what could be done, reviewed pilot projects, consulted widely and testified before Congress.

In June, the Dialogue Group issued a plan of action for assistance to Vietnam, so dioxin-contaminated soils could be cleaned, damaged ecosystems repaired and services expanded for people with disabilities. Costing $300 million over 10 years, the plan calls for supporting people with disabilities and gives highest priority to starting cleanup in Da Nang, Phu Cat, Bien Hoa and the other most dangerous "hot spots." U.S. and Vietnamese officials hailed the plan as a blueprint for scaling up successful pilot projects.

It is time to ensure that the resources needed will now be mobilized from government, foundations, individuals and the growing U.S. business community in Vietnam. This is an auspicious year to get started - the 35th anniversary of the end of the war, the 15th year since re-establishment of diplomatic relations between our two nations, and the 1,000th anniversary of the founding of Hanoi.

A broad public-private partnership would respond to the human suffering in Vietnam in a humanitarian spirit. It would follow the American tradition of generosity toward former adversaries, and aiding men and women around the globe who struggle for well-being. And it would heal wounds and address a legacy that haunts both nations.

Let's move now to take care of this unfinished business.
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Susan V. Berresford is the former president of the Ford Foundation and convener of the U.S.-Vietnam Dialogue Group on Agent Orange/Dioxin.
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Copyright (c) American Forum 10/10

MINNESOTA EDITORIAL FORUM

By Dan McGrath

Given the dire unemployment crisis, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that new Census Bureau data reveal that a record number of people struggled with poverty last year in the United States.

What may be more striking, however, is just how many of the poor were employed. Recently released state and local poverty data reveal that more than half of the Minnesotans who were below the poverty level were employed during 2009. More than 31,000 of our neighbors who worked full-time for the entire year were still officially poor. Too many jobs in our state pay workers poverty wages and are failing to provide a path to economic recovery for Main Street.

The ranks of the working poor are even larger when we look at the number of working Minnesotans who are working fulltime but are making less than twice the poverty line -- a measure many economists use because the official poverty line is based on an outdated 1960’s formula and considered woefully inadequate. Using this yardstick, a shocking one in 10 workers in our state who worked full-time for the entirety of 2009 was still in poverty.

Individuals in our state who have a job and are working hard still cannot escape poverty because wages are painfully low. Most minimum wage earners in our state make the federal minimum of $7.25 an hour or, roughly $15,000 a year for full-time employment. It's no wonder workers can't make ends meet even when they are fortunate enough to have a job.

According to an analysis by the Economic Policy Institute, roughly 50,000 workers earn the minimum wage in Minnesota. An increase in the wage floor would help these individuals directly as well as thousands more low-wage workers who would see their paychecks rise as employers adjust wages to preserve wage scales.

Raising the minimum wage would not only help working families afford basic essentials, it would also give the economy a boost. Consumer spending, which drives 70 percent of the economy, has stagnated. A modest increase in the minimum wage would put money in the hands of people who will purchase goods and services, drive up demand, and spur companies to increase production and hire more workers.

While the refrain to get America back on track has been "jobs, jobs, jobs," what we really need to be calling for are "good jobs, good jobs, good jobs." A recent analysis by the National Employment Law Project finds that the jobs that have been created in the private sector this year have been concentrated in low-wage and mid-wage industries. The jobs in high-wage industries that were lost in the downturn have yet to begin to register net gains.

If this trend continues, more and more of us will be working for less. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, seven of the 10 occupations expected to have the most job growth from 2008 to 2018 are low-wage jobs such as food preparation and customer service. If we do not act, a large and growing segment of the population will be rewarded for their work with poverty wages.

But leaders in Minnesota have the capacity to raise wages to help improve incomes and boost the economy. Fourteen states and the District of Columbia have already raised their minimum wages above the federal level. Washington State leads the way with a minimum wage of $8.55 an hour, followed by Oregon at $8.40. Minnesota should join the ranks of these state leaders by raising and indexing our minimum wage in the 2011 legislative session. A job should once again be the best means for hardworking Minnesotans to escape from poverty.
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McGrath is executive director of TakeAction Minnesota.
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Copyright © 2010 by the Minnesota Editorial Forum. 10/10

AMERICAN FORUM


By Yifat Susskind

As individuals, Americans are generous, often donating in response to crises abroad even while struggling to make ends meet at home. We tend to assume that our government’s foreign aid is similarly altruistic. But is it?

October 16 is World Food Day, a good time to examine this assumption about U.S. food aid and begin to press for some much-needed improvements.

Meet Khalida Mahmoud, a 29-year-old woman whose farming family was driven into worsening poverty, after U.S. food aid poured into her home region of eastern Sudan. That’s not how food aid is supposed to work, but just look at the policy: your tax dollars are used to buy grain from U.S. factory farms, the same giant corporations that already receive $26 billion in tax subsidies. Then the grain is transported halfway around the world, using thousands of gallons of fossil fuel and releasing tons of harmful carbon emissions into the atmosphere. The transport typically takes months while hungry people grow more desperate.


Click here to read the full article.

AMERICAN FORUM


By Yifat Susskind

As individuals, Americans are generous, often donating in response to crises abroad even while struggling to make ends meet at home. We tend to assume that our government’s foreign aid is similarly altruistic. But is it?

October 16 is World Food Day, a good time to examine this assumption about U.S. food aid and begin to press for some much-needed improvements.

Meet Khalida Mahmoud, a 29-year-old woman whose farming family was driven into worsening poverty, after U.S. food aid poured into her home region of eastern Sudan. That’s not how food aid is supposed to work, but just look at the policy: your tax dollars are used to buy grain from U.S. factory farms, the same giant corporations that already receive $26 billion in tax subsidies. Then the grain is transported halfway around the world, using thousands of gallons of fossil fuel and releasing tons of harmful carbon emissions into the atmosphere. The transport typically takes months while hungry people grow more desperate.

Once the food finally arrives, it floods agricultural markets, destabilizing fragile local economies. Small farmers are the first to go bankrupt. Most of them are women like Khalida, who work small plots of land hoping to sell enough at market to buy cooking oil, flour, a bar of soap and a pair of shoes so a child can stay in school.

These women are more than the backbones of their families: they grow most of Africa’s food. Unlike giant grain corporations, these women farm without fossil fuels and harmful chemicals. Their sustainable agriculture practices are critical to meeting the twin challenges of feeding people and protecting the planet. Khalida and millions of other small-scale women farmers are the people we want to support with our food aid programs. Instead, the policy undermines the livelihoods of those who hold the key to long-term food security in Africa.

Fortunately, there is a straightforward solution: the U.S. should buy food aid crops directly from local farmers in Africa. When the U.N. World Food Program did this, they were able to obtain 75 percent more corn to feed hungry families than when they purchased grain from factory farms in the U.S. Buying specifically from women farmers has an enormous added benefit. Studies consistently show that when poor women gain access to money, they use it to provide food, healthcare and education for their children.

Now is the perfect time to push for this innovative solution and Sudan is the best place to start. Here are three reasons why:

First, this fall, Congress will reform the 1961 U.S. Foreign Assistance Act, which governs how food aid is purchased and administered. The new policy should recognize that even widespread hunger is invariably a localized crisis and that food aid crops should be purchased directly from women farmers in the regions targeted to receive assistance.

Second, for the first time ever, women farmers in Sudan have organized a union, enabling them to produce enough grains to provide at least a modest portion of the region’s food aid. Sudan’s Women Farmers Union is supported by MADRE, an international women’s human rights organization, in partnership with a Sudanese group called Zenab for Women in Development.

Finally, in less than 100 days, Sudan will face a referendum that is likely to split the country in two, a potentially destabilizing vote that may lead to renewed violence, forced displacement and worsening hunger and poverty for thousands of families. At a time of impending crisis for Sudan, we can call for an improved U.S. food aid policy committed to buying local, sustainably grown crops from small-holder women farmers, giving them the resources they need to hold their communities together.

Last month, President Obama launched a new global development policy. In a speech at the United Nations, he said, “We must be more selective and focus our efforts where we have the best partners and where we can have the greatest impact.” Using our food aid dollars to support small-holder women farmers is a chance to do just that.
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Susskind is the policy and communications director of MADRE: Rights, Resources and Results for Women Worldwide.
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Copyright © 2010 by the American Forum. 10/10

MISSISSIPPI FORUM

By Hazel Gaines, MS, RN

Once again, Mississippi is the state with the highest rate of child deaths in the nation. The average rate for the country, according to the latest Centers for Disease Control and Prevention statistics available (2007), is 19 child deaths for every 100,000 children age birth to 14 years. The rate for Mississippi is almost twice that: 34 child deaths for every 100,000 children under age 15.

Mississippi’s Child Death Review Panel (CDRP) has been working since 2006 to bring down the number of preventable child deaths by determining why and how Mississippi children die. Operating under the auspices of the Mississippi State Department of Health, the CDRP works with over 20 state agencies, community organizations, and professional organizations to coordinate a review of unexpected child deaths from birth to age 18, including Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS). The CDRP issues a report for the previous year each December detailing the causes of the deaths of Mississippi children, and making recommendations for ways to decrease those deaths.

The latest CDRP Report details the causes of 278 deaths of the total 709 child deaths statewide in 2008. The 709 deaths in 2008 are a significant drop from the 745 child deaths reported for 2006 and the 765 deaths reported for 2007. Harrison and Rankin Counties had the highest number of child deaths at 17 and 13 respectively. Hinds County reported 11 child deaths, and Lincoln, Pearl River, Scott, Warren and Washington Counties each reported 8 deaths.

Of the 278 cases reviewed, more than 60 percent of the children who died were boys, 50 percent were white and 47 percent were African American. More than 15 percent of the children who died had an illness or other medical problem.

Of the 38 SIDS deaths, most babies died sleeping on their stomachs rather than on their backs, most had a smoker in the household (which has been associated with SIDS), and 76 percent were under four months of age.


The greatest number of preventable deaths, 76, was caused by vehicular crashes, most of which were car crashes. Forty, or more than half of the children killed in car crashes, were age 15-17. The number of children killed who were not wearing seatbelts has decreased since 2006 when Mississippi’s Primary Seatbelt Law was passed; in 2007 it was less than 40 percent. The overall numbers of children killed has also decreased since 2006, when 87 children were killed.

An increasing number of Mississippi children are killed or maimed in ATV crashes each year. Ten children were killed in ATV crashes in 2008.

Thirty Mississippi children were killed by firearms; 14 of these deaths were homicides, eight were suicides, and seven were accidental. Twenty-five of the children who died were boys, 23 were teens age 15-17, and 17 were killed by handguns. Firearms deaths have been increasing since 2006, when 18 such deaths were reported.

Mississippi has a high rate of fire deaths compared to other states: in 2008, seven children died and 71 percent were under three years of age. In 2007, 19 children died in fires.

Mississippi also has a high rate of child drownings compared to other states. In 2008, 14 children drowned and nine of those were under 5 years old. Most of the drownings happened in a natural setting such as a creek, a river or a pond.

The Child Death Review Panel continues to recommend that child injury and death prevention be a priority for policy makers. The Booster Seat Law of 2008, the Graduated Teen Driver’s License Bill of 2009, and the Jason Flatt Act of 2009 will all help to prevent child deaths in our state. The CDRP now recommends new ATV Safety laws in hopes of reversing the increasing number of children killed and severely injured in roll-overs and other ATV crashes. Too many children dying needlessly is one distinction Mississippi could do without.
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Gaines, MS, RN, is the coordinator of the Child Death Review Panel for the Mississippi State Department of Health.
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Copyright (C) 2010 by the Mississippi Forum 10/10

AMERICAN FORUM

By Sen. Dede Feldman

Anselm Roanhorse’s eyes grow large when he talks about his childhood on the Navajo reservation, herding sheep. “As a boy, I was out there for days, by myself, chasing sheep, protecting them, covering miles and miles of terrain,” he recalls. Now the Director of the Navajo Division of Health, Roanhorse explained to an obesity summit here in June that exercise was part of the traditional Navajo lifestyle, not an “add-on.”

“Our grandparents were not recreationally-oriented,” said Paul Pino, the chair of the health committee at Laguna Pueblo, a smaller settlement of Native Americans near Albuquerque. “But they were active, digging ditches for irrigation, plastering adobe walls or putting a new floor in the kiva, the center of traditional ceremonies.”

In as little as 15 years, all that has changed.

For Native American youth, digging ditches and herding sheep has been replaced by video games and chillin’ in front of the TV. Double Whoppers and Big Gulps, sold at local fast food outlets, have replaced fresh fruits and vegetables. The results of the cultural shift are dramatic.

On the sprawling Navajo reservation, for example, Roanhorse says 23,000 (out of approximately 250,000) Navajos, are now affected by diabetes; in 1940 there was only one documented case.

New Mexico’s Native Americans have two to three times the rate of obesity and diabetes than the overall population does; Indian youth are consistently more overweight than young people in the U.S. Most alarmingly, Native Americans here have the highest death rate from diabetes. The high death rate is particularly perplexing since American Indians are more likely to receive recommended screenings through the Indian Health Service.

Tribal communities, though, are tackling these chronic diseases. They are creating school and community programs to increase physical activity, encourage a return to traditional agriculture and promote healthy food choices. Their efforts are boosted by the cohesiveness of their communities and the commitment of their leaders.

At San Ildefonzo Pueblo, outside of Santa Fe, the Pueblo’s Governor, Perry Martinez, has issued at 5-2-1-0 challenge that has tribal members eating 5 fruits or vegetables per day, logging less than 2 hours of screen time, 1 or more hours of physical activity and 0 sweetened drinks. It’s part of “Keeping Po Woh Healthy—One Child at a Time.” The program uses garden mentors, walking trails and native language to deliver the message to children and their parents.

At Santa Clara Pueblo, elders are teaching kids how to identify medicinal plants, as well as edible ones. There’s a running club and lessons on how to prepare nutritious food. A University of New Mexico mobile health clinic brings health screening opportunities, and diabetes monitoring is done via cell phone. A wellness center is on the drawing board.

A more massive assault on the problem is underway on the Navajo reservation. “Just Move It,” is a series of runs and walks that depart each week from chapter houses and spread out through New Mexico and Arizona. Approximately 10,000 people participated last year with 30 to 150 participating in each event. The runs complement a more coordinated approach to school health in Northern Navajo schools.

For Native Americans and others confronting the obesity epidemic, it may require more. Citing escalating health care costs for the public, a number of states and local governments have attempted to use the same tactics against the junk food lobby that were used against Big Tobacco. New York and California now require food labeling for fat and sugar content echoing the FDA’s warning label on cigarettes.

In the past few years, Arkansas and Washington have taxed soda pop. Earlier this year, New York was unsuccessful at implementing a soda tax.

In New Mexico, beverage taxes present a particular challenge due to tribal sovereignty issues, which can cause a dual tax structure on and off reservations. It’s a challenge that the state and tribes overcame when the state raised tobacco taxes by 75 cents per pack in July. The new tax applies both on and off the reservation. It could serve as a model for a sugar sweetened beverage tax.

Meanwhile, tribal and community efforts continue with friends in high places. First Lady Michelle Obama has taken up the obesity cause, encouraging community gardens and even planting heirloom Native American seeds in the White House garden.
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Feldman (D-District 13) is a State Senator and Chairman of the Senate Public Affairs Committee.
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Copyright (C) 2010 by American Forum. 9/10

OHIO FORUM

By Greg Coleridge

Organizers are expecting hundreds of thousands of people will march on Washington on Oct. 2 to demand jobs, justice and education.

The “One Nation Coming Together” rally couldn't be timelier, as 15 million Americans are unemployed (including 600,000 Ohioans), another 11 million have stopped looking for work, and millions more are underemployed.

We have a national jobs emergency.

The 2008 financial implosion exasperated already massive jobs losses. Free trade, tax and corporate policies all encouraged corporations to move abroad and divert investments from real goods and services into speculative financial products.

The Obama administration's economic stimulus wasn't large enough and it lacked focus on hiring. It also added to the debt and deficit.

A massive national public works program is urgently needed. The private sector isn't creating jobs, so the public sector must. Shifting funds from a bloated military budget and ending tax credits to the super-rich are obvious financial sources. But there's another option -- one promoted by an Ohioan a century ago who arguably led this nation's first jobs rally.

Jacob Coxey, a businessman from Massillon, organized a 500-strong “Coxey’s Army” that marched from Massillon to Washington, D.C., in 1894 to promote federal intervention for job creation. The primary demand of this "petition in boots" was unique -- the direct printing and issuance of $500 million by the Federal Treasury to employ 4 million people.

What they did not promote was borrowing $500 million from bankers, which had to be repaid with interest, lining the pockets of the bankers. Nor did they advocate moving $500 million from one part of the federal budget to another, i.e. robbing Peter to pay Paul.

Coxey's Army members were "greenbackers," advocates for re-establishing the Lincoln administration’s policy that financed the Civil War with $400 million of government-issued funds.

Coxey's Army proposed two bills. The first, a "Good Roads Bill," would help farmers through $500 million issued by the federal government in legal tender notes, or greenbacks, to construct rural roads. The second, a noninterest-bearing bonds bill, would empower state and local governments to issue noninterest-bearing bonds to be used to borrow legal tender notes from the federal treasury. This money would be used to build urban libraries, schools, utility plants and marketplaces.

Millions of jobs would have been created -- debt-free.

"Money exists not by nature but by law," Aristotle said. What grants money credibility is its anointment by society. “We the people” should have ultimate democratic authority to issue and circulate money, not banks or bankers. The issuance of money should be democratized.

Unfortunately, that's not how it works in the United States. Money is privatized and corporatized. Private banks and the Federal Reserve create more than 95 percent of all our money. It is created literally "out of thin air" by banks and bankers for their own gain, regardless of society's needs. Banks can loan $10 for every $1 held in reserve.

A recent example of the corporatization of money was President Obama’s having to ask – almost plead -- with banks to provide more loans to small businesses.

Jacob Coxey, like Abraham Lincoln, understood that money should be publicly issued. History has demonstrated that when money is publicly issued to meet real physical and societal needs, there's no inflation.

The American Society of Civil Engineers estimates that we need $2.2 trillion to repair our nation's physical infrastructure. Spending publicly issued money on physical and human needs would improve the nation's infrastructure and create jobs without adding to the national debt or sparking inflation (unlike spending money on military warfare or Wall Street casino-like speculation).

The "American Monetary Act" proposed by the American Monetary Institute has developed a three-step plan for the democratization of money -- shifting its issuance from banks to “We the People.”

Those organizing and attending the upcoming national jobs rally must learn from Jacob Coxey’s army. We need to create a modern-day army that promotes the democratization of our money to address the current job crisis.
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Coleridge is Director of the Northeast Ohio American Friends Service Committee
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Copyright (C) 2010 by Ohio Forum. 9/10

AMERICAN FORUM

By Michael Mariotte

American taxpayers bailed out the banks. They bailed out auto manufacturers. But at least they were our banks and automakers. Now, taxpayers are once again being asked to lend a hand. This time it's to subsidize multi-billion-dollar foreign companies with names like Toshiba, Hitachi and Areva. If the going gets rough for them, taxpayers will be forced to dig into their pockets to bail them out, too.

America needs to invest in new forms of energy: to combat climate change and increase security by reducing our dependence on foreign suppliers. But that reality is being used by some on Capitol Hill to justify the expenditure of billions of dollars to construct new nuclear reactors – a high-cost, high-risk gamble.

Various proposals in both the House and Senate call for as much as $54 billion in taxpayer-supplied loan guarantees for new reactors. Another bill would put no ceiling on the amount of guarantees.

In the haste to make the case for these massive public investments there’s one detail that rarely receives much mention: The construction push will largely benefit global companies and overseas workers. They get the profits; U.S. taxpayers assume the risks.

All 18 of the energy companies seeking approval to build new reactors will be relying on foreign manufacturers to fill the bulk of their orders. That means revenue and jobs in Japan and France, not Ohio or North Carolina or any other state.

Foreign involvement in nuclear construction in this country goes even deeper than manufacturing. Two reactor projects at the head of the line for federal loan guarantees have foreign investors. Calvert Cliffs in Maryland is dominated by the French government-owned EDF Group and Areva (Constellation Energy is also a partner) and the South Texas Project is a partnership between NRG Energy of New Jersey, Toshiba and Tokyo Electric Power Company, both of Japan. A third reactor project awaiting approval, Nine Mile Point in New York, also is co-owned by Constellation and EDF.

Earlier this year, Sen. Charles Schumer (D-NY) took issue with the fact that federal stimulus money was being used to purchase foreign-made equipment for solar and wind projects. That money should be spent here, Schumer argued, not abroad. Unfortunately, that same question has not been raised when it comes to insuring billions in nuclear investments.

Each of these new reactors is estimated to cost about $10 billion or more. If the projects fail – and the Congressional Budget Office has put the odds of that happening at 50-50 – U.S. taxpayers will be forced to foot the bill to make good on the debt. In other words, another bailout to benefit Areva or Toshiba or Hitachi.

Why are U.S. taxpayers being asked to stake profitable global companies looking to make money in American markets? Wall Street is gun-shy. Investors there have looked at the risks of nuclear power and said no. So, to get these projects moving, nuclear backers in Washington have volunteered the taxpayers.

Why aren’t U.S. companies vying for these projects?

The U.S. nuclear manufacturing industry is moribund, its production facilities shuttered. No new reactors have been ordered in this country since Palo Verde in 1973.

Once, the number of U.S. suppliers licensed to produce nuclear-grade building components was 400; now it is down to 80. Today, for example, the only companies capable of building giant steel reactor vessels are located in Japan, China and Russia. While some new manufacturing capacity is being developed in the U.S., it will be years, if ever, before it could play a major role in reactor construction. Thus the U.S. is forced to look overseas for the foreseeable future.

We live in a global economy. American consumers are accustomed to seeing foreign-made labels on their clothing, cars and computers. Foreign investment in the U.S. is nothing new, either.

But what sets apart this latest entry into the U.S. market is the fact that when it comes to nuclear expansion, Washington wants taxpayers to take the risk out of making those investments. That wouldn’t make sense even if the nuclear companies’ owners were all living on Main Street. It makes absolutely no sense to expect U.S. taxpayers to bail out foreign companies – or the French government – if things go sour.
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Mariotte is Executive Director of the Nuclear Information and Resource Service.
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Copyright (C) 2010 by American Forum. 9/10

AMERICAN FORUM

By Antonio Gonzalez and Kathleen Rogers

On September 17, 1787, a group of visionaries and leaders signed our Constitution. They were intent on creating a functioning government based on universal truths and extraordinary principles in an environment complicated by disparate regional economies and wildly divergent parochial interests. Back then, differing proposals for the shape of our government divided our country into two camps, but the necessity to address the need for a common defense and a cohesive economic policy made our Constitution a great pragmatic solution that brought together two polarized sides.

Within a few years of our Constitution’s signing, these political camps became political parties and they refined their differences as they mobilized. At times, violent partisanship became so common that outgoing president George Washington, in his farewell speech to the American public denounced the dangers of such divisions: “The alternate domination of one faction over another, sharpened by the spirit of revenge, natural to party dissension, which in different ages and countries has perpetrated the most horrid enormities, is itself a frightful despotism.”

Notwithstanding his warning, our country has been fortunate to have had leaders that have embraced bipartisanship to produce some remarkable achievements worthy of the U.S. Constitutional framers. President Truman and a bipartisan coalition led the U.S. to invest in the Marshall Plan, which has cemented stable relations with Japan and Europe for the last 60 years. Lyndon Baines Johnson steered Congress through polemic waters in order to pass the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts, despite the hit that he would take from the Southern Democrats. The best examples of bipartisanship result when thought-leaders of different perspectives came together on common principles and developed pragmatic solutions free of partisan politics.

Unfortunately, the leadership that existed then to design and implement lasting solutions that did not require special interest payoffs is not present in our government today. Instead, we are steadily sidling into the same reality that President Washington warned us about over 200 years ago.

Time and time again -- no politics-free solutions have been attempted to address our nation’s most pressing problems. Instead, Washington, DC has punted on issues such as climate change, immigration reform, Wall Street loopholes and unsustainable fiscal policies.

In the 1970s, President Nixon and a Democrat-controlled Congress passed the Clean Air and Clean Water Acts. Those groundbreaking environmental protections passed almost unanimously. Compare that to today where despite overwhelming support for action on clean energy and climate change (70 percent), not a single Republican Senator would even cross the aisle to vote on a climate change bill -- not even Senator Lindsay Graham who co-authored the bill, nor Senator John McCain who at one point proposed more ambitious climate bills.

Bipartisanship for immigration reform has also faltered. The last major immigration law passed in 1986 with overwhelming dual party support. Since then, however, our evolving world has exposed deep problems in our current system and still, despite consistent popular support for a compassionate and effective solution, immigration reform hasn’t moved in Congress. In the meantime, millions of families and small businesses face unanswered questions that impact day-to-day life while the parties play political football with the Latino vote and border “swing states.”

Although James Madison famously said that there were three great principles of the Constitution: “compromise, compromise, compromise,” he also said it “will be of little avail to the people… if the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be read, or so incoherent that they cannot be understood.” Today our lack of commitment to principled solutions lead us towards the same sprawling unintelligible laws that Madison warned us about.

If our leaders want to be remembered for legacies of action and courage reminiscent of America’s architects, they need to manifest leadership, the type of leadership that yields bipartisanship -- a common thread in our nation’s proudest moments.
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Rogers is president of Earth Day Network. Gonzalez is president of the Southwest Voter Registration Education Project (SVREP) and the William C. Velasquez Institute.
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Copyright (C) 2010 by the American Forum. 9/10

NEW MEXICO EDITORIAL FORUM

By Lydia Pendley and Kathryn C. Sherlock

The working families of New Mexico and the nation are the backbone of our economic and cultural identity. Working families are so essential that our city, state and nation have created public policies and programs designed to help them to survive.

The Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) and Child Tax Credit (CTC) are just such tools. Both programs encourage low and middle-income people to work, even when their jobs pay too little to live on. These tax-credit programs also keep millions of children out of poverty each year, building a stronger future for our next generation.

The EITC for low-income working individuals and families is a refundable federal income tax credit. It has received bipartisan support since Congress passed it in 1975. The EITC is designed to "make work pay" by decreasing the impact of taxes that low-wage workers pay on their earnings by supplementing their wages. The intention is to move a family with a full-time minimum-wage worker above the poverty line. The EITC is the largest poverty-reduction program in the U.S., and, in 2009, it was expanded as part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) to provide more help to married couples and low-income families with three or more children. In 2009, the EITC lifted 6.6 million people out of poverty, half of them children.

The CTC is designed to lessen the impact of income taxes for families raising children. Again, as part of the ARRA, the CTC was improved to allow families earning between $3,000 and $13,000 the chance to claim the credit. Previously, these working families were not allowed to claim the CTC. This change alone has helped 13 million low-income children and their families.

As a nation, we are right to invest in tax credits for working families. The EITC and CTC (and the improvements to them enacted last year) have been essential in helping families get back on their feet, especially in these tough economic times.

Beyond helping individual families, EITC dollars are helping to get our economy moving again. In 2007, across New Mexico, over 319,000 households claimed the EITC and/or the CTC, thus bringing over $470 million into New Mexico’s economy. As many of us know, the dollars received by working families go right back into New Mexico’s economy.

The 2009 improvements to the EITC and CTC are due to expire at the end of 2010. If these long-overdue changes are allowed to end, thousands of working families in New Mexico will be put in financial jeopardy. In our state, 177,000 children would receive a smaller CTC and 78,000 people would receive less EITC.

At a time when New Mexico’s economy needs positive improvement, removing these benefits to our working families makes no sense at all.

It’s time to reaffirm our commitment to real family values and make the 2009 improvements to the EITC and CTC permanent.
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Pendley and Sherlock are Co-Group Leaders of RESULTS-Santa Fe.
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Copyright (C) 2010 by the American Forum. 9/10