American Forum Op-Ed

Thursday, June 11, 2009

What Court Ruling on Identity Theft Means to Migrants

Posted by American Forum at 11:57 AM

By Dr. Erik Camayd-Freixas

In May, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of Ignacio Flores-Figueroa, a Mexican migrant worker from Illinois convicted of identity theft in 2007. Like most migrant workers, Flores-Figueroa did not know that the social security number in the false papers he was forced to buy in order to get work was a number that actually belonged to another person.

The crime of identity theft was established by an act of Congress in 1998, to deal with the growing problem of people stealing credit cards and personal information to empty bank accounts or get thousands of dollars in credit under someone else’s name. After 9/11/2001, authorities feared that false identities could also be used to facilitate acts of terrorism. This led to the Identity Theft Penalty Enhancement Act of 2004, which made it an aggravated felony punishable by an additional two-year minimum prison sentence.

Since 2006, overzealous prosecutors realized they could use this anti-terrorist weapon to criminalize illegal immigration – which is only a civil offense. So they began testing the waters by charging migrant workers in isolated cases. They won convictions and appeals. One of those cases was that of Flores-Figueroa, who appealed to the 8th Circuit Court and lost. This success emboldened immigration prosecutors to apply the charge against 300 workers at the May 12, 2008 raid in Postville, Iowa.

The Postville raid and prosecution was a pilot project intended as a model for future massive raids across the country. But it backfired. After acting as an interpreter in the proceedings, I denounced their abuse of process in an essay that prompted a congressional investigation and the uniform condemnation by the American legal community. That is why at the August 25 raid in Laurel, Mississippi, only eight out of 595 workers arrested were criminally charged. However, if the Supreme Court had decided to uphold the charge earlier this month, Postville would now be the norm for the massive criminalization of workers in future immigration enforcement.

The identity theft statute reads: “Knowingly uses the means of identification of another person during and in relation to a felony violation.” The prosecution contended that “knowingly” applies to “uses a means of identification” but does not apply to “of another person”; therefore, such knowledge was not necessary to convict. The Supreme Court unanimously disagreed in a historic 9-0 decision. The Postville scandal had made a difference. It showed how simple semantics and biased interpretation of the law resulted in massive injustice.

Given that my inside account of the Postville prosecutions had cracked the case wide open, I was approached by a team from NYU Law School to help prepare an Amicus Brief to the U.S. Supreme Court in favor of Flores-Figueroa. I told the legal team that, as a linguist, I saw no ambiguity in the statute: “Knowingly” as an adverb of a “transitive verb” must apply to the entire object phrase, “uses the means of ID of another person.” Further, most of the detainees we interviewed did not even know what a social security number was. Many had their papers filled out at the plant because they could not read or write. I described the proceedings as a “lottery of justice”: If the made-up social security number belonged to another person, you were hammered with identity theft; if it was a vacant number, you were saved by sheer luck. These were the same rationales cited in the Supreme Court’s decision.

This decision is hugely significant. The Postville strategy was to threaten these workers with identity theft in order to force them, guilty or not, to plead to lesser charges and accept five months in jail followed by automatic deportation. With our immigration judges overloaded and detention beds full to capacity, migrants were being arrested faster than they could be processed, thereby putting a cap on raids and arrests. Postville’s criminal “fast-tracking” provided a way to circumvent the immigration backlog, giving raids an unlimited green light. The Supreme Court closed that loophole and turned the light to red.

The 9-0 decision overturned three Appeal Courts and thousands of individual cases. It meant that Postville and countless other proceedings were nothing but a big mistake, based on a biased interpretation of the law that put politics and prejudice before justice.
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Camayd-Freixas is a professor of modern languages at Florida International University.
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Copyright (C) 2009 by the American Forum. 6/09

Design for a New Economy

Posted by American Forum at 11:26 AM

By David Korten and Doug Pibel

Politicians and the business press are looking for signs that the economic crisis is over and we’ll soon be back on track. Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke speaks of “green shoots” of recovery. President Obama sees “glimmers of hope.” All the massive infusions of borrowed stimulus and bailout money are aimed at the dream of getting us back to where we were during the recent “boom.” Do we really want to go there? And even if we do, is such an economy realistic today?

Yes, the bubble economy of the ’00s created mountains of paper wealth. Between tax cuts for the wealthiest and increasingly exotic (and risky) forms of investment, the richest fraction of Americans did very well, indeed.

But during that boom, incomes stayed flat for the overwhelming majority of Americans even as productivity soared, millions lost health care coverage, costs of energy, housing, food, and education climbed, and debt reached record levels.

If economic recovery means returning to those times, there’s no reason for most of us to want it. This economic crisis may be the best opportunity in our lifetimes to shut down the unfair and destructive Wall Street system and reboot with a values-based operating system for a new economy designed to support social and environmental balance and the businesses that create sustainable and fair prosperity.

We have seen what happens when government and big business operate in secret. The new system must be open to public scrutiny. It must be locally rooted in strong communities, distribute wealth equitably, and balance public and private interests. Society is better served by a system that favors productive work and investment, limits speculation, and suppresses inflation in all forms -- including financial bubbles.

Here’s how we can get there.

1. Responsible Enterprise. Service to the community, rather than profit, is the primary justification for a business to exist. Enterprises are most likely to serve their communities when they are human-scale and owned by responsible local investors with an active interest in their operation beyond mere profit. No corporation should be too big to fail. The new economy will use anti-trust to break up large corporations into their component parts and sell them to responsible local owners, including family, worker, and community owned enterprises, and cooperative alliances among locally rooted firms.

2. Community Banking. The government is buying ownership shares in failed Wall Street banks with the expectation of eventually reselling them to private interests. A better plan, as many economists are recommending, is to force bankrupt banks into government receivership. These banks should be broken up and their branches sold to local investors. These community banks, credit unions and mutual savings and loan associations should be chartered to serve Main Street needs, lending to local manufacturers, merchants, farmers, and homeowners within a strong regulatory framework.

3. Real Wealth Investment. Contrary to the claims of Wall Street, financial speculation does not create real wealth. Since it serves no public interest, is predatory, and causes instability, it should be strongly discouraged. The money that has been used for speculation must be redirected to productive investment that meets our essential needs responsibly, equitably, and sustainably using green technologies and closed-loop production cycles.

4. Middle-Class Fiscal Policy. It is time to reinstitute the policies that created the American middle class after World War II. Restore progressive income tax with a top rate of 91 percent as under the Republican Eisenhower Administration; favor universal participation in responsible home ownership and a family wage. Because no one has a natural birth entitlement to any greater share of the real wealth of society than anyone else, use the estate tax to help restore social balance at the end of each lifetime.

5. Government-Issued Money. The government can and should issue debt-free money to create living wage jobs, rebuild public infrastructure, and restore domestic productive capacity. Properly administered, this money will flow to community-based enterprises and help revitalize Main Street market economies engaged in the production of real wealth. It is folly, however, for government to finance those projects by borrowing money created by the same private banks that created the financial mess.

Current proposals for dealing with the economic collapse fall far short of a real solution to the current economic crisis. We face an urgent need to expand and deepen the debate to advance options that can build sustainable prosperity for all our children and grandchildren.
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Korten is author of Agenda for a New Economy, and the lead article in the summer issue of YES! Magazine. Pibel is Managing Editor of YES! Magazine.
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Copyright (C) 2009 by the American Forum. 6/09

Fair and Just Immigration Reform

Posted by American Forum at 11:20 AM

MISSISSIPPI FORUM

By Rev. Jeremy Tobin

The history of immigrant labor in this country is as old as the country itself.

Given political or economical expediency, immigrants were given legal protection and a path to citizenship, or were locked out due to politically dominated regulations. That being said, goods we take for granted, and can purchase fairly cheaply, are often the result of immigrant labor.

The 12 million undocumented workers in the U.S. are usually paid below standard wages with no health or other benefits. Many are often cheated. Threatened with deportation, or worse, immigrants do not call on law enforcement for help. Recently an undocumented immigrant died, afraid to call for help after his home was invaded. These conditions create a subclass of people with a strong work ethic, who are easy to exploit, and readily available.

This is not the “American way.” The situation has to change, and it has to be on the side of foreign born workers who only want what everyone else wants -- the opportunity to support their families and live with dignity.

Immigration laws and regulations are a patchwork of inconsistencies, contradictions, and injustices. State laws are often worse. The raids on workplaces that have captured media attention tear families apart and trash human rights.

Organizations long associated with anti-black racism have reinvented themselves as watchdogs of national security. They are xenophobic and racist. They are afraid that if immigrants unite with other exploited groups, real reform in American labor law might happen. Massive profits, at the expense of exploited groups while the average Joe is able to buy things cheaply, is what has been accepted as the status quo.

To exploit people for profit is unjust. The current restrictions on visas are largely driven by racism. In the 50s it was the “yellow peril.” In the 2000s it is the “brown peril.” The folks that are benefitting from this racism are laughing all the way to the bank.

Fair and just immigration policy must include: a path to legal standing for those currently undocumented; no guest worker provisions; the right to seek employment like everyone else, with the same pay scale and benefits as everyone else; and the right to organize and/or join unions.

Those espousing comprehensive immigration policy say they want guest workers, but “they should be treated fairly and humanely.” In fact, there have been guest workers in one form or another over the past 40 years and they have been consistently exploited. If they quit, or get fired, they lose their status. If they seek better employment, they lose their status. In effect, guest workers are all but indentured servants to the company that sponsors and hires them. Their pay is at the mercy of the company. The imbalance between profit and employment all but guarantees worker exploitation.

Further, many of the crazy schemes like a great wall to keep out immigrants are a sham. As long as NAFTA and CAFTA are ruining native economies and driving farmers and others into destitution, the migration of the desperate to find work is unstoppable. The United Nations and religious leaders everywhere, defend the right to migrate, not only for decent work, but to escape persecution.

We have the opportunity and the will to correct the imbalances of our immigration laws. We can do it both to benefit immigrants by giving them the opportunity for a new life, and to enrich our country with their many cultures. This is our challenge in 2009.
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Rev. Tobin is a member of the Mississippi Immigrant Rights Alliance.
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Copyright (C) 2009 by the Mississippi Forum 5/09

Seeking Sensible Priorities to Help Uninsured Neighbors

Posted by American Forum at 11:17 AM

TENNESSEE EDITORIAL FORUM

By Tony Garr

We’re in a pretty tough economic time. We’ve seen this before and have pulled our neighbors and ourselves through by using our good sense and decency.

But, help me understand this:

More than a quarter million Tennesseans have lost their jobs and their health insurance since the recession started in December 2007. Before then, there were 850,000 uninsured Tennesseans. In May 140,000, TennCare enrollees began receiving notice that their TennCare would be ending. By the end of September, as few as 20,000 will retain their eligibility. In February of this year, Tennessee got good news when it learned that it was getting an additional $1.1 billion for its TennCare program to help people stay enrolled, keeping Tennesseans secure in these insecure economic times.

Stay with me, I have some more puzzling information.

The state closed the Medically Needy TennCare program for adults in May 2005, promising to re-open it soon. Now May 2009 has passed, and it‘s still shut tight. In 2005 the program was frozen, closed to new enrollees, leaving 97,000 enrolled. In 2007, the state changed the eligibility rules, allowing people to count only medical bills that they owe that are only three months old, not older medical bills. As a result, when TennCare conducted an eligibility determination in 2008, less than 1,000 people remained eligible. Now the governor proposes to keep the program closed. Does the governor think that because he’s shut the door on these folks they no longer exist—that Tennesseans aren’t hurting like other Americans; therefore, there is no need to re-open this program?

Now, for the tough part: tricky political math. State funds, not federal, proposed for the TennCare budget for fiscal year 2010 are less than they were for fiscal year, 2009, yet TennCare will actually cover fewer people and receive over $300 million additional federal dollars for fiscal year 2009, over $500 million for fiscal year 2010, and over $200 million for fiscal year 2011.

Of course, the state needs to balance its budget, but, it can do so without sacrificing some of its citizens who are in the economic abyss. So should it be okay for the state, the place for service of last resort for the most vulnerable of its citizens, to shrug its shoulder, turn away, and just say, “You are on your own. Good luck!”?

There are thousands of struggling families and now is the time--not during good times, but during bad times--when folks really need help. And there is no good reason for the state not to help. There is an existing program and more than enough existing funds reserved for health care to help Tennessee families.

Now is the time to re-open the TennCare Medically Needy program. This is a no-brainer. It will help thousands of eligible Tennesseans obtain medical coverage. It will do it with less state money and more federal money, and it will not obligate the state for future coverage beyond 2011 when the stimulus money runs out.

Here’s how it works:

• Tennessee will get three federal dollars for each state dollar under the stimulus package. It used to get only two federal dollars; • People who qualify can only get coverage for one year. This is like a bridge, like COBRA. For this reason, one-time money is what is needed. No problem here because TennCare has a reserve of about $500 million dollars and the state has a rainy day fund of 750 million; • It will only help people who have low incomes and who are either disabled, elderly, or the caregivers of children under the age of 21. By opening this program, it will not help everyone, but it will help thousands of very vulnerable Tennesseans.

It all adds up to priorities. Are working, low-income folks worth it? Or are they somehow undeserving because they have nothing to give to a re-election campaign?

Do state legislators care? Do Tennesseans care? In these tough times, are we still the decent people we say we are? I believe we are.
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Garr is executive director of the Tennessee Health Care Campaign.
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Copyright (C) 2009 by the Tennessee Editorial Forum. 6/09

Monday, June 8, 2009

How a Late-Term Abortion Saved My Life

Posted by American Forum at 12:29 PM

By Cecily Kellogg

Last Sunday morning, a man walked into a church in Wichita, Kansas and shot to death Dr. George Tiller. Dr. Tiller was volunteering as an usher that Sunday, so he was standing in the lobby of the church when the gunman entered. Unfortunately, Dr. Tiller’s death didn’t really come as a surprise; his medical practice centered on performing abortions, particularly late term abortions, and he’d been attacked before. Regardless of the near constant threats and harassment he received, Dr. Tiller was committed to his work. Why? Because he believed that “abortion is a matter of survival for women.”

It was for me. In October of 2004, I was pregnant with my sons Nicholas and Zachary. With great joy and expectation, my husband, my best friend, and I visited my doctor for a normal growth ultrasound. I was nearly 23 weeks pregnant, hovering at the start of the third trimester. Within moments it was clear something was wrong; one of the boys was still and had no heartbeat. When I met with my doctor, routine screening revealed the worst: the symptoms I’d been experiencing that I thought were normal with a twin pregnancy were actually evidence that I was sick -- very, very sick. I was immediately admitted to the hospital with severe preeclampsia, and though my doctors tried mightily to slow the progression of the disease, by the morning of October 27, 2004 a group of doctors stood at my bedside and delivered the worst news I’d ever received.

I was in advanced kidney failure. My blood pressure was skyrocketing, and it could not be controlled with medications. My liver was beginning to decline. The horrific headache I was experiencing could no longer be treated with pain medications because they were afraid it would depress my ability to breathe when I began to have the seizures they expected at any moment. I would soon likely suffer a stroke or a heart attack. In other words, I was going to die unless the pregnancy was terminated. Immediately.

There was no hope for my surviving son. He was too tiny and too frail to be viable. With my dangerously high blood pressure, a c-section would have likely caused me to bleed to death, and inducing labor would have stressed my system too much. My safest option was the procedure known as an intact dilation and extraction. It would save my life, and preserve my future fertility. As luck would have it, my obstetrician happened to be one of three doctors in the Philadelphia area that was both trained and willing to do the procedure. Within an hour of receiving my bad news, I lay in the surgical suite, covered in tubes and wires, weeping inconsolably as the doctors tried to offer comfort as they prepped me for surgery.

It was the worst day of my life.

After I came home from the hospital, grieving, I searched and found other women like me -- women whose lives were saved by the late-term medical termination of a pregnancy. I also met women who chose to spare their children from agonizing health conditions and birth defects by having an abortion. What I learned is that we are rare; only 1.1 percent of all abortion are performed after the 21st week of pregnancy (according to the Guttmacher Institute), and doctors only perform them in cases of extreme medical need. Dr. Tiller himself never performed a late term abortion without counseling the parents -- and getting a second opinion from another doctor. My doctor described the day of my surgery as the worst in his professional career.

With the help of other women like me, I grieved. I healed. I tried again, and in June of 2006, my wild and fierce daughter Victoria was born. As I healed, I came to realize how lucky I was. Yes, I said lucky. This was in 2004, before the Partial Birth Abortion Ban became law, and my doctors were able to move quickly to save my life without worrying about breaking the law. My doctor knew the procedure and was willing to perform it; something that has already become rare and will be rarer still if doctors have to put their lives on the line to perform this life saving medical procedure. If it’s you or your daughter, will you be so lucky?
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Kellogg is a freelance writer living outside of the Philadelphia area. She has blogged about her experience at http://www.uppercasewoman.com/.
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Copyright (C) 2009 by the American Forum. 5/09

Wednesday, June 3, 2009

Every Woman Should Have Reproductive Choices

Posted by American Forum at 3:06 PM

VIRGINIA FORUM

By Lindsey Oliver

When I was 16 I had an abortion. It was both difficult to arrange and pay for. Yet this pivotal event resulted in a lifelong commitment to working towards a world with reproductive justice for everyone. The sad part isn’t that I had an abortion, but that there were so many barriers. Even more disheartening is that I know I am not the only person who lacks access to a safe and legal abortion.

My experience led me to volunteer at one of Richmond’s most targeted abortion clinics. I helped protect patients from the aggressive and sometimes violent harassment they often receive from protestors when entering or exiting the clinic. One day someone walking by gave us $20 and encouraged us all to take ourselves out for pizza. But we had just witnessed several women leaving the clinic without getting their abortions because they couldn't afford the procedure. So we took that $20 and helped one woman. The experience helping just that one woman made me realize how many more need help. So at age 19 I co-founded the Richmond Reproductive Freedom Project. The fund primarily helps women who cannot afford to pay for their abortions, but it also provides education and advocacy in our city. Abortion funds like ours were set up in 41 states in order to ensure that poor women were able to have the same access to reproductive choice as everyone else.

The women we fund are poor -- many lack access to education, good jobs and health care for themselves and their children. Most often they are young, and are already mothers. They are always in a state of desperation. These women need and deserve help the most. I am often asked how these women are allowed to fall through the cracks. One of the many answers to that question is Henry Hyde, the man most directly responsible for denying millions of women’s access to an abortion just because they are poor.

After the Roe v. Wade decision decriminalized abortion in 1973, Medicaid -- the national system that offers financial support for medical care to low-income Americans -- covered abortion care without restriction. But in 1976, Representative Henry Hyde of Illinois introduced and passed an amendment to the federal budget that limited federal funding for abortion care. The Hyde Amendment has been passed with the federal budget every single year since.

Although 15 states use their own funds to cover abortions under many circumstances, Virginia is not one of them. This leaves the Commonwealth’s poorest women without resources to determine the size and shape of their own families. In the absence of public funding, abortion funds pick up what slack they can. Last year, abortion funds across the country, including RRFP, raised and disbursed more than $3 million to assist 21,000 women in paying for their abortions.

However, grassroots abortion funds like ours can only help a fraction of all women who need it. We will never be able to be able to take the place of public funding. That is why we need to restore Medicaid funding for abortion.

The National Network of Abortion Funds, an organization composed of 103 grassroots abortion funds in the U.S., Canada, Mexico and overseas, is now taking on the Hyde Amendment through the “Hyde-30 Years is Enough!” campaign. The 80+ organizational members of the Hyde Campaign are working to repeal the Hyde Amendment and restore dignity to poor women.

For women who are struggling to make ends meet and who do not have insurance that covers abortion care, the legal right to have an abortion does not guarantee access. The restrictions imposed by the Hyde Amendment unfairly jeopardize the health and well-being of low-income women and their families. Women who do not have the ability to pay for abortion services may resort to attempting a self-induced abortion or obtaining unsafe, illegal abortions from untrained practitioners. Even though the Hyde Amendment has exceptions for rape, incest and life endangerment, Medicaid virtually never pays even for abortions that meet those exemptions.

As the Richmond Reproductive Freedom Project celebrates our fifth year as a nonprofit, I feel the urge to take a moment to reflect on the hundreds of women’s lives we have directly impacted. However, the need for the health services we support calls for more action. It’s time to make a full range of reproductive health services available to all Virginia women.
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Oliver is the cofounder of Richmond Reproductive Freedom Project. At 25 years old, she is the youngest person on the board of the National Network of Abortion Funds.
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Copyright (C) 2009 by the Virginia Forum. 5/09

Monday, June 1, 2009

Renewable Energy Can Supply America’s New Energy Demand

Posted by American Forum at 3:59 PM

By Dennis Markatos-Soriano

Federal Energy Regulatory Commission director Jon Wellinghoff recently stated that the U.S. may not need any new coal or nuclear power plants. Due to our tremendous renewable energy potential, the rising challenge of global warming, and the high cost of new conventional plants, I think he’s right.

The U.S. can meet future electricity demand by deploying efficiency and renewable energy.

The potential for renewable energy is great. The U.S. has more wind and solar potential than all its oil, gas and coal reserves. Our current total electrical generating capacity of 1,000 GW is dwarfed by the combination of onshore and offshore wind potential of ~3,000 GW cited by Interior Secretary Salazar. And solar power's potential is many times greater than that if we deploy panels on less than 1 percent of our land. Add to that the potential of geothermal, hydropower, and biomass -- and fossil fuels begin to look like a dinosaur of the 20th century that will soon be replaced.

The price of new renewable energy is decreasing dramatically and may soon be lower than new fossil fuel power supply. For instance, solar photovoltaic modules have fallen from $20 per watt in the early 1980s to below $3 per watt today. Between 2004 and 2008, white-hot demand growth that outpaced solar supply growth prevented prices from falling. But now that supply has caught up with demand, 2009 prices continue downward.

Fossil fuels have powered our rising standard of living since the late 1800s. But now that we recognize large current and future costs from greenhouse gas pollution, we must cap such pollution and lower our emissions. We successfully lowered lead emissions from gasoline in the 1980s and sulfur dioxide from coal smokestacks in the 1990s. A similar cap (with emissions trading) to lower carbon emissions is now being considered in Congress. Such a framework gives renewable energy the opportunity to grow in electrical market share from 10 percent today to over 20 percent by 2020.

The renewables market is poised to meet all new electricity demand. Of renewables' 10 percent share of electricity, hydro contributes the most -- followed by wind, biomass, geothermal, and solar. Renewable capacity represented over half of new capacity in 2008 (with wind power growing a record 8.5 GW and solar .36 GW). By 2011, renewable capacity growth can provide the ~15 GW per year our grid needs without adding expensive new coal or nuclear power plants. By the mid-2010s, renewable electricity can replace retiring old coal power plants, especially in the wind-rich Midwest and the solar-rich Southwest.

U.S. electricity demand growth is slowing and may soon stagnate even as population continues to climb. From 9 percent per year in the 1950s, demand growth has fallen each decade to ~7 percent, 4.2 percent, 2.6 percent, 2.3 percent, and then ~1 percent so far in the 2000s. Today's recession erased the need for new electric capacity recently as electricity use fell almost 1 percent in 2008 and is projected to fall much further in 2009. Electricity demand is not expected to recover to 2007 levels until 2011.

This tough economic period is an opportunity to build a more secure economy by spurring our recovery through efficiency and renewables. As long as the recent stimulus bill is executed well, we can hold demand constant through living more efficiently and implementing smarter grid design.

Deploying efficiency and renewables can support millions of green jobs in our country and strengthen our economy as we free ourselves from huge foreign oil bills. Becoming the global leader in low-carbon energy and efficiency is a path to prosperity in a world focused on reducing emissions in the decades ahead.

We maintained economic health in the past by leading innovations of the 20th century. A domestic market was always crucial for success, such as U.S. computer demand driving Silicon Valley's advances. Now, a domestic market for efficiency and renewable energy will help us regain our economic footing.

Jon Wellinghoff is right. Our country has the renewable resources to take advantage of falling costs for wind and solar power. The time is ripe to aggressively match this deployment with efficient usage, simultaneously saving ratepayers thousands and helping preserve a stable global climate.
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Markatos-Soriano is the director of Sustainable Energy Transition (http://www.setenergy.org/), a nonprofit dedicated to helping campuses and communities throughout the country move to a climate-friendly energy future based on efficiency and renewables.
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Copyright (C) 2009 by the American Forum. 5/09

Friday, May 29, 2009

87-year old women Strives Self for Justice

Posted by American Forum at 4:53 PM

UPDATE: 87-year-old Chicago hunger strike participant hospitalized in Springfield. Click Here to Read Story.

Watch Mahaley Summerville's Personal Testimony

What would you do to save a child’s life? -- IL Residents Go Hungry for Justice

Posted by American Forum at 12:33 PM

What would you do to save a child’s life? What would you do to save the lives of 300,000 children?

I work for the American Friends Service Committee but now I’m at the Capitol in Springfield with five other people from various communities in Illinois doing a hunger strike. We are hungry for justice. We felt this drastic step was necessary to demonstrate to our legislators the seriousness of cutting human services for the most vulnerable people.

I’m here participating in this hunger strike for my granddaughter who is a type 1 diabetic who requires two different types of insulin, and takes four to six shots every day even on holidays. I’m going hungry for five days for my granddaughter and the 300,000 children that would lose healthcare if the human service budget cuts are passed by the legislature. My five days of hunger is not detrimental to my life as the loss of healthcare is to the lives of the 300,000 children if those cuts occur.

My granddaughter will celebrate her seventh birthday on Sunday, May 31. I may not be there to celebrate her birthday but when I go home I want to tell her I love her. I want to go home knowing that my granddaughter and 300,000 have healthcare.

--Margaret Jackson, age 55, Homewood, IL

Watch her personal testimony

Thursday, May 28, 2009

Illinois Residents on Hunger Strike for Budget Justice

Posted by American Forum at 2:17 PM

Community residents continue their hunger strike in the State Capitol building, with only a few days left in session and more than $7 billion in cuts to vital state programs and services looming. Close to 200 community allies will join Hungry for Justice, an ad hoc group of residents aged 24 to 87, to send the clear message to the Legislature that they must protect the safety net for seniors, children, and working families, and pass a fair revenue increase.

“I’m blessed to be in good health, but what about all the seniors who aren’t?” said Brenda Hobson of Westchester, age 65. “If the General Assembly votes cut these programs, we’re all in trouble. That’s why I’m here.”

Slashing core programs such as home care services for seniors and people with disabilities, prevention programs that reduce violence, teen pregnancies, and substance abuse, and education and safety programs such as parent patrols and Grow Your Own teachers is unacceptable. An estimated 5 million Illinois families depend on these programs. At a time of economic crisis, cuts to our safety net are the worst possible action the Legislature can take.
“I’m not worried about my health,” said Mahaley Somerville, 87. “I’m worried about the health of my communities if we try and fix this budget by removing these programs.”

“My focus is the children – what will happen to them if we cut education and healthcare?” said Linda Sarate, who today joined the original 5 hunger strikers and will continue with them through May 31st. “Our communities are already suffering – every day I see the food pantry lines across the street get longer and longer. I’m joining the fast because people’s ability to live is already on the line.”

Hungry for Justice plans to continue the hunger strike until May 31st unless the General Assembly passes a budget that raises new revenue, increases tax fairness for working families, and protects the safety net. New hunger strikers will join every day, and faith and community members plan on supporting Hungry for Justice in Springfield and across the state by undertaking one-day solidarity fasts. Hungry for Justice is staying at the offices of the Black Caucus in Springfield, and appreciates their providing haven for the hunger strikers.

Wednesday, May 27, 2009

Stepping up to the Plate

Posted by American Forum at 12:54 PM

NORTH CAROLINA EDITORIAL FORUM

By W. Hodding Carter III

Private foundations are among the greatest of American innovations.

They funnel private wealth into tax sheltered institutions that in turn support public institutions and purposes. At their best, they have been catalysts for civic and cultural development, economic revitalization and educational innovation.

North Carolina in particular is singularly fortunate to have a strong philanthropic tradition represented by a number of vibrant foundations with a well-developed sense of mission and focus. While the Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation comes immediately to mind, it is hardly alone. Mention community and economic development, educational innovation, environmental protection and racial justice, and you immediately think of the central role played by North Carolina foundations.

But in a world gripped by economic crisis, a jobless rate moving rapidly toward the worst in 60 years, and an ever-widening gap between the few who are rich and the many who are not, philanthropy has to do much, much more. Reflecting on past accomplishments is useful only as an incentive to innovation in the here and now.

In particular, the foundation world needs to refocus its approach to better assist those who are least able to help themselves. One way to do this is to make grants in ways that promote effectiveness. That means providing more unrestricted support so that nonprofits have the flexibility they need to respond to changing conditions. It also means giving longer-term funding and multiyear grants.

Foundations should also spend more to help nonprofits speak with a louder and more effective voice in advocating public policies that directly benefit those with whom they work. At a time when public policies are changing dramatically at both the national and state levels, those who are most affected by them should be given a seat at the deliberative table. What is good for banks in crisis is no less good for average Americans and marginalized communities in crisis.

That is a short version of the recommendations made by the National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy, a Washington-based foundation watchdog group on whose advisory committee I serve. Its recent report “Criteria for Philanthropy at Its Best” pulls few punches and goes straight to the moral heart of the issue: If foundations are not going to concentrate more heavily on the most deprived groups and individuals in our society, who will?

Some in the foundation world are threatened by the questions and the recommendations. Some fear that by subscribing to goals for how much should go to those in critical need, the door will be opened to government regulation. Others who have a long and fruitful history as patrons of the arts or higher education or medical innovation resist anything they perceive might diminish their historic commitments.

I respect their concerns. When I was president of the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, earlier in the decade, nothing was more contentious than our evolving efforts to reach more deeply into the communities we hoped to serve. But at this moment in the nation’s history, business as usual is no more tenable for the foundation world than it is for government and the private sector.

Asking foundations to devote a greater share of their grant dollars for the common good, the commonweal, is imminently reasonable and long overdue.
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Carter III is a former president and CEO of the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and Professor of Leadership and Public Policy at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
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Copyright (C) 2009 by the American Forum. 5/09

Ensuring Openness in Financial Products

Posted by American Forum at 12:50 PM

By Amelia Warren Tyagi

Imagine buying a tube of toothpaste. After using the toothpaste, you are rushed to the emergency room to have your stomach pumped. The paste contained rat poison. But, when you try to complain, you are told that you should have read the label more carefully, as the ingredient list included hydroxycoumarin. You are told that you should have known that meant rat poison.

Now imagine if the conclusion of most pundits and policymakers were “no new laws are needed; you just need more chemistry education.” Sounds ridiculous, doesn’t it?

But that’s the same situation consumers face every day with financial products that are advertised at one rate, but that rate mysteriously sky-rockets months later.

How do we protect consumers? In the real world, toothpaste is regulated as a product, and the government ensures a basic level of safety. But credit cards, mortgages, and other financial products are treated as contracts. When it comes to contracts, the government views its job as nothing more than enforcing the terms of the contract, regardless of the outcome.

This makes a certain amount of sense when the contract is between two small business owners who are agreeing on the price of installing a new roof. But when it comes to financial products, the law is behaving as if the average consumer were on the same footing as a $1 trillion bank, and that you can quickly analyze the contract and bargain at will.

This is absurd. Just try reading the lengthy contract that comes with your next credit card -- and then try calling the bank to tell them you’d like to amend the arbitration clause and the rate disclosure notification period.

The recent hubbub in Congress about a Credit Card Bill of Rights is certainly a step in the right direction. After decades of being held captive by the ultra-powerful banking lobby, it’s great to see Washington thinking about consumers for a change.

But does a bill of rights really solve the problem? It certainly tackles a few of the worst abuses: double cycle billing, retroactive rate hikes, and abusive practices toward college students.

But the proposal is silent on a variety of other nasty practices. It doesn’t do a thing about those ridiculous penalty fees when the check is 10 minutes late. And while it requires a 45-day notice to increase your rate, card issuers still have the right to raise your rate any time, by any amount, even if you haven’t done anything wrong.

A better approach to dealing with the credit card debacle would be a simple proposal to create a Consumer Financial Product Commission.

In the 1970s, Congress created the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), tasked with establishing safety standards, recalling unsafe products, and banning products that pose unreasonable risks. Since then, the CPSC has played a major role in ensuring safer products and a fairer marketplace. They work to keep us safe from lead paint, car seats that collapse on impact, arsenic in kids’ toys, and, yes, rat poison in our toothpaste. In fact, the CPSC estimates that standards for three products alone -- cigarette lighters, cribs, and baby walkers -- save more than $2 billion every year.

Modeled on the CPSC, the proposed Consumer Financial Product Commission would take on the job of ensuring that disclosures are clear, financial products do what they’re supposed to do, and the playing field is level and fair. Most important, it could act quickly and nimbly.

If done properly, the new agency would not try to fix prices. Nor would it prevent consumers from ever charging too much on a credit card or taking on a mortgage they can’t afford; it would be absurd to try to guarantee that no one would ever behave foolishly. (After all, the CPSC can’t prevent someone from throwing a blender into the bathtub.) But the new agency could eliminate the long contracts and give us fewer surprises when we open our credit card statements. And it could stamp out marketing that advertises a 5 percent interest rate in large print and buries the 35 percent interest rate in the fine print.

A Financial Product Safety Commission certainly doesn’t sound as exciting as a “Bill of Rights,” but it really is a far better way to govern, and could go a long way toward helping consumers. Isn’t that worth giving it a try?
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Tyagi is co-founder of Business Talent Group, and co-author of “Two-Income Trap” and “All Your Worth.”
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Copyright (C) 2009 by the American Forum. 5/09

Essential Services Would be Crippled by $1 Billion Cuts

Posted by American Forum at 10:36 AM

MASSACHUSETTS FORUM

By Anna-Ellen Lenart

Massachusetts is considering $1 billion in budget cuts. So, what would $1 billion in cutbacks look like for Massachusetts?

These dollars would be taken from essential services such as social programs, schools, and infrastructure. The impact on our communities would be devastating. Programs that would have an especially heavy toll include social and health services, community-based agencies, and aid to cities. This would greatly reduce preventative services that positively impact youth and our communities. This is poor accounting, since preventative care costs less than subsequent treatment services.

One area of mounting concern is teenage pregnancy. The Centers for Disease Control reports that although birth rates have increased across all age groups, the highest jump is among teenagers.

This situation is a grave concern, because young, single mothers are at high risk for raising their children in poverty. And there is plenty of evidence to show that poor children are far less likely to reach school prepared to succeed than their non-poor peers. In the long run, providing after-the-fact services instead of preventing teen pregnancy will cost taxpayers far more than $1 billion.

One way to resolve this issue is to explore new revenue sources and stop the budget cuts. No one likes raising taxes, but even a 0.5 percent state income tax increase would generate substantial revenue for the state. This is not small change being taken out of your pocket, but if it means vastly higher quality in education, prevention, and social services, and getting more out of your tax money over time, isn’t this worth it?

Raising the state income tax is just one way to increase revenue. How about adding sales tax to purchases made over the internet, or decreasing spending in another area, for example renegotiating state contracts?

Another way to resolve this issue is to support proposals that promote prevention and fund educational social programs -- policies that directly impact families and communities.

One such proposal that is currently being examined aims to make comprehensive health and sex education a core requirement in public schools across Massachusetts.

The proposal would end the disparities among school districts in regard to health and sex education. Some school districts have comprehensive health classes as a requirement to graduate, whereas districts in poor communities are likely to have “optional” classes which are typically the first items cut from the budget.

The program would allow adolescents from many different socio-economic levels to be educated on topics such as reproduction, disease prevention, violence prevention, sexuality, and interpersonal relationships. Children and teens would be educated in school and the entire burden would not be left up to parents and caretakers to cover this wide range of important topics.

Having worked with at-risk youth for the past five years in many different settings, I know the difference prevention though education makes. Many teens lack simple knowledge and skills that could have dramatically changed the course of their lives.

Cutting $1 billion in essential services that invest in our communities and our future is not the solution to the current economic state. It will only increase spending on remedial services, such as medical care for high-risk teen pregnancies, and welfare payments to support fragile, young families. Instead, Massachusetts must explore other areas of revenue and support preventative investments for the betterment of our communities.
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Lenart, age 27, is a social worker.
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Copyright © 2009 by the Massachusetts Forum. 5/09

Thursday, May 21, 2009

Expanding Voter Participation: The Roadmap is Clear

Posted by American Forum at 11:24 AM

By Page Gardner

Almost half a year has passed, but the 2008 election still looms as an epochal event. With a record voter turnout, the American people, including members of many groups who have been excluded from the political process, changed the face of the nation's leadership and the direction of our public policies.

In many ways, this view is not only optimistic but realistic. More than 133 million Americans cast ballots in the election last year -- the largest number of voters in U.S. history and 9 million more than in 2004. Four constituencies that have historically been under-represented -- African Americans, Hispanics, unmarried women and young voters (ages 18-29) -- provided the margin of victory for President Obama.

But the other side of the story is that 79 million eligible Americans did not vote. Forty-four million of these non-voters were not registered, and another four million were discouraged from voting because of burdensome policies, such as voter identification requirements.

Disproportionate numbers of non-voters belong to the very groups that have historically been excluded. African American turnout increased dramatically in 2008, but, in 2004, only 60 percent of African Americans voted. Meanwhile, in 2008, among voting-age Americans, 21.5 million young people, 20.4 million unmarried women, and 9.8 million Hispanics did not vote.

Why did 79 million Americans -- more than the total population of Great Britain or France -- not vote in an historic election after an exciting campaign? As Professor Nathaniel Persily of Columbia Law School testified before the Senate Rules Committee, "The United States continues to make voting more burdensome than any other industrialized democracy."

As an organization focused on encouraging the political participation of the nation's 53 million unmarried women, Women's Voices. Women Vote recently released a report, "Access to Democracy: Identifying Obstacles Hindering the Right to Vote" by Scott E. Thomas, former chairman of the Federal Elections Commission, and Alicia C. Insley and Jenifer L. Carrier.

The report found that many states have confusing and cumbersome registration requirements, limited options to cast ballots before Election Day, complicated voter ID requirements, inconsistent rules regarding casting and counting provisional ballots, and varied regulations regarding the maintenance of voter lists. These obstacles make registering and voting especially difficult for underrepresented groups who tend to move more often, have less formal education and income, hold jobs where they can't take time off during the day, and, especially among immigrants, lack common forms of identification.

The best way to encourage voter participation is to enact a Federal Universal Voter Registration Act. This would establish a national mandate for universal voter registration within each state. Federal funds would be provided to the states to create permanent voter registration systems that will allow voters to stay on the rolls when they move.

Short of this comprehensive initiative, five other reforms would bring the nation closer to the goal of full voter participation.

First, same day registration would allow eligible Americans to register on Election Day. In the 2008 presidential election, voter participation rates were highest in the states that allowed same day registration -- 69 percent, compared to 62 percent.

Second, there needs to be more clarity about voter qualifications, including whether people without permanent addresses or felons who have served their time are now eligible to vote. Qualifications should be similar in different states; the nation must not return to the days when arbitrary poll taxes and literacy tests set discriminatory standards in some parts of the country.

Third, registration deadlines should not vary from Election Day to a month or more before.
Americans who are excited about a presidential campaign debate a week before the election should not be told it is too late to register and vote.

Fourth, registration should be brought into the 21st Century. Busy Americans should be allowed to register online so that they do not have to wait in line.

Fifth, there should be "no excuses" early and absentee voting. As of January, 2009, 32 states allow no-excuse early voting, 15 require excuses, and four do not allow early voting at all. There is no reason why states should not allow no-excuses early voting.

The U.S. still lags behind most other advanced democracies in the percentage of the population that votes in national elections. We can correct this condition by simply removing the obstacles to expanding American democracy.
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Gardner is the president and CEO of Women’s Voices. Women Vote, a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization dedicated to increasing the involvement of women in the public policy process.
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Invisible Ink: The Writing of Washington’s Education Budget

Posted by American Forum at 11:09 AM

WASHINGTON FORUM

By Jesse Hagopian

No one ever said teaching middle school would be easy.

Last week, however, truly tried my patience. You’d think, by this time in the school year, they’d know not to fabricate elaborate excuses for incomplete work.

No, I am not ranting about unruly students in my third period.

I’m referring to delinquent state lawmakers who approved a two-year operating budget in this past legislative session that fails students and teachers by cutting a staggering $800 million from a school system that already ranks 45th in the nation in per-pupil spending. The bulk of the cuts come from voiding I-728, the voter approved class-size-reduction initiative designed to address our class-size ranking of 46th in the nation.

Astoundingly, these representatives maintain they are champions for public education because of their much-touted bill that promised to redefine basic education to include tools educators need to prepare kids for college.

But even my student who attempted to excuse himself from an incomplete assignment by explaining to me that temporary amnesia is a clinical condition -- not to be confused with merely forgetting -- would blush at the litany of half-truths and pretexts in the past legislative session.

Even if the mix of needed change and misguided policy in the proposal was able to help prepare students for college, our representatives didn’t fund it and put higher education out of reach for many by increasing four-year college tuition by 14 percent and two-year college tuition by 7 percent. Furthermore, this new budget denies Washington’s teachers their voter-approved cost-of-living raise, reduces math coaches and curriculum offerings for primary school kids, and will result in thousands of teacher layoffs and more disastrous school closures.

An education reform bill without the funding is like the kid who once told me he really had finished his essay, but I just couldn’t see it because it was written in invisible ink. True story.

Predictably, the Republicans in the state legislature showed why their party is about as popular as the meal-money thieving lunchroom bully, claiming the cuts weren’t deep enough.

However, you can be excused for forgetting which party is in charge in Olympia when the Democrats use their legislative majority to erode education.

“I'm tired of whining and complaining,” said Sen. Budget Chairwoman Margarita Prentice, D-Renton. "I'd like to have a whole lot more money, but you know, we don't.”

But as I tell my students, complaining only becomes whining when you don’t propose a solution.

At the Representative Assembly of the Seattle Education Association on April 20, I submitted a resolution proposing what nearly three-quarters of Americans indicated in a recent CBS/NY Times poll is needed to solve the fiscal crisis: taxing the rich.

This resolution, calling for a progressive income tax that would exempt anyone making less than $250,000 a year, passed with some 90 percent of SEA votes. The Economic Opportunity Institute has shown that with only a 3 percent tax on incomes between $200,000 and $999,999 and a 5 percent tax on incomes over $1 million, the state could immediately raise $2.58 billion -- more than enough to stop the education cuts in addition to cuts to healthcare and the General Assistance-Unemployable program -- a program which helps people with mental and physical health challenges that make it difficult for them to find work. Democrats in the legislature could have helped Washington join the 43 other states with an income tax, but didn’t get the bill out of committee.

Yes, insatiable CEOs trading in asset-backed securities caused a recession, making it hard to raise the money needed to continue basic funding commitments. But teachers, parents, (and yes, even middle school students with temporary amnesia) are tired of lawmakers’ “dog-ate-my-homework” excuses for neglecting schools in one of the wealthiest regions the world has ever known.

Today’s lesson in my third period asks the students to interpret the poem “Cloth” by Phillip Pulfrey:

We weave our excuses around events.
Thin, poor quality cloth of justification Poor substitutes for the heavy tribal blankets Once we wove to wrap our children.
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Hagopian is a teacher in the Seattle Public Schools and a member of the Seattle Education Association.
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