AMERICAN GOVERNMENT AND
THE VISION OF
THE DEMOCRATS


By: Mark Louis Latour
University Press of America
A Division of Rowman & Littlefield Publications
May 2007



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TABLE OF CONTENTS
Introduction – the Mission and Values of the Democrats xvii

Section One: Democracy’s Balancing Act
The Proper Role of Government 3
States’ Rights and Small Government 8
Separation of Powers 17
Election Reform 24
Media Reform 28
Campaign Finance Reform 39
Section Two: Economics and Tax Policy
Economic Policy 57
Realigning Budget Priorities 76
Tax Decreases 85
Corporate Welfare 100
Corporate Crime 106
Conflicts of Interest 119
Manufacturing and Industrial Policy 124
Trade, Tariffs, and Outsourcing 139
Section Three: Military Policy and National Security
Foreign and Military Policy 157
National Security 173
Immigration 180
Section Four: The Social Contract
Upholding the Social Contract 197
Labor Unions and Workers’ Rights 206
Unemployment 213
Consumer Advocacy and Workplace Safety 221
Education 232
Social Security 246
Pensions 256
Health Care Policy 267
Section Five: Civil Rights
Race Relations 289
Gay Rights 297
Children, Women, and Other Vulnerable Groups 306
Section Six: The Sylvan Contract
Farm Policy 321
Environmental Policy 340
Section Seven: Conclusion
Democrats’ Strategy 389
Democrats’ Coalition 396
Democrats’ Platform 402
Appendix 421
Notes, Bibliography, Index & Author Bio 433 to 459

INTRODUCTION – the Mission and Values of the Democrats


The modern Republican Party has come loose from its moorings. Its alliance with biblical supremacists is most certainly a transient one, and it finds itself adrift on a sea of convenience, outmoded traditions, policies begotten by temporary political advantage, sloganism, campaigns of disinformation, and the personal gain or profit of a very small number of powerful companies, lobbies, and truly wealthy individuals.

The Republican disinformation campaign that claims our government can spend hundreds of billions of dollars on a war in Iraq, without this leading eventually to tax hikes for the average citizen, is pure fantasy. Denial of this basic relationship between increased spending and increased taxes on the part of Republicans has been very selective, as Republicans are quick to point out that additional spending on social welfare programs, environmental protection, and education will lead to additional taxes. Republican budget math simply doesn’t add up. It never has…

Over much of the past century, Republicans have been defined by their fear of not having enough for themselves, whereas Democrats have been defined by their urge to uplift Americans other than themselves, and to improve the quality of life of ordinary Americans through whatever means possible. Such means include supporting benefits for workers, establishing a minimum wage and fair labor laws, advocating for universal health insurance, supporting laws to protect consumers and improve workplace safety, establishing and maintaining various elements of the social safety net (such as Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security, and unemployment benefits), protecting the environment, protecting other species, and increasing rights and self-determination for women, African Americans, gays, the elderly, the handicapped, and other struggling groups…

In his book, The Great Crash 1929, John Kenneth Galbraith describes Coolidge’s Secretary of the Treasury, Andrew Mellon, to be [like Coolidge] “a passionate advocate of inaction.” Such advocacy of inaction, and such a lack of responsiveness to the problems average Americans are facing or will soon face, is referred to in this book as “Coolidgism.” As America’s political leaders passively watched this country’s manufacturing sector decline over the past few decades, they were in many cases manifesting their Coolidgism. As America’s political leaders watched passively in recent decades, and hundreds of thousands of small family farms fell into bankruptcy, our leaders were again manifesting their Coolidgism. As close to one million illegal aliens cross the border into this country each year, and our political leaders choose to look the other way, they are guilty of the omissions of Coolidgism…

Government Officials as Errand Boys of the Global Economy
American citizens can neither afford nor allow their elected officials to merely act as lobbyists for giant multinationals (including companies headquartered outside of the United States). Our elected officials must be more than agents or errand boys of the global economy. They must respond to the needs of average Americans, and not just to the agendas of their wealthy campaign contributors on items such as tax cuts for the wealthy, easy factory closure laws, continued avoidance of sustainable energy technologies, continued ability of pharmaceutical companies to charge Americans several times more for prescription drugs then they charge consumers in other countries, a weakening of consumer protections, a weakening of environmental safeguards, and so on.

Americans should adopt President Ronald Reagan’s maxim that the role of government is to expand individual freedom and that individual freedom cannot be sacrificed for security. In this spirit, Congress should repeal the PATRIOT Act that was passed because of pressure and misinformation from the executive branch. Congress should be more pro-active in prohibiting consolidation of the media (as such consolidation can undermine both free speech and access to information). And Congress should guard against the imposition of a pseudo-biblical worldview on America’s governmental institutions (from the school system to the Supreme Court) as such a worldview will limit individuals’ freedoms rather than expand them.

The government must expand individual freedom, for when individual freedom is sacrificed for security (even in the name of the free market, the global economy, self serving interpretations of biblical prophecy, the quest for oil, or the fight against terrorism), we follow what Reagan called “the downward path to totalitarianism.”

When the American federation was founded, the United States Constitution left certain powers to the individual states which entered the federation, and invested the federal government with certain other powers and authorities. Over the years, however, the power of the federal government has grown substantially at the expense of the individual states. There are a number of reasons for this including: judicial interpretation favoring the role of the federal government in regulating policy areas such as interstate commerce; the fact that many problems, such as pollution, do not end and can not be tied up neatly at state boundaries; and the fact that the federal government has at various times taken on the role of grantor and guarantor of civil rights to a wide range of groups from women to African-Americans, the handicapped, workers, and consumers.

Critics of federal expansionism may have a legitimate complaint regarding the diminution of the legal authority and moral weight of individual states in various arenas of legislative action and public policy. However, the most vocal critics of this shift in power have been more selective than objective when applying their criticisms. And the states’ rights card has been played more often than not as an attempt to reverse expansions of civil rights that the federal government has legislated. In fact, states’ rights have often served as Republican or conservative code for undermining the expansion of civil rights and other aspects of the social contract.
In today’s political battles related to gay marriage and domestic partnership benefits, many pseudo-religious leaders, hate mongers, and even good citizens who simply disagree with the notion of equal rights for homosexuals, will invoke the states’ rights card, saying that the matter should be for individual states to decide rather than for the federal government.

Citizen led ballot initiatives will play an even more important role in government in the future, as broad policy issues from environmental protection to civil rights are debated on the national scene and at the state level and as individual states and the federal government fight to gain the upper hand in developing public policy.

 

The right of states to make laws that are more stringent than federal laws, whether in state legislatures or at the ballot box, should be supported. California-style emissions requirements are an entirely reasonable attempt, for example, to protect the health and welfare of the public. But when states’ rights are speciously invoked as a reason to roll back the civil rights of various groups, Americans should by now be aware of this ruse, and should move quickly to defend their lives, liberties, and their pursuit of happiness...

Today’s Republicans and other big business cheerleaders rarely have an understanding of or an affinity for small government or a respect for local self-determination. The question seems more to be “to what ends will our big government be used?”

While many citizens may appreciate the admonition of political philosopher Edmund Burke, with respect to how “that government which governs least governs best,” many of us also sense or realize that government is entrusted with a most difficult balancing act. Government has accepted more roles than it used to because that is what American citizens have asked it to do. It is easy for those with money, status, good health, full civil rights, political power, and other resources to say that government’s role should be limited (although they continually scheme to be the recipients of other types of government largesse)…

Individuals inside government such as former Speaker of the US House of Representatives Tom Delay, and many more outside government, are attempting to impose a biblical or pseudo-biblical worldview on America and its government. This must be opposed. The United States of America was settled and founded on the principle of freedom to worship as one pleased. DeLay’s attempt to impose one narrow pseudo-biblical world view on this country, in a way which promotes intolerance towards many Americans, is in complete opposition to the founding principles of our democracy…

In his recent letter to members of the Interfaith Alliance, television anchor Walter Cronkite says, “as a concerned person of faith… I have watched with increasing alarm as the Christian Coalition and other Religious Right groups manipulate religion to further their intolerant political agendas.” In this same communication of February 2005, the Interfaith Alliance attributes the following comments to members of these “religious” right groups:
o Jerry Falwell: “I really believe that the pagans, and the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays and lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle… helped make this [9/11/] happen.”

o Pat Robertson: “You say you’re supposed to be nice to the Episcopalians and the Presbyterians and the Methodists and this, that, and the other thing. Nonsense. I don’t have to be nice to the spirit of the Antichrist.”

o Randall Terry (Indiana News Sentinel): “Our goal is a Christian nation. We have a biblical duty; we are called by God to conquer this country. We don’t want equal time. We don’t want pluralism.”

o Pat Robertson: “The feminist agenda is not about equal rights for women. It is about a socialist, anti-family political movement that encourages women to leave their husbands, kill their children, practice witchcraft, destroy capitalism, and become lesbians.”

To anyone who supports America’s pluralistic and democratic form of government, comments such as those above must surely be troublesome. Certainly Randall Terry’s comments about conquering this country for God and not wanting pluralism are threatening to most Americans outside of Mr. Terry’s narrow, intolerant religious clique. His position is completely in opposition to the democratic process and the freedoms upon which America was founded. Even Mr. Robertson’s comments deriding Episcopalians, Presbyterians, and Methodists are hostile and divisive.

Separation between Business and State

Just as our form of government requires a separation between church and state, we also need separation between big business and the state. This should come in the form of strengthening our laws to prohibit the financing of political campaigns by big businesses and the wealthy (in return for the inevitable political favors); and this should also include strengthening laws to minimize the bombardment of Congress and the President by lobbyists representing big businesses and wealthy individuals. The revolving door between Congress and big business is compromising the objectivity of Congress members and is making it less and less likely that Congress will advocate for average Americans rather than for big businesses.

Executive Branch Overreach

It is clear from the Federalist Papers and other writings that the Legislative Branch of government was intended by the founding fathers to be the primary and most important branch of government, and that the Executive and Judicial branches had critical but less important roles. If polled today, most Americans would say that the President is at the center of the most important branch of government. And certainly there is much that a dynamic, compassionate, and skillful leader can accomplish in that position. Once Congress has emancipated itself from dependence upon its election campaign donors, perhaps Congress will be in a better position to lead this country on a wide range of issues, the solutions to which may suddenly be seen more clearly.

The Judicial Branch

An earlier skeptic of government, Alexander Hamilton, wrote in the Federalist Papers over two hundred years ago about the reach (and potential overreach) of the various branches of government. Hamilton makes it very clear that the judicial branch of government must remain independent and that the role of this branch is to interpret the laws of this country when they are in conflict with one another or when they are unclear. Although many political observers have accused the courts and their judges of judicial activism, such activism is only made possible when Congress and the states pass laws that are poorly thought out and poorly crafted…

An American House of Commons

Due to the perverse nature of the campaign finance system, today’s government leaders find themselves to be primarily advocates for big business and the wealthy. They have become deaf to the concerns of average citizens, and ineffective in advocating for the American poor, working class, and middle class. Americans should, therefore, consider the formation of two new branches of government. The first is a legislative branch of government that would represent only those citizens and households earning less than $100,000 per year (and having a net worth of less than $1,00,000), to which only individuals in this income bracket could be elected. The US legislative branch would consist of the Senate, the House of Representatives, and this new House of Commons. Approval of this new branch would be needed for any piece of legislation to pass in this country and elections to this new House could only be funded through the clean elections process – that is through public financing of elections…

Environmental Courts

Another branch of government that should be developed is an Environmental Court system. This could be a special branch of America’s existing judicial system where the environment and endangered species have rights; environmental issues would be resolved; and environmental crimes would be tried. Many states have already enacted environmental bills of rights, in which any citizen can bring suit to prevent a potential act of environmental degradation, and in which any citizen can sue for restitution after an environmental violation has occurred.

Such environmental courts might be aligned geographically rather than based upon state boundaries. They might conform to watershed boundaries or river basin boundaries. For example, all of the portions of states whose rivers drain into the Rio Grande would be in the jurisdiction of the Rio Grande Environmental Courts, all of the portions of states whose tributaries drain into the Colorado River would be under the jurisdiction of the Colorado River Environmental Court system, and so on.

President Bush and the Republican-led Congress have been incredibly soft on China, and have given China extraordinary benefits (such as Most Favored Nation trading status) which simply do not correspond with its role as an enabler of nuclear programs in Pakistan and North Korea; and which do not correspond with its aggressive, militaristic, and potentially tragic stance toward Taiwan; its takeover of the Spratlys Islands, which are claimed by the Philippines; its designs on the Parcel Islands, which are claimed by Vietnam; its traditional hostility and border skirmishes with India; and its invasion of Tibet and destruction of traditional Tibetan culture, religion, shrines and landmarks.
Regarding the significant Muslim population inside China’s western-most border, and the large Muslim populations just outside its western border in countries such as Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, and Afghanistan, one can only wonder how the interaction between these different world views will work out, and whether the denouement will be peaceful. Looking at the precedent set by China’s invasion of Tibet, and its systematic effort to obliterate Tibetan culture and to resettle Tibet with ethnic Chinese, it is difficult to be hopeful…

Can China Be Part of a North Korean Solution?

North Korea’s recent bragging about having nuclear weapons and technology is reminiscent of Saddam Hussein’s bragging about having Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq, when he did not actually have any. Maybe this bragging is just an insane, megalomaniacal dictator’s cry for help – an indirect or even subconscious way of inviting the US -- or any other power [China? Russia? South Korea? Japan?] to invade this tragic, backward, and isolated nation...

The US needs to take a much harder line in negotiating with countries, which are initiating or inciting conflict around the globe, and especially with nations which enable non-cooperating countries by selling them nuclear weapons technology, missiles and other weaponry. The US should not be intervening militarily, but such nations should not have Most Favored Nation trading status with the US. Taking back Most Favored Nation trading status can be a powerful bargaining chip in dealing with difficult countries and rogue states. And unlike military actions which have cost hundreds of billions of dollars, and have led to the loss of many American lives and permanent incapacitation of far more Americans, using MFN status as a bargaining chip will not cost the American taxpayers a penny and will not lead to the loss of any American lives.

Replace the Bush Doctrine with a Foreign Policy of Medical and Food Aid

The Bush Doctrine of pre-emptive war should be replaced with authentic foreign aid in the form of food aid, donated medicines, and the building of democratic institutions in foreign countries – from elementary schools to universities such as the American University in Beirut and Cairo, to health clinics, cultural exchange, and diplomacy. Foreign aid should take the form of helping countries to preserve their natural environments: e.g., helping island nations and mountain countries to develop wildlife preserves, rather than sending American companies in to cut down trees and ruin the environment – that is exploitation or rape, but it is not aid.

For most countries, foreign aid should be about eliminating terrible diseases for which we have simple and inexpensive cures, such as river blindness and small pox; and about initiatives such as the Peace Corps, and the International Farmers Corps that former Senator George McGovern (D-South Dakota) has proposed.
Many Americans are familiar with the contention of actress Jane Seymour and others that measles can be eradicated from the face of the earth for about a dollar per child (or a total cost of about one billion dollars). Upon hearing of the one to two trillion dollars that the US has spent in Iraq, can Americans be blamed for wondering what, if anything, has been achieved. True aid should be oriented toward helping third world countries preserve what is best about their native and ancient ways of life. It should not be oriented towards destroying their heritage and replacing it with our own. Providing unstable foreign countries with missiles, tanks, fighter planes, and the building blocks of chemical and biological weapons, is not a policy to which the American public has ever agreed. This is generally not “aid” at all.

Players responsible for the incredible shrinking of the American manufacturing industry in many of its traditional havens (such as the Great Lakes, New England, the Piedmont, and the mid-Atlantic states) are not just limited to emerging industrial tigers and to traditional economic powers located outside America’s borders. No doubt there were fundamental problems created by overzealous Union leaders who, in attempting to gain improved benefits for millions of workers and their families, may have been, at times, unreasonable in their demands or inflexible in their approaches.

But as Republican-led Congresses over the past century sided with big business and acted to prevent the expansion of Unions, and as many states (especially in the south) enacted (deceptively named) Right-to-Work legislation which made unionizing quite difficult in these states, the right to work states became pitted against the states more favorable to Union activity. Companies such as Halliburton began systematically to make pitches to the established big businesses in Detroit, Chicago, Cleveland, Pittsburgh and other northern industrial cities, to build new factories and assembly operations in the right-to-work states, where the labor costs were lower, and where workers had less leverage to effect increases in salaries, benefits, or better working conditions…

And over the years, areas such as Raleigh Durham, Norfolk, Charlotte, Chattanooga, Knoxville, Birmingham, Jacksonville, Spartanburg, Atlanta, Dallas, and Tulsa grew rapidly as northern industrial centers struggled to survive… How ironic it must be for the beneficiaries of this North-to-South rebalancing of industrial investment to now see the forces of the global economy shifting its investment focus outside the South, and outside of the United States entirely, to countries like China, Taiwan, the Philippines, Mexico, Brazil, and elsewhere, where workers have even lower salaries, and fewer benefits, and fewer rights…

The Republican-led betrayal of the South, through the (well-funded) Congressional effort to allow US businesses to transfer their investments abroad and allow these businesses to sell their foreign made products here in the US while imposing few tariffs, has diminished the amount of American-made goods from many industries, which are now purchased by either American or foreign consumers. This in turn has led to a slowdown in the creation of good new jobs in the South, and will eventually lead to the loss of existing jobs in the South. Only the Democrats, who are more concerned about workers and their families, than they are about big business profits, can resolve this situation. So, it is clear that any strategy for Southern prosperity is dependent upon Democratic leadership, and Democratic solutions...

In earlier decades, many considered the issue of unemployment to be one of the key problems of our society, yet today the issue rarely enters public discussion. And the low quality, low pay, and lack of benefits associated with many of today’s jobs, seem to be fatalistically accepted by many Americans as “just the way it is.”

 

As we have seen repeatedly during the Bush Administration, issues such as tax cuts for the wealthy, airport security, and the imagined threat from gay marriage, have pre-empted the really important issues which this country faces, such as unemployment, underemployment, and jobs training for Americans.

The US Departments of Labor and Commerce need to find a way to prevent white-collar jobs, high tech jobs, and back office jobs from being outsourced to Russia, India, and other countries. One salient aspect of the outsourcing of US work and jobs to foreign companies or to foreign subsidiaries of US companies, is its high correlation with digital or electronic information. Those tasks which can easily be outsourced and handled by less expensive workers in second or third world countries tend to be those which are based on electronic inputs, and which can instantly be sent across the globe via the internet…

The outsourcing of back office, white collar, computer, technical, and other electronically based or digitally compatible jobs and tasks may be as much a defining characteristic of America’s changing economy and society in the first few decades of the 21st century, as the decline of America’s manufacturing industry was to the last few decades of the 20th century.

CAMPAIGN FINANCE REFORM

One hundred years ago, President Teddy Roosevelt identified many of the same flaws in the election campaign finance process that exist today. Although a century late, this country needs to follow Roosevelt’s advice and provide public funding for political campaigns. The $4 billion contributed by companies, lobbies, and individual donors in the 2004 campaign grossly inflates the influence of big business on the political process and makes the concerns of the Little Man, that much less relevant to the candidates. In his 1905 inaugural address, President Roosevelt made the following comments:

There is a very radical measure which would, I believe, work a substantial improvement in our system of conducting a campaign, although I am well aware that it will take some time for people so to familiarize themselves with such a proposal as to be willing to consider its adoption. The need for collecting large campaign funds would vanish if Congress provided an appropriation for the proper and legitimate expenses of each of the great national parties, an appropriation ample enough to meet the necessity for thorough organization and machinery…

All states should legislate or vote to begin public financing for their election campaigns and follow the lead of states such as Maine and Arizona, which have already done so. Otherwise big money and big corporations and big lobby groups will control the outcomes of the majority of elections for office and of the majority of public referenda placed on the ballot -- and the voice of average Americans will not be heard.

The Super-Voters

Money is creating a new class of Super-Voters in this country. Corporations, lobbies, and members of the wealthiest one percent of the population are facilitating the entry of certain sympathetic or malleable candidates to the race for political office, and are then making it possible for those candidates to continue through the long election process and ultimately prevail at the ballot box, due to their financial contributions. So, without such financial support from the Super-Voters (large campaign contributors), candidates for political office lose their ability to get radio time, newspaper coverage, television coverage, as well as TV and radio advertisements. By this time, the candidates have most likely already made many off-the-record promises to these Super-Voters to represent their interests at the expense of the interests of the typical taxpayer...

The election of candidates for political office by the super-voters takes place in the year or two prior to the actual voting day, and this Super-Voter pre-election process colors the actual election to an extent to which the average citizen is not fully aware, and the general populace is thus largely disenfranchised by the time of the final elections, which often take place in November of various years…

Campaign finance reform is not only an issue that can help the environment and endangered species, it is in many ways the ultimate family values issue. The donations of big corporations and lobby groups are skewing public policy away from solutions that favor groups such as mothers, children, and families…

HEALTH CARE POLICY

It is estimated that about 46 million Americans lack access to health care. This does not include even larger numbers of Americans who lack access to dental care, eye care, and other therapies… Over the last two or three decades, a more conservative and reactionary group of religious leaders has gained great influence on the American political scene, and polls show that about half of Americans consider providing health care to all members of our society to be a moral issue. Curiously, this has not moved public policy regarding national health care off of dead center since the late 1940s, when President Harry Truman introduced to Congress the idea of a national health care program that would cover all Americans. From that time through today, America’s elected representatives have listened much more closely to well-organized and well-funded corporate interests on this issue than they have listened to the American people...

Considering that in a typical two-year period, one third of this nation’s families will spend some time without access to health care and that tens of millions of individuals will go without access to health care for long periods of time, America’s present health care policy (or lack thereof) must be considered to be a failure and a prime example of our government not doing its job of looking out for the health, safety, and welfare of its citizens…

The governments of the wealthiest European countries, as well as Japan and Canada, spend 9 to 10% of their gross national product (GNP) providing full health care to all of their citizens. How then can Americans spend 15% of this country’s GNP for health care while completely missing 46 million citizens, and sit back contentedly while hundreds of thousands of Americans die each year because they do not have access to simple treatments…

 

Providing universal health care to all US citizens would significantly decrease the amount of money spent by Americans on health care each year, and it would eliminate many of the gross inefficiencies and abuses that characterize the existing hodge-podge of private and public health plans in this country.

ENVIRONMENTAL PRESERVATION

The global environmental crisis is so overwhelming in its magnitude, so destructive in its potential outcome, and so relentless in its dynamic that, if it is not addressed vigorously, comprehensively, and immediately, mankind may not be able to continue to inhabit this planet for more than another century or so.
In fact, all of the other issues we have addressed in this book will become moot if we are not able to solve the environmental crisis correctly. With our polluting factories, gas guzzling cars, destruction of wildlife habitat in forests and jungles, exploitation of resources, drying up and draining of wetlands, global warming, heavy use of pesticides and fertilizers, and regular extinction of species, mankind is accelerating towards its own destruction. Instead of wondering how much more we can take from the earth, and how much more pollution we can dump into the oceans and the atmosphere, government leaders, business owners, and citizens need to focus on how to maintain an environment that is a balanced, self-renewing system.

Zero Population Growth and the Divine Plan

Despite the rhetoric of misguided right-to-life advocates religious leaders in the US, it is clear that America’s rampant population growth (from natural fertility, legal and illegal immigration, and increased longevity) is putting increasing stress on the environment. The expansion of human population is leading to the decline of non-human species in America. With dynamics such as expanding suburbs; crowded cities; increasing commercial and industrial activities; runaway mineral and natural resource extraction activities; the blockage of wildlife passage corridors by highways; deforestation; and the destruction of wildlife habitat, modern human civilization has put most of the remaining species on this planet in danger, and on the run.

America needs to adopt zero population growth as a national policy. Zero population growth is a pro-environmental policy, and, thus, pro-life. The goal of Zero Population Growth (ZPG) is to create and maintain a quality of life for Americans (and for non-human species and natural resources, as well) rather than to create more humans, more consumers, and wasteful patterns of unnecessary consumption. According to many ZPG advocates, the link between increasing consumption and improved quality of life is quite tenuous. In many ways, the rural, agrarian life of centuries ago was more fulfilling and enriching to mankind, and created a sense of balance (and connectedness) in everyday living that is largely missing today…

Those insensitive to the need for environmental sustainability, and those willing to put personal and corporate profit ahead of the absolutely essential need for healthy and self-renewing ecosystems, may think that the Divine Plan is for mankind to eventually rob the earth of “unimportant” or non-elite species and natural resources, and emigrate or escape from Planet Earth to faraway moons and to other solar systems, and begin destroying the resources on those planets. Or they may think that the Divine Plan is for mankind to prove itself to be the super-species (that is the most important, or most Divine, or fittest survivor on the planet), as most other species lose their place in the wilderness, and either become extinct, or are relegated to small reservations and small numbers of surviving members.

But this is not the Divine Plan. This is merely a crudely crafted and fatally flawed human contrivance fabricated from ignorance, fear, greed, wishful thinking, the myths of the modern era and the global economy, and stunted self-definitions. The Divine Plan involves mankind’s acceptance of all of God’s gifts with grace, with unbounded appreciation, and with an understanding of the divine nature of God’s gifts in the form of a clean environment, abundant natural resources, an incredibly wide variety of species, and so on. God’s gifts to mankind must not be treated so casually and irreverently…

America, through its leaders in Congress, the White House, and other institutions, must adopt Zero Population Growth as a key policy for the 21st century. Current policies of Congress prohibiting the funding of family planning initiatives (that is, birth control programs) in the third world countries, where populations are often living in poverty and great suffering, and completely out of balance with their ecosystems, and with the once-sufficient natural resources of their regions. Such policies must be completely reversed. America’s foreign aid to the third world and to other countries should in most all circumstances include funding for family planning education and funding to help girls and women be free from the burden of unwanted pregnancies.

The opposition and even revulsion to birth control by Biblical Supremacists and some social conservatives is not a moral absolute that exists without any social or environmental context. Biblical Supremacists and others have argued strenuously that birth control -- an effort to alter the processes God created for conception and birth -- is a “sin” of sorts and even an abomination. When viewed in its environmental context, however, birth control’s “sin” is infinitesimally small compared to that of destroying our God-given natural resources and the abomination of the endangerment and extinction of many of the other species with which we cohabit the earth.

Reclaiming the White House with Democratic Vision

SYMBOLIC ISSUES

Democrats and the media need to defuse many of the issues raised by hate groups and biblical supremacists which have done far more to divide and polarize our society, than to unite us. Members of these groups have railed against birth control pills, condoms, medical marijuana, textbooks that discuss evolution, gays and unwed mothers teaching in public schools, women in the military, health care benefits to committed life-partners of gay employees, and against gay adoption and foster parenting.

These groups have done more harm than good in this country, and have taken our focus off important issues whose solutions could help average Americans such as moving toward a universal health care system, maintaining a strong Social Security program, restoring jobs in the manufacturing industry, preserving America’s declining species and wildlife habitat, saving America’s family farms, and lowering college tuition. While there is an important place for such issues in America’s social, moral, and political evolution, we cannot afford to enter a state of gridlock over such issues, thus ignoring or losing momentum on issues that can be more easily solved through the political process and through the application of government resources.

REPUBLICAN FEARMONGERING

It is quite evident that today’s Republicans cannot win an election without invoking the Bogeyman to scare American citizens into passivity, compliance, and fear-based voting. Scare tactics of the Republicans and their allies in recent years have involved overstating Bogeymen such as: Al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein during the present Bush Administration; single mothers and gay men teaching in the public school system; feminists and bra-burners; gay marriage and domestic partnership benefits; African Americans and women in the military; gay foster parents; labor unions seeking to provide benefits for workers and their families; abortion; the exaggerated weakness of the social security system; and other contrived or overblown threats.

America’s Democratic Party leaders and strategists have paid a very high price by trying to make their presidential candidates appear politically correct in the past two presidential elections. In 2000, Al Gore and his advisors made a decision to distance themselves from Bill Clinton due largely to his personal transgressions, which had created such a disdain for Clinton among social conservatives and biblical supremacists. Yet Clinton was an energetic and effective campaigner, and he was enormously popular with many moderates and liberals. His more active involvement in the Gore presidential campaign of 2000 may have led to a clear Democratic victory in that election…

Instead of being spooked by the propaganda of the Biblical supremacists and talk show hosts, Gore should have spoken his mind, and not played it so safe during the election campaign. In speaking his mind and his heart, Gore would have become less rehearsed, but more charismatic, more passionate, and more inspirational. This would have won him the Presidency in 2000.

Likewise, Al Gore’s overly careful choice of the conservative and sinless, but bland Joe Lieberman as a running mate, again snuffed the passion and inspiration right out of the Democratic campaign.

 

Although Lieberman has been a fine Senator, he garnered tremendous yawns on the Boredom Meter. This is a reason why many Democrats have been so quiet and uninvolved in politics.

 

The Democrats have tried to appease the social reactionaries and the Biblical Supremacists. By playing it safe, democratic strategists sacrificed the inspiration, boldness, charisma, and passion, which would have won them the presidency, as well as many seats in Congress and various Statehouses…




ABOUT THE AUTHOR


Mark Louis Latour is a political strategist who writes and speaks about current political, social, and environmental issues. Mr. Latour has worked as a Town Planner in California and Massachusetts, a City Administrator in North Carolina, Oklahoma, and Maryland; and a County Administrator in Colorado. Mr. Latour was Chairman of the Business Management Department at Southern Vermont College in Bennington, where he also taught courses in American Government, and State & Local Government.

Mr. Latour has a Bachelors Degree in Political Science (with High Distinction) from Rutgers College. He also holds a Masters Degree in City and Regional Planning from Rutgers University, and a Masters Degree in Business Administration from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. Mr. Latour is currently writing a book on the politics of Environmental Preservation titled Saving Gaia: The True Conservatives.



To order books, you may use the Political Science (subject) book list in the University Press of America website: http://www.univpress.com/disciplines/index.shtml