WHY WE NEED A DEMOCRACY MOVEMENT

Election Debrief, Decompression and 
Discussion of Why We Need a Democracy Movement

Saturday, December 14 | 1:00pm - 2:30pm
Jefferson Branch Library
850 Jefferson Ave, Tremont (Cleveland) 44113

The 2024 elections are over. 

Elected officials didn’t save us.

Elected officials ultimately can’t save us – whoever is elected  – because the political system is captured by the super wealthy and corporations. 

IT’S UP TO US – as it has always been – to ultimately create justice, peace, a livable world and real democracy.

Join us!

Take Action!

More information: Greg Coleridge, [email protected] or 
Steve Norris at [email protected] 

The fourth bilingual (Persian-English) U.S. - Iran "town hall" peace-building gathering of the Peace-seeking Iranian Veterans (PIV)

کهنه سربازان ایرانی صلح جو (کاص)

Fri., Dec. 27, 2024

9 PM to 11:30 PM (Iran time) // 1 PM (U.S. Eastern time)

Zoom Link: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/82312453743?pwd=He5x4XAKED8mCDfmtUziyfTFiNi8Gi.1

Meeting ID: 823 1245 3743

Passcode: 622526

American Peace-activist Guest: 
- Greg Coleridge: Co-Director, National Move to Amend Campaign; past Principal, Program on Corporations, Law and Democracy; former National Governing Board member, Common Cause
https://www.movetoamend.org/gregmovetoamendorg

- Moji Agha, PIV's Founder, will co-admin (and bilingually translate) this special peace gathering from Colorado, U.S.

More info: https://piv-kas.blogspot.com/

by Racine County Eye Staff November 30th, 2023

By Hina Suzuki, THE BADGER PROJECT

If you agree that corporations should not have the same rights as people, and money is not protected speech, this amendment is for you.

The “We the People” Amendment would specify that the rights laid out in the U.S. Constitution are for individual human beings and not for groups of people, such as corporations and labor unions. It also limits political spending and requires all political contributions and expenditures to be publicly disclosed.

Amendment aims to ‘get big money out of politics’

Wisconsin United to Amend, which describes itself as a grassroots, cross-partisan citizens group, has been working for its passage in the state since its founding in 2010.

If you already voted or will tomorrow, you know that elections involve boxes. It may be the box where you drop your ballot outside a Board of Elections headquarters. It might be the 3-sided box stand where you place your ballot to vote in private. Or it could be the secure receptacle where your completed ballot is transported from your voting location to the country Board of Elections for tabulation.

But there’s still another box that involves elections, actually more like the winners of elections. That’s the ever diminishing space elected officials face on all sides to govern, especially if their goal is to genuinely serve the public interest and to ensure a livable natural world. 

The U.S. Constitution boxes in the actions of public officials and, for that matter, all of us. It delineates the extent of our democratic space, rights and responsibilities. Its size has expanded when many Constitutional Amendments like abolishing slavery and the poll tax and granting women the right to vote were passed following broad peoples’ movements. The box has also been enlarged following Constitutional interpretations by the Supreme Court.

But other Supreme Court interpretations have vastly decreased our democratic space – the box that was never was very large to begin with since We the People have never included all the people.

Many of those interpretations involved Supreme Court rulings affirming the power and rights of corporations over the power and rights of citizens and workers. Following each Supreme Court decision, our democratic space contracted. The democratic box became smaller.

Healthcare is one the main concerns of voters in the 2024 elections. Fifty-nine percent of the public think it is the responsibility of the federal government to make sure all Americans have healthcare coverage,

The U.S. health system is dead last among high income countries when it comes to “affordability, administrative efficiency, equity, and healthcare outcomes.” Every other “developed” country on the planet provides health coverage for all its citizens. The U.S. has the world’s highest healthcare spending per capita, one of the results of nearly two-thirds of the population being covered by private/corporate insurance.

October 8, 2024

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o4oYVBZ_qkU

WNHH, Low-power radio station broadcasting out of New Haven, Connecticut. For the community. By the community.

The November election is three weeks away. Several million individuals have invested time, energy and money on candidate campaigns and ballot measures. 

Elections are important – arguably more so this year than most. Electing representatives who genuinely value democracy is essential – including those who are knowledgeable about and committed to ending corporate rule and the corrupting influence of massive money spent/invested in elections. 

Fire Prevention Week is observed nationally each year from October 6-12, coinciding with October 9, the anniversary of the Great Chicago Fire of 1871.

This year’s campaign is, “Smoke alarms: Make them work for you!”

It should be “Stop Corporate Arsonists.”

Congress passed a funding bill last week to avoid a government shutdown. The stop-gap spending bill funds all government programs at their current levels through December 20.

Those levels were established in a combined $1.66 trillion package of two spending bills passed in March. The larger of those bills, totaling  $1.2 trillion, funded Defense, Homeland Security and State departments and other aspects of general government. More than 70% of the funding of that package was earmarked for the military. Meanwhile, non-military programs decreased.

The stop-gap spending bill simply extends and locks in the current spending inequities across the federal government. 

Who (or what) benefits from current federal spending? Increasingly it’s corporations as governments increasing “privatize” (or more accurately “corporatize”) what previously were public functions performed by public employees whose work was publicly transparent driven by public service vs. corporate profit.

Joint Statement from Veterans For Peace and Move to Amend

     Veterans For Peace              Move to Amend

Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza has produced increasing calls for an immediate ceasefire, while a pro-Israel, U.S.-based group has waged an increasing war on democracy with little public scrutiny and no end in sight.

The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) is one of the most politically and electorally influential groups in this country. They have bombarded our “democratic” system spending over $100 million just in 2024 to punish opponents of Israeli policies, including the military assault on Gaza that’s claimed over 40,000 deaths and displaced 2.3 million people.

Oil and gas corporations are not only major contributors to the destruction of our climate and overall environment through the burning of carbon. They are also major contributors to the destruction of the limited amount of democracy in our country. 

The reason for both is the same: corporate constitutional rights. 

The granting of First Amendment "free speech rights" to corporations by the Supreme Court in the 1970s and expanded in the 2010 Citizens United ruling has legalized the ability of business corporations to contribute massive sums of funds to corrupt elections and public policies toward the extraction and burning of climate-destroying oil and gas over the mass conversion to renewable energy.

What follows are the the current totals of the 2023-2024 election cycle (which runs through the end of this year).

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What podcasts do you listen to?

Do you think any of them would be interested in discussing ending corporate rule, big money in elections and the We the People Amendment?

If so, we’d love to hear your recommendations.

NEW RESOURCE:

End Corporate Rule to End Wars & Occupations "bookmark"

Veterans for Peace and Move to Amend developed a "bookmark" originally for distribution during the VFP-sponsored and MTA-endorsed Walk for Peace & Planet, Justice & Democracy that took place from May 7 in Maine to July 5 in Washington DC.

One of the stated reasons for "Why we Walk": 

We are walking to expose and address the power of corporations destroying our environment, driving everyday people and communities into more poverty while they reap enormous profits and power. These corporate entities, given more rights than living, breathing people with none of the accountability or responsibility, have hijacked our democratic ability to establish peace, justice and a livable world.

The copied and cut bookmark can be distributed anywhere at any time -- including around Memorial and Veterans Day.

Download the bookmark HERE

The moderators of the ABC-sponsored Presidential debate offered questions on a range of issues. They ignored, however, a major set of questions.

If MTA instead of ABC had moderated the debate, here are 10 questions we would have made sure to include.

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"Good evening. Welcome former President Trump and Vice President Harris. We'd like to begin tonight's debate asking the both of you the following questions. 

Letters to the editor

https://www.crescent-news.com/opinion/letters_to_editor/letters-to-the-editor/article_5fe1c252-986d-11ed-b0b0-932322ea12b4.html

Jan 21,2023

Corporations have “personhood” rights and their money qualifies as “free speech.” They financially back the politicians and, once elected, lobby them to create laws on their behalf. This system has big pay-offs.

Oxfam just published “Survival of the richest,” and revealed that “95 food and energy corporations have more than doubled their profits in 2022. They made $306 billion in windfall profits and paid out $257 billion (84%) of that to rich shareholders.”

We are pleased to share a summary of the survey that 506 of you recently completed.

The complete results will be reviewed and incorporated into our Board and Co-Directors retreat discussions beginning today in Chicago.

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The uprising of organized labor over the past year has yielded several impressive victories that have improved the lives of workers. Hollywood writers and actors, UPS workers and United Auto Workers at the Big 3 automakers all won significant concessions. Organized workers continue to be active with 182 labor actions having taken place in 242 locations so far in 2024.

The Republican National Convention (RNC) concludes tonight. The Democratic National Convention (DNC) takes place next month.

The four-day assemblies officially anoint their respective presidential and vice-presidential nominees, present speakers to inspire delegates and those watching to support their campaigns, provide delegates (including current elected officials) opportunities to connect with others in their state and beyond, and serve up plenty of convention hoopla. 

Capitalism and the Market Economy

Summer Reading Circle

Join Move to Amend and individuals from other organizations this summer to read and discuss Jonathan McMillan’s 2024 book, Capitalism and the Market Economy: Bringing Back Together What Banking Pulls Apart. Two times for reading circles are being offered to accommodate an international audience. Each group will be 3, 90 minute sessions discussing 1/3 of the book.

Capitalism and the Market Economy (2024) identifies and critiques the systemic flaw in today’s market economy—namely, banking corporations’ legalized power to create money out of credit. The book provides a concrete action plan to create a more sustainable, democratic, and fair economic system.