Killer Politics (6 page)

That's the ticket! What America needs is for the working poor to sacrifice just a little bit more—for their own good, of course. Minimum wage, by the way is $7.25 an hour, $15,000 a year. The poverty line is about $21,000 for a family of four.

That's the conservative plan in a nutshell. If you want a job, you just have to work cheaper. Yeah! Now we can all work for Walmart. Put Grandma's wheelchair up front. She can be a greeter. Increasingly, that is the thinking. The strength of unions has diminished through government complicity, because the government facilitated outsourcing, which
is really union busting by another name; the American worker doesn't have much protection these days.

Meanwhile, low wages and lack of disposable income have hurt the entire marketplace. The irony of this anti-worker business model is that as corporations outsource, they are unwittingly practicing economic cannibalism by devouring the very workers they need to be consumers.

For our economy to work, labor and corporations have to become partners instead of adversaries. Look, I understand that there will always be an adversarial undercurrent to the relationship, but lots of people keep dogs and cats under the same roof. It works out. The ownership agreement worked out between the United Auto Workers and GM (17 percent) and Chrysler (55 percent) will be a good test. One thing is sure—it's pretty tough to go on strike against yourself.

The Employee Free Choice Act would make it easier for workers to form unions, and the Act stands to strengthen the bargaining power of all workers—which is why big business is so set against it. As a senator, Barack Obama was one of many bipartisan cosponsors of the Senate version (S. 842) of the bill, sponsored by the late Senator Edward Kennedy (D-MA) and Senator Arlen Specter (D-PA).

The house version (H.R. 1696) was sponsored in 2005 by Representative George Miller (D-CA), chairman of the House Committee on Education and Labor, who said during the bill's introduction, “The current process for forming unions is badly broken and so skewed in favor of those who oppose unions that workers must literally risk their jobs in order to form a union. Although it is illegal, one quarter of employers facing an organizing drive have been found to fire at least one worker who supports a union. The employer has all the power; the employer controls the information workers can receive, can force workers to attend anti-union meetings during work hours, can force workers to meet with supervisors who deliver anti-union messages, and can even imply that the business will close if the union wins.”

Where would we be without unions? Unions and union organizers fought and died for child labor laws, the eight-hour workday, and safer working conditions. Unions pressured companies to pay women equal wages and defended workers against age discrimination. Through the years, many organizers were murdered for their efforts. At their core, unions defend not only workers' rights but
human rights
.

As of December 2009, the Employee Free Choice Act had not yet been brought to a vote, but the passage of this bill will be an important milestone along the road to empowering workers and rebuilding the middle class. America's economy will never be robust without a thriving middle class, and the success of unions will have much to say about that.

PAYING YOUR FAIR SHARE

Any time you have a fiscal policy that causes the richest 1 percent of American households to own more wealth than the bottom 90 percent, you've got a problem. The last time America had such a drastic difference between the haves and the have-nots was before the Great Depression. This more recent handout to the wealthy picked up warp speed with tax cuts for fat cats under Ronald Reagan, who lowered the top tax rate from 70 to 28 percent (it was 35 percent in 2009), and culminated with tax cuts for the rich under Bush II in the midst of two wars—something unprecedented in American history. (Taxes have increased in every previous U.S. war, except when they stayed level during the war against Mexico in the 1840s.)

Where was the sacrifice for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan? Bush and Cheney fought these wars with credit cards, and now that they are out of office, the statement has come in the mail.

Meanwhile, überconservatives, having slept through straight talk about fiscal matters for eight years, are
now
hypocritically concerned
about the national debt. These Rip Van Republicans want to use the Bush-Cheney national debt to squelch everything from health care to stimulus programs, seemingly clueless that the way to kick-start the economy is to get more disposable income back in the hands of consumers.

Any student of Business 101 understands that when expenditures exceed income, it's a good idea to increase income. In this case, we need to tighten our belts and do what Bush I and Bill Clinton did, and that is to raise taxes on the top bracket. Bush I went from 28 to 31 percent and Clinton, during the largest economic boom ever in America, made it 39.6 percent. The nation thrived! Clinton was balancing the budget! He also tightened up welfare.

When it comes to Social Security and Medicare, I believe in means testing. I know, I know, we all paid in, but does Bill Gates really need Social Security? If you have the means to do without the programs, you should. We all contribute to aspects of the infrastructure that we may not use but that are there for the greater good. Childless couples pay property taxes, and most of that goes to education. We have to consider the greater good if we are to be a greater country.

I see the logic of a progressive tax. But I sure as heck don't support a punitive tax code. I don't think Americans making $250,000 are necessarily rich, but most of us can afford to pay a little more per earned dollar than those making $21,000 a year, and if paying a little more is what it takes to keep the country safe and strong, sign me up.

Republicans have successfully made the word “taxes” a dirty word for thirty years, but taxes are a necessity. It's a matter of paying your dues as a member of this club we call America. You bet we ought to look for efficiencies where we can, and we ought to fight tooth and nail against increasing taxes, but in the end, we must accept that a certain level of taxation is the price of being an American.

The estate tax is a good idea. It keeps the playing field level. What's wrong with the Gateses and Buffetts and the Oprahs and the Waltons
(and I don't mean John-Boy) giving back to the country that gave them the opportunities to succeed? What's healthy about a pubescent billionaire who was born into it? Hey, I want my kids to have a little something when I'm gone, but not an empire. Working, not inheriting, builds character.

My father was a member of the Greatest Generation. I am ashamed to be a member of the Greediest Generation, and selfishness has been my generation's legacy to this point. Bush and Cheney left us with one hell of a mess and one hell of a bill. Do we have the moral character to clean up the mess and pay the bill, or are we going to pass it on to our children? It's not too late to redeem ourselves.

Pillar #3: Feed the Country

I live in two worlds. One is on the streets of Manhattan. The other is the lake and farm country on the Minnesota–North Dakota border. I see both of these worlds up close and personal, and I wish everyone could, because if there is a disconnect in America, it is between these worlds.

I can barely begin to express the frustration I have when I hear the East Coast intelligentsia editorialize in such an uninformed manner against farm subsidies. I want to grab them by the collar and say, “Do you realize it is
your
grocery bill that is being subsidized?”

Don't any of them know what it is like to have a little cowshit on your boots, live in a small town, or have a cup of coffee with a rancher? I have a small home in Mott, out in western North Dakota, where I go to hunt pheasants. Living in Mott part-time also keeps me in touch with the farming and ranching communities, and let me tell you, these good folks bear no relation to the people castigated on the editorial pages of the eastern press.

 

THE FARM BILL ALLOWS YOU TO EAT CHEAP!

We have a cheap food philosophy in this country that was born out of the Great Depression and a society whose European immigrants remembered all too well the great famines of Europe. According to U.S. Department of Agriculture statistics, in 1929, 23 percent of family income went to food. In 2008, that percentage was 9.6.

And people want to complain about a safety net for the people who have helped deliver this economic miracle. The farm folks I know aren't getting rich. If they were, you'd be paying a hell of a lot more than 9.6 percent.

The cost of subsidies to you?
A fraction of a percent
of the federal budget. Did you know food stamps, school lunch, and other nutrition programs account for
50 percent
of current Farm Bill spending—about $44 billion per year—about what it costs for four months of war in Iraq. While major industry has repressed wages, as poverty has inched upward, the Farm Bill is picking up the slack by feeding poor Americans! The Farm Bill is a poverty buster, though that's not something you'll hear from editorial writers in the major newspapers. They focus on the aspects of the Farm Bill that subsidize those who don't need the help, but in doing so they miss the big picture. Unfortunately, there are always people who will find a way to “game” a program. So no, this program is not perfect, and guys from farm states know it. They know the program is too heavily weighted in favor of Big Ag instead of the traditional family farm.

Senator Byron Dorgan (D-ND) and Senator Charles E. Grassley (R-IA) have unsuccessfully tried to cap federal payments for farming couples at $250,000 annually. The way the system works now, with slim profit margins, it encourages mega farms. The days when a farmer could make a good living on a few hundred acres are gone. Even “family” farms commonly extend over thousands of tillable acres. One of the downsides of the current system is a shrinking of rural communities and
a waning of the work ethic and family values that spring from such communities. Still, for now, fewer farmers producing more bushels does mean lower grocery bills for us all.

THE MERITS OF SMALL FARMS VS. BIG AG

When it comes to the safety and security of our food supply, we are much more secure with a vast network of small, independent producers than we are trusting big corporations. There's an old adage: “Don't put all your eggs in one basket,” and there's wisdom in that statement.

Late in 2008, the nation's largest poultry producer declared bankruptcy. Pilgrim's Pride Corporation, with 25 percent of the market share, filed Chapter 11 because of high overhead, weak market conditions, and a heavy debt load. Pilgrim's Pride supplies Kentucky Fried Chicken, operates thirty-five chicken processing plants and eleven prepared-food plants. Although the company continues to operate, its bankruptcy casts a shadow on the security of our food supply. Two companies—Tyson and Pilgrim's Pride—produce about half of the chickens in America today. To borrow a phrase from the financial crisis, they have become too big to fail.

In the crowded Big Ag conditions that produce a chicken for slaughter in four to six weeks, disease could wipe out millions of birds pretty quick. Birds are genetically engineered just as crops are for disease resistance and quick growth, but what happens if a disease mutates and kills them all? There's something to be said for the diversity that family farms have traditionally ensured.

We all realize that there are efficiencies in large corporations, but when it comes to something as personal and important as the food we put into our bodies, we ought to expend every effort to maintain a healthy supply, and that means supporting the independent producer. People seem to be gravitating in that direction. We see more farmers' markets springing up. More and more, city dwellers look for ways to buy
meat on the hoof. There's a certain comfort that comes from knowing how an animal was raised and processed.

The turkeys I see in the wild in western North Dakota bear little resemblance to the birds sold in stores, which have such large breasts they are actually too fat to breed by conventional means and are propagated through artificial insemination. However, “heritage” breeds are making a comeback. These varieties are typically tastier and bear a closer resemblance to wild turkeys.

As a sportsman, I can tell you that a wild goose, duck, pheasant, grouse, partridge, or turkey makes a far better meal than anything I can find from a factory farm.

PROFIT TRUMPS FOOD SAFETY

As the poultry industry has consolidated, the incidence of food-borne illnesses has increased. A North Carolina State University study found that eight of every ten poultry carcasses in North Carolina were positive for campylobacter, one of the most frequent sources of food-borne illness in people and a leading cause of death from such illness.

According to the World Health Organization, “in industrialized countries, the percentage of the population suffering from food-borne diseases each year has been reported to be up to 30 percent. In the United States of America (USA), for example, around
76 million cases
of food-borne diseases, resulting in 325,000 hospitalizations and 5,000 deaths, are estimated to occur each year” (emphasis mine).

That's astonishing. The American dinner table has become more dangerous than a war zone. This is happening in
industrialized
countries! Plain and simple, it's because profit has begun to trump food safety and consumer protection. Take for instance COOL, the country of origin labeling legislation, which was passed in 2002. COOL would label foods so consumers could decide if they wanted an American steak or one from Canada, where there have been well-publicized incidents of
mad cow disease. But bureaucratic and legislative stall tactics have delayed the implementation of these rules. Why? Big conglomerates think it would hurt their business if you knew where your food originated.