User:Bill Smoot

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As an American citizen, I propose a "Trust Fund For Global Education." The fund would be privately controlled by a multi-partisan board of directors and would recieve funding both privately and through grants from the United States government. The fund would be used to create a global network of university campuses that focused on developing international solutions. It would promote continuously expanding international student and intellectual (professor and teacher) exchange programs. On US campuses, I would advocate for it to focus on topics such as:

Reducing Poverty In the 21st Century At Home and Abroad

Expanding Access To Health Care At Home and Abroad

Expanding Access To Education At Home and Abroad

Facing The Reality Of Global Climate Change

Combating Discrimination In Employment

Expanding Democratic Participation

Balancing Public Safety and Criminal Justice

Expanding International Exchange and Understanding

Rationalizing International Trade and Domestic Stability

Energy Policy and The Environment

Stablizing and Reducing State College Costs

Enhancing The Environment and Limiting Urban Sprawl

Creating A More Peaceful and Nonviolent Foreign Policy

Modernizing and Expanding Public Transportation

Reducing Military Spending and Creating a Peace Based Economy

Building Solidarity With Human Rights Activist Across the Globe

Many of these topics could be studied with some benefit by the current US Democratic Party. The party currently seems to lack a sufficiently positive agenda and cannot effectively challenge the militaristic, capitalistic and religionistic (I think I just made up that word) policies of the current national government. I would like to see the Democratic Party organize 1,000 study groups around the country to meet together, study some of the issues listed above, and work on plans of action.

We need to increase the respect given to teachers and the teaching profession. The federal government should give every teacher a tax credit. We need more teachers. Throwing money at the problem is a good idea. Smaller class sizes contribute to better education. That is why rich people send their children to expensive private schools with small class sizes. Does anyone think that a class of sixty children functions as well as a class of 4 or 8 children? Did you learn better in a big lecture hall, or working one on one with the teacher?

Global warming is here and its going to get worse. The planet is a big greenhouse and it is getting hot. I will not link to the global warming article because controversial topics such as this tend to be politicized on wikipedia. I tend to agree with the vast scientific consensus that it is probably a major problem. In fact, I believe much of humanity is potentially headed in a downward spiral toward oblivion if CO2 emmissions continue escalating. For this reason, I have revised my earlier opposition to nuclear energy. I now believe the United States and other countries should expand the use nuclear energy quickly. I am interested in the pebble bed reactor concept and other allegedly safer nuclear designs.

Solar energy, energy efficiency, hybrid and electric vehicles are part of the solution. I am a hypocrit in this regard, since I drive a rusty old Dodge Van. We have not achieved anywhere near our potential in the areas of energy efficiency. The hydrogen economy is probably not in our future. It takes a lot of electricity to make hydrogen. Why not just use the electricity. Maybe we will develop some other great energy sources in my life time or my children's lifetimes. Maybe fusion energy will save our planet.

In America we have an economic opportunity deficit which is fueled by strong elements of racism and classism. People need a "living wage." The minimum wage should be doubled, at least, if not tripled. We need stronger laws to combat unfair labor and employment practices. We need to strengthen the rights of employees to form unions and worker associations by create private rights of action for individuals who have had their union organizing or other employment rights violated. American workers need laws that give them a cause of action to sue their employers in court where their rights to organize or act collectively were violated by their employers. Workers ought to be able to sue for compensatory damages, punitive damages, attorney's fees and costs. This would put an army of lawyers on the side of the workers, and would counterbalance the awesome power of Wal-Mart and other giant corporations. We need to strengthen employees' rights to bring class action lawsuits.

Professor Manning Marable has contended that there are three key barriers to black participation in American capitalism that include high unemployment, high rates of incarceration and disenfranchisement of black voters. In Mississippi, for example, as many as 30% of African American men have been disenfranchised because of law barring individuals with criminal convictions from voting. Under the current regime, these problems are getting much worse, not better.

I am also a big advocate of establishing improved barriers to corporate participation in elections. Corporations have gained the power of citizens in the United States. It seems wrong to me that the corporations are buying political power and many political offices. Unregulated capitalism leads to an erosion of democracy, the environment, and humane values. Take one of our major corporations, AT & T. This company is the leading purveyor of pornographic movies. They are willing to exploit women and promote a course and vulgar society in order to make money. Corporations such as AT&T have an ideal vision for society. It looks like the strip in Las Vegas. In this vision, they own the casinos, the brothels, the peep shops, and the cable porn channels. You and I are the johns and the prostitutes, the gambling addicts, the drunks. We are the saps. Who is AT&T and its executives. They are the pimps. I don't want to be pimped by a big corporation and its fat cat executives.

I am also a big advocate of eliminating the death penalty. Countries with severe human rights problems, like China, Cuba, Burma, Iran, and Russia can point to the U.S. as having a poor human rights record as long as the US has the death penalty. There is a great deal of improvement that can be made in the US on the human rights front, but, by comparison with the above countries, the US is a human rights paradise at home. In its foreign policy on the other hand, the US can justifiably be described as a terrorist state and a supporter of terrorism.

We need to work to stamp out racism, nationalism, superstition and religous fundamentalism and capitalistic fundamentalism. God does not exist. We live on a rock in the middle of an unimaginably large vacuum called space. We evolved from a fish who evolved from a single celled organism. Jesus Christ was a nice guy, but, his idea of advanced technology was a wheelbarrow. What leads people that believe that Jesus was the son of God, that they can communicate with Jesus who died 2000 years ago, that God created the earth in 6 days and that Jonas lived in the stomach of a whale for three days? Isn't this kind of thinking, combined with some serious narcisism and other mental disorders, that brought us Osama Bin Ladin. We need to avoid accepting the illusions that are often peddled by religious fanatics. We need to avoid the delusions that can corrupt our thought processes.