My Thoughts, Beliefs, and Opinions

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Not in any particular order of importance--

My Fundamentals: I believe in a woman’s right to chose. I do not want the government to legislate morality or make decisions that are deeply personal. I support gay rights. I believe the LBGT community should have the same civil rights as the rest of us--to marry, to raise children, and to purchase a wedding cake from any damned bakery they please. I believe in the separation of church and state, and I support the notion that when churches become political, they should lose their tax exempt status. Religious activism has caused many people to turn away from religion and caused a precipitous and unfortunate drop in church attendance. I believe in public education. One of the reasons our ancestors came to this country was for the public schools. I consider 2-year community colleges  public schools and believe they should be tuition-free. I believe in the arts in public education. The arts (great literature, visual arts, dance, music, and film) enrich us and expand outward our minds and our souls.

I think corporations who have been lucky enough to exist in this country should pay their fair share of taxes, without loopholes. I do NOT believe in “trickle down economics,” which has been proven time and again not to work for the middle and lower classes. I believe billionaires can live on less and therefore should be taxed at the same rate as the rest of us. I once read that a billion dollars lined up end to end would encircle the earth three times. Now, honestly, who can’t live on a billion dollars?

I believe in labor rights and that the minimum wage needs to be doubled. It’s expensive to live in this country and workers need to be paid accordingly. And I believe corporations that move their businesses overseas to avoid paying state and local taxes or to avoid hiring American workers should be penalized with a higher tax rate and with the tariffs that apply to the country where they have moved. I believe that health care is a human right and should be given freely by a country as wealthy as the United States to ALL of her citizens. I believe in humane immigration laws. I believe in a guest worker program that will regulate the wages paid to non-citizen workers, and provide a work force willing and able to do the service jobs that most Americans do not wish to do. However, I do believe that the United States is an English-speaking country and should designate itself as such.

I believe in legalizing marijuana and decriminalizing other illegal narcotics. I believe in the death penalty, but only in the case of heinous crimes, such as serial killings or mass murders. I believe that Federal Judges should be elected by the people and not appointed.

I believe in a strong military force that provides career opportunities and education for enlistees, and gives them the lifetime benefits guaranteed by the G.I. Bill. In return for their service to the country, I believe we should pay our soldiers more. It’s a disgrace that a newly enlisted serviceman earns so little that they qualify for welfare programs. In addition, I do not believe that our military force should be used for extended periods of conflict without a formal declaration of war.

I believe in a national gun registry, title included, the same way we do with our cars and trucks and RVs, so that when a gun is inherited or bought from a friend or person other than from a gun store, the title to that gun will transfer from one individual to another. I believe in regulating magazine capacity to 6 rounds, and that ammunition sales should be tracked and reported to the gun registry. You can’t buy too much decongestant from the pharmacy within a given month. I know because I have been denied. So if that can be tracked so can the purchase of guns and ammunition.

I believe Election Day (first Tuesday in November) should be a national holiday. I also believe that all states should have the same election laws and conduct their elections in a uniform manner nationwide. I believe that a voting ID with a picture and bar code should be given to every registered voter and that this ID should be the only item required at the polls. I believe that voting districts should be determined by population and by a regulatory committee and those districts should remain the same so long as the populations of those districts does not change. Voting districts should not be determined by any Political Party.

As regards the office of President of the United States: I believe that any candidate running for the highest office in the land should be REQUIRED to show five years of tax returns. I believe that once elected, all presidents should be REQUIRED to divest of their business interests in the form of either a blind trust or a straight divestiture. I believe that the power to pardon should have judicial oversight and be used sparingly. I believe that the FBI, CIA, and DOJ should fall under the Judicial Branch and not under the Executive Branch of government. I believe that the President should be held to the same standards under the laws and ethics of this country as any other citizen. I believe that he--or she--can be arrested, tried, and convicted just as the rest of us. We do not have kings in this country. In fact, we fought a long war to get rid of our king.

As regards campaigning and lobbyists: I believe that it should be illegal for any campaign to go on for longer than 1 year. I believe that all campaigns should be paid for with public money and that “dark money” or PAC money should be illegal. I believe that there should be term limits placed on all elected officials of 8 years, the same as there is for the President. I believe that lobbying should be strictly regulated, and consist of only verbal or written solicitations and not monetary campaign contributions. I believe that Third parties should be included in the Party Primary system and should also be included in all public debates and town hall meetings. We must remember that we "hire" elected officials to work for us. We should be able to set the rules.

Above all, I believe in fairness and equality and the absolute meaning of both of those words. I do not believe that one race or the wealthy or any class of people should have more rights than another. I want an open and ethical government that is transparent to its people. I want a moral but secular country where all people are free to practice their religious beliefs--or not--without bias. I want government FOR the people and BY the people.

I love my country but I do not love the place where I presently find all of us who live here. We have strayed, I believe, far from the fundamentals of our Founding Fathers, partly because they could not, in the late 18^th Century, have foreseen the changing and globalizing world we have now. And we have been divided by people and corporations with ulterior motives, a division that worries me greatly, and I think worries most of us. We have to remember, once again, the old Golden Rule we were all taught as school children: Do Unto Others As You Would Have Them Do Unto You. That doesn’t mean we all have to have the same emotions or opinions; it just reminds us to respect one another.

Anyone who has read this far might not, and probably won’t, agree with everything I have laid out here. That is perfectly OK. We are all entitled to our own opinions and beliefs. That’s what makes this a “free country.” My opinions are mine, developed over 60+ years of watching, reading, and paying attention to the goings on around me. I own them, and actually, I’m proud of them so don’t expect me to change them easily. I’m hardheaded and I’m actually not looking for debate.  I simply want some understanding of the positions I hold dear. We all make the mistake of assuming someone feels the same way we do about a subject, and that assumption is often deeply offensive to me. Yes, I am a liberal-thinker, and I am certainly not ashamed of that. When I look up the word “liberal” here is what I find: “Open to new behavior or opinion; broad-minded; tolerant of individual rights and freedoms.” I proudly accept that label.

Onward....