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FROM MY CORNER, Announcing My Candidacy

Howell Hurst 2020 Presidential Election, American News, Climate & Environment, Economy & Finance, People Politics, Poverty, Presidential Election, Racism

FROM MY CORNER

Announcing My Candidacy

Since America has gotten to the point of malcontents actually mailing bombs to people they don’t like, I think it’s finally time an ordinary guy tossed his hat into the 2020 presidential race.

So, I’m tossing mine in right now to get a head start on all the governors, senators, vice presidents, business owners, and others slyly maneuvering in the background, waiting for the right moment to make their move.

I think the right time for me to make my move is now. After all, I don’t have any money; don’t have any established constituency – except potentially my fellow ordinary citizens, the entire American public – and haven’t anything to lose but my privacy.

All of us knowing my odds of winning are theoretically a million to one against me, and since I don’t owe anybody a dime for financially supporting me, I can say exactly what I think the country needs to return to sanity.

The priority issues I see are: Health Care for all Americans, Life-supporting income for all Americans; Serious attention paid to the looming consequences of global warming; Reigning in corporate domination of government; A rational program to create an American financial opportunity out of the worldwide refugee and immigration dilemma; An intense, top priority concentration on international collaboration to end nuclear weaponry.

Consider: 55% of all Americans now favor Obamacare. 20 Million Americans who had no healthcare now do because of Obamacare. It’s the best we’ve come up with so far. So, let’s keep it and work on it and improve it.

Corporations have employees working 45 – 60 hour weeks while some 30 million Americans desperately need life-supporting jobs and income. There needs to be an organized program to reduce hours to some reasonable level, perhaps 30 hours – and share the newly released hours with those who need it. This will take a major job training collaboration between government and corporations.

What is causing global warming is not the only priority. The pertinent issue is that ocean waters appear set to rise all over the world and millions of towns, people, homes, and businesses will have to move away from present shorelines. We must help guide an international collaboration dealing with the massive number of dollars it’s going to cost to manage this unique situation.

Corporate domination of government is destructive We people don’t commonly have a real say in our governments at Federal, state, or local levels. We need a national plebiscite quite possibly, to vote corporate money entirely out of politics.

As for the world’s refugees and immigrants, I suggest we invoke the country’s Christian belief of 90% of all Americans, that we should treat them as we would be treated if we were them.

I suggest we create an immigration program orchestrating their legal entrance to the U.S. – with cautious security measures – building thereby a new lower cost labor base to make us more globally competitive against China, Brazil, and India. How to finance it? Tax incentives for corporations to invest their massive present profits in the concept.

This should be founded on people being our prime economic asset, rather than the present victims of business and government. The clear benefit would be to make America more globally competitive to the large populations of China, India, and Brazil, by serving just emerging nations. China, for one, is already doing it. We’d better get on this wagon.

The nuclear issue is an international no brainer. This is the world’s, and our, Achilles heel. If nations don’t stop making it, and military defense in general, profitable enterprises, we continue to seriously endanger the entire human race.

So, there it is. My opening shot. I don’t need any money. What I need are other people who think the issues make sense. And that, for a change, an ordinary citizen with a rationally functioning mind will serve up a better vision for the country than the mind we are presently saddled with.

We have a sitting president to replace, who more than fifty percent of the country would like to see stop making millions of dollars being president, and instead get back to the private real estate business.

We’ve got an entire government full of rich politicians – almost all of whom were elected with corporate donations and are beholden to those dollars – who want the job of president. Is it unreasonable for America to consider an ordinary citizen who always has earned the average American income? A Veteran? One not against corporations, but decidedly against corporations who seek only profits, disregarding the needs of all Americans?

The worst that can happen in such a campaign is the emergence of totally original concepts for America to reinvent itself. So, here’s my cap in the ring. An independent populist with a lot of new ideas to offer. I suggest that a thinking writer with a philosophical bent will make more sense than most of the lawyer politicians yearning for the job with their hands out begging for million dollar donations from and for corporations.

Keep your money in the bank! Tell me what would you like to see happen with America to put it back on target. I’m all ears. Send me an email and I’ll present your ideas, and more of mine, in the next column.

Till then:

Yours,

Hal

PS. My social security and VA pension will cover my financial needs. You guys can keep the president’s salary. With lowered working hours, let’s also increase women’s paid assistance when birthing children. And devise more paid vacation time each year, like the Western European countries have so successfully done for decades.

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