Citizens Participate
Examples of concerned, informed citizens helping our country are here. Want to share your ideas? Please get in touch.
Visions that could be, click here.
Messages to Jim Risch, Mike Crapo, and Mike Simpson, click here.
Messages to Idaho State officials, click here.
Messages to other government people, click here.
Messages to President Obama on whitehouse.gov or from
http://www3.capwiz.com/c-span/home/
are below:
July 29, 2009
Here is what I sent to my legislators, who all are
fighting health insurance reform. Will you arrange for several million of us to
appear with you before congress to tell them to reform health insurance?
July 29, 2009
Sent to Jim Risch, Mike Crapo, and to Mike Simpson
If the health-insurance reform package includes a government-run public option,
what could be the problem? Most everybody says the government can’t do anything.
If that is so, then the health insurance industry has nothing to worry about.
Are you going to vote for health insurance reform with a government-run
public option? That is one way for the folks I know in Salmon to get health
insurance. Without it, they will be in the place they are now: no health
insurance. How else might they get health insurance?
May 31, 2009
Can you help us make gas in Salmon for
Salmon?
Because of your
Sustainable Energy Options with the
Departments of Agriculture and Energy, Environmental Protection Agency,
we thought we could find help from them or from grants.gov.
We have not been able to find help to make gas in Salmon for Salmon.
At
http://votingpeoplehelpingpeople.com/GuideOurGovernment/GasInSalmon.html
we explain that Salmon can grow sugar beets and make ethanol from those beets.
When we succeed and show that it helps the community, we can share what
we learn with Challis, Mackay, Dubois, Arco and other small towns.
No ethanol is being produced from sugar beets in the USA.
Columbia, the United Kingdom, and China are a few of the countries making
ethanol from sugar beets. Corn
producers make nearly all the ethanol in this country for about one dollar per
gallon, they say. What they don’t
say is that they spend another dollar per gallon to get the ethanol to market.
We think we can make ethanol from sugar beets for less than the $2.36 per
gallon that our research shows, simply by doing it better.
We can.
We have asked for but have gotten no help from our legislators, Mike Simpson,
Mike Crapo, and Jim Risch. We can’t
find a grant on grants.gov, and we can’t find anybody in Salmon, who has the
money to help us get started.
Where can we find help?
May 11, 2009
I have written to you about this before,
asking you to stop it. Weapons
research is still a substantial part of Department of Energy:
While Dr. Chu emphasized the allocations for research, a former Energy
Department official, Robert Alvarez, pointed out that the budget still includes
$6.4 billion for nuclear weapons and $4.4 billion for naval reactors, nuclear
nonproliferation activity and safe storage of surplus plutonium. “Weapons still
make up the largest single expenditure,” he said.
May 10, 2009
While you are going through government programs line-by-line, please try to find why this is going on:
For Victims of Recession, Patchwork State Aid
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/10/us/10safetynet.html?pagewanted=1&tntemail0=y&_r=1&emc=tnt
May 6, 2009
We are delighted to see:
President Obama Announces Steps to Support
Sustainable Energy Options, Departments of Agriculture and Energy, Environmental
Protection Agency to Lead Efforts
We ask that this directive help rural
communities to produce ethanol locally, by growing biofuel crops and fermenting
these crops into ethanol?
All the money associated with ethanol
production stays in the rural community, like Salmon, Idaho, where we live.
Horizons Community Leadership to Reduce Poverty is ongoing and could help
make this ethanol project a reality.
Producing ethanol locally can reduce poverty and show small communities that
they can be energy independent.
Small scale ethanol production, say for a
town of 3-4 thousand people, need not transport ethanol.
The town’s people would burn it in the town.
Money from this entire project stays in the town.
We estimate that we can make ethanol at this scale for about
$2.36/gallon.
April 10, 2009
Here is the message I sent to Mike Crapo, Mike
Simpson, and to Jim Risch yesterday.
Choices to deal with economy:
Liquidate
Receivership
Conservatorship
Subsidize
The solution to the economy must be:
Transparent: all aspects of plan must be available to everybody
Assertive: actions must be aggressive
Accountable: bad managers must be replaced
Clarity: strategy and plans must be available to everybody
590 billion of 700 from TARP and 1.3 trillion by Federal Reserve. have been
spent.
Treasury and Federal Reserve have chosen to Subsidize.
Today (April 9, 2009) Larry Summers could not say when we will see recovery.
Please insist that Treasury and Federal Reserve set specific benchmarks for
recovery. Insist that they describe the benchmarks to everybody. Put them on a
website and in the media.
April 9, 2009
What is your plan to get us out of the mess we are in? You voted against the
2010 budet. What is your plan for energy, education, healthcare, and deficit?
The separation of rich and poor is greater now than it ever has been.
April 8, 2009
We think that the TARP funds are not in the best interest of the people and are
in the best interest of the bankers who caused the problem. We gather
information from C-Span and from the Senate Oversight Panel, to mention just two
of the sources. You can do something about this. We rely on you.
We can't trust the same people who got us into this financial mess to help lead
us out. Replace the leadership at the bailed-out banks, starting with Bank of
America CEO Ken Lewis.
If Secretary Geithner forces him to resign, it'll send a strong message to the
rest of Wall St.: The era of zero accountability is over and reckless behavior
that puts our economy at risk won't be tolerated.
Of all the folks who helped bring about the recession, Lewis is one of the
worst:
Shareholders say he helped drive the company into the ground. Bank of America
has lost billions—and 90% of its value—in part because Lewis "hastily arranged
the ill-considered acquisition" of Merrill Lynch.
Even after the crisis, he hasn't changed his ways. He ensured that high-level
staff received bonuses—despite recent announcements that the bank was laying off
another 35,000 employees.
On top of all this, he's fighting against more rights for workers. Three days
after receiving $25 billion in bailout money, Bank of America brought together
powerful banking interests to figure out how to defeat the Employee Free Choice
Act
Ken Lewis has got to go. And we need to look closely at the other bailed-out
banks that may need new leadership too.
Please formulate a plan and get us out of the mess we are in.
April 9, 2009
The plan in Afghanistan may need adjusting now. Please look at it carefully. This New York Times article describes what they saw:
U.S. Hope for Afghan Police Is Undercut by Corruption
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/09/world/asia/09ghazni.html?emc=tnt&tntemail1=y
But a shortage of American trainers is only one factor hampering the Afghan police. If the experience of the American troops already training police officers in Ghazni Province is any indication, better policing may be impossible for Afghanistan unless government officials at all levels stop cannibalizing their civil administration and police force for a quick profit.
April 1, 2009
At http://c-span.org/Watch/watch.aspx?MediaId=HP-R-16917 Neil Barofsky, the Special Inspector General for the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), Elizabeth Warren, chair of the Congressional Oversight Panel, and Mr. Dodaro, Government Accounting Office appeared before the Senate Finance Committee. The GAO report is at http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d09504.pdf
A clear message from all three, in their testimony and in the discussion, is that the TARP fund distribution has no stated objective, no way to measure if it does what it needs to do, and no way to see how the banks are using the TARP funds. When they ask Treasury about the TARP funds, Treasury doesn’t bother to answer them.
TARP still retains about $135 billion of the $700 billion allocated, Treasury Sec. Geithner said recently.
This is what happened: TARP funds go to a bank. That bank pays other banks with those TARP funds. Those banks do not use TARP funds to lend to business and people. Instead they pay off banks that don’t have TARP funds. How does the government know how TARP funds are used? The government can’t see what TARP banks are doing and certainly can’t see what non-TARP banks are doing with TARP money.
HR 1586 was a reaction to AIG bonuses, which accomplished nothing. 2.9 trillion dollars is at stake, according to Max Baucus, chair of the committee.
Please work with the Senate Finance Committee and any other way you can to stop sending TARP funds to banks with no accountability and no way to know what the banks are doing with taxpayer money. You may help the USA from falling into bankruptcy.
March 31, 2009
I ask that you work with Timothy Geithner to take the five largest banks into receivership. This is part of the reason that poor people are getting poorer and rich people are getting richer.
The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency shows why the USA has the greatest separation of poor people from rich people.
The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency report http://www.occ.treas.gov/ftp/release/2009-34a.pdf shows:
The largest five banks that hold 96 percent of the total notional amount of derivatives are: JPMORGAN CHASE BANK, BANK OF AMERICA, CITIBANK NATIONAL ASSN, GOLDMAN SACHS BANK USA, HSBC BANK USA NATIONAL ASSN
Timothy Geither has said that his plans are a starting point. Please work with Timothy Geithner to evaluate these banks. Consider that most banks in USA are healthy. They cannot loan because of these five banks at the top.
The government should put these five banks into receivership, book them to zero in net worth, and fire the management.
At http://www.stanford.edu/group/scspi/pdfs/pathways/winter_2009/Berlin.pdf we see that the income distribution is going the top 1%. The management of these banks is in the top 1%.
What’s Behind Persistent Poverty?
While the U.S. poverty rate has remained virtually unchanged for 35 years, total economic
growth (as measured by gross domestic product) has tripled over the same period
(see Figure 1). So why didn’t this economic growth reduce poverty? There are four principal
explanations: (1) the returns to economic growth, which used to be shared with the
bottom half of the income distribution, are now accruing primarily to the top 1 percent;
(2) the three-decade stall in inflation-adjusted average wages and earnings has had particularly
devastating effects on workers with a high school diploma or less; (3) employment
rates among men, particularly teenagers, have declined precipitously, as have rates
of full-year, full-time work; and (4) single-parent households are increasingly common,
a result of the 40-year upward trend in divorce and a 30-year increase in out-of-wedlock
childbearing.
March 27, 2009
TARP Funds to Legislators: More outrage for the people. Please check this for accuracy. If it is, can you stop it?
From NBC's Chuck Todd
In the midst of the congressional outrage over bonuses and bailouts, many of the very firms who benefitted from TARP funds are still making political donations. And the politicians are still taking them.
According to the latest F.E.C. data for February, several members of Congress who have been critical of the federal government’s bailout of U.S. companies have received campaign contributions just in the last six weeks – from the firms they bailed out.
Campaign-finance-reform advocate Fred Wertheimer says the government's been bailing out banks and other major "too-big-to-fail" firms -- as these same companies continue to use their PACs to make contributions.
Posted: Friday, March 27, 2009 2:17 PM by Petra Cahill
http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2009/03/27/1868569.aspx
March 27, 2009
At http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/27/world/27military.html?emc=tnt&tntemail1=y
the article, U.S. Sees Chinese Military Rise, refers to
http://www.defenselink.mil/pubs/pdfs/China_Military_Power_Report_2009.pdf
Please give us your ideas of this document and the circumstances involved with it.
March 27, 2009
Today I sent this message to my legislators: Mike Crapo, Jim Risch, and Mike Simpson.
Timothy Geithner on March 26, 2009 suggests six key elements for regulation of financial institutions to the House Financial Services Committee:
1. giving a single government entity, possibly the Federal Reserve, the power and authority to oversee the entire economy for signs of systemic risk
2. the establishment of a government mechanism to seize and dismantle large institutions whose failure threatens the nation's financial stability
3. the enacting of tougher requirements for the amount of money and assets financial institutions need to have on hand so they can withstand economic troubles
4. requiring large private investment funds to register with the Securities and Exchange Commission
5. the creation of a new, comprehensive framework of regulation for derivatives, including a central clearinghouse for trades in that market
6. the development of new, stronger requirements for money-market funds so increased withdrawals won't threaten the broader financial system.
He explained that these are a starting place and that regulation needs a lot of work so that the people do not need to bail out the financial market again.
Many of us know that the deregulation of the financial markets has been the work of both parties for at least 25 years. Many of us know that the greed of the market and excessive profits are part of the problem. Instead of using those profits to provide better service to their customers, they created the biggest separation of poor people from rich people that this country has ever had.
We ask that you participate in this regulation process, to find a solution. We ask that you work to stop these institutions from giving money to legislators for any reason whatever. How can legislators accept money from the industry they are regulating?
March 25, 2009
Starting today, you can ask a question about the economy from whitehouse.gov where you can get to:
Here is question Calvin Leman sent today:
You have said that you want to cut government programs that the people do not need. And you said that savings from this could help make the deficit half by the end of your first term.
How is this job going? Do you need help with this analysis? When do you think you will conclude this analysis? How much money will this save?
March 23, 2009: Calvin Leman to President Obama.
Financial Institution Failure Is Only Part of the Problem.
From 1820 to 1970, for 150 years, wages went up as productivity went up. From 1970 to 2009, productivity has continued to increase. Wages have not. Automation, computers, and technological progress have helped increase productivity. Why did wages not increase? One factor is: Companies learned that if they don’t pay workers more, their profit is higher.
After 1970, American workers began working longer hours and more family members began working, in order to pay their bills. After working more and still not being able to pay their bills, Americans borrowed money, as they tried to maintain their standard of living.
Why did this happen? By 1970, those countries that had been devastated by WW II were beginning to compete with USA companies. Companies moved from this country to other countries in order to increase profit. At the same time, more family members entered the work force. This created more workers than we have jobs.
Wages have not gone up since 1970 because we have more people than jobs: (1) more people are working longer hours, and (2) jobs are going overseas. Neither of these would create the depression we have. Now add this: Since 1970, Boards of Directors’ greed has kept wages from rising.
The profits of these companies from 1970 to 2009 have gone to the stock market, to make a few people rich, and to the financial institutions. This has created the richest people the world has ever seen, the greatest separation of rich people from poor people that the United States has ever seen, and the most debt Americans have ever held: $4,400 per person in the United States right now.
The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA) can help working people succeed by helping them with energy, with education, and with healthcare. This can create a workforce that can compete with any county. None of this will affect what the real problem is.
Workers must have a say in how the company is run. If they had a say in how the company is run, they would not stop their wages from increasing, they would not lend money to somebody who could not repay, they would not create an Internet Bubble that breaks, and they would not create a Housing Bubble that breaks.
More information on this idea are:
Interview on therealnews.com with Richard Wolff:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WoGyOaM5Guw&feature=player_embedded
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DX_Cxq2Cl-g&feature=player_embedded
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bR-VNaMZTRw&feature=player_embedded
Other media by Richard Wolff:
Capitalism Hits the Fan: A Lecture on the Economic Meltdown - Preview Feb 4, 2009
Rick Wolff on Economic Crisis and Socialist Strategy Oct 13, 2008
Capitalism Hits the Fan A Marxian View Oct 7, 2008
The Struggle: "Recession" Feb 9, 2008
March 22, 2009: Calvin Leman to President Obama.
The Problem:
Boards of Directors make decisions that have caused the loss of income to the working people even as productivity increases, as you show in STAFF REPORT, The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA): Helping Middle-Class Families, at http://www.whitehouse.gov/assets/documents/staff_report_ARRA-FINAL.pdf
(See the bar plots 1979-2007 on page 4.
ARRA is a good policy to try to help the working people now. To solve the problem, though, business must be run differently in the USA. The workers need to participate with the Board of Directors. If they had, then their wages would not fall while productivity increases, banks would not make risky loans, and automobiles would be an export product.
Richard Wolf describes this inequity at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bR-VNaMZTRw.
Government could alter tax on companies that allow workers to participate on the Boards of Directors and that increase worker compensation as productivity increases. Government may find other policies to help solve this inequity.
March 21, 2009: Calvin Leman to President Obama. This is my response to the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, available at whitehouse.gov.
I am studying the The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 and agree that it can lead to long term prosperity for common people. Healthcare, renewable energy, education, and our fiscal deficit have been holding common people down for a long time. Getting us all back to work should be the first order of business.
I am telling my legislators and my neighbors about this plan. Neither of them understands the dangers that David Walker and others are bringing to our attention. Taxing wealth and taxing stocks and bonds at the rate we all pay income tax can pay for this economic recovery. Your plan to make all expenditures transparent on the Internet can help stop corruption and inefficiency. Your plan to rid government of unneeded programs can help reduce the deficit.
Thank you for keeping your eye on the ball.
March 20, 2009: Calvin Leman to President Obama
CBO Cost Estimate: American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (H.R. 1) CBO summary is at
http://www.cfr.org/publication/18387/cbo_cost_estimate.html
CBO cost estimate is at http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/99xx/doc9968/hr1.pdf
In the next ten years, the government must save $816 billion, to offset the cost of H.R. 1.
Concerning the budget deficit, CBO says:
Combining the spending and revenue effects of H.R. 1, CBO estimates that enacting the
bill would increase federal budget deficits by $169 billion over the remaining months of
fiscal year 2009, by $356 billion in 2010, by $174 billion in 2011, and by $816 billion
over the 2009-2019 period.
How will the government save $816 billion in the next ten years?
Can the government borrow money as government has been doing? Who will lend the money? We need to borrow from foreigners. We owe China 1.3 trillion, 40-50 billion is the interest we pay each year right now.
March 19, 2009: Calvin Leman to President Obama
Here is a message I sent to my legislators (Mike Crapo, Jim Risch, Mike Simpson) on March 19, 2009
Yesterday we asked you to support the president’s plan. Today we ask that you support the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.
The president’s plan, the budget document is:
A New Era of Responsibility
Renewing America’s Promise
http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/assets/fy2010_new_era/A_New_Era_of_Responsibility2.pdf
The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009:
From whitehouse.gov on March 19, 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009
http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=111_cong_bills&docid=f:h1enr.pdf
We are concerned that these two documents may not be enough.
Massive government spending is needed. How to pay for it? Government cannot spend more and at the same time spend less. How can Obama half the deficit by the end of his first term and stimulate the economy at the same time? The government must tell the people how dangerous the current situation is. The government is bailing out financial institutions and still we have people with no job and no money and no health care.
Can the government tax the people to pay for these programs? Tax is obviously counterproductive. Tax more, people spend less, the recession gets worse.
Can the government borrow money as government has been doing? Who will lend the money? We need to borrow from foreigners. We owe China 1.3 trillion, 40-50 billion is the interest we pay each year right now.
Can government tax the wealthy? Yes, if government is to serve the people.
Can the government take over failing industries to stop spread of failure? Yes, if government is to serve the people.
The government must help families with income and a job now. To prevent the disaster we are in and to get out of the disaster we are in, government must reorganize how business is carried out. Since 1970 Boards of Directors have taken advantage of those who do the work. Productivity has been increasing for 30 years. Wages have not. Wages are stagnant because of these Boars of Directors. Can we reorganize business so that the workers take part in decision-making? If workers were part of the decision-making, would wages be stagnant while productivity increases for the last 30 years?
March 18, 2009
Thanks to the Bush-Obama-Geithner policy of bailing out failing companies, we now have the worst of all possible scenarios: A taxpayer subsidized, government supervised private company; an unsustainable public/private hybrid that is too public to make its own decisions and too private to be responsible to the taxpayers that are keeping it alive.
Please rethink the entire bailout process. The dangers of a domino-like financial meltdown are real. But so, too, is the danger that the outrage of the American people will reach the point that we no longer trust the dire warnings or the righteous indignation coming from Washington.
One opportunity is to stop bailing out banks and use this bill for part of the recovery.
From whitehouse.gov on March 19, 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009
http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=111_cong_bills&docid=f:h1enr.pdf
Wealth tax, take over failing industry,
legislation creating another regulatory entity to govern the dissolution of large financial institutions such as AIG
Massive government spending is needed. How to pay for it? Government cannot spend more and at the same time spend less. How can Obama half the deficit by the end of his first term and stimulate the economy at the same time?
1. Tax to raise money. Obviously counterproductive. More tax, less spending, recession.
2. Borrow money as government has been doing. Who will lend the money? Need to borrow from foreigners. We owe China 1.3 trillion, 40-50 billion in interest each year right now.
3. Wealth tax, take over failing industries to stop spread of failure, help families with income and a job, reorganize how business is carried out. Since 1970 Board of Directors has taken advantage of those who do the work. Productivity has been increasing for 30 years. Wages have not. Wages are stagnant. Can we reorganize business so that the workers take part in decision-making?
March 18, 2009: Calvin Leman to President Obama, first message
While you are making the government serve the people, please consider removing all defense activities and cleanup from defense activities from agencies like the Department of Energy.
The Pentagon may intentionally use agencies like the Department of Energy for defense activities in order to hide the cost of defense activities from the people, from the president, and from the congress.
March 18, 2009: Calvin Leman to President Obama, second message
This World Bank Report show counterproductive USA trade policy. This from the Washington Post:
Trade Barriers Could Threaten Global Economy
World Bank Finds Protectionist Trend
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, March 18, 2009; Page D01
At least 17 of the 20 major nations that vowed at a November summit to avoid protectionist steps that could spark a global trade war have violated that promise, with countries from Russia to the United States to China enacting measures aimed at limiting the flow of imported goods, according to a World Bank report unveiled yesterday.
The report underscores a "worrying" trend toward protectionism as countries rush to shield their ailing domestic industries during the global economic crisis. It comes one day after Mexico vowed to slap new restrictions on 90 U.S. products. That action is being taken in retaliation against Washington for canceling a program that allowed Mexican truck drivers the right to transport goods across the United States, illustrating the tit-for-tat responses that experts fear could grow in coming months.
March 17, 2009: Marsha Garland shows Calvin Leman is trying to help, by sending a message to President Obama.
Help with the Bailout investigation
Cal Leman, who keeps a close eye on current events, noticed that the Senate had formed a committee to investigate the degree of success of the bailout process to help the people, as it was intended to do. Cal noticed this committee had made specific findings which were important. As a concerned citizen, Cal wanted to make sure Obama and his staff were aware that this was going on. To this end, Cal put this information on the Whitehouse website. He was going to do everything he could to ensure Pres. Obama has all the pertinent information to make its procedural decisions.
All citizens should be aware of this website (http://cop.senate.gov/ , http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dqkTpSpT0HY and http://www.whitehouse.gov/) . Obama appears to be doing all he can to reach out to them.