Basics of the Green Party Philosophy
The goals of the Green Party really are rather simple. The platform of the Green Party is based on making society better by making sure that everyone is taken care of and has equal opportunities. In general that means the Green Party puts people ahead of politics. They believe that people should have the chance to get quality healthcare, education, and basic civil rights.
The Green Party philosophy isn’t simply about giving handouts to everyone. Instead the idea is that American society benefits when the most people have the education, food, shelter, and medical care that they need. Children who are living in comfortable environments are more likely to be their best selves in school and the community if they have everything they need.
The Green Party platform doesn’t require anyone to ignore the reality that not everyone makes the best decisions, but the party’s platform does call for good treatment in prisons. The Party calls for education and work/life skills to be part of the prison culture.
Overall the politics of the Green Party supports non-violence, which is why the party is opposed to most war. The 10 Key Values, the guiding document of the Green Party, state that the party will “work to demilitarize, and eliminate weapons of mass destruction” while still acknowledging that sometimes self-defense becomes necessary.
The idea behind the Green Party is that peace and love can be guiding forces in the world and that sharing the wealth of the entire nation not so that everyone has exactly equal possessions and assets but so that everyone has at least enough to cover their basic needs. The purpose of the bulk of the Green Party’s positions is to make the world happier and more satisfying for the largest number of people, rather than pitting people against each other to compete for resources.
The Need For Campaign Reform
There is a growing problem in the country and it’s one that needs a major shakeup in the way that the government does things. It has to do with finance campaign reform. It’s a big deal these days, but if you aren’t sure of the problem, you might need to take a closer look.
The two candidates from the two biggest political parties are often spending millions and millions of dollars in order to fund their campaign to be president. While the smaller candidates are doing similar things, it rests on such a smaller scale that it makes sense to focus on the bigger candidates.
Therefore, when these presidential nominees look to get campaign money they look to businesses. A wonderful business like 21st Century Insurance might decline to help because of a conflict of interest, but another competitor might want to give money to the democratic nominee. So they donate a rather large check to the candidate in hopes that they win. This isn’t always the case, but if they do win, it’s where things get to be a little underhanded.
If the candidate wins and gets into office, they will be looking favorably at the businesses that got them into office. When reform comes down that might be good for the American people, but bad for the business of that company, the president might be inclined to think about the best interest of the business first.
The reason for this is because the president will want to get re-elected and doesn’t want to ruin their potential donation the second time around. This is why many people believe that this country needs some campaign parameters that says candidates can’t get money from places or people that can ultimately cause a conflict of interest once in office.
Green Party’s Goals for Better Healthcare
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Party politics typically means pitting Republicans and Democrats against each other to talk about how to best fix American society within a narrow scope. The two major parties represent only the center in terms of political beliefs, and their arguments typically are over shades of grey. Such is the case with the healthcare reform now in litigation.
One of the central beliefs of the national Green Party is that universal healthcare, also called a single-payer system, is the best option. Universal healthcare means that the government acts as the insurer, negotiating with doctors and making payments and medical determinations in the way that insurance companies do now.
The Green Party belief is that society would benefit from overall lower healthcare costs, even if taxes increased to pay for this service. Though universal healthcare didn’t pass in the 2009 healthcare reform bill, there are other issues that the Greens support related to healthcare.
The Green Party supports the “Manhattan Project,” a series of HIV/AIDS-related ideas, including increased funding for research on HIV/AIDS and the care of people living with AIDS. The Manhattan Project also calls for needle-sharing programs and for low-cost medications to be made available.
The only place where the politics of the Green Party aligned enough with the major parties was in the belief that healthcare is a human right. The general belief of the Green Party is that all people should have access to proper healthcare, which means that there are no people turned away from coverage because of a pre-existing condition. The new healthcare reform law will require insurers to begin to accept patients with a variety of conditions that previously led to denied coverage.
The Green Party’s goals with regard to medical rights are to make society better by ensuring that healthcare benefits are equally accessible and affordable for everyone.
The Green Party Hopes to see Equality at the UN
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In the Green Party Platform one can find principles and tenets about the United States and its role as an international neighbor. Among these tenets is a simple, yet important one: “Pre-emptive invasion in prohibited by international law.”The invasion and subsequent occupation of Iraq did not please Greens. Although it was unarguable that the then-dictator of Iraq, the infamous Saddam Hussein, was a tyrant who did not deserve to be in power, that same argument could have been made for dozens of rulers in the world at the time.Where the Green Party differentiates from others is that it specifically outlines the role of the United Nations, and how the United States should respect the UN’s role in international diplomacy.The Green Party is known for its preference of diplomacy over force. It recognizes that the United Nations is an institution of international law whose treaties the US is bound to uphold after signing. Many Americans aren’t aware that the Green Party has a very detailed platform outlining when, and in what circumstances the United States should become involved in international force. First and foremost, the platform says the United States “is obligated to render military assistance or service under U.N. command to enforce U.N. Security Council resolutions.” This means Despite the fact that Greens opt for peace over war any day, they see a military presence as sometimes inevitable in cases of genocide or other acts against humanity. One point the platform outlines in its Foreign Policy section. It states that the veto power currently held by the five permanent members on the UN Security Council should be repealed.This fits right in line with the overall Green value of grassroots government, because now the five most powerful nations can veto the resolutions passed by the UN General Assembly. This has happened time after time, and always has the same result: the powerful walk away unscathed and unaccountable for their actions.
The Media’s Role in an Election Year
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The Historical Rise and Fall of “Third Parties”
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The Historical Rise and Fall of Third Parties
Third parties, whether in the United States or other nations where a two-party system dominates, only gain strength when one of the two major parties fails somehow. This failure could be due to a division, a lost identity, or a breakdown of leadership. Many times, upon seeing this weakness, the third party will make a strategic move to win the disenfranchised electorate over.
Experts say, however, that the danger of a third party is its short-lived nature in the spotlight: it makes a smashing debut on the grand stage in its first election, bringing refreshing ideas to a weary populace. By the next election, however, the two major parties have had time to regroup and focus their efforts directly on the people the third party had won over. In the past, this has involved the major parties tweaking their own platforms and agendas to “follow the pack.†The end result is that the third party fades away into the background, and the two major parties once again take the lead on the stage.
It should be noted, however, that although third parties do tend to rise and fall quickly, the mark they make on the major parties is almost always evident. Their principles become part of one, or both of the two dominating parties. Their slogans are echoed in the banter of politicians who claim the ideas as their own.
In many countries around the world, the norm is a plurality of political parties; groups are born and die on a regular cycle. The United States, however, has had two dominating parties for so long, it will take persistence, organization, grassroots efforts, and awareness for a third party to hold its own. It will also take the creation of a new identity among voters; just like faith, education and work comprise who people are, so, too does politics. Voters must be convinced that the political party they belong to is a part of who they are.
No Green Pawns
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The Green Party is growing in size. If it wants to beat the two major parties in their game of Monkey in the Middle, it still has a bit of growing to do. One of the biggest challenges facing the Green Party is its own level of success. As it becomes larger, the major parties attempt to manipulate the Green Party’s mass to affect election outcomes in their own favor.
Take the Texas tussle to get the Green Party on the ballot. To break into the two party system, a party must pass a petition with over four thousand signatures. The Green Party mobilized a drive garnered twice the necessary forty thousand signatures necessary to allow their candidates to appear on the 2010 November ballot. This was a significant victory for the party—this year, there would be a viable third contender in the usual two-party race.
Yet in June 2010, the party found itself suddenly banned from the ballot it had worked so hard to attain. The state served the Green Party a restraining order as if it was a stalker ex-boyfriend. The reason? Republicans contributed funds to the petition drive.
The Democratic Party uncovered that one of the petition drive’s biggest contributors was an out-of-state corporation with ties to the current Republican administration. This was considered an ethical violation because the Republican Party was hardly contributing altruistically—- they intended to use the Green candidates to siphon votes from the Democratic challengers.
The state supreme court overturned the restraining order. This decision was based partly on the grounds that once access to the ballot had been granted it should not be unduly rescinded. Henceforth the Green Party campaign bore a slightly darker cast for their involvement in the whole affair.
This debacle made one thing clear—now that the Green Party carries more weight, the two major parties are both looking to brandish it like a mace. Until the Green Party reaches the critical mass it needs to throw the two-party system out of balance, it must be vigilant to avoid being the pawn of other parties.
3 Prevailing Myths About the Green Party
Existing outside of the two major parties means combating a lot of bias in the media and educating the public on what one’s positions truly are. The Green Party, like the Libertarians, the Socialists, and others, find themselves in this position often. Here are some of the most common myths about the Green Party and its members.
Myth: They’re all hippie tree huggers without jobs.
Truth: Okay, they’re mostly tree huggers. Green Party activists do love the environment, and they want the government to take steps to protect it. Green Party members often are non-conventional and work in creative jobs, but there are plenty of members who work good, old-fashioned 9-5 jobs, too.
Myth: They want the government to run our lives.
Truth: The Green Party’s platform calls for gender equality, civil rights, compassionate economics, and environmental sustainability. When these issues are in jeopardy, then the Green Party supports legislation that will propel the issue forward. Examples include the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which made many forms of race-based discrimination illegal, and healthcare reform (in the form of a single payer system), which would give everyone access to quality healthcare.
Myth: Their ideas would make people lazy.
Truth: There’s nothing to support this claim, but it gets bandied about often. The idea behind is that public assistance encourages people not to work. The truth is that public assistance is a lifeline for people who cannot support themselves.
Providing financial assistance as well as life skills training, which would require a greater investment in social services, could be a long-term benefit to struggling families.
These myths are simply three of the most pervasive about the Green Party and its
members. The policies that the Green Party promotes aren’t intended to harm citizens. Instead they’re intended to help provide everyone with the best possible chance to succeed.
Public Defenders in America Find Themselves Overloaded
In 1966, the United States Supreme Court determined that when a person is arrested and charged with a crime, he or she must be read the “Miranda Rights.†Those are the now-familiar string of sentences, beginning with “You have the right to remain silent.†Further down the line goes something like this: “You have the right to an attorney. If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be appointed to you.â€
The attorney who is provided to an indigent criminal is known as a public defender. But America’s public defender offices are in crisis. The attorneys representing the accused are, in many states, overworked and underpaid. Some public defenders have reported taking on hundreds of cases at a time. Now, some public defenders are even closing their doors to new cases while they catch up on current ones.
The end result? Justice is delayed, if it arrives at all. It is delayed for the alleged criminal, obviously. Many of the accused sit in jail waiting for an attorney to be appointed to them. Once they have an attorney, the attorney is often swamped with so many other cases, he or she doesn’t have more than a few minutes to glance at the case before meeting the client, often for the first time, in the courtroom.
Justice is also delayed for victims and their families.
When the public defenders office cannot do its job, one of the underlying principles of the United States “justice for all” suffers.
It will take money appropriated by the state legislatures to fix this problem. It may take private attorneys working together with the state and local courts to ease the load, too.
Since public defenders are held to the same licensing standards as private attorneys, they feel their careers are on the line if they don’t cross all their “T’s†and dot all their “I’s.†And that, they say, is impossible to do when you can’t see your desk from the hundreds of files sitting on top of it.
Encouraging Local Politicians to Go Green
Being “green” is trendy right now, which means that many politicians are open to ideas promoted as green. While that is great news for the environmental movement, that doesn’t mean that local politicians always get what it really means to make green decisions. There are a few substantial ways that you can push local politics a little closer to your tree-hugging ideal.
Hiring a sustainability coordinator is a must-do for any mid- to large city. In Kentucky, that would include Louisville, Lexington, Frankfort, Paducah, Covington, Newport, Richmond, Bowling Green, and Berea, at a minimum. Other, smaller areas can hire someone on a short contract or part-time, but sustainability coordinators are important there, too.
These coordinators often work for a percentage of what they save the city in energy usage. They work to decrease energy use by putting better workflow habits into place, improving water and sewer lines, suggesting better vehicles, and making other changes.
In addition, a solid recycling program also is a necessity for all towns and cities. Good recycling programs can make money for cash-strapped local governments. It isn’t enough just to have recycling but push local politicians to work on a public education campaign about what can be recycled and how valuable it is to the Earth and the city’s bank account.
Green spaces hold a growing importance in our concrete world. New developments should have a minimum percentage of the land dedicated to green spaces, and the city should have spaces with trees and grasses as well. Being out in nature is excellent for our physical and mental health, and it encourages people to care for the environment.
These three ideas are just the tip of what local activists can help bring about in their cities. Working to create a greener tomorrow in Kentucky is a lengthy, but rewarding, process.
