Domestic Agenda

SEVEN POINT DOMESTIC AGENDA

Approved by the National Committee of the Social Democrats USA on 11-18-2010

Introduction

During the past year the Social Democrats USA has been at work rebuilding mediums of communication as a result of its 2009 internal political crisis. Thus a new official web site called “Social Democracy for the 21st Century” was developed. New and improved discussion groups and the Socialist Currents blog also had to be developed. Work with the medium of Face Book has also commenced. A National Convention was held on September 1 and several important revisions to the SD Constitution have been made to make the constitution a more effective and democratic document more in line with organizational realities of the SD.

Other important work has also been proceeding . Leaders such as Chairman Rick D’Loss have been reaching out to important members of the old pre-reformed organization. Members have participated in important events such as the One Nation United rally in Washington DC.
Finally it must not be ignored that the two Co Chairs of the Social Democrats USA Rabbi Craig Miller and Rick D’loss both hold elected local offices in New Jersey and Pennsylvania respectively. The Social Democrats USA is one of the very few socialist organizations in the nation with members who now hold elected political positions. Thus this has been a busy and productive year for the Social Democrats USA.

Since much of the ground work for the SD to again become an effective political organization has been laid, it is now time for the Social Democrats to begin to develop a more unified program to in order to focus the political work of its membership more effectively. It is also a necessity for the SD to communicate the practicable direction of its politics more effectively during this post 2010 election period to potential new members and to the nation in general. Therefore the National Committee is starting this process with the formulation of a much more concrete domestic policy agenda than has existed in the immediate past. This Seven Point Agenda while immediately pointing to the practical direction of SD political work in the foreseeable future, should not be viewed as necessarily definitive all of the political work or issues in which SD members are involved. But what it does do is show the political priorities of the Social Democrats USA. Enclosed is the SD’s Seven Point Common program.

The SD Seven Point Agenda for 2011 and 2012

The Social Democrats USA have a pragmatic and progressive domestic agenda of seven primary goals. These are:

1) The SDUSA supports and defends the integrity of Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and other effective social democratic programs which historically has made life much better for the majority of Americans. We will vigorously oppose all efforts to disband or weaken these programs by stealth or out right by the forces of the radical right. We instead seek to protect and strengthen these programs.

2) The SDUSA supports financial and regulatory reforms of Wall Street, the stock market, and other financial markets and institutions. We reject attempts to allow the big banks to return to the recklessness that cost eight million Americans their jobs. While we praise the Obama administration for being the first American president in decade who has pushed through any level of positive financial reform, we believe that the Obama reforms did not go far enough. We support further reforms which will stabilize and subordinate Wall Street and the financial markets to the real financial needs of the American people.

3) The SDUSA, while recognizing its limitations, supports the Obama health care plan which we believe represents a strong movement forward toward the goal of providing effective universal health care for the American people. Therefore we will fight to prevent the Republican Party and Tea Party movement from repealing that legislation. We will also support legislation which will strengthen that bill.

4) The SDUSA supports strong public investment in good public schools, public infrastructure, energy independence through renewable energy technology, and spending by the government that creates new jobs.

5) The SDUSA opposes extending the Bush Era’s $700 billion worth of tax cuts for the upper one or two percent of America’s richest people. We believe a great deal of hypocrisy exists in the Republican mantra that the US deficits can only be ended by making gigantic budgetary slashes which will only hurt poor, middle, and working class citizens. Contrary to Republican dogma taxes are needed to make government work. It is no original sin for government to raise moderate amounts of tax revenue to balance governmental budgets or to increase governmental spending to deal with economic meltdowns such as the Obama administration faced at the beginning of its term.

6) The SDUSA supports the abolishment of the Senate filibuster and of all other legislation and rules which political reaction uses to undemocratically block progressive change. Some other changes which we support would be the elimination of laws which make it virtually impossible for third parties of have ongoing ballot access in the states. The SD also supports progressive electoral reforms.

7) In spite of the fact that the performance of the Obama administration has disappointed some in the SD, the SDUSA believes that if the Obama administration fails then the cause of much that the SD supports will be set back for perhaps a generation. Therefore the SDUSA will continue to give its support to the administration based its historic support of the broad Democratic Party coalition of organized labor, the African American community, and liberalism. The support that the SDUSA gives to the Obama administration is not uncritical. The SD will continue to criticize the administration when such criticisms are needed and will oppose those policies which it believes are wrong.

The SDUSA does not believe that any minority left insurgency in the democratic primaries in 2012 is likely to succeed. What we do believe is that such an insurgency is likely to seriously weaken the Obama administration in its battles against a tea party inspired Republican Party later that year. Should a historically unprecedented and unlikely situation occur in which the main institutions of organized labor and the African American community break from the Obama administration then the SD would have to reconsider its position of support. However in spite of its lack of a miraculous ability to predict the future the SD does not for see such historically unprecedented events as probable.