The excitement over the 2006 elections is subsiding, now that the Democrats have taken control of the House and Senate, restoring some balance in our federal government. In good faith to the public that elected them, they’ve moved to raise the minimum wage, pushed forward on the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission, and actually challenged the escalation of the war on Iraq.
It’s easy to look so good in an arena of so much bad.
But let’s not exhale just yet. We grabbed the whip in November, and now it’s time to get crackin’.
Increasing the minimum wage? A no-brainer of common decency for the millions of Americans struggling to keep their heads above water. Now let’s see sick-day requirements put in place to help working families take care of their children and get paid. According to the Institute for Women’s Policy Research, 77 percent of workers in the lowest quarter by wages did not have paid sick days, compared with 43 percent of middle-class workers who didn’t and 31 percent of workers in the top quarter. The result is people forced to go to work sick, contagious and even seriously ill, just to make rent or feed their families. It means that when poor children get sick, their parents don’t get paid.
And speaking of health care, how about some? The battle is only just beginning at minimum wage.
Moving ahead to enact the 9/11 Commission recommendations? Great! Now let’s work to end the politics of fear that Washington has been coasting on in lieu of real security. It’s not enough to make us physically safe, although that seemed like a good idea the first time around. We also must dismantle the paranoia machine that has provided a false sense of safety for some by excluding and criminalizing others. This is the same machine that chewed up and spit out habeas corpus and incarcerated Portland lawyer and Muslim Brandon Mayfield. It’s the machine that proliferates anti-immigration groups by the boatload, builds great big fences and harasses day laborers along East Burnside. It’s the fear that is manifested right down to the riot gear surrounding anti-war marches in downtown Portland, and the hysterical reaction some people have to seeing others who have nothing at all.
Regarding the war – we know what needs to be done, but if Congress is serious it will not stop with the surface politics but rather dig deeper into the gross profiteering that has become part and parcel with our foreign policies of aggression. OK, it’s unlikely Congress will get to dismantling the military industrial complex in the first 100 hours, but let’s not let them off the hook with a few tough words on occupation and escalation. It’s not the bin Ladens but the Benjamins keeping us in Iraq. That’s where the investigations should begin. One can only guess where they might end.
On the surface, Congress appears poised to do our bidding, but we’ve been asleep at the wheel for so long that we’re still a little drowsy on this whole democracy thing. Just remember, we didn’t elect leaders, we elected representatives. Remember when that meant something? No? Well make it mean something today.
