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“F” Your Way To Howie Hawkdawg
No new majors will be accepted to the French, Russian, Italian, Classics and Theatre programs at SUNY Al- bany–a decision widely seen as a pre- cursor to dissolving the departments entirely. SUNY is coming apart at the seams, grossly underfunded and grasp- ing desperately at the poison straws of privatization. The State University is not alone–public goods in New York and throughout America are under at- tack: facing cuts, corruption, dissolu- tion and selloffs. Nine years ago, the Campaign for Fiscal Equity won a lawsuit arguing successfully that urban schools are unfairly underfunded. The money was never redistributed and now primary and secondary schools are in the same boat as SUNY–as are county health care facilities, the state workforce, parks, highways and all the com- monwealth of the state of New York. The brutal austerity budgets from Albany are justified on an illusory economic disaster, supposedly the result of a downturn on Wall Street–while at the same time, the Wall Street Journal reports that for the second consecutive year, pay on Wall Street will hit an alltime high. In the face of this madness, The Press says “No!” to the systematic subjugation of New York and endorses the Green Party’s Howie Hawkins for Governor.
Hawkins, a Tax-the-Rich Teamster from Syracuse and cofounder of the Green Party of the United States, focuses his campaign on asking the wealthy to once again pay their fair share of the state’s tax burden, to fund dramatic increases in investments in education, health care, full employment and renewable energy innovation and industry. Hawkins is overwhelmingly the best candidate in the seven-way Governor’s race, addressing head-on state budget slashing, the central issue facing not only state university students but all New York constituencies. Under New York’s complicated electoral laws, a vote for Hawkins for Governor also helps build a lasting third party to address the corruption inherent in the anticompetitive two-party system. Finally, nationwide the Greens represent a vital new direction for America, reflecting the views of the majority against endless imperial wars, the strangling of fun- damental civil liberties and the failed war on drugs.
The Press has agreed with some of Hawkins’ arguments in the past, while editorializing against the PHEEIA legislation that would lock in perpetual tuition increases and whore SUNY out to private developers. The state budget crisis has been manufactured by reckless tax-cuts. For three decades, both Democ- rats and Republicans have been pandering to the self-indulgent wealthy with multiple income tax cuts for the top brackets. The stock transfer tax, a kind of miniscule sales tax once levied on financial instruments (already as low as one twentieth of one percent—far lower than the kind of sales tax you would pay on the things you need) is collected by the state as a legacy of an old tradition and then returned immediately to Wall Street. If the state didn’t hand back the stock transfer tax alone, the budget deficit would immediately turn into a multibillion surplus. By undoing several decades worth of foolish tax cuts for the rich, Hawkins looks to be able to fund a wealth of existing and new state programs: among them restoring SUNY to the time when tuition was free and providing full employment to all New Yorkers through an environmental New Deal-like program, not only putting people to work but addressing the threat of global climate change.
Hawkins’ Green Party is on the cusp of establishing itself as a consistent force for reform in New York. Under the state’s ballot access laws, a party whose candidate for Governor receives 50,000 votes is given official recognition in the form of automatic ballot access— circumventing an unreasonable get-on- the-ballot petition process designed to hamstring third parties. In the last four election cycles, the Greens have danced around the 50,000 threshold, making the grade once and falling just short three times. (Given the Green Party’s proximity to this benchmark and the likely lopsided victory in the Governor’s race, an individual vote for Hawkins could literally make a difference in a way that votes for none of the other six candidates could.) When the Green Party has automatic ballot access, it means a flood of idealistic newcomers getting involved in politics throughout the state in the kind of winnable local races a third party needs to grow—in- jecting new ideas into tired debates and restoring the healthy competition nec- essary for elections to function as an in- strument for popular control of government. Those local campaigns can be the first meaningful wins for a third party—like when the Greens and independent allies took a majority in the government of the Village of New Paltz in the mid-aughts, launching innovative municipal environmental programs and standing behind young mayor Jason West, fresh out of SUNY, who drove the national civil rights con- versation by solemnizing same-sex marriages.
The national political scene shows increasing dissatisfaction with the monied political parties, who stand united for endless foreign wars for em- pire, the dissolution of core American civil liberties, the perpetuation of the failed war on drugs and Wall Street’s predations. Howie Hawkins represents a party with a broad platform of public- interested populism. Hawkins is for reducing SUNY tuition to zero, putting every last New Yorker to work, switching to single payer health-care at the state level (a cheaper and more effective way to cover everyone with no exceptions) and ending, as he calls it, “legalized bribery”—the systematic corruption of privately-financed elections. Vote for Howie Hawkins on Row F.
The brutal austerity budgets from Albany are justified on an illusory economic disaster, supposedly the result of a downturn on Wall Street–while at the same time, the Wall Street Journal reports that for the second consecutive year, pay on Wall Street will hit an alltime high. In the face of this madness, The Press says “No!” to the systematic subjugation of New York and endorses the Green Party’s Howie Hawkins for Governor.
“F” Your Way To Howie Hawkdawg
No new majors will be accepted to the French, Russian, Italian, Classics and Theatre programs at SUNY Al- bany–a decision widely seen as a pre- cursor to dissolving the departments entirely. SUNY is coming apart at the seams, grossly underfunded and grasp- ing desperately at the poison straws of privatization. The State University is not alone–public goods in New York and throughout America are under at- tack: facing cuts, corruption, dissolu- tion and selloffs. Nine years ago, the Campaign for Fiscal Equity won a lawsuit arguing successfully that urban schools are unfairly underfunded. The money was never redistributed and now primary and secondary schools are in the same boat as SUNY–as are county health care facilities, the state workforce, parks, highways and all the com- monwealth of the state of New York. The brutal austerity budgets from Albany are justified on an illusory economic disaster, supposedly the result of a downturn on Wall Street–while at the same time, the Wall Street Journal reports that for the second consecutive year, pay on Wall Street will hit an alltime high. In the face of this madness, The Press says “No!” to the systematic subjugation of New York and endorses the Green Party’s Howie Hawkins for Governor.
Hawkins, a Tax-the-Rich Teamster from Syracuse and cofounder of the Green Party of the United States, focuses his campaign on asking the wealthy to once again pay their fair share of the state’s tax burden, to fund dramatic increases in investments in education, health care, full employment and renewable energy innovation and industry. Hawkins is overwhelmingly the best candidate in the seven-way Governor’s race, addressing head-on state budget slashing, the central issue facing not only state university students but all New York constituencies. Under New York’s complicated electoral laws, a vote for Hawkins for Governor also helps build a lasting third party to address the corruption inherent in the anticompetitive two-party system. Finally, nationwide the Greens represent a vital new direction for America, reflecting the views of the majority against endless imperial wars, the strangling of fun- damental civil liberties and the failed war on drugs.
The Press has agreed with some of Hawkins’ arguments in the past, while editorializing against the PHEEIA legislation that would lock in perpetual tuition increases and whore SUNY out to private developers. The state budget crisis has been manufactured by reckless tax-cuts. For three decades, both Democ- rats and Republicans have been pandering to the self-indulgent wealthy with multiple income tax cuts for the top brackets. The stock transfer tax, a kind of miniscule sales tax once levied on financial instruments (already as low as one twentieth of one percent—far lower than the kind of sales tax you would pay on the things you need) is collected by the state as a legacy of an old tradition and then returned immediately to Wall Street. If the state didn’t hand back the stock transfer tax alone, the budget deficit would immediately turn into a multibillion surplus. By undoing several decades worth of foolish tax cuts for the rich, Hawkins looks to be able to fund a wealth of existing and new state programs: among them restoring SUNY to the time when tuition was free and providing full employment to all New Yorkers through an environmental New Deal-like program, not only putting people to work but addressing the threat of global climate change.
Hawkins’ Green Party is on the cusp of establishing itself as a consistent force for reform in New York. Under the state’s ballot access laws, a party whose candidate for Governor receives 50,000 votes is given official recognition in the form of automatic ballot access— circumventing an unreasonable get-on- the-ballot petition process designed to hamstring third parties. In the last four election cycles, the Greens have danced around the 50,000 threshold, making the grade once and falling just short three times. (Given the Green Party’s proximity to this benchmark and the likely lopsided victory in the Governor’s race, an individual vote for Hawkins could literally make a difference in a way that votes for none of the other six candidates could.) When the Green Party has automatic ballot access, it means a flood of idealistic newcomers getting involved in politics throughout the state in the kind of winnable local races a third party needs to grow—in- jecting new ideas into tired debates and restoring the healthy competition nec- essary for elections to function as an in- strument for popular control of government. Those local campaigns can be the first meaningful wins for a third party—like when the Greens and independent allies took a majority in the government of the Village of New Paltz in the mid-aughts, launching innovative municipal environmental programs and standing behind young mayor Jason West, fresh out of SUNY, who drove the national civil rights con- versation by solemnizing same-sex marriages.
The national political scene shows increasing dissatisfaction with the monied political parties, who stand united for endless foreign wars for em- pire, the dissolution of core American civil liberties, the perpetuation of the failed war on drugs and Wall Street’s predations. Howie Hawkins represents a party with a broad platform of public- interested populism. Hawkins is for reducing SUNY tuition to zero, putting every last New Yorker to work, switching to single payer health-care at the state level (a cheaper and more effective way to cover everyone with no exceptions) and ending, as he calls it, “legalized bribery”—the systematic corruption of privately-financed elections. Vote for Howie Hawkins on Row F.
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