This week has created a whirlwind of commotion as the debt debate continues and we watch Obama yield to Republican demands and consider sacrificing the needs of some of our country’s most vulnerable people through cuts to Medicare and Social Security.
Our “Foreclose on Walden” campaign (starting with an action in May where we issued Walden a Notice of Foreclosure) is about challenging the National Right-Wing Agenda. The agenda of what is becoming the right’s “hell no” caucus in Congress is bent on ignoring the real causes of our economic crisis, the bloated Pentagon budget, and on protecting the rich from paying their fair share, while they promote huge cuts to basic necessities for our communities. It is time to again expose this agenda and push back.
Click on “Read More” below for a letter from Senator Bernie Sanders to President Barack Obama that says it all. Let’s get this in circulation in our communities. Let’s use it to create clear and simple context about the deficit debate right now.
Consider writing your own introduction, signing onto the letter and submitting it to your local paper. Or share other ideas you have for drawing public attention in your community to real solutions that work for our communities and our democracy.
Let us know back what action you take by emailing cara@rop.org.
To President Barack Obama from Bernie Sanders, U.S. Senator, Independent, Vermont
This is a pivotal moment in the history of our country. Decisions are being made about the national budget that will impact the lives of virtually every American for decades to come. As we address the issue of deficit reduction we must not ignore the painful economic reality of today – which is that the wealthiest people in our country and the largest corporations are doing phenomenally well while the middle class is collapsing and poverty is increasing. In fact, the United States today has, by far, the most unequal distribution of wealth and income of any major country on earth.
Everyone understands that over the long-term we have got to reduce the deficit – a deficit that was caused mainly by Wall Street greed, tax breaks for the rich, two wars, and a prescription drug program written by the drug and insurance companies. It is absolutely imperative, however, that as we go forward with deficit reduction we completely reject the Republican approach that demands savage cuts in desperately-needed programs for working families, the elderly, the sick, our children and the poor, while not asking the wealthiest among us to contribute one penny.
Mr. President, please listen to the overwhelming majority of the American people who believe that deficit reduction must be about shared sacrifice. The wealthiest Americans and the most profitable corporations in this country must pay their fair share. At least 50 percent of any deficit reduction package must come from revenue raised by ending tax breaks for the wealthy and eliminating tax loopholes that benefit large, profitable corporations and Wall Street financial institutions. A sensible deficit reduction package must also include significant cuts to unnecessary and wasteful Pentagon spending.
Please do not yield to outrageous Republican demands that would greatly increase suffering for the weakest and most vulnerable members of our society. Now is the time to stand with the tens of millions of Americans who are struggling to survive economically, not with the millionaires and billionaires who have never had it so good.
Respectfully,
Sen. Bernie Sanders;
and Co-signers