GREEN PARTY OF THE UNITED STATES
http://www.gp.org
For Immediate Release:
Thursday, May 10, 2012
Contacts:
Scott McLarty, Media Coordinator, 202-518-5624, cell 202-904-7614,
[email protected]
Starlene Rankin, Media Coordinator, 916-995-3805, [email protected]
Green Party: Americans should learn from Greek, French voters who
rejected austerity
• 2012 Green Presidential Nominating Convention, July 12-15 in
Baltimore, Md. http://www.gpconvention2012.com
Media Credentialing page http://www.gpconvention2012.com/p/media.html
WASHINGTON, DC — Green Party candidates and leaders said today that
Americans should learn something about democracy and change from
voters in Greece and France, as well as Iceland, in recent elections
that overturned their respective governments.
US Greens also congratulated UK Greens, after strong Green advances in
recent local elections in England and Scotland
(http://www.globalgreens.org/news/green-victories-in-uk-local-elections).
• Carol Brouillet, Green candidate for the US House in California’s
18th District (http://www.carol4congress.org):
“Greek and French voters said, we don’t have to accept austerity
measures to pay back bailouts for bankers whose recklessness and fraud
damaged the US economy. Americans shouldn’t have to accept such
measures either. Democratic and Republican politicians have enacted
policies that enrich the one percent while demanding sacrifice from
the rest of us. Working people are losing their job security and
financial stability. Benefits, workplace organizing rights, and even
Social Security and Medicare are facing the axe. We’re seeing a
redistribution of wealth — from the bottom to the top. Both parties
have been responsible for policies that have widened the gap between
the superrich and the rest of us. This is why people in the Occupy
movement are protesting in the streets. We urge Americans to carry
that outrage to the voting booth and put an end to the exclusive rule
by two corporate-money parties.”
• Laura Wells, 2010 Green gubernatorial candidate in California:
“Newly elected French President Hollande said he would introduce two
new higher tax rates, implement a new financial transaction tax, and
increase capital gains taxes on banks
(http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-17980926). This is a balanced
approach: give some austerity to those who’ve been getting the
prosperity. As for the banks, let’s go one better and implement
publicly owned banks so that we stop paying interest to the publicly
bailed-out banks. We can create state banks patterned after the
successful Bank of North Dakota, as well as municipal banks. We can
invest in our states and cities, not in Wall Street. We can declare a
halt to home foreclosures and restore the Glass-Steagall Act. We can
repeal Taft-Hartley and protect the rights of working Americans. We
can save Social Security with a very modest rise in the cap for the
wealthy on contributions. We can expand Medicare to cover everyone.”
• Anthony Gronowicz, Green candidate for the US House (14th
Congressional District), running against incumbent Democratic Joseph
Crowley who voted for the Iraq war (http://votegronowicz.info):
“Politicians from the two established parties, as well as the major
media, like to judge the US economy according to stock market
performance, profit margins of top companies, and GDP. In the Green
Party, we judge the economy according to the level of financial
security for working people, access to health care, basic services for
the needy, and the state of the environment. Anyone who still believes
Democrats offer a program of change should remember that President
Obama approved the Wall Street bailout, stacked his administration
with Wall Street operatives, and spent his first term capitulating to
the GOP. While Republican Gov. Scott Walker went on the rampage
against public-sector workers’ job security, benefits, and union
rights in Wisconsin, Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo was doing the same
thing in New York. (The billionaire Koch brothers, who promoted the
attack on public sector employees, donated $92,000 to Cuomo, more than
double the $43,000 they gave Walker.) Democrats are now boasting of an
economic recovery that’s really benefiting the small percentage of
America’s wealthiest, who’ve enjoyed 93% of income gains in the
recovery’s first year.”
• Natale “Lino” Stracuzzi, DC Statehood Green Party candidate for
nonvoting Delegate for the District of Columbia in the US House of
Representatives
(https://www.facebook.com/groups/stracuzziforcongress):
“We’re seeing political changes throughout the world, as more and more
people reject neoliberal politicies of deregulation, privatization,
international trade pacts that favor top corporations, subsidies and
bailouts for the superrich, and austerity for working people. What
happened in Greece this past weekend reflects what happened in Iceland
two years ago, when Icelanders refused to pay the debt incurred by
banks, tossed rightwing politicians out of office, and rewrote the
country’s constitution in the ‘Kitchenware Revolution’ — which the US
media has virtually ignored. Americans have the same power to effect
similar change, but it won’t happen as long as we keep electing the
same politicians from the same political parties.”
See also:
“Green Party Says Cuomo Fiscal Plan Recycles Failed Policies”
Press release from the Green Party of New York State, January 6, 2010
http://www.howiehawkins.com/2010/media-releases/476-green-party-says-cuomo-fiscal-plan-recycles-failed-policies.html
“Striking it Richer: The Evolution of Top Incomes in the United States
(Updated with 2009 and 2010 estimates)”
By Emmanuel Saez, E. Morris Cox Professor of Economics, University of
California at Berkeley, March 2, 2012
http://elsa.berkeley.edu/~saez/saez-UStopincomes-2010.pdf
“Why America’s Rich People Are Better Than Everyone Else’s”
By Paul Buchheit, Nation of Change, May 8, 2012
http://www.nationofchange.org/why-america-s-rich-people-are-better-everyone-else-s-1336397033
2009 Icelandic financial crisis protests
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kitchenware_Revolution
“Corporations Win in Battle Against Investment Regulation”
By Isolda Agazzi, Inter Press Service, May 7, 2012
http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=107684
MORE INFORMATION
Green Party of the United States http://www.gp.org
202-319-7191
• 2012 Green Party Presidential Nominating Convention, July 12-15 in
Baltimore, Md. http://www.gpconvention2012.com
• Green candidate database and campaign information:
http://www.gp.org/elections.shtml
• News Center http://www.gp.org/newscenter.shtml
• Speakers Bureau http://www.gp.org/speakers
• Ballot Access Page http://www.gp.org/ballotstatus
• Video Page http://www.gp.org/video/index.php
• Green Papers http://www.greenpapers.net
• Google+ http://www.gp.org/google
• Twitter http://twitter.com/gpus
• Livestream Channel http://www.livestream.com/greenpartyus
• GP-TV Twitter page http://www.gp.org/twitter
• Facebook page http://www.gp.org/facebook
Green Pages: The official publication of record of the Green Party of
the United States
http://gp.org/greenpages-blog