Lisa Savage, Maine candidate for the U.S. Senate, promises
the most comprehensive plans for systemic changes needed to meet escalating
crises exposed and worsened by the Covid 19 pandemic, crises that have been
building for decades. We in Aroostook are as vulnerable to these crises as
those elsewhere.
This pandemic exposes justice inequalities that lead to
increased crime, social unrest, drug addiction, and mental illness, all
problems that are increasing here in Aroostook. In both local news and News
Hour reports, I hear almost daily how Covid 19 disproportionally afflicts
racial minorities and the poor. Lisa promotes changes that will directly
address causes of these problems: police brutality targeting minorities; mass
incarceration of black and brown people; and discrimination against women,
LGBTQs, native Americans, immigrants. Her changes will provide justice equality
for all.
Extreme income inequalities in our economic system victimize
the poor regardless of race. Lisa will work for a minimum wage of $15 an hour,
greater democratic involvement of workers in business and banking, fair-share
taxing of the rich, and trade agreements that treat workers fairly. Competing
with Canadian workers, Aroostook woods workers are especially vulnerable to
trade agreements with Canada.
Covid 19 exposes inequities, inefficiencies, and poor outcomes
of our Health care system. Millions are uninsured. According to Physicians for
a National Health-Care Program and Dr. Sachin Shah of Doctors for America more than
30 % of health-care expenses go to administrative costs, much of that in the
form of outsize profits and executive salaries for the health-care industrial
complex. Lisa promotes expanded and improved Medicare for All that will provide
cost savings in the system and better health outcomes for all. Such a system
will help to level the playing field for woods workers here. Canadian workers can
work here for lower wages because they have a universal, single-payer system
and don’t have to pay the high premiums and co-pays that we have to pay.
In various PBS News Hour interviews, Jane Goodall explains
how environmental health and human health are closely related. She says habitat
destruction forces greater interaction between wild animals and humans that
allow increased transmission of disease which is what scientists think happened
with Covid 19. We now have to worry about ticks and Lyme disease creeping into
Maine because of global warming. Covid 19 won’t be the last pandemic we face.
We need to pivot to the Green New Deal Lisa will work for that will employ
millions in clean energy solutions improving health and the economy as well as turning
the disastrous tide of climate change.
Injustices in our elections system have been growing for
decades here in Maine as well as in the nation: voter suppression; an
undemocratic electoral college system; campaign finance laws that result in the
richest big-money interests controlling legislators. These problems have led to
politicizing and worsening the pandemic.
Dark-money powers are financing both Susan Collins and Sara Gideon with attack
ads against each other that inflame division in the legislature and in the
country. These ads neither educate the public about the full context of the most
serious problems we face nor offer much by way of solutions. Refusing to take
corporate campaign contributions, Lisa Savage is the one with immunity to
big-money corruption. Her website states that she will promote “a government
that works for us, not the big banks, weapons manufacturers, fossil fuel
giants, and corporate lobbyists,” and she
will “work for a new system that puts people, planet, and peace over profit.”
We need legislators with an expansive view of how all of our
most serious problems are connected and with a vision of the future focused on
solving the problems. Lisa Savage has that view and vision. Please mark her # 1 on your Ranked Choice
Voting ballot which allows voting your values without fear of the spoiler
effect.
SomeSources:
https://pnhp.org/resource/pnhp-research-the-case-for-a-national-health-program/
http://www.drsforamerica.org/blog/the-cost-of-for-profit-health-care
https://lisaformaine.nationbuilder.com/
