Score One For The Working Families Party in NYC

Score two, actually... Via The Gotham Gazette, The Working Families Party, a political party that has made significant contributions to Connecticut's political landscape, has taken over New York city:

Both Liu and de Blasio had the endorsement of the Working Families Party, yesterday and in their original primaries two weeks ago. De Blasio’s ties to the party are particularly tight.

The victories yesterday continue a very successful election year for the Working Families Party. In the Sept. 15 primary, challengers backed by the party toppled four sitting council members.

“The Working Families Party, once derided as a ragtag collection of Brooklyn progressives, is now the pre-eminent political force in New York City politics, replacing a forlorn, disorganized Democratic Party,” Michael Barbaro observed in the City Room.

The kinds of issues that the Working Families Party pursues?

This:

Billionaires for Budget Cuts is a diverse group of insurance company CEOs, bailed-out Wall Street executives and hedge fund managers, united to stop even a pay increase in taxes on the very rich, even if it means slashing healthcare and education.

See the Billionaires' recent press clips.

Join the Billionaires for Budget Cuts Facebook group.

That:

Our healthcare system is broken. Costs are through the roof, and yet we still have hundreds of thousands of families in Connecticut without coverage. It's time for a high quality public health option. Read more.

And the other thing:

Paid Sick Days. Between the outbreak of swine flu and the recession, it's clearer than ever that working families need paid sick days. We're leading the fight. Learn more.

I don't expect that they will see a lot of corporate money flooding their coffers as they endorse candidates from every and any party that has a proven record of voting for the little guy.

In The News:
Read the our great CT Post Op-Ed on why people are voting Working Families and help spread the word:

"When you vote for a Democrat or a Republican on the Working Families line, you're vote counts for the candidate just the same as a vote on the major party line. But a Working Families vote also sends a powerful message to all politicians that it's time to put working families first again.

The real work to fix our economy will start the day after Election Day. Our elected officials will have to make difficult choices to put our country and our state back on the right track.

Voting on the Working Families line is a small way that each of us point our politicians in the right direction -- and give them a little push."

More details here.

Conyers needs support for HR 676: Single Payer Universal Healthcare

Via Rep. John Conyers' Blog:

The health care crisis we face today affects everyone, overwhelming America's workers and businesses. Many low-wage earners do not receive health benefits and cannot afford insurance. Higher salaried workers know that the cost of their health insurance may lead to the next round of layoffs.

More than 46 million Americans lack basic health care coverage. Millions more face high deductibles and staggering costs leaving essential care out of reach.

We can no longer seek gradual reforms or provide insurance companies with financial incentives to solve the problem. The time has come for a single payer national health care system that provides complete care to all Americans.

Since the 2006 elections, we have heard plenty of new voices calling for universal health care. Unfortunately, many of these claim to be universal health care, but are merely bandaids to the problem.

One proposal has the federal government giving billions of dollars to insurance companies to cover the uninsured. Other proposals only cover children or shift the entire burden of healthcare to employees in the form of health savings accounts.

Unfortunately, patchwork fixes like these will not work. The only way to provide a lasting solution to our health care crisis is through single payer universal health care. We must not let the movement toward universal health care be co-opted by proposals that serve to enrich those seeking to extend the status quo at the expense of true reform.

To address this need, I have introduced H.R. 676, the United States National Health Insurance Act. My bill would create a single payer universal health care system by strengthening and extending the Medicare program to cover all Americans.

Please help me enact this important legislation by signing this statement of support. We must have real reform through a single payer universal health care program if we are to solve our nation's health care crisis.

I signed it... This goes above and beyond the bandaid solutions offered by Connecticut politicians who seem to think that they can fix the "healthcare for profit" system that needs to be eliminated before anything will get better.

If you have any doubts about this fact, Maura at MLN will give you the scoop:

The creative and scrappy Working Families Party of CT is headlining another great visibility event to raise awareness about how badly broken our current health care system is.

No one is sure yet how high their 2007 profits will be, but in 2006 Aetna had profits of $1.6 billion. Billion. And Aetna's CEO earned $30 million last year, while health care expenses went way up for average consumers and small business.

A significant portion of our health care dollars are not going toward actually keeping people healthy or taking care of sick people -- they're going toward huge profits and obscenely high executive compensation packages like this. That should make us all sick.

Hope some MLNers will be able to attend this fun and important event - spread the word! Read more from Joe at the CT Working Families Blog.

Again... Go show your support for HR 676. It is good for your Health!