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Posted in domestic violence, Equal Rights Amendment, inequality, prositution, rape, sexual harrassment, slavery, trafficking, Uncategorized, Women's Bill of Rights, women's rights | Tagged discrimination, Equal Rights Amendment, inequality, oppression, rape, sexual harassment, slavery, trafficking, women's rights | Leave a comment

Women’s Reproductive Rights

Posted on March 17, 2020 by mekorganic

Women’s rights must be protected and expanded to guarantee each woman’s right as a full participant in society, free from sexual harassment, job discrimination or interference in the intensely personal choice about whether to have a child.

Women’s right to control their bodies is non-negotiable. It is essential that the option of a safe, legal abortion remains available.

The “morning-after” pill must be affordable and easily accessible without a prescription. The government should sponsor public relations campaign to educate women about this form of contraception.

Clinics must be accessible and must offer advice on contraception and the means for contraception; consultation about abortion and the performance of abortions regardless of age or marital status.

We should endorse women’s right to use contraception and, when they choose, to have an abortion in accordance with the Roe vs. Wade Supreme Court ruling. This right cannot be limited to women’s age or marital status.

Contraception and abortion must be included in all health insurance policies in the U.S. Any state government must be able to legally offer these services free of charge to women at the poverty level.

Public health agencies operating abroad should be allowed to offer family planning, contraception, and abortion in all countries that ask for those services.

We should oppose our government’s habit of cutting family planning funds when those funds go to agencies in foreign countries that give out contraceptive devices, offer advice on abortion, and perform abortions.

We should encourage women and men to prevent unwanted pregnancies. It is the inalienable right and duty of every woman to learn about her body and to be aware of the phases of her menstrual cycle. It is the duty for every man to be aware of the functions and health of his and his partner’s bodies. This information is necessary for self-determination, to make informed decisions, and to prevent unintended consequences.

Unplanned conception takes control away from individuals and makes them subject to external controls. The “morning-after” pill and option of a safe and legal abortion need to remain available.

Source: Green Party

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Paycheck Fairness Act

Posted in discrimination, Human Right, Roe vs. Wade, sexual harassment, sexual harrassment, Supreme Court, Uncategorized, Women's Bill of Rights, women's reproductive rights, women's rights | Tagged morning-after pill, reproductive rights, Roe vs. Wade | Leave a comment

Women’s Economic Equality

Posted on March 17, 2020 by mekorganic

Women earn only 77% of men’s wages for equal work, despite outnumbering men in the workforce and despite the U.S. 1963 Equal Pay Act. Thus we should support intensified effort to see this unfair gap closed, including support for the Paycheck Fairness Act and similar legislation along with greater effort at enforcement.

Single mothers are the largest and most severely impoverished group in the United States, which explains why 22% of the children in our country live below the poverty line. Welfare reform has forced mothers to abandon their children while they travel to work at minimum wage jobs. With the extreme pay inequity, single mothers cannot afford child care, nurture their children, and move out of poverty.

We need real reforms to end poverty and return dignity and opportunity to all mothers. We call for implementing innovative programs that work with the particular and special needs of motherhood.

Mothers should not be forced to have outside employment to receive adequate welfare. Children are a nation’s most valuable treasure and we must see that they are well nurtured.

We also support other programs such as a universal basic income that will provide for those who nurture the next generation — work that is of incalculable importance to our society.
Sources: Green Party

Posted in Children, community, Economic Bill of Rights, economic equality, economical justice, economy, Equal Pay Act, Human Right, poverty, Uncategorized, universal basic income, welfare, Women's Bill of Rights, women's rights | Tagged equality, poverty, welfare | Leave a comment

Welfare – A Commitment to Ending Poverty

Posted on March 17, 2020 by mekorganic

An unjust society is an unsustainable society. When communities are stressed by poverty, violence and despair, our ability to meet the challenges of the post industrial age are critically impaired.
A holistic, future-focused perspective on how we distribute resources in this country would consider the effects of such distribution not just on our present needs, but on the seventh generation to come.
It is time for a radical shift in our attitude toward support for families, children, the poor and the disabled. Such support must not be given grudgingly; it is the right of those presently in need and an investment in our future.

We must take an uncompromising position that the care and nurture of children, elders and the disabled are essential to a healthy, peaceful, and sustainable society.
We should recognize that the work of their caregivers is of social and economic value, and reward it accordingly. Ensuring that children and their caregivers have access to an adequate, secure standard of living should form the cornerstone of our economic priorities. Only then can we hope to build our future on a foundation of healthy, educated children who are raised in an atmosphere of love and security.
All people have a right to food, housing, medical care, jobs that pay a living wage, education, and support in times of hardship.
Work performed outside the monetary system has inherent social and economic value, and is essential to a healthy, sustainable economy and peaceful communities.
Such work includes: child and elder care; homemaking; voluntary community service; continuing education; participating in government; and the arts.
We call for restoration of a federally funded entitlement program to support children, families, the unemployed, elderly and disabled, with no time limit on benefits.
This program should be funded through the existing welfare budget, reductions in military spending and corporate subsidies, and a fair, progressive income tax.
We should call for a graduated supplemental income, or negative income tax, that would maintain all individual adult incomes above the poverty level, regardless of employment or marital status.
We should advocate reinvesting a significant portion of the military budget into family support, living-wage job development, and work training programs.
Publicly funded work training and education programs should have a goal of increasing employment options at finding living-wage jobs.
We must support public funding for the development of living-wage jobs in community and environmental service. For example, environmental clean-up, recycling, sustainable agriculture and food production, sustainable forest management, repair and maintenance of public facilities, neighborhood-based public safety, aides in schools, libraries and childcare centers, and construction and renovation of energy-efficient housing.
We oppose enterprise zone giveaways, which benefit corporations more than inner-city communities.
The accumulation of individual wealth in the U.S. has reached grossly unbalanced proportions. It is clear that we cannot rely on the rich to regulate their profit-making excesses for the good of society through “trickle-down economics.”
We must take aggressive steps to restore a fair distribution of income.
We support tax incentives for businesses that apply fair employee wage distribution standards, and income tax policies that restrict the accumulation of excessive individual wealth.
Forcing welfare recipients to accept jobs that pay wages below a living wage drives wages down and exploits workers for private profit at public expense. We reject workfare as being a form of indentured servitude.
Corporations receiving public subsidies must provide jobs that pay a living wage, observe basic workers’ rights, and agree to affirmative action policies.

Sources: Green Party

Posted in poverty, trickle down economics, Uncategorized, welfare | Tagged enterprise zones, healthy, income, living wage, poverty, subsidies, sustainable, wealth, welfare | Leave a comment

Veterans and GI Rights

Posted on March 17, 2020 by mekorganic

Support for men and women in the armed forces must go far beyond the rhetoric used to discredit the peace movement in the U.S. today.

We need to understand that the ill-advised and illegal actions of the U.S. administration have unnecessarily put our troops in harm’s way.

We should further understand that the dangerous burden of fighting the unnecessary war in Iraq, and the wars that may follow, due to the administration’s overly narrow and militaristic response to terrorism is disproportionately borne by families of lesser means.

Those who are required to carry out militaristic policies, often with great hardship to themselves, their families, and even the risk of their lives, deserve our respect and our commitment to adequate compensation and benefits.

Our first priority in foreign policy considerations is to creating a future without war. We must be committed to the idea that future generations will not face the separations and sacrifices of war.

We must recommend the following actions:

Increase the current pay levels, including monthly combat pay, imminent danger pay and family separation allowances for those risking their lives in combat zones.
Provide better care for the wounded, sick and injured soldiers.
Restore full funding for veterans’ health programs. Ensure that the Pentagon takes all steps necessary to fully diagnose and treat the physical and mental health conditions resulting from service in combat zones, including post-traumatic stress disorder.
Support increased funding for additional clinics to provide services which now are too often delayed or denied throughout the Veterans Affairs system because of over crowding and budget constraints.
Ensure that all pre-deployment physicals are completed within the standard allotted time period, and that medical follow-ups are routinely given to all soldiers.
Honor all laws concerning time limits on deployments.
Ensure a smooth transition from active military service to civilian life by providing counseling, housing, emergency management, job protection and other support systems.
Many of those U.S. Soldiers, Sailors, Marines and Airmen who served during U.S. Wars in the past two decades have been exposed to nuclear, chemical and possibly biological warfare agents. We insist that the Veterans Administration not ignore the suffering they have experienced since coming home from the war.
The Congress should fund and the VA should implement a comprehensive program to survey Vets and the impacts of Gulf War Syndrome on them and their families and to provide the best possible medical treatment available to minimize the suffering of these men and women and their families.
Veterans of the U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are being unfairly discharged from the service with PTSD and other injuries caused by stress, trauma and head injuries, under trumped-up behavioral charges, as a means of military budget cost-cutting.
We must insist that all U.S. combatants are entitled to medical and psychiatric health care by the VA, after serving any time in a combat zones. Service members serving in combat zones are subjected to assorted variations of permanent physical and mental damage and are entitled to treatment by the Veterans Administration.
This nation has a moral obligation to provide health care services and disability entitlements to its veterans. We should support funding for additional clinics to provide services which now are too often delayed or denied because of over-crowding and budget constraints throughout the VA system.
Provide recognized, independent veteran organizations with access to military personnel to ensure they are being informed of their rights, including those who are hospitalized due to service related injuries or illnesses.
Establish a panel of independent medical doctors to examine and oversee the military policies regarding forced vaccinations and shots, especially with experimental drugs.
Insist that the military halt the practice of testing experimental medicines and inoculations on service members without their consent.
Enact a new GI Bill, similar to the one that began after World War II and ended in 1981, to provide tuition grants for four years of college or other educational opportunities, low-interest loans for housing or business start-ups, and free medical care for military personnel and their families for ten years following separation from the armed forces.
Support a transparent and democratic conscientious objection process free of harassment, imprisonment, or deployment to war zones for conscientious objectors. Defend the right of individuals in the military service to modify or completely separate from military involvement because of conscientious objection.

Sources: Green Party

Posted in Afghanistan, conscientious objection, G I Bill, G I Rights, Iraq, military actions, Military-Industrial-Media Complex, PTSD, Uncategorized, Veterans, Vetgeran's Administration, war | Tagged combat, conscientious objection, G I Bill, Veterans, Veterans Affairs, war | Leave a comment

USA PATRIOT Act

Posted on March 17, 2020 by mekorganic

We must call for the repeal of the USA PATRIOT ACT. Many of its provisions, along with many of the other so-called National Security Acts, undermine and erode our Bill of Rights, and contribute to the destruction of the democratic foundation of checks and balances between the branches of government.

Revoke the 2011 re-authorization of the Patriot Act, including “John Doe” roving wiretaps and the “library records” provision.
Restore habeas corpus, a legal action to obtain relief from illegal detention. End the use of indefinite detention without trial.
End the abuse of National Security Letters, which the FBI uses to force Internet service providers, libraries, banks, and credit reporting companies to reveal sensitive information about their patrons.
End illegal government spying, including the use of warrantless wiretaps. Three federal judges have ruled that President Bush’s National Security Agency warrantless wiretaps violated the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which contains criminal sanctions. Ensure that anyone who violated the FISA is held accountable for crimes committed.
Strictly enforce our First Amendment rights of speech, assembly, association and petition. Federal, state and local governments must safeguard our right to public, non-violent protest. It is intolerable that law enforcement agencies intimidate lawful protesters with brutality, surveillance, repression and retaliation. We should support students’ constitutional rights to free speech.
Support strict Fourth Amendment protections against illegal search and seizure.
Recognize that the privacy protections of the 4th amendment extend to the Internet.
Demand the elimination of bulk Internet data collection by our government.
Fund and promote research into alternate Internet structures that would build in privacy.
Hold criminally accountable all government officials, employees and contractors who illegally spy on Americans, and who provide false, misleading or incomplete testimony to Congress about surveillance of American communications by law enforcement and intelligence agencies.
End torture, such as in prisons like Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo Bay and other U.S.-controlled facilities. Ensure those guilty of ordering or executing torture are held accountable for violations U.S. and international law.

Sources: Green Party

Posted in Abu Ghraib, FBI, First Amendment, Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), Fourth Amendment, freedom of speech, Guantanamo Bay, habeas corpus, National Security Act, torture, Uncategorized, USA Patriot Act | Tagged FBI, FISA, Fourth Amendment, habeas corpus, Patriot Act, prisons, spying, torture | Leave a comment

Torture

Posted on March 17, 2020 by mekorganic

End torture, such as in prisons like Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo Bay and other U.S.-controlled facilities. Ensure those guilty of ordering or executing torture are held accountable for violations U.S. and international law.
Sources: Green Party

Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity

Posted in Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo Bay, Human Rights, International Criminal and Humanitarian Law, International Law, torture | Tagged Human Rights, International Law, torture | Leave a comment

SOA – Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation

Posted on March 17, 2020 by mekorganic

Close the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation, formerly known as the School of the Americas, in Ft. Benning, Georgia.

The SOA, renamed the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation (WHINSEC) in 2001, is a US military training school based in Fort Benning, Georgia.

The school made headlines in 1996 when the Pentagon released training manuals used at the school that advocated torture, extortion and execution.

Despite this admission and hundreds of documented human rights abuses connected to soldiers trained at the school, no independent investigation into the facility has ever taken place.

Source: Green Party
SOA Watch

Posted in Central America, Human Rights, military actions, prison-industrial-complex, SOA, Terrorism, torture, Uncategorized, Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation | Tagged Ft. Benning, military, Pentagon, WHINSEC | Leave a comment

Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity

Posted on March 17, 2020 by mekorganic

We should support full legal and political equality for all persons regardless of sex, gender, sexual orientation, or gender identity, characteristics, and expression.

We should affirm the rights of all individuals to freely choose intimate partners, regardless of their sex, gender, or gender identity.

We must recognize the full civil rights of sexual and gender minorities. The existing civil rights act prohibits discriminating on the basis of race, color, national origin, religion, sex, age, and disability. We must work to add sexual orientation, gender identity, and gender expression to the existing civil rights act.

We should be inclusive of language in local, state and federal anti- discrimination law that ensures the rights of intersex individuals and prohibits discrimination based on gender identity, characteristics, and expression as well as on sex, gender, or sexual orientation. We should oppose non-consenting intersex genital surgery.

We should affirm the right of all persons to self-determination with regard to gender identity and sex. We would affirm the right of choosing non-binary and gender fluid identification. We should therefore support the right of individuals to be free from coercion and involuntary assignment of gender or sex.

We should support legislation where offenders must pay compensation to Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, Intersex, Asexual (LGBTQIA) people who have suffered violence and injustice.

We should end all Federal military aid to national governments whose laws result in the death, other harm, or imprisonment of its citizens and residents who are Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, Intersex, Asexual (LGBTQIA).

We should support enacting a policy that the U. S. Government recognize all same sex marriages or legal equivalents such as civil unions, in processing visitor and immigration visas.

We must end security surveillance and covert infiltration of organizations that promote rights for sexual and gender minorities.

Sources: Green Party

Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Reparations for United States Afrodescendants

Posted on March 17, 2020 by mekorganic

The development of the United States has been marked by conflict over questions of race. Our nation was formed only after Native Americans were displaced. The institution of slavery had as its underpinnings the belief in white supremacy, which we must condemn. In slavery’s aftermath, people of color have borne the brunt of violence and discrimination. We must unequivocally condemn these evils, which continue to be a social problem of paramount significance.
The community of people of African ancestry whose family members were held in chattel slavery in what is now the United States of America have legitimate claims to reparations including monetary compensation for centuries of human rights violations, including the Transatlantic slave trade now recognized by the United Nations as a “crime against humanity.”
As our Nation has done in the past with respect to the Choctaw, the Lakota, the Lambuth, and more recently for Japanese Americans and the European Jewish community, reparations are now due to address the debt still owed to descendants of enslaved Africans.
We should commit to full and complete reparations to the African American community of this nation for the past four hundred plus years of genocide, slavery, land-loss, destruction of original identity and the stark disparities which haunt the present evidenced in unemployment statistics, substandard and inadequate education, higher levels of mortality including infant and maternal mortality and the practice of mass incarceration.
We need to recognize that reparations are a debt (not charity) that is owed by our own and other nations and by the corporate institutions chartered under our laws to a collective of people. The leadership on the question of what our nation owes to this process of right ought to come from the African American community, whose right to self-determination and autonomy to chart the path to healing we fully recognize.
We also must understand that until significant steps are taken to reverse the ongoing abuses; to end the criminalization of the Black and Brown communities, to eradicate poverty, to invest in education, health care and the restoration and protection of human rights, that it will be impossible to repair the continuing damage wrought by the ideology of white supremacy which permeates the governing institutions of our nation.
While consensus is still evolving on what would constitute full and complete reparations, we should support the following initial steps:

The creation of a claim of action and a right to recover inherited wealth and other profits accumulated from the slave trade for the benefit of a reparations trust fund.
Initiate the repeal of the slave clauses that survive today in the U.S. Constitution.
Work to restore lands stolen through a variety of tactics including: violence, terrorism and the discriminatory access to operating capital that together has robbed black farmers and the broader community of their lands.
Release of all political prisoners held by the USA. It is time that the political frame-ups, the prosecutorial misconduct and the racist application of police power that pass for justice in our country be buried and those victimized by these abuses of state power be given their lives back.
Existing Historically Black Colleges and Universities, as well as new and existing Education and Development Funds. We support efforts to overcome the effects of over 200 years of racial discrimination.
End official support for any remaining symbols of slavery and specifically call for the removal of the Confederate battle flag from all government buildings.
Condemn the practice of racial profiling by law enforcement agencies, which are guilty of stopping m torists, harassing individuals, or using unwarranted violence against suspects with no other justification than race or ethnic background.
Strong measures to combat official racism in the forms of police brutality directed against people of color.
Effective enforcement of the Voting Rights Act, including language access to voting.
Oppose discriminatory English-only pressure groups. We call for a national language policy that would encourage all citizens to be fluent in at least two languages. [See section K. Immigration / Emigration in this chapter]
Vigorous enforcement of civil-rights laws, the aggressive prosecution of hate crimes, and the strengthening of legal services for the poor.

Sources: Green Party