Fried: Looking Forward to a Far Better 2009

Somehow we've survived another year, which took a bit more effort than most years. Now it's time to half-heartedly try to live up to another crop of resolutions while writing the wrong year on our checks. Peering into my crystal ball, here's what I expect in 2009.

On the national level, most of us are eagerly counting down the days to the inauguration of a new and better president. Since Dubya set the bar so low, all Obama needs to do to be better is tell the truth, forego needless wars and prevent his cronies from looting the treasury. But we expect much more than that. We expect a 21st century Franklin Delano Roosevelt and a new New Deal.

Since the election, progressives and grass-roots activists have been mostly silent, busy with families, jobs, and the holidays, while the “permanent government” has been aggressively lobbying Obama on behalf of Business As Usual. They've hammered home the false idea that “America is a center-right nation,” so Obama should govern that way. Excuse me? The day before the election we were told Obama was a pro-terrorist, secret Muslim/racist Christian running against a war hero, and we elected him in a landslide anyway! How center right could we really be?

Here's what one of my favorite local organizations, the Center for Justice, Peace and the Environment, wants from the incoming President:

• Withdrawal of virtually all U.S. troops and military contractors from Iraq and Afghanistan within the next 16 months.

• Redirecting funds from foreign occupations and the regular military budget to meet critical needs at home, including infrastructure, energy independence and health care.

• Redirecting remaining public funds approved for the financial bailout package toward an economic stimulus package to put people back to work.

• Commitment to aggressive reductions in greenhouse gas emissions to stabilize the climate.

• Restoration of all constitutional rights compromised by the misnamed USA PATRIOT Act, the Military Commissions Act, and numerous executive orders since 2001.

• Passage of comprehensive immigration reform legislation.

I expect the Obama administration to move quickly on climate change, restore our lost constitutional rights and redesign the bailout package. I'm less optimistic they will rethink America's imperial foreign policy or shrink the bloated military-industrial-contractor complex. That will depend on what we do at the grass roots. Please go to www.cjpe.org and get after it.

On the state level, the Colorado legislature will be forced to make substantial cuts to the state budget because of the failing national economy, unless a new national stimulus package includes significant aid to states, especially for transportation infrastructure projects. Depending on how the North I-25 Environmental Impact Statement and the new national economic-environmental programs line up, 2009 could be the year we finally begin to develop commuter rail in Colorado.

Locally, we face a city council/mayoral election in mere months. Conservatives have never stopped campaigning, blaming the council majority for everything from a phony War on Christmas to driving business to Loveland and Timnath by daring to maintain high standards and a commitment to our local quality of life. So far only one candidate has declared: Tom Griggs for mayor. A professor of education and 2006 candidate for state Board of Education, Griggs is active in local Democratic Party politics, causing some tongues to cluck over our supposedly “nonpartisan” city elections. All nonpartisan means is candidates run as individuals, not party nominees. Besides, I seem to recall some very heavy Republican Party involvement in the 2007 elections.

Naturally, now that every elected official representing Fort Collins from president to state rep is a Democrat, conservatives want to de-emphasize parties. Sorry, that train has already left the station.

I love the way “Mayor Griggs” sounds. If we can re-elect Kelly Ohlson and Ben Manvel and replace the absent Diggs Brown with someone more reasonable, we can really make 2009 a year to be proud of.

Eric Fried has once again met ALL his nonexistent New Years resolutions at eric@pvgreen.org.