Dear Foster's: Vote Democrat

[This is the letter to the editor I just sent to Foster's Daily Democrat. It's pretty terse in order to fit everything into the length requirement. They don't always publish my letters, so I'm posting this here as well - Dean.]

To the editor:

On November 4, I urge every Democrat to vote and everyone to vote Democrat.  Issue after issue, Democrats offer and implement real solutions while Republicans offer fear, ignorance or meanness.  In 350 words:

 

Economy: Over Obama's term: Unemployment from 7.8% to 5.9%,  -800,000 to +200,000 jobs a month, 55 months job growth, S&P 500 up 130%, deficit reduced from 10% to 3% of GDP, financial reform.  Republicans offer default(!), government shutdowns, gutting environmental regulations, privatizing Medicare and severely cutting CDC, NIH and defense.  Domestic energy production near independence levels, gas prices low, auto sector saved.

 

Income Inequality: Democrats lower taxes on 95%, got Republicans to raise taxes on the top, want a livable minimum wage and job-creating infrastructure building.  Republicans offer severe cuts to the safety net (including food stamps) and tax breaks for job exporters.

Women's Issues: Democrats champion reproductive freedom, equal pay, Planned Parenthood, violence prevention.  Republicans offer forced transvaginal probing, TRAP laws, personhood and bosses dictating contraception.

Science: Democrats believe in evolution and climate change, letting science guide policy on sex education, product safety and environmental regulation.  Republicans not so much.
 

Foreign Policy: Obama got bin Laden, Dubya "not that concerned."  Obama destroyed Assad's chemical weapons. Republicans advocated attacking Assad, leaving ISIS to grab those chemical weapons.  Obama gets us out of wars.  

 

Healthcare: Democrats produced 10 million newly insured, no preexisting condition exemptions, no lifetime caps, subsidies as needed, Medicare solvent 14 more years, closing doughnut hole, working cost controls, five more companies on our exchange.  Republicans cry "repeal, repeal, repeal" which would take all that away, and never agree on "replace."

Ebola: The president bases protections on science.  Keeping America safe means beating Ebola in West Africa.  He honors the heroic health care workers who go fight this disease.  Republicans treat them like lepers, constitution be damned, making it harder to volunteer, and us all less safe. Republicans absurdly stoke fears about infected ISIS soldiers crossing the Mexican border.

 

I'll just mention voting rights, Citizens United, marriage equality, gays in the military, and immigration reform.  On Tuesday, vote Democrat.
 

Dean Rubine, Lee