THE NEW COVENANT WITH AMERICA-- THE DEMOCRATS' CONTRACT WITH AMERICA

The New Covenant with America (Democrat Contract With America)
by Robert B. Reich


1. Competence. We promise America a competent government headed by people with
expertise and experience. We will never appoint or confirm cronies whose main
qualification for office is personal connection or party loyalty.

2. Fiscal responsibility and a capital budget. We will get the federal budget
back under control by barring special spending (pork to political loyalists back
home) and corporate welfare (subsidies to particular industries like
agribusiness, oil, and pharmaceuticals). We will create a national capital
budget so that federal construction money never again goes to bridges to nowhere
in Alaska and instead goes to stronger levees in New Orleans.

3. Fighting terrorism and getting out of Iraq. We will fight terrorism with a
strong military and with economic investments and aid for poor nations that are
often the breeding grounds for terrorism. But we will withdraw American troops
from Iraq. As even our generals now tell us, our presence there is incubating
new terrorists and fomenting anti-Americanism around the world.

4. Ending torture and respecting the rule of law. We will respect the Geneva
Conventions. We will never condone torture or keep people imprisoned
indefinitely without due process of law.

5. Reducing oil dependence and greenhouse gases. We will reduce American
dependence on oil and reduce global warming. By 2020, 20 percent of our energy
will come from solar, wind, biomass, and other alternative sources. Also by
2020, America will utilize 20-percent less fuel than today.

6. Restoring the middle class. We will restore the growth of the American middle
class and of middle-class incomes. Supply-side economics, which rewards the rich
with generous tax breaks and tells us that the resulting economic growth will
trickle down to everyone else, has proven a cruel hoax. Little or nothing is
trickling down. A quarter of all the benefits of economic growth now go to the
richest one-tenth of 1 percent of Americans. We are determined to reverse
course.

7. A progressive tax code. The cost of making the nation's homeland secure
against terrorism and natural disasters and of providing adequate health care
and education -- without falling deeper into debt -- will require more federal
revenue. Yet the middle class cannot afford more taxes. It's time for the rich
to bear their fair share. We will impose a surtax of one-tenth of 1 percent per
year on net worth in excess of $1 million and will roll back the
administration's tax cuts for those earning more than $300,000 a year.

8. A minimum health-care wage. The cost of health insurance for the typical
family is rising by double digits, while 46 million Americans are without
insurance altogether. We will establish a simple minimum health-care wage
offering basic health insurance -- one free checkup per year, five free medical
visits, one free dental, choice of doctor or dentist limited to an approved
list, free drugs up to $1,000 per year -- to any American wishing to join. The
expected large scale of this program will give government bargaining leverage to
get low prices from providers and drug companies.

9. Lifelong education through progressive vouchers and re-employment insurance.
We will finance every K-14 student (that's right -- two years beyond high
school) with a progressive voucher in an amount inversely related to family
income. (This year, for example, it would range from $15,000 for students from
families at or below the poverty line to $3,000 for students from families in
the wealthiest 10 percent.) The vouchers could be used at any publicly certified
school. In addition, we will turn the unemployment insurance system into a
re-employment insurance system. Recipients will get job training, job-search
assistance, and, if the new job pays less than the old, wage insurance paying
half the difference for a year.

10. Maintain separation of church and state. We will never allow religion to
dictate whether an individual must be kept on life support, young people can
gain access to birth-control information or counseling, women will have the
freedom to choose to terminate a pregnancy, research can be done on stem cells
or any other potential scientific innovation, or public schools must teach
nonscientific interpretations of sacred texts.

Robert B. Reich is co-founder of The American Prospect.