Kitteh for Regional Sec of the Wiki: the most exciting RSoW election evar!

[Gass3268]

Endorsed and I strongly agree on this point!

I am not running this campaign just out of opposition to Governor Tmthforu. The Governor is a good person who has done legitimate good for this region. I do not oppose him personally, nor do I question his character or commitment to our region. But this is not a personality contest. It is a debate over who has the best ideas and policies for our region.

[Kitteh]

Drj, while I cannot support you in this campaign, I'm glad you plan to run an issues-focused campaign. This should foster a good bit of intellectual activity within our region, and I definitely look forward to it. I hope that we can avoid hard feelings and still remain on decent terms with each other, despite our political and policy disagreements. Not everyone would mount a Don Quixote-esque campaign out of conviction and for the sake of democracy, and you've earned my respect for that, although I will strongly support the Governor in this election.

I respect that. Thank you.

[Kaine for Senate '18]

I agree with TexasDem.  Good luck.

[tmthforu94]

Best of luck to you. I was expecting a challenge.

 I would like to point out a few holes in your argument, though:

Throughout the term of this assembly, the Governor has opposed and vetoed sensible, progressive reform time and again.

I would say that is a bit of a stretch - I have only vetoed two bills during my time, one being the abortion bill and the other being the bag tax, which we passed a better version of it, which you voted for.

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That is not true. I was only responding to your arrogant post by reminding you that if the person I appoint opposes it, it would require my signature (Which, for the record, I plan to sign).

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That's an interesting way to put it, to say the least. As someone who has passed countless reforms both in the Mideast and at the federal level, I strongly support the legislation. My concern, which was addressed in the debate thread, was that I didn't want to sign the legislation until we had concrete numbers from the GM on approximately how much it would cost. We're trying to be fiscally responsible here - I think it would be very unwise to pass a bill that could potentially cost us tens of billions of dollars. The first class affected by this will not be heading to college until the fall of 2014 - I fail to see why there is such a rush to get it passed.

[Kitteh]

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That's an interesting way to put it, to say the least. As someone who has passed countless reforms both in the Mideast and at the federal level, I strongly support the legislation. My concern, which was addressed in the debate thread, was that I didn't want to sign the legislation until we had concrete numbers from the GM on approximately how much it would cost. We're trying to be fiscally responsible here - I think it would be very unwise to pass a bill that could potentially cost us tens of billions of dollars. The first class affected by this will not be heading to college until the fall of 2014 - I fail to see why there is such a rush to get it passed.

I was addressing my amendment to the bill, specifically. I agree with the GM analysis part.

[tmthforu94]

Subject to GM analysis, I will sign this.

^I obviously don't oppose the bill itself. Though I am not thrilled with all parts of it, I agreed to remove the portion on private schools, which I thought was us meeting in the middle.

[Kitteh]

The People deserve some clarification of this stuff, which needs context from the assembly.

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That is not true. I was only responding to your arrogant post by reminding you that if the person I appoint opposes it, it would require my signature (Which, for the record, I plan to sign).

This is in regards to the Amendment to the Labor Relations Act. After Mr.X, Gass, TexasDem and myself stated that we supported a repeal of the Mideast's right-to-work law, I stated that since 4/5 members of the assembly support it, it was going to happen. I don't believe that is an arrogant statement, just a statement of fact. It certainly was not intended to be arrogant at all. The Governor then responded by saying:

Would there be support for the establishment of a Labor Relations Board?

I would much prefer to simply remove the right to work language altogether.  That seems like both simplest and the best solution.

Agreed!

I'm on board with this as well.

Me too. Which means it will happen.

Not necessarily - Mr. X will be leaving for the Senate soon, and I will be appointing his replacement, who hasn't weighed in on this yet.

I understood that to mean that the Governor would veto the act, because the only way that Mr. X's replacement's views on this issue would determine whether the bill passes is if the Governor vetoes. Otherwise, the support of TexasDem, Gass, and I would be sufficient to pass it, and the fact that Mr. X's replacement might oppose the bill wouldn't make it any less likely to happen. I am happy, though, that the governor has said on the record that he will support repeal of this law.

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That's an interesting way to put it, to say the least. As someone who has passed countless reforms both in the Mideast and at the federal level, I strongly support the legislation. My concern, which was addressed in the debate thread, was that I didn't want to sign the legislation until we had concrete numbers from the GM on approximately how much it would cost. We're trying to be fiscally responsible here - I think it would be very unwise to pass a bill that could potentially cost us tens of billions of dollars. The first class affected by this will not be heading to college until the fall of 2014 - I fail to see why there is such a rush to get it passed.

This quotes is in regards to The Affordable Education Act of 2012. The amendment initially specified that any student with a minimum of certain GPA and SAT/ACT requirements who graduated from Mideastern public high schools would get 50% of their college tuition paid for by the Mideast government. The governor introduced an amendment to expand that to private and homeschooled students, which I opposed. I also proposed changing the GPA and test score requirements to a requirement that the student graduate in the upper x% of their class. This is more fair, because it compares students in poor, inner-city schools with terrible teachers to other students in similar situations, rather than comparing them to wealthy suburban students who have much better teachers and who's parents can afford private tutors and test prep classes. In response, the Governor said:

I will not sign this if it makes the decision based off of class percentage.

I then proposed that I would give up one of the two things I wanted (class percentage, and only public schools) in exchange for the other, which seems like a fair compromise. Since consensus was reached that giving up class percentages was better, I proposed an amendment that would allow public and charter school students to be elidgeable, and base eligibility on GPA and test scores, not class percentage. The Governor than said that he would only sign the bill if it also included homeschooled students:

This will get my veto without it.

I conceeded that, considering it a minor point since few students are homeschooled and I strongly support the idea of this bill (making college more affordable). TexasDem then proposed an amendment with that, and now, subject to GM analysis, this bill will pass.

I would like to address this, though:

Subject to GM analysis, I will sign this.

^I obviously don't oppose the bill itself. Though I am not thrilled with all parts of it, I agreed to remove the portion on private schools, which I thought was us meeting in the middle.

I don't agree that that was "meeting in the middle". Of the two changes that I wanted made, I agreed to give up 1 1/2 of them (grade percentage and homeschooled students). That seems like a "compromise" that highly favors one side to me. This bill now looks almost identical to the one that the Governor proposed, with the only major difference being that private schooled students aren't elidgeable. But I agreed to it because I believe the intent of this bill is very good and should be supported.

[tmthforu94]

Well, I just have a fundamental disagreement on basing it on class percentages. Part of that probably stems from the fact that I didn't get a full-ride scholarship the college I was hoping to go to because you had to finish in the Top 10% and I was in the Top 12.5%. Had I been in any of the four high schools around mine, I would have qualified for that scholarship.

That is a discussion that is probably better suited for the debate thread, rather than your campaign thread, so I'll leave it at that. I look forward to an idea-oriented campaign, and hope we can have a friendly debate before the election kicks off in a couple weeks.

[Kitteh]

Well, I just have a fundamental disagreement on basing it on class percentages. Part of that probably stems from the fact that I didn't get a full-ride scholarship the college I was hoping to go to because you had to finish in the Top 10% and I was in the Top 12.5%. Had I been in any of the four high schools around mine, I would have qualified for that scholarship.

That is a discussion that is probably better suited for the debate thread, rather than your campaign thread, so I'll leave it at that. I look forward to an idea-oriented campaign, and hope we can have a friendly debate before the election kicks off in a couple weeks.

Sounds good. I wish you luck, may the best candidate win.

[Kitteh]

I am calling all Mideasterners to get out and vote AYE on the Mideast Assembly Expansion Amendment. With so many candidates running for Assembly, 11 at last count IIRC, we need this amendment to keep elections fun and competitive. Also, in response to the claims that this amendment will encourage people to move to the Mideast at the expense of low-activity regions like the Midwest, note that this amendment only expands the assembly to 7 if there are 9 or more candidates running already. It responds to already increased activity, not drives up new activity.

[Kitteh]

Statement on the appointment of Cathcon to fill the assembly seat left vacant by Mr. X

I was disappointed when I heard today that the Governor was appointing Cathcon to fill the vacant seat in the Mideast assembly. I believe that as a general principle the will of The People should be the force guiding the politicians of Atlasia. In the last election, voters in the Mideast chose to give the Mideast People's Liberal Labor caucus control of the assembly with four out of five seats. There was a clear mandate for the Liberal Party to hold a seat in the assembly, given that Mr. X had one of the highest vote totals. So when Mr. X left the assembly, I believe that the balance of power that The People voted for should have been upheld. There is a Liberal candidate currently running for assembly, Clinton1996, who has the endorsement of Mr. X (and myself) and who had expressed interest in the appointment. Given that Clinton1996 is from the same party as Mr. X and has similar political views, it is only fair that the Governor should have appointed him to preserve the assembly as The People voted for it to be. Instead, the Governor decided to appoint a conservative Federalist, Cathcon. This is a violation of the principle of popular sovereignty, a statement by the Governor that his will is more important than the will of The People. Governor Tmthforu's appointment of someone from his own party has changed the makeup of the Assembly from the way The People voted for it to be. Further, this has happened at a time when there are a number of contentious bills in the Assembly, including the repeal of the so-called "Right-to-work" law. Now there is a new, unelected member of the assembly who has strongly different views on these issues than the representatives the voters of the Mideast chose. I oppose the Governor's choice of Cathcon for this reason.

[tmthforu94]

The People also elected me as Governor and entrusted in me the responsibility of picking who I felt would best serve as the replacement - I am under absolutely no obligation to pick someone of a similar ideology as the person who created the vacancy. Political motivation wasn't involved here - I have already stated what my plans are for the Labor Relations bill, and the other signature piece we're discussing is the Lt. Governor amendment, which isn't really a partisan issue. If I was really being politically motivated, I would have stalled until today to announce my veto of the abortion bill, knowing that the veto override would fail with Cathcon and Inks both in there. Instead, I decided it would be better to let the same people who started debate on the bill to make the final decision on it.

Also, more than anything, to avoid favoritism with so many well-qualified candidates running in the upcoming election, I made the decision very early on to appoint a placeholder to the seat, rather than someone who was running a seat in January. FWIW, I reached out to several individuals before settling on Cathcon, with two of them being left of center. Cathcon (No offense, Cathcon, as I'm sure you'll do great) was the only person with interest who would only be a placeholder, so it was an easy decision for me based off of that.

And FWIW, Cathcon was a member of "MPLL" back during the Assembly elections in November.

[tmthforu94]

On another note, I would strongly encourage you to go ahead an request Wiki access from Dave to avoid the risk of the region's Wiki becoming outdated should you get elected. I can also give you a basic overview of how things work on there, should you be unaware (I've never seen you edit anything on there, so I'm just assuming you don't have access).

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

And FWIW, Cathcon was a member of "MPLL" back during the Assembly elections in November.

Come again?

[tmthforu94]

And FWIW, Cathcon was a member of "MPLL" back during the Assembly elections in November.

Come again?

It's an "alliance" exclusively for members of the TPP, Liberal, and Labor parties in the region. You were in the TPP back in November, correct?

[Mad Deadly Worldwide Communist Gangster Computer God]

Just a reminder for you to make your endorsement speech in the Liberal Party thread soon.  I want to hold a vote before the election starts.

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

And FWIW, Cathcon was a member of "MPLL" back during the Assembly elections in November.

Come again?

It's an "alliance" exclusively for members of the TPP, Liberal, and Labor parties in the region. You were in the TPP back in November, correct?

I believe so, Governor.

[Mad Deadly Worldwide Communist Gangster Computer God]

Just a reminder for you to make your endorsement speech in the Liberal Party thread soon.  I want to hold a vote before the election starts.

[Kitteh]

Just a reminder for you to make your endorsement speech in the Liberal Party thread soon.  I want to hold a vote before the election starts.

Sorry! That got buried under the other stuff. I will get to that later tonight.

[Kitteh]

Official Campaign Platform

As Governor, I will work with all parties to bring progressive change to our region. I will fight for the most vulnerable first and the most powerful last. With that in mind, I release my official campaign platform:

Budget:

I agree with the Governor that the failure of previous administrations to pass a budget was highly irresponsible. I commend the Governor on passing a budget, but I disagree with him on the specifics as well as the principle of the budget. If elected Governor, I will pass a fully balanced budget, but I will not balance it on the backs of the most vulnerable. In the last assembly the Governor refused demands by the assembly center-left to increase taxes on the wealthy, and instead eliminated the deficit through a sales tax increase. I strongly disagree with this as the sales tax amounts to a regressive tax that hurts the poor more than the wealthy. I understand the Governor's desire to keep taxes low, but I believe that keeping taxes low for the middle-class and poor is more important than keeping them low for the wealthy. If elected Governor I will propose the following changes to the previous budget:
*Repealing the Governor's sales tax increase, and replacing it with tax increases on the wealthy.
*Creating more tax brackets for higher incomes. Currently the top tax bracket is for people earning $10,000,000 or more. I would add a $100,000,000+ and $1,000,000,000 tax bracket as well.
*Increasing the maximum amount where an individual pays no income tax from $13,000 to $15,000 to help working-class people and stimulate the economy
*Cut wasteful spending, such as the almost $3 billion that the region spent on "farm income stabilization" programs, aka handouts to agribusiness
*Increasing the R&D Tax credit to create jobs
*Passing a carbon tax, and using the profits from it to reduce taxes on lower-incomes and create jobs through stimulus measures like infrastructure spending (see section below)

Women's Rights, Gender and LGBT Equality

One of my most strongly held beliefs is that all people deserve equal rights, regardless of gender identity or sexuality. I am proud to be (to my knowledge) the first transgender person elected to the Mideast assembly. We have made a lot of progress on this front in the last assembly, but there is still a lot of work left. As Governor fighting for this equality will be one of my highest priorities. To this end, I will:
*Pass a law establishing guaranteed maternity and paternity leave for all workers in the Mideast. This is something that virtually every other country in the world has, and for our region to not have such a law is a disgrace.
*Repealing the Mideast Abortion Statute. This is an issue where the Governor and I have been (somewhat notoriously) at odds. Current Mideast law prohibits abortions even in the first trimester. This makes us the most restrictive region in Atlasia when it comes to reproductive choice. I believe the law passed by the Senate on this issue is sufficient, and our region's law should be repealed.
*Guarantee that all Mideast Government forms and documents (including driver's licenses) that specify a person's gender will have an "other" option for people who identify as neither male nor female. A small but significant (and growing) number of people identify as neither male nor female, and these people deserve to be respected and treated equally.

Protecting Working Families

I believe firmly that everyone should have equal opportunity to live their life as they chose. It is fundamentally wrong that a person's opportunities in life should be limited by the income level of their parents or the ZIP code where they were born. As Governor, to fight for equal equality, I will:
*Pass a law establishing that if a majority of workers in a workplace sign a written statement declaring that they wish to establish a union, the union will be recognized as the workers' representative, and the employer shall not be able to demand an additional vote.
*Fight against any attempt to reinstate the "right-to-work" (for less) law in our region. I am happy that the Governor signed the repeal of this bill, which I was a strong advocate for. However, the Governor has also signaled to the Right that he will try to amend this bill in the next assembly. If elected, I will strongly oppose any further restriction on workers' rights.
*Calculate maximum income levels for all Mideastern social programs according to the cost of living in the county where the recipient lives. Someone making $20,000 in Chicago is in a very different situation from someone making $20,000 in rural Virginia, and they should receive different levels of government assistance. This will be done in a way that does not increase total government spending.
*Guarantee all Mideastern workers a minimum of two weeks paid vacation per year. Like maternity and paternity leave, this is something that most other first-world countries have, yet we do not.

Environment and Sustainable Development

I will work to protect the environment. Our region's growth and development must be done in a sustainable, environmentally friendly way. The assembly has made some progress on this front with the bag reform bill, but more is needed. As Governor, I will:
*Pass a regional carbon tax, modeled on the legislation set forth in the Pacific region by Governor (now Senator) Spamage. This is the most significant thing the assembly can do to protect the environment, and I believe that I can get support for this from all parties, similar to the Pacific region.
*Use the funds from the carbon tax to create a real public transit system for our region. Compared to Canada, Europe, or Asia, the Mideast's public transit system is severely lacking. Our assembly has passed some legislation to increase public transit funding in the last session, but much more is necessary. I want to make it so that Mideasterners not just in major city centers can live conveniently and easily without owning a car. This may sound idealistic, but it is a reality in many other nations and I believe it can be here. Doing this will help the environment, improve public health by lowering pollution, help lower the standard-of-living gap between those who can afford cars and those who can't, and create jobs and boost the economy of our region.

When I announced, I promised that I would give The People a real choice on the issues with this campaign. With this platform, I hope I have. I am proposing real, substantial change for our region. I do not expect people to agree with every part of this platform, but I do believe that the ideas I have laid out will change our region for the better.

Thank you,
-Drj101

[Talleyrand]

Federal level:

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While I share your sentiments regarding progressive taxation, don't you think the federal government has made ample, if not excessive efforts to that regard?

[Kitteh]

Federal level:

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While I share your sentiments regarding progressive taxation, don't you think the federal government has made ample, if not excessive efforts to that regard?

Yes, I agree that the federal government's taxation policies are plenty progressive. But let's remember that what I am proposing is not a tax increase. It is an increase in one tax (the income tax for higher incomes) and a decrease in another (the sales tax), resulting in no net increase for Mideasterners. I believe this is fair, as while it may push taxes up slightly for some at the very higher end, it will lower them for the middle class and the poor.

[tmthforu94]

All of the revenue created to balance our budget was done by finding a number close to the average of all states in the region. That's how we came up with both the sales tax numbers and the gas/diesel taxes. While it was technically a tax increase for individuals in regions that were on the lower end of the spectrum, it also cut taxes for some on the higher end.

Doing those brought us to a balanced budget - though we had talked before on potentially creating a more progressive tax system (little change, as I believe the federal levels are excessive and completely unrealistic, tbh), that was scrapped whenever we reached a balanced budget, as I figured in reality, folks wouldn't like it too well if we were raising their taxes when it wasn't needed.

[Kitteh]

I am familiar with the budget debate and how the sales tax number was calculated. But I stand behind my point; the amount that the average Mideasterner pays in sales tax was increased while the amount that the wealthy paid was not. Even if you don't wish to call that a tax increase, then my proposal is still valid, only instead of proposing the removal of a sales tax increase I am proposing a reduction of the sales tax. Substantially the same thing.

I would encourage all Mideast citizens to review the debate over the last budget. Here you can see the issues that the Governor and I are talking about, as well as the Governor's advocacy for a flat tax, a proposal I strongly oppose but have not brought up so far in this campaign because it was a failed proposal in the past.

[Kitteh]

Statement:

I am proud to be the founder of the Cultural Marxist Caucus within the Labor Party, and if I elected I will work to bring Cultural Marxism to the Mideast.