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By Jonathan Kissam, on March 23rd, 2011
Published in the Burlington Free Press March 11th
In the past weeks, anti-worker Republicans have bared their teeth. Republican leader Boehner’s budget proposal in Congress, and attempts by Republican governors in Wisconsin and Ohio to roll back the basic human right for public employees to organize, demonstrate clearly that their agenda is not simply one of “fiscal conservatism.” Instead, it is a highly ideological attack on many of our fundamental human rights. Leaving in place the Bush-era tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans, Republicans — and many Democrats — are using the deficits created by those tax cuts to not only attack programs for the most vulnerable, but also to attack women’s reproductive health and prevent the Environmental Protection Agency from acting on climate change and the Federal Communications Commission from protecting net neutrality.
Vermont can be proud that many of our elected officials have stood up against this dangerous agenda. Senator Bernie Sanders galvanized people across the nation with his 8 1/2 hour “Filibernie” in December, and our state is poised to be the first to truly solve the healthcare crisis, supported by a strong grassroots movement around the state demanding Healthcare Is a Human Right. However, the state
Continue reading Defending and Expanding the Public Sector Benefits Us All
By Jonathan Kissam, on November 12th, 2010
 For more than two years, the Vermont Workers’ Center/Jobs with Justice, a community-based workers’ rights organization, has been leading a statewide campaign to implement a universal and equitable healthcare system in the state of Vermont, the Healthcare Is a Human Right Campaign. This campaign won legislation in the 2010 legislative session which commits the state to implementing a new healthcare system which meets the human rights principles of universality, equity, accountability, transparency and participation. Dr. William Hsiao, who designed Taiwan’s single-payer system, is designing three options for the state, one of which will be a single-payer system and all of which must meet the human rights principles. While there are many struggles ahead to make sure that the state chooses and implements a new plan that actually meets human rights principles, Vermont is certainly headed in the right direction.
The contrast with the national situation is stark, especially in light of last week’s election results. The 2008 election of Barack Obama as President and majorities for the Democratic Party in both houses of Congress
Continue reading Vermont as a Catalyst for National Change in the Struggle for Health Care
By Jonathan Kissam, on August 19th, 2009
On Saturday, August 15, hundreds of people converged on a U.S. Senator’s Town Hall meeting in Rutland, Vermont, with healthcare reform on their minds. Despite the fact that Rutland had seen a 200-person-strong “Tea Party” rally less than two months before, and that various right-wing radio stations has been ceaselessly promoting the event for weeks, this event turned out very differently from town hall meetings held elsewhere in the country in recent weeks, where Democratic representatives and senators were largely cowed by large, well-organized and disruptive crowds. Instead, the audience, physical space, and media coverage of this town meeting, and a similar one held later in the day in the town of Arlington, were dominated by the red placards and t-shirts of the “Healthcare Is a Human Right” campaign of the Vermont Workers’ Center/Jobs with Justice.
Anti-reform speakers got their share of time at the microphone but were unable to be disruptive because of the large Workers’ Center mobilization, and Independent Senator Bernie Sanders — a long-time supporter of a single-payer, national healthcare plan — remained in control of the room, Continue reading Taking on the Right over Healthcare Reform: Lessons from Vermont
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