NEW AMERICAN INDEPENDENT PARTY Platform Issues I The 'Bread and Butter' Issues |
Electoral Reform We support Electoral & ballot reform in America. The current system limits the participation of voters and creates unneeded obstacles for Independent and third party candidates to run for office. The two major parties dominate American politics due to these restrictive ballot access laws, along with the use of redistricting gimmicks and of course money. We support: * campaign finance reform * public funding for elections *safe and secure voting machines with a paper trail * the right to circulate initiatives, referendums & recall * extending voter registration dates (but not election day voting registration) * the counting of all votes including write-in votes * Government paid priority mail/ express mail for mailing soldiers overseas absentee ballots *instant runoff voting for local elections *national general election day holiday. *fair ballot access *full voting rights for U.S. Territories Puerto Rico, Virgin Islands, Guam) * full voting rights for U.S. Citizens that were born overseas to U.S. Citizens but did not live in the U.S. long enough to establish residency in any one U.S. State. * Term limits are up for platform consideration next. We will be conducting surveys and discussions on the issue of term limits in the coming months and hope to generate spirited and thoughtful debate as we try to determine if the NAIP should support or oppose term limits for public office holders. The NAIP values and relies upon member input / feedback. Fair Trade Agreements, NOT Free Trade Agreements America needs to engage in and sign Fair trade agreements, not free trade agreements. America cannot continue to run up record trade deficits and flood our markets with cheap foreign goods. We must work to eliminate our record trade deficits and this won't happen until we rework our trade agreements and put pressure on other countries to follow through on their end of the bargain. We must end or renegotiate our participation in NAFTA, CAFTA and other free trade agreements. These free trade agreements contribute to the loss of American jobs by flooding the U.S. markets with cheap foreign goods, which leads to a decline of American manufacturing and the outsourcing of American jobs. Most of our current Free trade agreements are with countries that lack, or ignore any environmental, social and labor standards. America's current free trade agreements put us into a race straight to the bottom. We cannot continue to sell out the American worker and American companies by giving foreign companies and countries unfair trade advantages. The New American Independent Party encourages all Americans to buy MADE IN USA goods. The NAIP calls for a return of American self-reliance and the rebuilding of American manufacturing. Outsourcing American Jobs, technology & companies We must defend the American Worker by ending the outsourcing of American jobs. America is losing jobs in all forms and sectors to outsourcing. Corporations continue to sell out the American people in order to find cheap labor in foreign markets like China, India, Mexico and the Philippines. Americans continue to lose jobs, while we are building the economies of countries who will challenge our superpower status in the future like China and India. Also, the neo-conservative planned opening up of the Middle East to "freedom" and "democracy" will first lead to more carrot sticks (free trade agreements) being offered to them, which in turn will lead to the loss of more American jobs to the region as U.S. Corporations will quickly flock to the region for the cheap labor. We must stop giving private contracting jobs in places like Iraq to U.S. Companies who outsource jobs or offshore their headquarters to avoid paying taxes. We must work to keep American companies and technology here. The outsourcing of America's technology and the offshoring of American companies is a recipe for disaster. We must keep our economic and technological advantages in the world, if we are to have any advantages at all. The outsourcing of America's technology puts America's very survival at stake. If America is to remain strong in the future, we must, as a nation, regain our self-reliance. We must work to bring good jobs to the American people in safe working conditions. We need to ensure that every American has access to a good public high school education and access to an affordable Higher Education. We must also work to shrink the wage gap between men and women by raising Women's wages up, not by declining the wages of men. We must greatly reduce the number of approved H1B and L1 visa's that allow U.S. Companies to hire foreign workers in America. This practice has devastated the remaining American tech workers sector after the initial devastation by outsourcing tech jobs overseas. Approving large numbers of foreign workers visa's has also led to a drop in wages for those American tech workers fortunate enough to keep their jobs. The current H1B cap discourages American students from pursuing higher education in computer science, math and engineering. The NAIP will oppose all efforts to raise the annual H1B cap. Hundreds of thousands of U.S. tech workers are unemployed or under employed. It is time that America once again relies on our own technology and our own tech workers and engineers. It is time to stand up for the American worker! Use of Military (Foreign Policy) America has the greatest military on earth. We must use our great military only when it is in our national interest (Afghanistan-yes, on our border-yes, Iraq-no). Our great men and woman are too important to be sent in harms way for political or corporate interests. We support our military as they bravely protect our freedoms and defending us from those who might want to do us harm. We would of course support going to war when it is necessary. We support some goodwill missions in times of large disasters, especially in countries in close proximity to the United States, like Haiti. Disasters in those countries close to us can lead to large numbers of people attempting to migrate to the United States illegally. Assisting in setting up services and stability can help create goodwill, while also helping to stem the potential flows of illegal foreign nationals to America. We strongly opposed the invasion of Iraq which was sold to us with lies and misleading information and is part of a much larger neo-conservative agenda. The Bush Administration seized upon the people's fears after the attacks of September 11th. Seizing on these fears helped the Congress and the Administration strip away the rights of the American people quietly, in the name of security. An interventionist policy (the policy of the Bush Administration) will only result in more conflicts and more danger for America. A continued interventionist policy will further isolate America and drive the European Union toward a closer alliance with China. Let me be clear, we do not support an isolationist policy, but an engaged policy. We support a foreign policy that does not seek to mold the world into the image of America. We support a common sense stance on the Israeli/Palestinian conflict, a much smaller presence in the Middle East and Independence from Middle East oil. We will always support our troops even if we do not always support the strategic mission or the politicians that send them to battle. We fully support taking care of our Veterans through greatly increased Veterans benefits. We support a responsible exit strategy from Iraq. We do not support a permanent presence in Iraq or a hasty irresponsible withdrawal. Secure the Homeland We need to secure our homeland and stop actual Terrorist threats toward the U.S. Our nuclear power plants, ports, borders, trains, and dams are not secure and the local and state authorities are not getting the funding they need or were promised. This is breaking state and local budgets and putting our citizens in danger. Our borders need to be secure with increased border agents and national guard troops if need be. The government must work to keep America safe, but we must always preserve our individual rights. We strongly oppose many provisions of the hastily passed patriot act, which infringes on individual rights and doesn't make America safer. Israeli/Palestinian Conflict We need a more common sense neutral stance on Israeli/Palestinian conflict. America can work with both sides at the peace table to find compromise over the holy sites, settlements and other conflicts. The United States should avoid getting too close to either side. Our traditional close intimate relationship Israel will endanger our national security. We cannot set foreign policy that is dictated by a select group within Israel (or any other nation) or is created for the benefit of Israel first. We can protect our long time friendship with Israel best, by tackling the division in a fair and reasoned way. We urge members to refer to President George Washington's farewell speech. In that speech, Pres. Washington warns us not to get too cozy with foreign nations foreign policy interests. America can remain the world's leader and a beacon of hope in the eyes of the world by staying engaged in the world and working with allies to solve world issues and regional conflicts, while still always holding our right to act alone if necessary. However, it is not America's mission to shape the rest of the world in our image. Undertaking a mission to "bring freedom, democracy and capitalism to every nation and people of the world" would result in a serious decline in American power and our standing would be dramatically lowered in the long run. An interventionist policy is a recipe for disaster (more war). We need elected officials who will question policies, big or small. That is part of their responsibility as public officials. They have failed to fulfill their duties in the past. Voices of protest have been silenced or sent out to the wilderness, left barking with no one to hear them. Energy Policy & Energy Independence America must achieve Energy independence through renewable energy sources. We must end our funding of terrorists and oppressive regimes by ending our consumption of their oil (America's drug of choice). We must work to quickly phase in alternative renewable energy resources. Domestic Natural Gas, Wind and Solar power should be a top priority. We must begin manufacturing of U.S. made electric cars and other technology that will weed us off of oil, especially foreign oil. We have the technology to do this and it would add hundreds of thousands of green jobs into this new area of energy policy. Making America more energy efficient will make American goods more competitive on the global market. It will also make America much, much safer. We are concerned with Global warming, or as we refer to it, Global Climate change. We must quickly work to cut vehicle emissions. When we get to the point when global climate change is too unbearable, it would take over 100 years for our proactive changes to start making a difference. Environmental protection must be and always remain a top priority. We support the change over to renewable energy resources for our Federal and State governments, this includes their facilities and vehicles. The U.S. Federal government is our largest national polluter and so we should start there. State governments should also quickly be transformed. While hybrids are more expensive than non-hybrids, most government vehicles are larger, more costly, fuel- inefficient models. Compared to these larger, more expensive models hybrids would be cheaper or at least comparable in price. Yet, the long term fuel savings in money and emissions make these fuel efficient hybrid vehicles the clear choice. American auto makers in Detroit need to step up to the plate in regards to manufacturing hybrid vehicles. Detroit has slipped well behind foreign auto makers in hybrid and renewable technologies. Nearly 100 years ago the Ford Model T achieved roughly 24 miles to the gallon. Here we are 100 years later in the age of technology and our vehicles are doing no better in regards to miles per gallon used. America must act immediately to embrace the many economically and environmentally sustainable proposals available. Cleaning up America and enforcing environmental laws can be costly at times. However, time and time again we have seen that it is much less costly to prevent environmental problems before they occur, then after they occur. Airline emissions constitutes a large percentage on our overall emissions. We support greatly reducing the amount of passenger & freight flights that cover short distances. For instance, flights traveling from Philadelphia to Washington D.C., Washington D.C. to Baltimore, Philadelphia to New York, New York to Boston, Cincinnati to Pittsburgh, Los Angeles to San Diego and such could be largely eliminated and replaced by high speed rail. Aircraft emissions could be greatly reduced while the travel times involved would see little difference. Some government subsidies would shift to the railroad industry and this would reduce the amount and frequency of massive government bailouts to the airline industry. Our new high speed rail system could run on renewable energy and create thousands of new jobs. *The NAIP has endorsed the Pickens Plan. Environment There is nothing radical with wanting our children to have safe drinking water, clean air to breath, numerous parks and natural areas to enjoy, litter & trash free hillsides to walk on and clean sparkling rivers and shorelines to swim in. America's identity was realized through our amazing natural environment that set us apart from Europe. America's environment is America's heritage. Unfortunately, America faces many environmental challenges now and in the future. We must work to implement sustainable energy & environmental policies for America. We must utilize renewable energy resources, enact conservation measures, reduce emissions and encourage organic farming. These measures would not hinder our economy as some often claim. Instead, the transfer to renewable energy resources would usher in a new economy that would create many hundreds of thousands of new jobs. We believe that the use of genetically modified food is not in the best interest of America. Today our food is full of growth hormones, which we believe is greatly contributing to the obesity epidemic in America and behavioral changes in us, including making our children physically maturing sooner. Our environmental challenges is directly related to our swelling population and consumption levels. Thus we support the enforcement of illegal immigration laws and a more flexible policy in regards to our current legal immigration levels to better meet the challenges of today and tomorrow. Large corporations must not be allowed to disregard their effects on the environment, nor either should the government (who has been the largest contributor of pollution). We must implement the switch to renewable energy resources in government funded facilities and vehicles. Fix Social Security Social security has been a very useful and successful program. It has benefited many Americans, in particular (but not only) seniors. Privatizing Social Security would not solve the funding issues that Social Security faces. We are not fundamentally opposed to private accounts. Indeed, private accounts could possibly benefit many Americans. However, any establishment of private accounts should be outside of, independent of social security. Social Security is an insurance policy, not an investment policy. We are strongly opposed to borrowing more money from China, which is who we would be borrowing the money from to pay for the initial shortfall caused by the privatization of Social Security. The problems with Social Security has been caused by the U.S. Government spending Social Security trust funds. If those funds had not been touched and the irresponsible Bush tax cuts had not been enacted, Social Security would be fully funded for the foreseeable future. While the New American Independent Party is against over burdening our citizens with taxes, and we strongly approve of giving tax cuts when the nation can afford it, we feel tax cuts at a time of war and record budget deficits and trade deficits is extremely irresponsible and totally political. In the end, privatizing Social Security would not solve the funding issues that Social Security faces. We are not fundamentally opposed to private accounts. Indeed, private accounts could possibly benefit many Americans. However, any establishment of private accounts should be outside of, independent of social security. Social Security is an insurance policy, not an investment policy. Health Care While some have said that Social Security is in crisis, it is actually our health care system that is truly in crisis. We need to get a handle on skyrocketing health care costs. We have the highest health care costs in the world and we spend the most money on health care than anyone else in the world. It is one of the most inefficient programs ever. We can insure every American for much less than we are paying now. Too many Americans do not have health care coverage that want it. And those that do have coverage are paying far to much for it. For those citizens that do not have Health care and do not want it, they should not be forced to buy a Health care plan. We also support the importation of cheaper drugs from Canada until we can get our inefficient health care costs under control. Most of these cheaper Canadian drugs are actually made in the United States and meet FDA standards. Those drugs can be accepting into the United States. The NAIP supports encouraging citizens to practice preventative medicine and pursue healthy lifestyles. The NAIP opposes free heath care for illegal foreign nationals. More will be added to our Health care platform soon! Education Education is the key to the survival of our great nation. The New American Independent party will not turn it's back on America's public schools. We do not support private school vouchers in their current proposed form. Many private high schools across the country have outrageous tuition costs. Many have tuition costs between $5,000 and $35,000 dollars a year! Paying a few hundred dollars in vouchers won't give Americans more choice or help most Americans afford private schools. In the end it will only help the wealthy families who can already afford private tuition. We support fully funding education in America. Every child should have equal access to educational opportunities. Every child of every race, of every income, in every geographic region should have access to a rich learning environment in safe schools, with qualified teachers. Also, ending illegal immigration into America would reduce education costs and reduce class size all across the country. We support saving the now endangered Physical education and history curriculum's. Every classroom must be equipped with newer technology and every student engaged in civic learning in order for America to stay competitive in the world. We encourage broader access for American high school and college students who wish to study abroad. We strongly encourage cultural exchange which fosters international understanding and cooperation. Cultural exchange and study abroad experiences gives American students a richer and deeper understanding of the world and our place in it, while also giving international students the opportunity to gain a broader understanding of America. We believe that the government relies too much on standardized test scores. Standardized test scores are very limited and they restrict many students access to higher education. Schools teaching the 'standardized test' curriculum woefully under prepare our children for the real world. Also, the federal "No child Left Behind" program forces states to comply with many government mandates while making the individual state foot the bill. This illegal burden is braking state budgets, while the children truly are being left behind. Children who drop out of school or skip the test are not factored into the schools performance. Thus by eliminating the drop outs or those in jail it appears that test scores are going up. These dishonest practices were born out of the states' desperate attempts to meet the federal mandates. Meeting the federal mandates in "No child Left behind" is required in order to gain federal education dollars. In addition to elementary and secondary education being a top priority for the New American Independent Party, we also strongly support higher education, adult and continuing education programs. Tuition for these programs has skyrocketed and we need to make higher & continuing education affordable for all Americans. We do not support affirmative action programs in the admittance of students to our college and universities. While these programs might have been well intentioned, we feel they are unfair, unequal, and they don't correct the root problems or make things 'right'. Budget deficit & wasteful spending Fiscal responsibility is a cornerstone issue for the New American Independent Party. The nation's budget deficit must be dealt with immediately. We support state and federal balanced budget amendments that must be followed, with only slight "wiggle room" in case of emergencies or war time events. The corporate influence that owns the Democratic and Republican parties has led to massive amounts of wasteful spending at local, state and national level. Generous campaign contributions from corporations are paid back by the politician in the form of wasteful spending bills or favorable legislation. We fully support a fiscally responsible government that should always strive for efficiency. That doesn't mean cutting corners in important programs, but it does mean eliminating wasteful spending and overlapping resources. Corporate special interests We must put an end to the corporate special interests. The two major parties have put the interests of the huge national/global corporations before the interests of the American people. It is often difficult for ordinary American citizens to gain access to their federal and state lawmakers, while corporate lobbyists often have an open door to your lawmakers with campaign contributions in hand. Corporate crooks should be punished, not the honest employees of those companies. All looted money must be replayed back to the workers, investors, pension holders and consumers. Agriculture For the first time in our nation's history, we are beginning to import more of our food than we export. This is a disturbing and hazardous trend that we must immediately end and reverse. We also continue to see a growing trend of a concentration of wealth by agribusiness, biotech, chemical, and financial corporations over our nation's vital fiber and food economy. Our nation's heritage of family farms are being choked into extinction. We must pro actively work to save our nation's family farms and end our increasing dependence on foreign agriculture and domestic corporate interests. Low prices and lack of market access due to corporate mergers and acquisitions by big agribusinesses is destroying the ability of family farmers to compete. Our government is also failing to provide research funding and also failing to get other vital information out to the public. This information is vital to independent food producers, organic farmers and cooperatives. Access to such information can open up new and competitive markets, promoting new food infrastructures, creating communities, promoting sustainable agriculture practices, while preventing pollution and the degradation of our nation's natural resources. We are opposed to the extending of daylight savings time. The changes will NOT result in less gasoline consumption as the Bush Administration claims. This was tried during the Nixon years and while electricity use went down some, gasoline consumption grew steadily. The NAIP seeks a return to American Agricultural self-reliance. The NAIP supports organic agriculture. The NAIP supports the legalization of the farming of Industrial hemp. Legal & Illegal Immigration America is a nation of immigrants. Our rich history is the history of immigrants coming to America to find a better life for themselves and their families. This diverse mix of people has made America what it is today. America has truly been a melting pot and we should recognize our amazing history. This diverse blend of people that makes up America has created America's unique spirit. And we join in recognizing and celebrating the contributions of all peoples who have had a hand in making America great. Thus, we have no desire to have a boring society of faceless clones with no unique characteristics or features. We have no problem with immigrants who have come here legally. America and the rest of the world is facing one of greatest challenges we have ever faced. This is the challenge of Globalization. America must remember it's past and it's traditions, but America must also be flexible enough to adapt to today's situations and challenges if America is to last. Old ways, including old immigration policies must be reformed in order to face today's unique challenges. The sterile inflexible tree will be snapped by the wind, while the flexible tree will bend and sway, but not break. Our elected officials in Washington, continue to stubbornly cling to the sterile, inflexible old ways of thinking toward our immigration policies, while ignoring the current problems that this old thinking is creating. Old policies are for old times. We need new policies for a new age. America desperately needs to address our current illegal immigration problem. The current amount of Illegal foreign nationals coming across our borders is environmentally and economically unsustainable. Again, America faces economic, environmental, overpopulation, health care and terrorism threats to name just a few. Our current Illegal Immigration laws should be enforced, instead of the current "let them all in" thinking toward illegal immigration that prevails in Washington D.C.. The vast majority of our current politicians have ignored our illegal immigration laws. Illegal immigrants should be treated humanely and with care, however, we must work to end the incentives that entice illegal immigrants into coming here. And we must create incentives for immigrants to engage in the legal process of attaining U.S. Citizenship. We should work to prevent illegal immigrants from entering our country by securing our borders. Not only would securing our borders help in controlling our growing population problems and all of the adverse effects associated with it, but securing our borders is also vital to our national security. We do not blame immigrants for trying to enter our country. Life in the United States offers many of them much better pay, a better life for their children and potentially many other added benefits. And again, we have no problem with legal immigrants who are here in our country. We have nothing against people of different ethnic heritages and we are against racism in any form. However, in regards to illegal immigrants, they must play by the rules if they are to be accepted into our country. Our government has the duty to secure our borders from terrorists and the population escalation. Our country cannot continue to bear the extra burden of increased population, consumption, pollution, health care costs and job loss. The New American Independent party is dedicated to protecting American jobs from being lost to foreign workers. It doesn't matter if that means saving our jobs from foreign workers in other lands (outsourcing) or on our own soil (illegal immigration). The lack of consistency on the issues of outsourcing and illegal immigration by the Democratic and Republican parties is mind boggling. The incentive that the illegal immigrants have for entering our country should be addressed and removed. Hence, employers who knowingly hire Illegal Immigrants should be severely punished under the law. Businesses caught hiring illegal foreign nationals should be fined and repeated violations should result in the loss of their business license. Eliminating the incentives are the only way we will ever get a handle on the illegal immigration problem in America. We do not call for deporting illegal immigrants. Instead, by enforcing the law against employers many illegal workers will return to their homelands or look for opportunities elsewhere. The massive numbers of foreign nationals flooding into the United States has began creating an America that is much more like a mixed salad instead of a melting pot. Due to the current massive amounts of legal and illegal immigrants coming into America, we are now seeing large groups (separate ingredients in our salad) of people who are not fully blending together with the population. This will create challenges for America as we move forward. All across the nation ESL (English as a second language) classes quickly fill up and people are often turned away. We call for greater funding of ESL programs that would create more ESL classes and teachers. This would create greater assimilation by new immigrants and give them a better future. How many good jobs are available in the United States without knowledge of English? Our Legal Immigration policy should be a sustainable one that is more closely linked to the current times and conditions in our nation, and also always includes an eye toward the future. Our policy should be flexible, in that it should be tied to the current population totals, future population trends, environmental threats, unemployment rates (a more accurate unemployment calculation is needed) and other economic conditions. Those legal immigrants that we do admit should be encouraged to assimilate or melt into the population. Currently, America's population is swelling, we face great environmental risks, and our unemployment rate is too high. Also, Employers and the American government must more tightly monitor and enforce our visa fraud laws. Also, the current amount of legal work visa's issued should be reduced. America has and will always need teaching positions, such as teaching Chinese language, African environmental history, Jewish philosophy or Japanese politics in our Colleges and Universities that would often be best filled by natives from those countries. If no legal American citizens born in those countries can be found, then work visa applications can be accepted. However, in regards to most of the rest of America's jobs; America has million of unemployed workers who can fill those slots. Employers are not making a good faith effort to find American citizens to fill their open positions. We propose that employers who have open positions and claim they can't find applicants to fill these positions, must report those openings to state welfare and unemployment offices. These open positions can then be matched up with able American workers. Veterans Benefits The New American Independent party believes we should always support our Troops and our Veterans. Our nation's veterans have put their lives on the line and sacrificed so much for our great nation. The very least we can do is honor them and make sure they receive the thanks and the respect that they deserve. We support: Issuing all Military Veterans a "Hero's Card" allowing them access to complete FREE Medical coverage at the doctor or Hospital of their choice. The "Hero's Card" benefit would extend to the eligible family of both Military Retirees and Veterans whom have lost their life on active duty. Providing for the families of active duty personnel who lose their life while on active duty (excludes suicide), a stipend of $500 a month to a spouse without children for two years. Spouses with Children would receive the previously described $500 benefit plus an additional $100 per month for two years for children under the age of 18 years. This benefit would include all active duty personnel both in and out of conflict in any location throughout the world. Making Military Retirement pay totally tax exempt. Completing all Veteran claims in a timely and accurate manner. Providing Veterans with up to $12,000 a year or a total of $48,000 (lifetime) in college or technical/ trade school tuition benefits. Additional issues to be added soon. Please check back to read our stance on additional bread and butter issues. Proceed to Issues II page>>>>>> |
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