“Promoting the general welfare” is a part of our social DNA. It is featured in the United States Constitution in the Preamble and tasked to Congress to address in Article 1 Section 8. It is part of their job scope to ensure that the general welfare needs of our people are met.

Also noted in our foundational document, as part of servicing the general welfare needs of the people, was the creation of “postal roads,” along with post offices, as resources needed by Americans. The Founding Fathers also called for the creation of free public libraries to keep our citizens informed and educated.

In short order, developing out what was meant by “general welfare” grew as the nation grew. In the early 1800s, with the construction of the Erie Canal, the government funded in the Northeast a fairly involved effort to improve upon the transportation needs of the growing country.

Also occurring during the first few decades of the new nation was the formation of free public schools to educate our population. Via the efforts of Horace Mann, Massachusetts became the first state to provide a public education to its state’s citizens. In time, as part of serving the general welfare needs of the nation, a free public education from K-12 became the norm.

The notion of building upon our transportation needs continued to be a priority with the mostly government funded and subsidized building of the Transcontinental railroad.

Any student of our history will know that in times of need, more government programs have been created to serve the general welfare needs of our people. During the Progressive Era, we created government funded police departments and fire departments, passed zoning laws and worker safety measures. All in pursuit of the general good.

During the Great Depression, under Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal, we established many government programs designed to get the nation back to work and put forth some long-term reform efforts such as the Social Security system, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation and the Securities Exchange Commission to help stabilize the economy and assist our people in the future.

Under the leadership of Republican President Dwight D. Eisenhower we greatly expanded on the notion of the government providing better roads with his support of the Interstate Highway System — a mostly toll-free enterprise that greatly contributed to the growth of this nation and common general welfare needs of the people.

Under the leadership of Lyndon B. Johnson and Congress, two major programs designed to serve the healthcare needs of our people — Medicare for our senior citizens and Medicaid, to serve the needs of our poor — were created.

Today, there is a push on the state level for the passage of the New York Health Act (NYHA) and on the national level for a Medicare for All health-care system to provide quality healthcare to all Americans.

The NYHA act, co-authored by New York State Senator Gustavo Rivera and New York State Assemblyman Richard Gottfried, would create a comprehensive health-care system for all New Yorkers covering not only medical care but also vision, dental, mental healthcare and long-term care. It would truly be a sea-change improvement on the status quo, saving most Americans expenses in the process.

A Medicare for all national system would best serve the millions of Americans currently enduring poor coverage, with private insurance poorly covering major ailments and nickle-and-diming via co-pays every aspect of seeing a doctor. It would be a logical growth to our health-care system for a government-run program aimed at addressing our entire population’s needs, cradle to grave.

Providing for tuition free-college at state schools is also a logical outgrowth to providing for the general welfare needs of the people. An educated populace is in the best interest of all of us as we compete and interact with the rest of the world.

Ultimately, it is the role of government to do what it can to assist the people it serves. We have done this since our founding and have developed a stronger safety net over time.

So the next time you attend a town hall, press your elected officials on where they stand on providing for the healthcare and educational needs of us all. And as you do, remind them of the Preamble and Congress’s responsibility to promote the general welfare of all the people. Let them know that doing so is part of who we are. It is in our national DNA to do so.

Robert Buonaspina is an Elected Steering Committee Member of Long Island Activists and a History Teacher at Locust Valley High School, Locust Valley, New York with more than 25 years of experience.

I believe we are currently living through a second Gilded Age. It began officially with the election of Ronald Reagan in 1980 and has continued through both Republican and Democratic administrations to the present.

As both U.S. Sens. Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren have stressed, the system is rigged and the richest 1 percent of Americans and other wealthy donors have been controlling our political processes. But living during a Gilded Age is nothing new to us. 

More than a century ago in the 1880s, America saw the first Gilded Age, when the robber barons preyed on the masses. That era was ended in large part by the Progressive Era. So much good came from those “woke” at that time in the world of reporting, writing, and advocacy. 

Substantial reforms were passed from the creation of the primary system, the development of the initiative process — for citizen-written laws, and the referendum process — for citizens to vote on ballot measures that could also become law. 

Police and fire departments were created by people arguing for a safer society. Building codes were passed. Job safely measures enacted. Large trusts like John D. Rockefeller’s Standard Oil were broken up by the U.S. Supreme Court because they had too much power and had abused the trust of the people in the process.

Thus from the perspective of the masses — the 99 percenters of the day — this was a fairly healthy time period for positive change. What we need today is a second Progressive Era, bigger and bolder than the first, to right so much wrong that has crept into our politics.

The current woke among us need to push back the political, social, and economic pendulum firmly toward serving the needs of the majority of Americans. We need a return to a liberal-progressive America that values people over profit first. 

Bernie would be a great leader in that effort and so would Warren. Fighting the right fight would place our economy on a much firmer and secure footing to create a vibrant future America. The status quo and current political reality is not a sustainable one. 

Robert Buonaspina is a Long Island Activists steering committee member

Recently the U.S. Supreme Court blocked rulings from two federal courts that had previous struck down voting maps in Ohio and Michigan as unconstitutional. In the cases of Rucho v. Common Cause and Lamone v. Benisek, the court ruled that the Constitution does not bar extreme partisan gerrymandering.

In effect, what the court is doing here by its decision in those two cases is allowing the status quo to continue. To the many recently awakened progressives out there who are seeking to break through the current status quo, this is not a welcome decision.
Nearly a decade ago, Republicans — more so than Democrats — made gerrymandering an art form that in effect gave them control of Congress for several years and control over most state houses.

See David Daley’s book Rat F**Ked — The True Story Behind The Secret Plan to Steal America’s Democracy for a detailed explanation on how this was done. Such efforts will no doubt continue in 2020 — especially now that the court has in effect condoned these undemocratic practices as Constitutional by not forcibly weighing in on this practice.

This fraying of the fabric of democracy was given a near body blow with the 2010 decision in the Citizens United vs. The Federal Elections Commission case. Via that decision to allow for the unlimited spending of corporate and union monies to political action committees to spend on behalf of candidates, our system has become even more controlled by the rich and powerful among us. Another undemocratic attack on our electoral processes.

I understand why U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (Q-Queens) vented her frustration recently to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi about the lack of support for progressive ideas like a Green New Deal. The reality is the system as currently structured whether you are a Democrat or Republican is rigged against the change agents among us.

As a progressive in the likes of Bernie Sanders and AOC and an activist serving on the steering committee of Long Island Activists, I find the times we live in to be extremely frustrating if you really want to see positive changes in the lives of average Americans. The government at present is not serving the current needs of the people. However, as an American history teacher for more than 25 years, I am aware that change can and does happen when the people push back.

One needs to only look back at the Gilded Age of the late 1800s. A time period much like our own, that saw great changes brought about by the woke of their day — the muckrakers, leading to a progressive movement that made many needed changes at the time. Changes aimed mostly as serving the needs of the majority.

I believe we are living during a second Gilded Age that has gone on for more than 40 years and began officially with the election of Ronald Reagan and continues to today. And just like the first Gilded Age was busted through by the Progressive Era, we progressives need a second progressive movement to address all that has happened during these last forty years to hurt most Americans.

So In light of the court’s gerrymandering decision that is basically allowing an unfair, undemocratic practices to continue, why not play that game as well and un-rig the system? In the end, put more of one in an area, and that person’s party will win. So why not use this thinking to bust through the status quo? Here is my idea. I call it The Way Forward.

What if we progressives were to lead a movement that involved taking the woke among us and physically move to parts of the country where congressional and state legislative seats can be easily flipped?

It could involve people who are most hurt by the status quo such as the willing long-term unemployed, which there are millions of such people who do not appear in the current data used to look at unemployment figures — those in need of life-saving medical care, those idealistic among us. The “Berners” and other progressives who are seeking a better day.

It could encompass the energies and idealism of the Freedom Summer movement of 1964, and the activism of the ’60s anti-war movement and other movements of social change that occurred simultaneously. Go Fund Me accounts could be created to fund this Marshall Plan-like idea and concerts given by those who endorse this idea to fund the moving of people and paying for living expenses for at least one year.

Monies could be also used to fund a website that keeps real time information on where people are leaving and moving to. This alone could help people make informed decisions when they relocate for a variety of reasons. This would certainly be a major undertaking — one that may not show results quickly — however, overtime, real change will occur because progressives will win office in various places and, like AOC and others, push for real change to help average Americans.

In the near future though, target number one would be U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell with ideally an influx of people into Kentucky that will give the Democrats the edge this time around. They should also settle within all the Republican gerrymandered districts to push them deep blue from deep red.

Currently, the U.S. Senate has 51 Republicans and 49 Democrats, including two independents. A flip of nine Republican Senate seats to the Democratic party in 2020 would give them a 60-vote majority enabling all major legislation to pass this body. There should be a concerted effort to go after the most vulnerable Republican Senate seats out of the 22 that are up for re-election.

With the election of 60 Democratic senators and a Democratic House even more progressive than now — combined with a progressive president like Bernie Sanders — all of the key changes that progressives and many Americans support are possible. What is at stake here would be the passage of a Medicare-for-all system, a Green New Deal, tuition-free state schools, and so much more that would move our country in a better healthier position. It would truly make America great — great for the average America, whose real needs have been ignored for way to long.

We should also target voters in the four states that gave Trump his electoral win: Florida, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin. Flood these states with enough voters to turn the tide for the Democratic candidate. This progressive candidate would need to address the needs of these people as well with offering a plan to create quality livable wage jobs.

Such an effort would demonstrate quite clearly the power of the people — the power of the 99-percenters — to un-rig a system that is currently rigged and not serving their needs. And elect in the end a new progressive leadership block in Congress and throughout state houses ready and willing to do the people’s bidding.

In effect use the Tea Party playbook to gain control of the agenda. I call this plan The Way Forward. Are you with me?