Q&A with Summers

1. Why are you running for this office, whether for re-election or election the first time? Is there a particular issue that motivates you, and if so, what? What will be your main priority?

To bring intelligence, integrity, ideas, and good old fashioned common sense to Washington. I am running on a "fresh start" platform of peace, progress, and prosperity.

2. For incumbents and non-incumbents. If you are an incumbent, describe your main contributions. Tell us of important initiatives you've led. If you are not an incumbent, tell us what contributions you would make.

(a) Champion "microcapitalism" through a program of home and community-based businesses. (b) Recognize that economy and ecology really are bound up as one: commit to a national "eco-eco" program of business and development. (c) Cultivate an "Individual Initiative" program of citizen commitment and action. (d) Expedite withdrawal from Iraq and Afghanistan, and recommit our country to being a neighbor among nations. (e) Establish "Medicare-for-All" as a basic human right. (f) Enforce fiscal responsibility, including a balanced federal budget and debt reduction.

3. In which ways, if at all, would you alter U.S. policy in Iraq and Afghanistan? How would you characterize the effect of the U.S. "surge" in Iraq? What objectives, if any, must the U.S. still meet before it begins to withdraw troops?

I would press for an expedited withdrawal from Iraq and Afghanistan. Gains from the so-called "surge" are largely temporary (if not illusory) and will not be sustained. Regrettably, our troops cannot be completely pulled out immediately: armament must be removed or destroyed, protection must be afforded to refugees and the internally displaced, and infrastructure must be rebuilt.

4. What short-term steps, if any, would you advocate to keep gasoline prices in check?

The era of cheap gasoline is over. We need to adapt accordingly with more public transit, more efficient automobiles, and a shift to electric and hydrogen cars. The only mildly plausible short term gas price relief is a windfall profits tax on petroleum companies rebated to consumers -- but I'm skeptical that that will do much. If anything, gasoline taxes -- in the form of a steep carbon tax -- must rise to world levels, due to (a) climate change and (b) decaying infrastructure. As it is, we presently pay far less in gas taxes than do citizens of other industrialized countries.

5. Please list the key elements of your preferred long-term energy policy. Rank or rate the relative importance of domestic oil exploration, conservation and alternative-energy development. What part, if any, should ethanol play in U.S. energy policy?

Conservation and sustainable energy development must become the keystones of our energy policy. Per capita, Americans use more energy than any other people on the planet: each of us must go on an "energy diet". Ethanol will not suffice, except perhaps at the margins as we transition to electric and hydrogen. I am adamantly opposed to using foodstuffs (i.e., corn) for ethanol while people throughout the world are starving. Domestic drilling? I'm adamantly opposed to expansion of it, for a reason most voters will not expect: it's now a national security issue. We have but two percent of the world's petroleum reserves. What will we do in ten, twenty, or thirty years when we have a war or national emergency and no oil left? Recklessly pumping it all out now as fast as we can will "bleed American dry first".

6. What steps, if any, should Congress take to promote economic recovery? What steps by the federal government might make the nation's economy worse?

Top-down solutions, e.g., government subsidies, tax breaks, enterprise zones, and TIFs, simply aren't working. I want to build our economy from the bottom up through a program of "microcapitalism", and raise up a whole new generation of entrepreneurs. Home and community-based businesses will in turn create new jobs. And -- those jobs will not be outsourced! The federal government's intolerable budget deficits (coupled with our huge trade deficits) now loom as the most profound threats to our long term economic well being. The budget MUST be balanced, and our nearly $10 trillion in national debt MUST be reduced.

7. Do you favor or oppose a larger federal role in health-care? Either way, why and what should the federal role be? What, if anything, should be done about rising health care costs and Americans who do not have health coverage?

Universal health care -- or, as I call it, "Medicare for All" -- is a basic human right. Period. Every other major industrialized nation has it. We don't. And it's not for lack of resources: we spend copiously on our convoluted and patchwork and dysfunctional health care system, and yet have so-so outcomes PLUS millions of uninsured. Medicare-for-all will be expensive, to be sure: a new payroll tax, plus a bump in income taxes, plus steep new taxes on alcohol and tobacco, plus sharp cuts in defense spending, will be necessary to pay for it. And it will require an entirely new societal mindset, and whole new styles of peer pressure: each of us, as we are able, must keep costs down by eating right, keeping fit, refraining from tobacco, and drinking but little.

8. Would you maintain or scale back federal tax cuts made during the past eight years? Either way, why? How, as specifically as possible, would you try to reduce federal budget deficits and the national debt?

The Bush tax cuts were -- and are -- preposterous. And grossly irresponsible. For over five years, we've been fighting two wars -- on credit! Federal taxes must now go UP -- and sharply -- in order to compensate for the outrageous excesses of the past eight years. And -- taxes must go up steeply on the well-to-do. And on estates. And on luxury goods. Defense spending must be slimmed down drastically. Higher taxes on the wealthy, coupled with turning our military into peacemakers and peacekeepers (rather than warriors), will balance the budget and ultimately ease the national debt.

9. The current Congress could not agree on immigration reform. What would you do to advance reform in a divided Congress, and, briefly, what should the key policy elements be?

People are on the move all over the world. Immigration cannot be stopped: it can only be managed in an orderly way. Walls at the Mexican border are an utter waste: from the Great Wall of China to the Berlin Wall, they never, ever work. And immigrants are NOT of themselves the problem: cram-down trade policies such as NAFTA serve to dislocate people (e.g., sustenance farmers in Mexico displaced by our heavily subsidized corn) and render them destitute and turn them into economic migrants. (And we're all supposed to be indignant when they risk their lives crossing the desert and come to the U.S. looking for work -- as a direct result of our preposterous trade policies? Oh, please!) Unless you're one of the indigenous peoples (and apart from the despicable legacy of slavery, of course) -- you, or your ancestors, were immigrants to this country. Immigration helped -- and continues to help -- make America great. We betray our traditions by engaging in demagoguery on the issue. Skip building walls, offer a limited amnesty, fix trade policies, register aliens, and start them on the path to citizenship -- which is precisely what we did one hundred years ago in the face of massive European migration to the USA.

10. In what ways is the U.S. government successfully defending citizens against terrorism, and in what ways is the U.S. failing in that regard?

The U.S. government, by itself, cannot successfully defend against terrorism at all. Forfeiting our liberties through such abominations as the Patriot Act will not protect us. Once again, we overlook a fundamental initiative: "neighborhood watch" style programs, and individual responsibility. If we see something suspicious, we must take it upon ourselves to report it to appropriate authorities.