Issues
A Champion for Senior Citizens
I will fight to preserve Medicare, a program that we all pay for and that helps everyone. Fraud and waste in the Medicare system must be eliminated. The Republican proposal to get rid of Medicare by creating a voucher system will make average, middle-class senior citizens fend for themselves with insurance companies at a time when their health care needs are increasing. It will not work.
Social Security works as intended. It is not a Get-Rich-Quick scheme, which seems to be part of why Republicans want to privatize Social Security. It is not about maximizing investment income. It is a program to keep senior citizens from falling into poverty when they are no longer able to earn a living. The tax cap on Social Security should be removed to ensure solvency.
I support increased funding for senior citizen housing programs and work experience programs. I support stronger Consumer Protection for senior citizens to stop them from being victims of financial fraud and other schemes that prey upon senior citizens.
As executive director at the senior center on Elm Street in Allentown, I know that senior citizens contribute to our families, communities and nation. We must do all we can to help them as they have helped us throughout their lives and continue to be important to our nation and our families.
Bring Jobs Back to America
I will do all I can to stop unfair trade policies that have wrecked our manufacturing base. Over the past twenty-five years Congress has passed numerous free trade agreements that have sent jobs overseas. China violates trade agreements, keeps its currency artificially low, pollutes freely, and workers have few if any rights, yet we do virtually nothing. Free trade agreements with other nations are not much better.
Unless Congress vigorously protects our manufacturing industries, our economy will not recover. I will fight to use every provision in any trade agreement to protect our industries, penalize other countries that violate current trade agreements, and never sign another free trade agreement with a nation where we lose even one more job.
Good Jobs. Fair Wages. Stable Employment.
Growing up, the roof over my head and food on my table was put there in part because of wages brought about through the efforts of organized labor, and my parents never belonged to a union. My parents owned and operated Daugherty Travel Agency in East Allentown. As a child, I saw customer after customer come in to book trips to Disney World, Hawaii, Europe, and all around the world. Most were regular working people. They had jobs in the factories at Bethlehem Steel, Western Electric, and Mack Trucks.
Stable employment and good wages allow a local economy to flourish. Small businesses have customers. Workers can purchase homes. Neighborhoods become stronger. Manufacturing firms located in America pay real estate taxes that keep our taxes lower. Payroll taxes support Medicare and Social Security – keeping those programs strong. Whether you are a union member or not, jobs sent overseas help none of us. As Americans we need to join together and bring our jobs back and demand that Congress stop free trade agreements with countries that do not share our values.
Keep America Strong and Safe
Our Defense budget must be aligned with our current national security threats. The Soviet Union is gone. Weapons systems designed to fight nation states such as the Soviet Union must be evaluated for effectiveness against our current threats.
We can no longer be the Policeman of the World. Our allies must do their fair share. Right now as our defense spending grows, our allies are cutting what they spend. Yet we continue to promise to defend them, even as they undercut us economically. We have too many overseas bases and not adequate security along our borders and at our ports.
Cyber security, border protection, enhanced international intelligence, and diplomacy must become a greater focus of our national security priorities.
