‘Let’s stop this government-by-extortion’ – Green Party’s Stein on US shutdown

The American public, not President Obama, is the force that can have the most impact on how Washington pulls out of its current acrimony, former Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein told RT on Wednesday.

“I think it’s really the American people who need to kick in
here… we need to kick in to say, ‘Let’s stop this
government-by-extortion,’” Stein, the most successful female
presidential candidate in US history, said.
Of a government shutdown that is already having impacts on vital
federal programs, Stein said it is “the extension of a process
that’s been taking place for the last decade, or two, or three if
you trace it back, whereby money and power have been concentrated
in the hands of an economic and political elite.”
Stein believes a unified response is needed now more than ever in
the face of the “unhinged one percent” that dominates
American politics.
“That’s where an independent party like the Green Party comes
in, in that we offer a place to rally, to unify the principled
opposition, because it’s only together that we can change
course,” she said about seeking solutions to concerns that
her party has with the way America is governed.
RT: The country’s in deadlock now after the Democrats
and the Republicans have clashed over this. So where does your
party fit into all of this?

Jill Stein: Where the Green Party fits in is where the
American people fit in, who have also been locked out of a voice
and a way forward by this real betrayal of the public trust and
the public interest. What Congress is doing really serves no one,
certainly not ordinary people who are really taking it on the
chin. And the pain and the impacts of the shutdown are really
compounding the policies of the past 10 or 15 years, which in
turn have been intensified by austerity with the skyrocketing
Wall Street bailouts – we’re still bailing out Wall Street to the
tune of $85 billion a month; our incredible military budget and
the expanding front of our endless wars, which are everywhere;
the attack on our civil liberties. One out of every two Americans
is now in poverty or [is] low-income according to the Census
Bureau. Thirty-nine million students are in debt. And I have to
mention just one more figure here, which is what the Department
of Labor predicts, and that is that nine out of 10 jobs being
created in the American economy over the next 10 years [will be] low-wage and insecure jobs, half of them not even requiring a
high school degree or paying high-school wages. So what we’ve
seen most recently with the move of the Tea Party, supported by
the Republicans, is really the complete unhinging of our
democracy and the extension of a process that’s been taking place
for the last decade, or two, or three if you trace it back,
whereby money and power have been concentrated in the hands of an
economic and political elite. And a unified response, to answer
your question, a unified response is really, critically
important. That’s where an independent party like the Green Party
comes in, in that we offer a place to rally, to unify the
principled opposition, because it’s only together that we can
change course. But we just did that in stopping the expanding war
in Syria. So amazing things have happened. The power of democracy
and justice is sweeping across the planet. We do have the power
to change course. It will take substantial work in organizing and
I urge the people to get involved with your state Green Party or
national Green Party.
RT: It will take a lot of work and also a lot of time,
and time is of the essence. If you had the chance to take Obama
aside, what would you say to him in terms of resolving this
current crisis?
JS: I think it’s more in the hands of the American people
than Obama, to tell you the truth. We should not give in to
extortion and blackmail on the part of a wing of the Republican
Party that really represents the unhinged one percent. And I
think it’s really the American people who need to kick in here in
the same way we stopped the war, we need to kick in to say,
‘Let’s stop this government-by-extortion.’ We need to
continue with the funding of the budget, we need to raise the
debt ceiling, and let’s get down to restoring jobs, to creating
our democracy, to solving the climate crisis, to downsizing our
military. I think we need consistent public pressure, starting
with, let’s fund the continuing resolution on the budget. I think
we need to bombard Congress with phone calls.
RT: On raising the debt ceiling, this is an issue that
will come around in the next couple of weeks or so. Will we see
an agreement on that? And if there isn’t an agreement on that,
what are the repercussions? Not just for the US, but for the
world? What would you be saying to impact all that?
JS: It’s very frightening already. Just from the shutdown,
we’re seeing real impacts on Medicare and Medicaid, veterans’
services, and people who need those services now cannot get them.
New enrollees have been forestalled. You have a complete shutdown
of food aid through the Women, Infants and Children, the WIC
program, which is closing down within a week; the budget of the
entire District of Columbia; loans for homes, for students; the
Nuclear Regulatory Commission. So we’re seeing big impacts on
people who are vulnerable, not only in health care, but
particularly Head Start and similar programs are really being
held up. Aid to school districts. So we’re being impacted right
now and it’s going to get much worse if the debt ceiling is not
raised.
Copyright: RT