Dan Canon to release detailed policy statements; local Democrats announce Game of Thrones night at the Roadhouse.

If we were to submit Dan Canon's platform to 10 prominent local Democrats at random, how many would NOT reel in horror?

POLICIES

In the coming weeks, I will be releasing detailed policy statements that will appear on CanonForIndiana.com. Please click here and sign up to be notified when new policies go live. If you have a specific question or an issue you do not see addressed here, please email info@CanonForIndiana.com.

• Universal healthcare as a right for all people, beginning with basic transparency and cost controls along with a public option that is basically a Medicare expansion; ultimately phasing in a true single-payer system over time.
• Nationwide paid parental, family, and sick leave through an expansion of the federal Family Medical Leave Act, similar to the programs currently in place in Washington state, New York state, and elsewhere.
• An immediate and substantial increase in the minimum wage, and the creation of an independent commission to determine and recommend an appropriate minimum living wage by region.
• Comprehensive campaign finance reform, including a constitutional amendment to overturn the Citizens Uniteddecision; ultimately strengthening democracy by moving to low-cost, publicly financed campaigns.
• Legislation that ends the practice of partisan gerrymandering (should the Supreme Court uphold the practice), and the establishment of independent committees to redraw congressional and other districts.
• Legislation that bans discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity or expression in employment, housing, and places of public accommodation.
• Nationwide automatic voter registration, similar to the system recently instituted in Illinois and eight other states.
• Removal of marijuana as a Schedule I substance under the Controlled Substances Act, and ultimately the cessation of all federal criminal regulation of cannabis.
• Legislative support and strengthening of public schools (PK-12), including protecting the federal Department of Education, increased Title I funding, and the formation of partnerships with teachers to ensure that resources are properly allocated in order to abrogate and reverse the de facto segregation of schools by race and income.
• An immediate and varied strategy to address the opioid crisis, including a nationwide prescription drug monitoring program, increased availability of mental health/telehealth services (especially in rural areas), and increased access to safe, natural, non-addictive opioid alternatives.
• Abolition of private prisons and a prohibition on involvement by private, for-profit corporations in any way within the carceral system, particularly with regard to inmate healthcare.
• Defend a woman's right to make her own health decisions and support policies proven to lower demand for abortion while being resolute in the commitment to reproductive freedom for all; safe, legal, and accessible abortion; repeal of the Hyde Amendment; fully subsidized coverage of contraception as well as quality pre-/post-natal care.
• Comprehensive immigration reform, including transparency within the detention system, a prohibition on moving accused immigrants to detention facilities more than 100 miles from their place of apprehension, a path to citizenship for certain qualified undocumented immigrants and their families, and a prohibition on involvement by private, for-profit corporations in any way within the immigration detention system.
• Abolition of the federal death penalty. It doesn't do any good, it's too expensive, there's too much potential for error, and citizens should never be willing to give the state the power to kill its own people.
• Fully subsidized public higher education nationwide, under a system similar to those in Tennessee and New York State, through a baccalaureate degree or substantial equivalent; this would begin in community and technical schools and gradually expand to all public universities.
• Abolition of the electoral college.
• Legislative strengthening and increased enforcement of antitrust/anti-monopoly laws, particularly including laws specifically designed to restore stability to small local businesses by breaking up financial, agricultural, pharmaceutical, media, and other monopolies.
• A legislative reversal of the case of McKleskey v. Kemp, which keeps civil rights lawyers from bringing actions to correct systemic race discrimination within the criminal justice system.
• A guaranteed public-jobs program that provides meaningful work to those who are willing and able to take it, primarily in rebuilding and improving American roads, bridges, public transportation, energy grids, rural broadband access, and in environmental cleanup/preservation; ultimately the program would aim to result in 100% (voluntary) employment over time.
• Establishment of a universal basic income (see, for example, the beginnings of UBI recently enacted in Hawaii), to work in tandem with the guaranteed jobs program within a projected time frame.
• Legislative strengthening of the EPA, including increased enforcement powers to deal with Flint-type crises, to ensure breathable air, drinkable water, and clean soil.
• Establishment of a separate, politically independent agency tasked with immediately addressing the urgency of global climate change via geoengineering and other innovations, and given broad enforcement powers to address the root causes (e.g., deforestation and irresponsible energy consumption).
• Simplification of agricultural tax policy and incentivization for farmers to help eliminate food deserts in Indiana.
• Protection and strengthening of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and expanding its reach to cover important individual consumer purchases such as automobiles.
• Protection and strengthening of labor unions, including vigorous enforcement of the National Labor Relations Act both privately and through the National Labor Relations Board, and enacting stronger measures to prevent retaliation against workers who wish to organize.

I fully understand and recognize that these goals will not be achieved overnight. But I believe they are achievable. We have to start with a vision of what we want for America 25 years or more in the future and have a clear plan for how we intend to get there. Real change starts with the belief that a better country is possible, and the will to start working on it together. We can never make these ideas mainstream, we can never convince anyone that these ideas are right, if we keep treating them like pipe dreams ourselves. We can be incremental in our methods, but we must be revolutionary in our aspirations.