John Delaney, House Representative and businessman. He was also the first to jump into the fray. Yes, that’s right he was the first and yet remains one of the least recognizable. That might just be his amiable, polite manner. Though, it might be his run of the mill stand on the issues.
He supports universal healthcare but doesn’t want to call it Medicare for all. Though, he does want to add supplementals after the model provided by Medicare. He wants to eliminate the employer-based model and the cost and problems involved. But he wants to use private insurance to provide the value-added packages for those who can afford them. Moreover, he wants to include the option to “opt out” which really takes the “universal” part out of “universal health care.” So, I’m not really sure where he stands.
He supports a cap and dividend program for carbon emissions and provides a date of 2050 to make the US net-zero carbon dioxide. The dividend portion of the program would be returned to taxpayers, which is a nice little benefit. But, it might seem wiser to use it to pay for his “Green Energy Research,” which, by his own estimates, will cost 375 billion dollars. Since he estimates the carbon fee will generate 3 trillion in a decade he could seemingly pay it off and show a tidy little profit. One thing I haven’t been able to figure out is his proposed Carbon Throughway. A series of pipes and facilities to move and store extra carbon for future use. I will continue to look into that and see if anything pops up.
Delaney does support raising the minimum wage to fifteen dollars an hour. And, that has to be part of the bargain. Plus, he supports the expansion of early childhood education, another point we shouldn’t have to negotiate, it is too important.
He does have a high likability quotient. And in many ways after the current president, it would be nice to have someone who seems human. But, it is important to have someone who is willing to stand by his beliefs. There is a lot of work to do, and we can’t settle for more of the same, we can’t be happy with just undoing the harm.
We need to demand progress.
You can check out Michael Bennet, Joe Biden, Cory Booker, Bill de Blasio, Steve Bullock, Pete Buttigieg and Julian Castro here!
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Photo: Wikimedia
