Thread by @m_older

It's Sunday afternoon and I'm not being productive anyway, so: 1 like = 1 public policy proposal.* #SpeculativeResistance

*may vary in level of detail, realism, and response delay.

1) Make cigarettes illegal: small fine for use outside home, large fine for retail, jail up to CEO level for wholesale and production. Make all addiction support programs free/subsidized, incentives for tobacco farmers to switch to organic crops.

2) Raise absolute minimum wage AND link any given firm's minimum wage to its maximum wage (eg, no maximum wage may be more than 20x the minimum wage at that company)

3) Regulate the shit out of pesticides (industrial, household, lawn, all of it).

4) New grant program for public transportation, focusing on environmental impact, sustainability (grants must include maintenance & upgrade funds), access for poor areas, and pedestrian linkages (safe crossings, shade, etc)

5) New foreign policy approach: prioritize humans over nation-states

6) Close the light truck loophole

7) Request Department of Agriculture to prepare reports on environmentally ideal crop distribution across US geography. 6-month deadline. Adjust farming incentives accordingly.

8) Anything too big to fail is too big to exist and will be broken into smaller units (no (required) layoffs! More competition!)

9) Universal, flexible, extended parental leave. Companies that complain about the cost will have it taken out of CEO bonus lines. Smaller companies can apply for subsidies.

10) Increase Peace Corps budget. Relatedly, reduce Defense Department budget.

11) Regulate the shit out of the real estate development industry.

12) Separate public education from local tax base. Yes, federalize that budget. We can debate federalizing other parts of it.

13) Extend public education to begin at age 3; develop program for universal child-care from age 0.

14) Abolish ICE and while we're at it entire Department of Homeland Security. Prosecute for crimes as appropriate.

15) Put FEMA back at cabinet level. Request some serious revisions of both preparedness and reconstruction policies. Strengthen mutual aid programs.

16) Grant program to establish Department of Fab at municipal level: public support for therapy, nutrition, home renovation, professional and self-image (fashion and grooming), AND the "adulting" skills

17) Hi IRS. Let's start by auditing the wealthiest. Get those done before you audit the poor. Also, you are now required to make tax returns easy like other countries do. Lay waste to the entire industry of personal tax return assistance.

18) Intensive review of all rail travel, passenger and freight. Budget for a 22nd-century update in terms of safety and environmental sustainability and start it NOW

19) Expand national funding for (hard AND soft) scientific research, revamp independence and granting criteria. Offer a research career track outside of (potentially overlapping with) academia.

20) End the tipped minimum wage: all workers entitled to (new, higher) standard minimum wage.

21) Grants to states and municipalities for tree-planting programs.

22) Immigration reform: basically open borders, with a lot more money for processing and integration support, and a progressive tax rate for immigration (eg wealthy people wanting to move pay more).

23) Regulate the shit out of big pharma.

24) Single, universal health care program. Maybe subsidiary insurance companies will be allowed but tightly regulated.

25) Colleges and universities paying athletic coaches more than professors risk losing federal funding.

26) Regulate the shit out of the banking industry. Establish post office banking. End predatory and pay-day loans.

27) Information as a public good. Strengthen public broadcasting (radio and TV). Bring the fury of anti-trust down on news megacorps. Support free, accessible internet for all.

28) End mandatory minimums for drug crimes. Establish mandatory minimums for "domestic" violence and hate crimes. Make them draconian, possibly involving actual dragons.

29) Make profiting off of prisons illegal (this would go for deportation centers too but we already effectively ended the demand for those on #22).

30) Regulate the shit out of the "temporary/contract/adjunct" worker category. To the extent that companies are still involved in social safety nets (see above) don't let them get out of them this way.

31) Company salary scales and salaries are public information.

32) Firms required to calculate and publish their demographics with breakdowns by managerial level/salary scale.

33) Federal program for the rehabilitation of sad old big box stores and strip malls into affordable housing and community spaces, with a requirement for public transport and pedestrian linkages.

34) FUNDING FOR THE ARTS, especially outside of major urban areas.

35) Regulate the SHIT out of the bottled water industry (in this case both literal and figurative)

36) End single-use plastic bags.

37) Student loan forgiveness. Affordable education for all, through doctorate (go ahead, tell me it's not possible. I paid <400 euros a year for my doctorate in France, where the education system has not yet crumbled)

38) Get caught littering once, no more anything sold in a disposable container for you.

39) Establish program to support people of any age to spend 3-9 months working in a foreign country they have never been to

40) Update and strengthen nutritional information requirements and guidelines.

41) Expand national parks and increase funding.

42) Establish program for adult education/technical training/career counseling for people facing career shifts, whether by choice or by layoff. Companies engaging in massive layoffs for automation or other nefarious reasons must contribute.

43) Collective bargaining rights. Also thinking about what kind of union structure makes sense in a world in which people might not *want* to work for the same company their whole lives - industry-wide?

44) Municipal grants for the construction of playgrounds, including indoor playgrounds.

45) Energy strictures applicable to new construction over a certain size and management of older buildings, eg: motion-sensor hallway lights, air-conditioning minimum temperatures, etc

46) Audit concessioning for airports, train stations, stadiums, and other public or semi-public venues. Incentivize local and small businesses over crappy enormous chains.

47) Reform the tax code to support self-employment and micro-businesses. Do it now.

48) Demilitarize police departments with weapons etc buy-backs.

49) Any police department that does not process rape kits within a reasonable time loses federal funding.

50) Federal department to investigate and develop policy to reduce killings by police officers.

51) Comprehensive gun control, including: immediate moratorium on any new production; background checks; research; buy-back program; disarmament, dimilitarization, and reintegration program.

52) Stringent reparations for environmental damages and environmental injustice committed by major companies.

53) All historical treaties with Native Americans considered law, with tribes having the opportunity to renegotiate in their favor any necessary changes brought on by the changes in the world since those treaties were signed and broken, as interest compounded over the long wait.

54) End the electoral college. Uncap the House of Representatives.

55) Statehood for DC. Plan and mechanism for legitimate, free, and fair votes on statehood/independence in PR, Guam, other protectorates.

56) Limited terms for Supreme Court Justices.

57) Ranked choice voting, with a mechanism for shifting to other methods in the future as they arise and are documented.

58) Voting day is a holiday. Automatic voter registration. Early voting.

59) Drastically shorter campaign periods and public funding for campaigns with additional financing illegal. The money that is spent on these things is shameful.

60) Pilot programs to test out direct democracy (ie., voting directly on proposed laws rather than on representatives) in various contexts.

61) Moratorium on deforestation; foreign policy program to weight deforestation in foreign aid allocations.

62) Reform entire foreign aid program. Start with removing requirements to use US food in food programs and US flag carrier transport etc.

63) Expand and rigorously require implementation of ADA. Also Title IX. No more excuses, comemierdas.

64) No more fracking, no more mountaintop removal mining, no more deep water oil drilling. Coming for the rest of it too, start shifting your investments now, comemierdas.

65) Raise gas taxes. Raise taxes on new automobiles.

66) Reform social security. Regulate company pension plans.

67) Oh yes, the finance sector. I'm going to need to hire some experts for this one, but let's cut the bullshit.

68) Establish large government program for caregiving: training, standards, direct employment through govt + subsidies for private sector, support for caregivers for the elderly, disabled, ill, homebound etc.

69) No more television advertisements for prescription medicines. (probably covered under regulating the shit out of big pharma, but just in case)

70) End gerrymandering. Independent committees to determine districts, must include both mathematicians and social scientists (until we find some silver-bullet formula which I'm skeptical of but not ruling out)

71) Equal pay for equal work.

72) Regulate the shit out of the cruise ship industry (again, literal as well as figurative)

73) Let's get rid of the Senate, why not? I'll consider some other form of bicameralism not dependent on ancient and arbitrary borders.

74) Federal commission to do a deep dive (heh, sorry) into federal flood insurance and look at ways of reducing national climate + disaster risk exposure without leaving poor homeowners destitute. Needs to work closely with regulating the shit out of real estate development

75) Judicial system reform, including increased funding for public defenders, elimination of the cash bail system, addressing racism and anti-poverty aspects, ending school-to-prison pipeline, pardons, etc. Goal to reduce prison population by, oh, 98% in 5 years.

76) End the ongoing wars. Yes, it's more complicated than that. But that is the strategic directive. Figure it out and figure it out fast.

77) Vastly reduce military, fully pension veterans, update remaining defense spending to align with current threats & world order.

78) Regulate the shit out of college athletics programs; examine the profitability and reform the tax structures of municipal stadiums; eliminate "ownership" from pro-sports. Oh and there are some racist team names that need to be changed.

Hiatus for food and work that might eventually result in getting paid.

79) (Expansion of) public childcare and camp programs during summer and other holidays

80) Regulate the shit out of animal husbandry and slaughterhouse industries. Also, task force to look at ranching and what the f is going on there.

81) Airline policy *cracks knuckles* - nah, instead of regulating the industry just going to allow foreign airlines in for competition

82) Multistakeholder commission to look at policy for sustainable fisheries

83) New federal department on climate change, with divisions for mitigation and adaptation that are required to talk to each other frequently.

84) All cost-benefit analyses submitted for federally funded projects must include credible assessments of environmental and social costs.

85) Massive wetlands reclamation program, all around the coasts.

86) Reallocate defense funding to nationwide water-quality program

87) Ratify International Criminal Court and land mind treaty, endorse Responsibility to Protect

88) No more shipping garbage to overseas landfills. Deal with it and find ways to reduce it.

89) While we're on the subject, some transparency on the topic of nuclear waste.

90) Task force on how to effectively tax, and hold accountable, multinational companies.

91) Establish government program based on Dolly Parton's Imagination Library program (free monthly books to every kid up to I think age 5?) (yes we support kids and literacy but also we support writers)

92) Major new program to support research, funding, training, and other initiative in pre-natal, maternal, and post-natal health.

93) Tax billionaires (and require fair pay see #2 above) until there are no billionaires left.

94) This should be clear based on immigration reform (above) but in case it's not ACCEPT ALL REFUGEES and fund support and integration programs.

95) Build stricter worker, human, and environmental rights requirements into trade deals. Require offshoring companies to hew to the same standards.

96) Program to support non-profit, community based social media platforms (note that the information-is-a-public good one above will already have hit the large companies, as will the no-more-too-big-to-fail)

97) Increase funding for libraries, meals-on-wheels, food kitchens, homeless shelters, and other social services.

98) Legal initiatives to hold gig-economy companies accountable for both the basic well-being of their employees and the actions of those employees while working.

99) Investigate ways to expand the diversity of capital investment, to get start-up funding to people who aren't comemierdas and have actual business plans.

100) Expand research and investment into energy alternatives; introduce programs to reduce energy usage.

101) Moratorium on all international arms sales.

102) New civic education curriculums at the high school level.

103) New civic engagement program aimed at getting adults to participate in government beyond voting.

104) Lower the drinking age to 18, much harsher penalties for drinking and driving

105) Expand federal funding for municipal adult education and culture programs, from literacy to dance to foreign languages to basket weaving

106) Mandatory minimums for sexual assault, also they don't get to complain about their lives being ruined.

107) Move burden for safety on to cars rather than pedestrians.

108) Plan for phasing out all fossil-fuel-based private vehicles.

109) No more paper-based junk mail

110) Companies required to allow sick days, provide weekly schedules ahead of time, and otherwise treat hourly and minimum wage workers as human beings

111) Actually support democracy overseas instead of saying we do and then doing the opposite and also without being comemierdas about it (i.e. not steamrolling locals)

112) No more bids to host the Olympics (or any other major international sporting events that require construction) unless they're demonstrably pro-poor which, let's face it, is not likely to happen.

113) This should be covered under equal pay for equal work, but: Pay female athletes as much as male athletes. And stop exploiting both of them (eg, taking all profits from use of image in video games, etc)

114) End capitalism-based (ie, for price purposes) food waste

115) free breakfast and lunch available as needed at public schools, massive upgrades in school lunch nutritional standards

hiatus for work and maybe sleep? more tomorrow if not before.

116) DO NOT REPEATEDLY BETRAY STATELESS ALLIES yes this is a very specific subtweet but also a solid policy position

117) Modernize national electrical grid for more resilience and easier buy-back from customers with their own production (eg solar panels)

118) Mandate overview of recruitment and hiring processes in all government departments, with the goal of diversifying staff along all axes (gender, race/ethnicity, age, educational background, geography, etc). Push this down to state and local with metrics and incentives.

119) Fund NASA with a stable budget and request that they set 5, 10, 20, 30 year priorities.

120) Develop and expand federal discretionary fund for emergency response to reduce reliance on Congressional funding during disaster. Partial seed money from companies that have exacerbated disasters (eg, fracking, wetlands destruction, financial crash)

121) Entire reorganization of the ways zoos are conceived and run, with the first priority non-cruelty.

122) No guns allowed outside of well-regulated militia with the emphasis on the well

123) Hard line on pollution of air, water, and earth. Jail time for upper management in companies that perpetrate egregiously.

124) Grant program for local and state clean-up efforts of polluted and contaminated areas, with strong research (hard and social sciences) and community engagement components.

125) Grant program for extracting major highways from urban areas, with requirements for, wherever possible, restoring property and value to communities displaced by the construction of those highways.

126) Prosecutions of former U.S. government officials, from POTUS down, implicated in crimes against humanity. One law for all and it needs to be enforced for all.

127) Thorough dismantling of the nuclear weapons program.

128) Including, if it's not clear, dismantling all of the weapons.

129) Reduction on tariffs, trending towards their elimination. Competition!

130) Data privacy act, stating that individuals own their personal data, companies must provide complete transparency about what data they collect, how they use it, how they store it. User agreements should be short and clear and data sharing should be opt-in not opt-out. etc.

131) Research, promotional campaigns, and grants aimed at reducing proportion of meat and especially beef in US diet. Legal action against companies implementing or promoting deforestation at home or abroad for beef production.

132) Government department dedicated to making information about government policies clear and accessible to all, providing comparison on state and local policies, relocation assistance for people getting screwed over by their state's policies.

133) National version of Responsibility to Protect, allowing above department to mount legal challenges against states for policies that harm or neglect their populations or subsets of their populations.

134) Fund public schools, make public school teacher a high-paying, prestige job. End teacher tenure. Expand art and music programs. Make after and before care optional but integrate parts of the public school system.

135) No more flyovers or city fireworks. Let's respect PTSD sufferers, pets, and the environment and find other ways to celebrate. Air shows and fireworks shows allowed with permit.

136) Do No Harm law for manufacturing, with stricter regulations on toxicity for employees, people living in the vicinity of factories/refineries, and end users.

137) End the death penalty.

138) DoJ comprehensive re-evaluation of the way forensic science is used in court

139) Complete value-chain information (farm, processing, transport, etc) labeling on all food products - eminently doable and important both for containing outbreaks of food-based disease and for enabling ethical eating/holding companies accountable

140) Complete value-chain information labeling on other products. Where did your microchips come from??

141) I know we're working on getting rid of all private fossil-fuel vehicles, but in the meantime no texting while driving.

142) Remove the census question about race/ethnicity, ask instead if the respondent has experienced racism and what kind.

143) FEMA must use Sphere guidelines and monitor and evaluate responses using impact as well as process indicators.

144) Commission exploring how to make boards of directors more diverse (eg rollcall.com/news/congress/…)

145) Build on @AccountLab/@IntegrityIcon model: recognition for civil servants at the most local level who are carrying out their roles with dedication and integrity. integrityicon.org

@AccountLab @IntegrityIcon 146) Infrastructure weekS: evaluate all bridges for safety. update/retrofit/rebuild as needed.

@AccountLab @IntegrityIcon 147) Waterways. Rethink dams and other waterway controls from scratch. Solicit proposals from Interior on what it will take to restore the rivers.

@AccountLab @IntegrityIcon 148) Report & recommendations on credit and loans, micro, small, medium level. Are credit report algorithms discriminatory? How can people with income but without a salary - gig workers, freelancers, artists, etc - get loans for housing/transportation/business investment?

@AccountLab @IntegrityIcon 149) Student debt forgiveness.