Green Party candidate for Governor
Published on March 6th, 2002
STONEHAM, MA - In week three of the Daily Times newspapers’ continuing series of interviews with the candidates for Governor of Massachusetts, Green Party candidate Jill Stein introduces herself. To date readers have heard from Libertarian Carla Howell and Democrat Warren Tolman.
All the candidates have agreed to interviews, so keep your political eyes peeled for the rest of the Democrats and Republican Governor Jane Swift in the weeks to come. The interviews begin with a brief summary of the candidate’s background followed by a question and answer format.
JILL STEIN (Green Party)
Jill Stein, age 51, is a medical doctor and a mom living in Lexington with her two children and her husband, a surgeon at New England Medical Center in Boston. She was attracted to the Green Party by the Nader for President campaign in 2000 and is excited about the race for Governor because it allows her to conduct a simultaneous public advocacy campaign for a single-payer healthcare system.
Stein knows a little something about healthcare: She graduated from Harvard College in 1972 and Harvard Medical School in 1979. She is on leave from her position as an internist at the Simmons College Health Center and has volunteered for six years for Physicians for Social Responsibility, a public health and environmental advocacy group. She’s running as a full-time candidate, but like Howell and the income tax repeal, Stein’s candidacy is intertwined with her advocacy of a universal, single-payer state healthcare system.
"I’m not a politician but a healthcare advocate," Stein says. She comes to politics after years of frustration in trying to change the system from the outside. She was brought into the political world by an invitation to speak at Green Party Presidential nominee Ralph Nader’s "super rally" at the Fleet Center in 2000. The Green Party is a national organization with a platform addressing issues from environmental policy to civil rights. Nader received close to three percent of the popular vote in his 2000 defeat, six percent in Massachusetts. Stein spoke about healthcare reform at the Nader rally, and local party activists liked what they heard. In July of 2001 the Massachusetts Green Party asked Stein to run for Governor, and she says she was excited by the opportunity and jumped at the chance to make a difference in yet another way.
This doctor and healthcare expert has diagnosed the problems facing Massachusetts, and she is asking the voters to give her the power to heal what ails us. Is Stein the cure, or do you want a second opinion? Read on, and see what you think...
Question: Will you get the necessary 10,000 signatures to get on the ballot, and can you win the race or accomplish anything positive along the way?
Editor’s note: Due to Nader’s strong showing in Massachusetts in the 2000 presidential campaign, the Greens have official ballot status; they need only the 10,000 signatures to get on the ballot like the Democrats, Republicans and Libertarians. And when people register to vote in Massachusetts, they can register as Green Party members.
Stein: This is not a token campaign. We are running to win, to change the conversation to put some win / win solutions on the table that other candidates are not talking about because they can’t afford to because they take money from special interests... We are running on the Jessie Ventura model. He was outspent 15 to one, but he had good ideas. We don’t have the signatures yet, but we just started, and I think enough money can be raised under the Clean Elections rules, even without state funding – $350,000 to $400,000. Right now I have 12 volunteers and two part-time, paid staff people. I’m hopeful about the Clean Elections funding, but for now we’re running on the power of ideas. We’ve raised $30,000, but the money has gone back into the campaign. Our advertising plans are on hold until we resolve Clean Elections. We’re actively pursuing the funds.
Editor’s note: To qualify for Clean Elections funding a candidate must gather 6,000 donations of more than $5 and at most $100. Stein has gathered 2,000 qualifying donations so far.
Also, the Supreme Judicial Court ruled that Clean Elections candidates who sue for funding can receive money from an account used to pay settlements against the state. But recent reports indicate that this account contains only $600,000. Democratic candidate for Governor, Warren Tolman, is first in line with his $811,000 voucher, and the use of alternate funding sources remains ambiguous.
Question: Why are you a member of the Green Party?
Stein: At the Nader event [discussed above] I was delighted to see that the Green Party brings together healthcare advocates, progressive labor, and advocates of social and economic justice and diversity. I get to run as an outsider from a corrupt system and to offer the voters a change.
Editor’s note: There are plans in the works to fuse the Green Party and the Rainbow Coalition into a new national party.
Question: An article published in The Nation magazine during the 2000 Presidential campaign argued that Nader’s efforts were destined to fail because no political party claiming to be a party of the people had ever succeeded without the support of organized labor. Can the Green Party succeed without organized labor or win over the unions?
Stein: A lot of union members left the Democrats to vote for Republican George W. Bush in 2000. Things are changing. Working families are poorly served by both the Democrats and the Republicans. Labor is starting to wake up – labor is always outfunded by industry.
Question: What is the biggest issue facing Massachusetts, and what would you do about it as Governor?
Stein: Government has been serving the special interests, not the people. During the boom of the 1990s only the wealthiest five percent have seen an increase in wealth. There are crises in healthcare and housing. Developers and industry have made the most contributions; 85 percent of political contributions come from one percent of the voters. Special interests are repaying their debts, not working for us.
We need an economy that focuses on sustainable growth. For example, grants to convert to wind energy, which is less expensive than fossil fuel, can lower the cost of production and create more jobs while keeping the environment unharmed and workers safe...
The major problem is accountability. Clean Elections will help with that... And a single-payer healthcare financing system is needed. We [in the United States] pay more than any other country per person. Question 5 on the 2000 Mass general election ballot [universal state healthcare] was running well in the polls until the last few weeks when the managed care industry outspent public health proponents 70 to one to defeat it.
Question: What are your positions on abortion and the death penalty?
Stein: I support a woman’s right to choose, but I think women should have more choices. Women should have full access to reproductive healthcare. Unwanted pregnancies are failures of the healthcare system.
I am opposed to the death penalty.
Question: What would you do as Governor about the Big Dig?
Stein: We are beyond the point of no return. This has been an outrageous misuse of too much money directed into automobile transportation. We should provide the public with more options for safe, cost efficient public transportation. But as to the project, I would take control and go after waste.
Question: Massachusetts citizens voted on the 2000 general election ballot to roll the state income tax back to five percent. Do you agree with this move, and how would you approach balancing the state budget in the face of an anticipated $2 billion deficit in fiscal 2003?
Stein: If need be, I would consider delaying the income tax rollback, if possible, only for the wealthiest 50 percent. We have an enormous deficit, and we have had $1.7 billion in tax cuts over the past 10 years; 70 percent benefitted only the upper 20 percent, 50 percent to the richest one percent. People object to taxes because they get it that taxes are not fair.
We have to close tax loopholes for the rich, reinstate capital gains, use more of the tobacco settlement money, increase the cigarette tax, and draw on the rainy day fund.
Question: How do you feel about gun control?
Stein: It’s an important public health issue. Guns pose a grave danger to families, especially children. According to a study – "Injury and death due to firearms in the home," by Kellerman [see the Physicians for Social Responsibility Web site] – a gun is four times more likely to be involved in an unintentional shooting, seven times more likely to be used in a criminal offense and 11 times more likely to be used in suicide then for self-defense.
Question: Do you have a preferred candidate for Lieutenant Governor?
Breaking news from Stein: We decided on March 3 to name Tony Lorenzen as our Green Party Lieutenant Governor candidate. He is from Leominster, and he teaches at Cathedral High School, a parochial school in Boston.
Editor’s note: The Green Party will hold its convention in June. So far Stein and Lorenzen are unchallenged within the party.
Question: What do you think of the possibility of a four party race for Governor with four female candidates: you, Libertarian Carla Howell, Democrat Shannon O’Brien and Republican Jane Swift?
Stein: I think it’s a fascinating opportunity. If the race is between four females, we might all get national attention for our messages.
Question: Why should the voters elect Jill Stein Governor?
Stein: There is widespread disillusionment with government. People are ready to take government back, to kick special interests out and get government working for us. I don’t represent special interests, I’m working for the public interest. There are good solutions out there, and I’m in a unique position because I don’t owe any political debts.
CANDIDATE WEB SITES
To find out more about the candidates who have appeared in this series, check out their Web sites. Carla Howell and the Libertarian Party host www.carlahowell.org and www.smallgov.org. Democrat Warren Tolman hosts www.tolman2002.com. And Stein and the Green Party host www.jillwill.org and www.massgreens.org.
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