- Abortion issues: Pro-Choice (Note: Mr. McReynolds personally answered all these questions regarding his positions on the issues) Where noted we quote from speeches and writings.
- Affirmative action: Supports affirmative action. McReynolds said, "I don't favor the various hate crime laws because it weakens the right of defense."
- Campaign finance: Strongly prefers reform. Announcing his candidacy at a press conference on 9/7/99 said, "I will work to limit the kind of obscenity we see today when the corporations openly bid for the candidates. Campaign financing laws must be enacted that provide a level playing field, with no special favors to large donors"
- Crime: Preventative approach e.g: job skills for prisoners. McReynolds calls for: Ending the policy of emphasizing imprisonment for non-violent crimes that has created what McReynolds terms a "gulag nation." "There are more people in prison today in America," according to McReynolds, "then at the height of Stalin's Terror in Russia."
- Defense spending: Massive Decrease McReynolds calls for: Peaceful priorities, starting particularly with an immediate 50% cut in the US defense budget and an eventual zeroing out of all military spending.
- Drug policy: Decriminalization, strongly prefers.
- Homosexual issues: I favor the right of gays and lesbians to marry... I don't favor the various hate crime laws because it weakens the right of defense. Murderers and rapists should be tried for murder and rape. Win or lose. I am not persuaded that they should also be tried because they murdered out of hatred, etc.
Open letter: "We have made great progress on the issues of gay and lesbian liberation - progress, which as a homosexual who "came out" in 1969, I can measure with amazement. But it is a battle that is not yet won."
- Education money: Tax dollars support public schools only.
- Environment: Protecting the environment for today and the future is essential.
- Evolution: Teach the basic science of the matter, not ideology.
- Foreign policy: Poor choices (SelectSmart.com's options)- not for military intervention but for a strong United Nations. Said on May 1, 1999, "...if Tony Blair and Bill Clinton were concerned about moral issues and the plight of the innocent they would have lifted the sanctions on Iraq before doing anything else. (In Iraq at least 500,000 and possibly one million people, largely children and the elderly, have died and continue to die for lack of medical care and food.)"
- Gun control: Support Gun Control (or maybe just outlaw the production and sale of ammunition)
- Health care: Health care is primarily the responsibility of the government. For McReynolds, a key points of the campaign is: Comprehensive healthcare for all citizens.
- Moral issues: Oppose Federal involvement in moral issues.
- Social security: Protect Social Security.
- Tax policy: Overhaul the federal income tax codes with radical change. McReynolds calls for: A maximum wage of four times the minimum wage. "If we limit the maximum wage to four times that which the lowest paid of us makes," says McReynolds, "then you can be damn sure that we'll see the minimum wage increased fast!"
- Trade issues: Too complex to answer with yes or no - NAFTA should be opposed but that, by itself, is too simplistic an answer.
- (SelectSmart.com thanks Mr. McReynolds for personally answering each question regarding his positions on the issues) David McReynolds is the Socialist Party candidate for President.
For McReynolds, the four key points of the campaign are:
* Comprehensive healthcare for all citizens.
* A maximum wage of four times the minimum wage. "If we limit the maximum wage to four times that which the lowest paid of us makes," says McReynolds, "then you can be damn sure that we'll see the minimum wage increased fast!"
* Ending the policy of emphasizing imprisonment for non-violent crimes that has created what McReynolds terms a "gulag nation." "There are more people in prison today in America," according to McReynolds, "then at the height of Stalin's Terror in Russia."
* Peaceful priorities, starting particularly with an immediate 50% cut in the US defense budget and an eventual zeroing out of all military spending
|
