Bob Kelleher for U.S. Senate
Welcome!
Email:
kelleherlaw@onewest.net
Bob Kelleher
P.O. Box 397
Butte, MT 59703
BOB KELLEHER'S STAND ON THE ISSUES
NO MORE TAX CUTS Until HUNGER, HEALTH, HRDC and JOB NEEDS are SATISIFED and SOCIAL SECURITY, MEDICARE & MEDICAID FUNDS SECURE!
June 22 - FIRST DEBATE: TAX CUTS: At the first senate debate before the Montana Newspaper Assoc. convention in Kalispell on June 22, candidates Taylor and Baucus called for more tax cuts. Libertarian Jones called for complete elimination of the income tax. Bob KELLEHER - standing between Taylor and Baucus - pointed out how Baucus had violated the Montana Democratic platform proscribing tax cuts for the rich by pushing through for Bush the $1.35 trillion tax cut 52.2% of which went to the richest 1% with an average annual income of $1.1 million. Baucus stood mute. Baucus did not explain why he did not as quid pro quo for giving Bush his tax cut ask Bush for at least a some money for more food stamps for the 1 out of 4 Montana children under age 6 - estimated at 67,260 - who go to bed hungry every night and the more than 9,000 Montana senior citizens who had their food stamps cut last October - some to as low as to $10 a month, or a job program for the 75% unemployed on our 7 reservations, or HRDC services including mental health. Kelleher demonstrated his opposition to any further tax cuts by - putting on his engineer cap and red bandana - calling for funding for return of rail passenger service to southern Montana in part to provide more high paying union jobs. Kelleher's three opponents were silent about returning rail service to southern Montana.
May 4 - Kelleher was only senate candidate to walk in mental health march in Bozeman. Baucus' spokesperson said "sorry, but we could not get more mental health money in this year's appropriation - but we will ask the House in January to give us more money."
May 14 - Kelleher was only senate candidate to attend HRDC conference at Havre where he learned of the disastrous results of HRDC inadequate funding.
Sept. 16 - SECOND DEBATE: IRAQ WAR: KULR-TV, Billings: asked "Do you favor invasion of Iraq, yes or no, and explain." Baucus and Taylor both said they had the utmost confidence "in our president - he is doing a great job" and whatever he did was o.k. with them (Kelleher's paraphrase). Kelleher, a retired Army intelligence colonel, said an invasion meant "we will kill a couple of million women and children with our smart bombs and a few Iraqi soldiers - if we can find them - and when we get Saddam holed up in his concrete bunker - just like Hitler - he will stick his pistol in his mouth and pull the trigger."
Sept. 23 - THIRD DEBATE: HAND GUNS: Kelleher used his opening two minutes by citing the Augusta mother who a few weeks earlier with a .38 hand gun shot and killed her 14 year old son and 10 year old daughter as they slept in the safety of their own beds. Bob said: "Max, Mike and Stan - I call up upon you before the people of Central Montana to covenant with me that whoever is elected will fight for an effective hand gun control law" - silence. The eyes of over 400 people in the Great Falls civic center darted back and forth looking at the candidates to Bob's left and right - still silence.
Bob continued: "if we remove hand gun control as an issue, we can concentrate on the real issue - Shirley, the single mom checker at Albertson's who must work 72 hours a week to support her five kids."
Sept. 30 -FOURTH DEBATE: One and a half hour state-wide public radio debate allowing voters to learn candidates position on - or skirting of - many issues. After Baucus changed the debate rules, debate was cancelled. Baucus was "home free" - no more need to explain his support for Wall Street investment brokers like Goldman Sachs who gave him $34,000 and drafted Montana's deregulation laws - SB 390 (power) and SB 396 (natural gas).
KELLEHER'S PRIORITIES
1. First Priority: HUNGER (border-line starvation): one out of six American kids goes to bed hungry; in Montana it's worse: 25.6% of Montana kids under age six live below federal poverty level; between 1993 & 1999 Montana poverty jumped 31% [Ex. 8-18 from affidavit of U of M Professor Paul E. Miller, poverty expert, in SINGLE MOMS INC., a non-profit et al. v. Montana Power, Pennsylvania Power & Light, et al., U.S. District Court for Montana, Civil No. 01-46-BU-DWM; U.S. Court of Appeals for Ninth Circuit Docket No. 02-35361, Bob Kelleher, Sr. Attorney for Single Moms]
SOLUTION: use part of $200 billion Lawrence Lindsey, Bush's chief economic advisor, says is the monetary cost of the Iraq war for an immediate influx of food stamps sufficient to provide adequate diet for the 67,261 Montana children under age six (2000 U.S. Census) [cfr. Dr. Miller Ex. 8-13, Single Moms] and millions of other hungry American kids as well as over 9,000 Montana seniors who had their food stamps cut to as low as $10 a month last October - senators Baucus and Burns, who get cheap filet mignon and lobster in the Senate Dining Room and just initial the bill - their credit is good - did nothing to alleviate the hunger pains of Montana kids and seniors!
2. Second priority - JOBS: (a) Shirley, Billings single Mom grocery checker works 72 hrs a week to support 5 kids - although it has an excess of minimum wage service jobs, Montana has lowest median wages in U.S. - Job Study 2001 says Shirley must earn $16.24 in 2000 dollars to support two kids; (b) BIA reports 75% unemployment on 7 reservations; high unemployment means increased alcoholism and drug addiction followed by increased domestic violence (increased 200% in last decade)
SOLUTION: civil service/military service (draftee's choice) draft for male and female 18 to 25 year-olds to register for either military or civilian service with greatest need in Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) to repair nation's K-12 schools which NEA chief in 2000 estimated at $322 billion (GAO estimate is $112 billion) freeing local dollars for teachers' salaries & pensions, counselors & nurses and (2) to work on environmental projects such as removal of Milltown Dam and improving National Forests and National Parks as in FDR days; registrants thereafter to be entitled to 8 semesters of free undergraduate schooling at college of their choice.
FUNDING for civil service draft and to increase salaries for enlisted personnel and second lieutenants (it's obscene to squander scarce dollars on Star Wards while a sergeant's family needs food stamps to survive) will come from: (i) repeal of 2001 Bush/Baucus $1.35 trillion tax rebate for the rich; (ii) canceling construction of 50 Virginia class submarines at $2 billion a copy, while Los Angeles class subs still have additional 9 year life expectancy; (iii) permanent postponement of Anti-missile missile hallucinatory "system" aka Star Wars costing hundreds of billions - probably trillions - about which former Pentagon director Philip E. Coyle III warned in December, 2000 under "realistic combat conditions. . . .The enemy's feints and surprises would include not only decoys but nuclear explosions in space that would emit powerful radiation designed to destroy antimissile systems." [America Editorial, 4/2/01 burying Star Wars with "other putatively infallible defense systems - from Spartan phalanxes and Hittite horsemen to France's Maginot Line"]
3. Third priority - JOB DRAIN: (a) stop overseas job drain and (b) more closely monitor H1B visas (issued for specific work requirements) where unemployed Americans have those skills; thousands of high tech jobs and hundreds of thousands of high paying union jobs went overseas because Baucus/Clinton did not have the foresight in creating NAFTA to require American corporations to pay the same salaries Americans had been receiving for those jobs now re-located to India (e.g., soft-ware specialists) by Microsoft. Other corporate multi-nationals set up shop in Egypt, Turkey and Jordan while GM and Ford moved plants to Mexico to avoid paying just wages. Before October Baucus' NAFTA cost about 7,500 Montana jobs. This past month it cost another 300 jobs at the Libby saw mill.
SOLUTION No. 1: Kelleher will require U.S. corporations to pay same salaries overseas as they did "state-side"
SOLUTION No. 2: Clinton/Baucus - besides exporting high-paying jobs - compounded the "job drain" by allowing computer "work product" to enter U.S. duty-free, i.e., a "source code" or almost completed software can be transferred by FTP electronically from India to the U.S. and finished as CD's in the U.S. All such imported "source codes" should be taxed as if already converted to CD's.
4. Fourth priority: HEALTH CARE: 40 million Americans - including millions of children - have no health care coverage. In October the Bush Administration made drastic cuts in Medicare and Medicaid benefits for expensive items such as pace makers. Although Baucus has been a Montana senator for a quarter of a century and says he is the third most powerful member of the Senate, we still have neither an inexpensive health nor prescription program. On August 13, 2002 speaking to seniors at the Billings' YWCA a woman asked Baucus "European countries have national health care, why can't we?" Baucus replied (Gazette, Aug. 15) "We are the richest country in the world!" Translation: "not while I am head of the Finance Committee!"
SOLUTION: We may not be able to get adequate health care (allowing choice of health care provider with final decision on method of treatment being made not by insurance adjusters but by health care providers) until we have elections on issues (cabinet government) rather than on personalities where the candidate with the most money wins (Imperial Presidency government). [As Will Rogers said: "We have the best Congress money can buy."] Professor Richard J. Estes www.restes.upenn.edu after 30 years of on-going research tells us 26 countries have a higher standard of living than the U.S. based on such subindices as health care, life expectancy, infant mortality, freedom from hunger, free college education, treatment of women, pollution control, per capita percentage of homicides, etc. Bob Kelleher says all 26 countries which have a higher standard of living than the U.S. have "unity of powers" (a parliament) rather than "separation of powers" government (Imperial Presidency copied from 1787 absolute monarchy of King George III). President Woodrow Wilson, Senator James William Fulbright, and a host of political science professors including former MSUB (EMC) Adjunct Professor of Scandinavian Government Bob Kelleher want the Secretaries of Defense, Army, Navy, Air Force, Treasury, Transportation (including FFA) etc. elected by voters and not appointed to serve at the whim of the Imperial Presidency.
QUERY: If the head of the FAA had been elected, would the FAA anti-hijacking security plan been two years behind schedule on 9/11, as charged by independent airline analyst Mike Boy on CNN in October, 2001?
5. Fifth priority: Return of inexpensive, low-cost frequent RAIL PASSENGER Service for southern Montana.
SOLUTION: Over 20 years ago - when Baucus had already been in Congress for 5 years - Bob Kelleher as attorney for Montana AFL-CIO urged the Interstate Commerce Committee Hearings Examiner in Billings not to allow the Burlington to seize the Northern Pacific, Great Northern and Milwaukee. Ever since then Kelleher has been fighting for a return of rail passenger service (with adequate leg and work space) from Sandpoint Idaho to southern Montana with high speed (160 mph) service from downtown Billings to downtown Denver and Missoula to Salt Lake City. If elected Kelleher will his colonel's eagles to get a seat on the Senate Armed Services Committee so a Montana owned passenger railroad service can be funded out of Homeland Security appropriations.
6. Sixth (actually a continuing) priority: IRAQ: for Kelleher's comment about killing "a couple of million women and children" and his opponents' responses see the Billings KULR-9 Sept. 16 debate above. Kelleher remains opposed to this waste of money and blood.
7. SOLUTION: Lawrence Lindsey, head of White House National Economic Council, admits war will not boost economy (as Hitler had expected in 1939 when he invaded Poland) and estimates the Iraqi war will cost American taxpayers $200 billion. The Pentagon has been silent on the number of expected U.S. casualties. Kelleher says when a student in the U.S. Army Command & General Staff College at Fort Leavenworth an essential part of planning an attack or invasion was to estimate the number of green body bags and coffins and number of grave diggers needed to bury our troops. Professor George Waring, Butte Silver Bow Green Party chief, told Kelleher a Montana Tech petroleum engineering student claimed a thorough review of the oil reserve date in Tech's library indicates Iraq has the second highest amount of proven reserves after Saudi Arabia. The analyst who has been sharing his research with Kelleher on deregulation during the Single Moms litigation and the Bush administration's FERC, Enron and other electric power decisions since before Kelleher announced his senate candidacy in December, reports the Bush Iraqi occupation plan calls for the U.S. to administer and sell Iraqi oil supplies, citing a 10/12/02 article in The Guardian by Julian Borger. U.S. General Tommy Franks will replaced Saddam Hussein. The army of occupation will have 75,000 troops and cost up to $16 billion a year.
Kelleher proposes we continue to work through the UN to locate and destroy biological and atomic weapon potentials in Iraq, using the $200 billion wars costs thus saved for food and to begin funding the CCC program to get people back to work.
8. FUTURE TAX CUTS: Robert Shapiro, Clinton Undersecretary of Commerce, told Kelleher on Sept. 13 the $1.35 trillion tax relief rebate for the rich pushed through by Baucus/Bush almost doubled unemployment nation-wide - from 3.9% to 5.9% (now at 5.7%). When Kelleher asked Undersecretary Shapiro what would be effect of a cut in capital gains (as proposed by Baucus and Taylor) Shapiro said the tax savings would either be re-invested in stocks already benefiting from capital gain protection or invested in an already shaky stock market resulting in its further destabilization. Kelleher opposes all future tax cuts until our hunger, HRDC, unemployment and health and prescription problems have been solved and guaranteed protection for social security/Medicare has been insured.
9. EUROPEAN UNION COMPETITION: Kelleher charges the Bush administration not only intends to use the Iraqi war to get its hands on Iraqi oil but to distract Americans from high unemployment at home and hungry American children but also from the fact in Jan., 2004 eight more countries will be admitted into that already economic giant, the EU. Kelleher says we need to begin yesterday to negotiate with Japan, Korea and China about creation of a Pacific Union with a common currency in order to be able to compete with the Euro.
As they say in Butte, vote early and often. Thank you and God Bless You!
Keep Montana Green!
Bob Kelleher is the Green Party’s candidate for one of Montana’s two seats in the United States Senate. Bob is running a grass-roots campaign and is interested in representing the ordinary working Montanan. Contact Bob at the e-mail address above.
“In 1968 I was the Democratic nominee for Montana’s Second Congressional District, losing to Republican Jim Battin, a four-term incumbent, and in 1969 Richard Nixon’s first appointee to the federal bench. In 1971 I was elected from Yellowstone County as a Democratic Delegate to Montana’s
constitutional convention, where I tried to change Montana to the parliamentary system. I ran for governor four times as a Democrat on a two-plank platform – (1) return of passenger rail service to southern Montana and (2) change Montana to a unicameral parliament. In 1976 I was on the Democratic presidential ballot in New Hampshire, Mass., and Georgia on a platform of a two-house U.S. Parliament. Because of
disenchantment with the failure of the Democratic Party in the U.S. and in Montana to abide by the principles of FDR, Harry Truman, Jack Kennedy, Hubert Humphrey and Lyndon Johnson, I am running for the U.S. Senate as a Green Party candidate.”
A Few Words From Bob ...
Bob's Message to Montana Schoolkids Recently, Bob Kelleher taped a 15-minute TV interview for high school students, sponsored by Secretary of State Bob Brown and Public Schools Superintendant Linda McCulloch. The tape was sent to 100 Montana high schools. Here is part of the script Bob used for the interview.
Hi! I’ m Bob Kelleher – one of four candidates for the U.S. Senate. I was a political science teacher and adjunct professor of Scandinavian Government at MSU, Billings.
Let’s go to your questions:
1. What about a draft? Before Bush talked about invading Iraq, I proposed a return of the compulsory draft for men and women, ages 18 to 25 with an option to go military or civilian. If military, you could sign up for 2 years active duty or 20 years in the reserves. If civilian, 2 years in Peace Corps, Vista or Civilian Conservation Corps repairing school buildings or environmental projects.
How will we fund our new American Citizenship Program? No. 1. We will repeal the $1.35 trillion dollar tax relief for the rich. 2. We will cancel the 50 Virginia Class submarines at $2 billion each. The Los Angeles class subs still have 8 years of life expectancy. We will pick up another $100 billion by canceling the star wars missile defense. After you successfully complete your tours of military or civilian duty, you will receive vouchers paying your tuition for 4 years at a college of your choice.
2. Yes, drug use is on the rise in Montana. In 1970 the federal bureau of prisons had less than 21,000 inmates - 16% of whom were drug offenders. By last October the number of inmates had jumped almost 600% - to over 120,000. In that time drug sentences jumped 340%. The cost of maintaining a federal prisoner a year will almost pay for a year’s tuition at Harvard or Yale!
Half of the drug busts involved marijuana! The war on drugs has been lost – like prohibition against alcohol in the days of gangster Al Capone. Sen. Duane Grimes, R-Clancy, chair of the Drug Study Committee, reported to Gov. Martz and Attorney General McGrath in September after an eight-month study that the war on drugs in Montana is a failure and that we need two more treatment centers in addition to MCDC in Butte. Also lost are the taxes that could have been used for treatment centers or education. Why not ask Montana voters if the want to legalize and tax marijuana?
Violence also is on the rise. High unemployment leads to more alcoholism and drug abuse which in turn leads to increased domestic violence. The BIA reports the jobless rate on our 7 reservations is at 75%. Between 1989 and 1998 domestic abuse in Montana more than doubled. According to the U.S. statistical abstract, in 1995 handguns were used in over 55 percent of homicides. In 1995 twice as many people were killed in family arguments as in felonies.
Last August in Augusta a mother used a .38 caliber handgun to shoot and kill her 14 year old son and 10 year old daughter as they slept in their own beds. On Friday, October 5 a Great Falls teen-ager fired a hand gun at two C.M. Russell High School students in the school parking lot. In our Great Falls debate I asked my 3 opponents to covenant with me that whoever is elected will support hand gun control – so we could concentrate on jobs! Not one of them would so covenant with me!
3. How can we improve our educational environment? The NEA says our schools need $322 billion in repairs. If the new CCC repairs our schools, billions of dollars will be available for teacher salaries and pensions, school counselors, smaller classes, and lab equipment. Kelleher’s new Montana College of Transportation at Montana Tech or MSU will train naval architects and engineer officers for the new Montana Merchant Marine. MontMarine will haul grain and frozen beef and lamb to Pacific Rim countries - Korea, Japan and China – our natural market. The College of Transportation will also train rail engineers, conductors, accountants and repair persons to operate the new Montana Freight Rail Service to compete with the Burlington which now charges Montana farmers 70 cents to haul $2.89 wheat.
4. Regarding your retirement, the only way to protect the Social Security and Medicare fund, is to outlaw any further tax cuts until the fund reaches a level guaranteeing coverage for the children of baby boomers. My opponents refuse to do this.
5. How do we find jobs for you? My late wife, Gerry Kelleher, and I had six children. All are college graduates. Only two found work in Montana.
The Kelleher plan to boost the Montana economy includes: (1) the compulsory military or civilian draft; (2) As attorney for the Montana AFL-CIO during the Interstate Commerce hearings in Billings, I fought against the Burlington seizure of the Great Northern, the Northern Pacific and the Milwaukee railroads. Ever since I have been fighting for a return of rail passenger service from Seattle and Portland through Sand Point Idaho across southern Montana. 160 mph service from downtown Billings to Downtown Denver will be competitive cost-wise and time-wise with flights out of Billings to Denver International. No Montana member of Congress wants this rail service. Because I am a military intelligence colonel and graduate of the U.S. Army Command and General Staff School and Army War College, I will get a seat on the Senate Armed Services Committee. We need this railroad for Homeland Security to move troops and for civilian use including students going to and from college. MontRail will provide more jobs for Montanans.
6. In the Great Falls Tribune for September 23 opposite the editorial page you will find my letter to Vice Admiral Thomas, the Pentagon. I asked Admiral Thomas to move the Defense Intelligence Agency – DIA – and its high-paying three thousand five hundred jobs to Malmstrom Air Force Base at Great Falls. I told Admiral Thomas, Montana’s colleges and universities will provide a continuous pool of engineers, computer and language and other intelligence experts as older DIA employees retire.
What about the minimum wage? A 25 cent hourly increase will not help Shirley, the single mom checker at Albertson’s in Billings now working 72 hours a week to support her five kids. Every Montanan is entitled to a living wage. On Feb. 12 of this year Associated Press in Helena reported the 1996 Work Welfare Reform enacted by Clinton, Baucus and Burns a 90% failure in Montana and 95% failure on our seven reservations. It must be repealed.
Will you join me in this Second American Revolution – a non-violent revolution?
Will you help me finish the job started by governor Edmund Randolph of Virginia and William Patterson of New Jersey by creating the U.S. Parliament?
Secretary of State Bob Brown and your local clerk and recorder have made it easy to get out a large vote in this election. But they need your help. I need your help. A single mom working 72 hours a week to feed her five kids or a homebound person may have trouble getting to the polls on election day. With your help, they can vote absentee. Simply fill in your name at the bottom of the cards you get from the clerk and recorder and have the single mom or homebound person sign it. Tomorrow and every day until the day before election you can pick up blank ballots from your clerk and recorder, have your friends vote at home and then bring back their ballots to the courthouse before election day, November 5.
God Bless you!
Agriculture
Ag Exports
1998 - Wheat & products ------ $242.3 million [69% of total], 2000 - $179.7 million
1998 - Live animals & meat --- $16.5 million, 2000 - $11.0 million
Four Year Drought
AP report of Jan 2002: 2001 was third straight year of drought (we are now in 4th year). Dave Kelsy of Molt says deeper well cost over $11,000 (with risk of dry hole) Some well driller working 16 hours a day. Blaine County drillers dug 100 holes in 2001 - twice normal number
Aug., 2001: Billings USDA office tells Kelleher "emergency conservation payments" are made when the "precip" falls below 60% of a 30 year average and they made such payments in 2000, 20001 and 2002 (1999 data could not be found). Chinook USDA office reported payment sin 1998 (not in 1999), 200, 2001 and 2002.
The National Climatic Data Center reports that according to the Palmer index the present drought is the worst since the 1930's. This internet information has been available to Baucus' staff, yet Baucus and Burns did not ask for emergency drought relief until
August 1, 2001
Aug 1, 2001: Montana Standard carried AP story that Baucus and Burns authored a bill to get $5 billion in drought relief for farmers and ranchers.
Kelleher asks Baucus when you were being solicited last year by the Bush White House to push through the $1.35 trillion tax rebate, 52.2% of which goes to the 1% richest Americans, why didn't he play "let's make a deal?" Why didn't Baucus tell Bush give Montana money for drought relief, mental health and child care and maybe we can cut a deal that protects the social security trust fund. Incumbent Baucus did none of this.
- Moreover on the Ides of March, 2001Baucus - after receiving $18,500 from American Motor Manuf. Assoc. - voted against 35 mpg engines (recently approved by the progressive California Assembly) which would have meant independence from the 2.6 million barrels a day of Middle East oil by 2009, which in turn would have meant slowing down global warming (reducing threat of future drought) as well as pulling our service people out of the Middle East who keeping getting killed protecting Saudi oil.
Kelleher's Ag Bill
1. Agweek Magazine of Grand Forks, ND asks: Did the 2002 Farm bill set the proper direction for U.S. farm policy?
No. My ideal farm bill would subsidize family farms even if incorporated for tax purposes but not large corporate farms worked by tenant farmers. The communization of former "peasant" farms that Josef Stalin could not force even though he killed millions of his fellow Georgians, the multi-nationals are managing to do. Partially raised on my uncle's dairy farm in Wisconsin, as an adult politician I have always encouraged "co-op" vertical integration. I would introduce legislation providing direct financial support as well as tax incentives encouraging close cooperation between credit unions, family farms, elevators, mills, transportation facilities (rail and truck) and co-op grocery chains.
2. As attorney for Montana AFL-CIO at hearings before the Interstate Commerce Commission in Billings I fought against the Burlington seizure of the Northern Pacific, Great Northern and Milwaukee. In May, 1980 the Milwaukee went bankrupt. A major plank in my platform is return of rail passenger service in Southern Montana as well as freight service competitive with the Burlington which charges 70 cents to haul $2.89 wheat. The Pacific rim countries - Japan, China and Korea, the natural market for agricultural products of the Dakotas and Montana, have the currency to pay for our products.
3. It is my legal opinion that legislation providing the devise of an agricultural unit to a spouse, direct descendant or relative within the third degree of kindred shall be a tax-free devise while said land is operated as an agricultural unit would not violate the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment of the federal constitution.
4. I support country of origin labeling for meat. Customers are entitled to know the country whence comes the food for themselves and their family. Packers should not have title to livestock prior to slaughter. There is too much temptation to fatten the animals with unhealthy fodder and chemicals. My own preference is that tax incentives be given to livestock growers who sell to a co-op packing plant.
5. If elected, what piece of agricultural legislation would you introduce and push for passage? Answer: All of the above. Cheaper reliable transportation to markets; co-op ownership of means of production, transportation, preparation for market and retailing - all on a co-op basis will result in a fair return to the man and woman who made it all possible - the family farmer.
National Health Care
Baucus top industry contributor is insurance. [www.opensecrets.org, Table "Top Industries 2002 Race, Montana Senate] Top industry: Insurance: $239,203. Top Contributor: American International Group (AIG) - $36,750. Kelleher asks: Will insurance companies support Kelleher's national prescription program?
Baucus sixth top contributor is drug manufacturer Merck & Co.
Kelleher asks: Will drug companies like Merck & Co. and Pfizer Inc. who gave Baucus $26,000 support Kelleher's national prescription program. [Albertson's drug stores boast they will accept over 3,000 prescription plans. Kelleher says that because the insurance industry offers over 3,000 plans "there's gold in them thar hills!"
Baucus' Relation to Electrical Power Cost
Baucus has received $34,000 from Goldman Sachs, Wall St. investment firm which drafted SB 390 (power) and SB 396 (gas) pushed through the 1997 55th Montana Legislative assembly with the help of 18 lobbyists paid over $70,000 by Bob Gannon's Montana Power's PAC "Committee for Responsible Government" which destroyed the pension plans of MPC employee widows and others putting their faith in MPC stock.
The BB twins on April 10 killed the Feinstein amendment (Burns voted "no" and Baucus refused to vote - amendment failed by two votes) which would have required federal regulation of speculators in electrical Enron-like power contracts that Sen. Feinstein and the head of the California Public Service Commission claimed bankrupted Pacific Power & Light.
What About Organized Labor?
On June 27 in Great Falls I told the assembled B.A.'s and other AFL-CIO officials - including some "hot shots" from Washington - that Big Labor cannot sleep with Big Business, that whore of Babylon without coming away with an STD. In 1997 a dozen Washington AFL-CIO top brass refused to accept Ralph Nader's offer to hold 50th anniversary town hall meetings around the country calling for repeal of Taft-Hartley, passed over Harry Truman's veto in 1947. Not one labor official was interested. The AFL-CIO in D.C. and in Montana have betrayed the working man and working woman. I support the Montana Progressive Labor Caucus formed in Butte on June 15, 2001.
Bob Kelleher
Candidate, U.S. Senate