My To-Do List for 2013 and Beyond

Here are some of the issues we need to work on in the New Year (actually starting right now):

Fight to preserve Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid without cuts.

Let Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest expire.

Overturn Citizens United; get Fair Elections passed in New York State

Keep working for Universal Single Payer Healthcare (Medicare for All)

Repeal DOMA and replace with Respect for Marriage Act.

Restore Glass-Steagall

Get a progressive elected Mayor in NYC in 2013, not a Mayor who crushes dissent and boasts that the NYPD is his private army.

Abolish the sections of the NDAA that endanger American civil liberties.

No TPP, which would have more devastating effects than NAFTA or CAFTA.

Oppose the ongoing War on Women.

Oppose workplace discrimination against LGBT people.

Kick the Teabaggers out of Congress, state and local government in 2014. We don't need "Blue Dogs" either.

Pass the Jobs Act, Jobs for Veterans, and rebuild the US infrastructure.

Raise the federal minimum wage to a living wage.

America Wins, Big Money Loses

I'm writing this on the morning of November 7, 2012. In the weeks approaching Election Day, I feared the worst. I was afraid I would wake up to "President-Elect Romney," and the destruction of so many vital social programs it didn't bear thinking about.

But that didn't happen. Despite a hurricane, despite blatant voter suppression, intimidation, and tampering, people came out and voted. They are the real heroes of this election. The woman who broke her leg but still voted, the woman who stopped to vote on the way to the hospital to deliver her baby, the man who took time to vote before going in for heart surgery, these are the heroes. So are the people who stayed in line for hours, determined not to be turned away. So are the volunteers who knocked on doors and made endless phone calls. Because of them, President Obama won a second term.

We showed the Tea Party that their ideas are out of the mainstream and they have been soundly rejected. Although Democrats did not take back the House, our Senate majority is stronger. Many Tea Party candidates are out on their keisters. Women, the LGBT community, Latinos, African-Americans, and other minorities fought back and won.

And we showed the billionaires who poured hundreds of millions of dollars into secretive superPACS and bogus 501(c)(4) nonprofits that they could not buy the White House. They ended up pretty much where they started, after pouring their money down a losing rathole. The Koch brothers, Sheldon Adelson, Karl Rove, etc. must be feeling pretty stupid right now.

The people spoke and the people won. We will not be ruled by big money. Now we have time to overturn Citizens United before the megabucks dictators try again. Maybe they realize their gambit failed and won't try, but to make sure we must amend the Constitution and fight for fair election laws.

Voting is for humans. Corporations are not people, and money is not speech. We won, thank the Goddess. Tomorrow the work continues - but at least, many people are safer today for what the voters accomplished last night.