Bill Cushing's Issue Positions (Political Courage Test)
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California Congressional Election 2010 Political Courage Test
| Pro-choice | a) Do you consider yourself pro-choice or pro-life? | ||
| No | b) Should abortion be legal only within the first trimester of pregnancy? | ||
| Yes | c) Should abortion be legal when the pregnancy resulted from incest or rape? | ||
| Yes | d) Should abortion be legal when the life of the woman is endangered? | ||
| Yes | e) Should federal subsidies be prohibited from being used for abortion procedures? | ||
| As a Libertarian, I note that "life" is listed first in our basic rights and should be honored in that way; this also accounts for my note against federal funding of abortions. As to legal abortions, any performed after the first trimester should be carefully scrutinized and after the third trimester forbidden unless the mother's life is in real and documented danger. | |||
1) SpendingIndicate what federal funding levels (#1-6) you support for the following general categories. Select one number per category- you can use a number more than once.2) TaxesIndicate what federal tax levels (#1-6) you support for the following general categories. Select one number per category- you can use a number more than once.
| Eliminate | a) Agriculture | ||
| Eliminate | b) Arts | ||
| Maintain Status | c) Defense | ||
| Maintain Status | 1) Intelligence operations | ||
| Maintain Status | 2) Military hardware | ||
| Slightly Increase | 3) National missile defense | ||
| Slightly Increase | 4) Salary and benefits for active duty personnel | ||
| Slightly Decrease | 5) Programs to improve troop retention rates | ||
| Maintain Status | 6) Research and development of new weapons | ||
| Eliminate | d) Education | ||
| Greatly Decrease | e) Environment | ||
| Eliminate | f) Homeland security | ||
| Eliminate | g) International aid | ||
| Greatly Decrease | h) Medical research | ||
| Greatly Decrease | i) Scientific research | ||
| Slightly Increase | j) Space exploration | ||
| Eliminate | k) United Nations | ||
| Eliminate | l) Welfare | ||
| Maintain Status | a) Alcohol taxes | ||
| Greatly Decrease | b) Capital gains taxes | ||
| Slightly Decrease | c) Cigarette taxes | ||
| Greatly Decrease | d) Corporate taxes | ||
| Slightly Decrease | e) Gasoline taxes | ||
| Eliminate | f) Income taxes (low-income families) | ||
| Eliminate | g) Income taxes (middle-income families) | ||
| Eliminate | h) Income taxes (high-income families) | ||
| Yes | 3) Do you support the elimination of the federal estate tax? | ||
| Yes | 4) Do you support requiring the federal budget to be balanced each year? | ||
| No | 5) Do you support using government funds in an effort to stimulate and improve the economy? | ||
| Many of these social programs should NOT be a federal concern but turned back to the states, counties, and municipalities with a corresponding decrease in taxes at the federal level. Furthermore, intelligence should be reassigned to the military (where it belongs and is done much more competently) while "homeland security" is also a military or defense concern. | |||
| I support the Fair Tax, an equitable system based on consumption rather than production. Taxes collected should also be better allocated to specific projects or work related to the tax (i.e. gas taxes should be dedicated to highway infrastructure). | |||
| The estate tax is nothing more than taxing revenue that has already been taxed, and as long as there is an income tax, there should be no estate tax. Replace the income tax with a fair tax, and then I would certainly reconsider this position but at a minimal level. | |||
| Yes | a) Do you support privatizing elements of Social Security? | ||
| Yes | b) Do you support reducing government regulations on the private sector? | ||
| No | c) Do you support increasing the federal minimum wage? | ||
| Yes | d) Do you support the ability of workers to unionize? | ||
| No | e) Do you support federal funding for job-training programs that retrain displaced workers? | ||
| Job-training programs should be funded at either the corporate or municipal level. Social security is neither and is officially broke, and minimum wag laws depress employment numbers. | |||
| Yes | a) Do you support increasing the amount individuals are permitted to contribute to federal campaigns? | ||
| No | b) Should Congress regulate indirect campaign contributions from corporations and unions? | ||
| Yes | c) Do you support removing all contribution limits on federal campaigns? | ||
| No | d) Should candidates for federal office be encouraged to meet voluntary spending limits? | ||
| Yes | e) Do you support giving the President the power of the line item veto for items concerning appropriations? | ||
| No | f) Do you support limiting the President's ability to define how legislation is applied through the use of signing statements? | ||
| If truly open campaigns are desired, allow political entities (either individual or group) to raise as much as they wish from wherever they wish with the only requirement being that regularly updated spreadsheets of donors and amounts be made available to any citizen for a reasonable fee (perhaps $5 per 50 pages of text) per request. While I like the thought of a line-item veto, it is probably constitutionally difficult at best. | |||
| Yes | a) Do you support capital punishment for certain crimes? | ||
| Yes | b) Do you support programs that provide prison inmates with vocational and job-related training and job-placement assistance when released? | ||
| Yes | c) Do you support programs that provide prison inmates with substance abuse treatment? | ||
| Yes | d) Do you support reduced prison sentences for non-violent offenders? | ||
| Yes | e) Do you support mandatory prison sentences for selling illegal drugs? | ||
| Obviously prescription drugs need regulation, but I believe this nation needs to rethink its laws regarding "recreational" drugs. | |||
| No | a) Do you support federal education standards and testing requirements for K-12 students? | ||
| No | b) Do you support federal funding for universal pre-K programs? | ||
| No | c) Do you support federal funding for charter schools? | ||
| Yes | d) Do you support federal funding for K-12 school vouchers? | ||
| No | e) Do you support the federal government providing college students with financial aid? | ||
| As long as the Department of Education exists at the federal level, vouchers should be incorporated into the system. However, education should be the concern of the individual states and municipalities. | |||
| No | a) Do you support enacting environmental regulations aimed at reducing the effects of climate change? | ||
| No | b) Do you support international emissions targets aimed at reducing the effects of climate change? | ||
| No | c) Do you support allowing energy producers to trade carbon credits under a "cap and trade" system? | ||
| No | d) Do you support strengthening fuel efficiency standards on all gasoline and diesel-powered engines, including cars, trucks, and sport utility vehicles? | ||
| Yes | e) Do you support domestic oil exploration in federally-protected areas? | ||
| No | f) Do you support federal funding for the development of alternative energy? | ||
| Yes | g) Do you support the development of nuclear reactors? | ||
| Climate change is a naturally occurring event; human activity, while an influence on environment, is not the source of any perceived radical alteration of it. | |||
| No | a) Do you support restrictions on the purchase and possession of guns? | ||
| Yes | b) Do you believe that the Second Amendment guarantees the right of individual citizens to own guns? | ||
| Yes | c) Do you support allowing individuals to carry concealed guns? | ||
| No | d) Do you support a ban on assault rifles? | ||
| e) Other or expanded principles | |||
| No | a) Do you support a publicly-administered health insurance option? | ||
| No | b) Do you support expanding access to health care through commercial health insurance reform? | ||
| Yes | c) Should the federal government expand eligibility for tax-free medical savings accounts? | ||
| Yes | d) Do you support monetary limits on damages that can be collected in malpractice lawsuits? | ||
| Yes | e) Do you support relaxing regulations on the importation of prescription drugs? | ||
| Government interference has had more to do with increasing medical costs than any other factor. Aside from the court system as protection against fraud or malpractice, the federal government should not interfere with the health policies of the country. | |||
| Yes | a) Do you support a pathway to citizenship for illegal immigrants? | ||
| No | b) Do you support decreasing the number of legal immigrants allowed into the country? | ||
| Yes | c) Do you support establishing English as the official national language? | ||
| Yes | d) Do you support the enforcement of federal immigration laws by state and local police? | ||
| Unfortunately, any nation that tries to accommodate more than two languages within its borders becomes too fragmented for the good of its citizens. Providing translators in court cases is fine, but any other translation services should be paid for by the person requesting them. | |||
| No | a) Do you support United States military action in Afghanistan? | ||
| No | b) Do you support increasing military assistance for Afghanistan? | ||
| No | c) Do you support increasing economic development assistance for Afghanistan? | ||
| Yes | d) Should the United States continue to strike suspected terrorist targets in Pakistan? | ||
| No | e) Do you support granting aid to countries when it is in the security interests of the United States? | ||
| No | f) Should the United States support the creation of a Palestinian state? | ||
| No | g) Do you support increasing sanctions on Iran if it continues to defy United Nations mandates? | ||
| Yes | h) Do you support the withdrawal of United States troops from Iraq? | ||
| Yes | i) Do you support the United States' involvement in free trade agreements? | ||
| Anyone who has read Jefferson's thoughts on foreign relations will understand my stances on these issues. | |||
| No | a) Should marriage only be between one man and one woman? | ||
| Yes | b) Do you support allowing openly-gay men and women to serve in the United States military? | ||
| No | c) Do you support federal funding for embryonic stem cell research? | ||
| Yes | d) Should the federal government end affirmative action programs? | ||
| Government should not even be involved in marriage; make every relationship a "civil union" for purposes of legal possibilities. | |||
| My primary goal as an elected representative is to uphold the Constitution and its original intent as stated in the history of its writers as well as the semantics of the diction chosen at the time of its writing. This is what representatives swear to do, but it is the one thing I see too little of. In addition, I support a Fair Tax system, the ending of the federal reserve with a return to a gold standard, and the passage of a constitutional amendment that will not allow exceptions to be written into any laws. |
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