Thanksgiving Thoughts on Enough

(This blog also appears on www.dmiblog.com)

On Thanksgiving eve, I watched KVUE news (an Austin ABC affiliate) do a number of Thanksgiving stories. One struck me as particularly meaningful; about a woman named Lola, the focus of local documentary director, Michelle Nehme. A damn good cook and human, who considers herself "just a nobody trying to help somebody", Lola’s proof that you don’t have to have a lot to give a lot.

She is effectively homeless, living in the back of her tiny restaurant, Nubian Queen Lola’s Cajun Kitchen. On Thanksgiving eve, she got on her bike and rode through the streets of East Austin, handing out food to people who needed it. To her, “it’s not how much money you have, but what you’re going to do with what’s in your hands” that counts. It’s the idea that if you have enough, you can afford to give away the extra. The next day I went to visit her. She greeted me with a hug at her door, as if we were long lost friends.Her spirit is infectious, and her warmth permeates her restaurant, where she has many times invited local government to sample her food and her work with the homeless. Her requests have gone largely ignored, since she too requires assistance to keep doing what she does, and a roof over her head.

Close to Lola’s place, there’s another Thanksgiving phenomenon occurring. Whole Foods Market is bustling with people buying pie, sides and last minute turkeys. The CEO of Whole Foods, John Mackey, publicly gets the concept of ‘enough’ with respect his employees. Company policy caps the amount that any of the executives can make at 14 times that of the average worker’s compensation. His network of stores continues to expand and he has one of the best balance sheets in the food industry.

Outside of Whole Foods, the average CEO made 431 times the average worker’s pay in 2004. In 2005, the average CEO made 821 times what a minimum wage worker took home. Since the last vote for minimum wage increase in 1997, Congress voted itself 8 raises.

Congress should now gets its act together. It should not just pass, but shoot through, minimum wage hikes, right to a living wage. Corporations may complain that paying people more makes them less competitive. Tough. They can look at Whole Food’s balance sheet and realize that greedy doesn’t equal better. Learn enough is enough.

Meanwhile, this corporate disconnect and non-thanksgiving like selfishness seeps into other issues that Democrats should focus on fixing. Among them is health coverage: while fewer Americans have insurance at all, health insurance premiums have doubled. While last year’s federal budget cut governmental plans like Medicare and Medicaid, gifts for drug companies, ala Medicare Prescription D were plenty.

Likewise, government sponsored insurance for credit card companies in the form of last year’s Bankruptcy Abuse and Consumer Protection Act, made it harder for people to file bankruptcy, yet put no restrictions on fees or rates card companies charge.

Whole Foods doesn’t make the kind of profits Exxon-Mobil does, but it makes money, fairly compensates workers, and carries quality products – including amazing sweet potato pies, fantastic creamed spinach and pumpkin ravioli. It shows something that we, who are lucky enough to have Thanksgiving dinners, know in our stomachs: enough is enough is healthier individually and leave plenty to go around the table.

Choice: Democracy and Finance Reform

(This post is also on www.dmiblog.com)

To me, every single component of strengthening our democracy relates to having choices. First, there’s voting, which gives us the opportunity to elect those we let govern us. We did a great job of that a couple weeks ago. We chose to fire officials that weren’t doing it for us. That was uplifting and step one.

Step two is choosing which issues we want to focus on and which laws we want to change. That’s a bit more complicated because they run the gamut from windfall taxes on oil and gas companies, to personal bankruptcy reform, to funding education, to fixing Medicare Prescription D and the health care system in general. I’ll get into those issues over the week, but before that, there’s another choice related matter – who gets to run for office in the first place. On that matter, little has changed. It’s still nearly impossible to run for office without a serious amount of cash. And even harder to win.

According to the Center for Responsive Politics, in approximately 93 percent of House races and 67 percent of Senate ones, the candidate with the deepest pockets won. These were slightly better pay-to-play odds than in the 2004 election, but this was also a year, where voters chose to vote out the most corrupt big-spenders. It still costs about $1 million bucks to run for the House and $8 million for the Senate. In all, over $1.2 billion dollars were spent to run for Congress.

It concerns me that Hillary spent $46 million on her race, especially when no one in New York even remembers who ran against her. It seems so, well, decadent. Unfortunately, the people best at raising money are least likely to allow anyone else in the game. In a November 19th, New York Times article Democrats Split on How Far to go with Ethics Law by David Kirkpatrick, Diane Feinstein said "you use taxpayer dollars to finance people who may not only be fringe candidates but - I was going to use the term "nut" - may be mentally incompetent." Less wealthy equals less intelligent? Come on, Diane.

Even leaving aside the fact that those who fund Congress (lobbyists, corporations, etc.) thwart our choices by bogarding legislation initiatives, not capping campaign funding amounts or providing substantial media public access to candidates who don’t have a few mil at their disposal, simply kills choice. So, this year, let’s not merely tinker around the edges of reform. Let’s go ‘all in’; invite more people to the table by establishing more inclusive opening limits and rules. Yes, it’s radical. But, choice is the most rewarding choice of all.

Happenings for Friends/Federal Bar Association

On Tuesday, November 14, my friend, Ray Dowd, was sworn in as President of the Southern District of New York Chapter of the Federal Bar Association. Noted Immigration attorney, Amy N. Gell was sworn in as Vice President.

The ceremony was co-sponsored by the Eastern District of New York Chapter of the Federal Bar Association. Ray's speech was both gracious and intelligent, as is he. The Honorable Kimba M. Wood, Chief Judge of the Southern District of New York, offered her court for the event. In addition to her brilliance as a judge, she was dressed in a very stylish off-white suit.

A reception followed where I met Ray's brother, Brendan, a securities laywer at O'Melveny & Myers, LLP. Also among Ray's well-wishing friends were Food&Wine writer, Amy Savatto, film star, Linda Fiorentino, plus many attorneys, including Roland Gell.

Ray is a partner at Dunnington, Bartholow & Miller, LLP. He writes a column for the New York Law Journal called "Trial and Error", and until joining his current firm, wrote a blog on solo and small firm lawyers called small firm life. He just published the Copyright Ligitation Handbook.