So, Marianne Williamson declared her run for president for 2024. Her declaration speech was fairly...conservative to me. She hit a lot of good notes, had a lot of populist takes, talked about the economy not working and how we needed to be like FDR to stave off the threat of fascism. It was a good speech to some extent, but it felt almost...conservative. Not economically conservative, mind you, but she seemed to play it safe. No mention ofUBI, and a lot of more standard Bernie type policies.
Williamson did pretty good when I studied her 2020 platform on my blog previously. She actually had some of the highest scores. TLDR she supported UBI but gave no indication of how to pay for it. She supported a public option where you bought insurance off of the exchanges, which wasnt that impressive, she supported a full on green new deal, while I supported the more mdoerate framework, and she supported free college and student debt. She at least spoke to all 4 major issues in my simple big 4 purity test, and did well as a result, having the third highest score of all of the candidates, behind bernie and yang. Without correcting her scores she actually beat both Bernie and Yang. So she actually stood out to me a lot looking at 2024 short list candidates.
Reflecting on her speech and then looking at her platform, I'm less enthused. Because keep in mind, Biden isnt a slouch either on my big four issues. He doesnt support UBI, he only supported public option healthcare, but so did marianne, he supports some free college and some student debt forgiveness even if he isnt overkill on it, and i LIKED build back better. Biden had a score of 90 on my purity test. Williamson was 125. And most of that was due to UBI support.Williamson was higher on education, but lower on the green new deal (again, not a huge fan of the full on "progressive" GND as its a glorified jobs program). On healthcare they were the same.
Given Biden is the default option here, eh...I have to give Biden the benefit of the doubt. He's the bar to beat, and if a candidate wants my support over her, they need to provide a better package than Biden does. I'm not sure that Williamson does that. She has a progressive flair which sways me, but I've matured a bit since 2016 and 2020. I dont care as much about flashy rhetoric. After all, if they get in and get stalled by congress, being flashy doesnt matter much. Not saying i wouldnt rather have the more progressive person in there, but Williamson needs the more progressive policy set. If she actually supports the same stuff as biden, that doesn't really mean much. Ya know? Why change horses? Another issue I have is pure electability. Yes, Biden is a flawed candidate, Im not a biden fan. BUT...the numbers speak for themselves. If we replace biden odds of a republican winning goes down, and I really dont think 2024 is the time for a protest vote. I dont say that to sound all normie and establishment, I mean, the GOP is literally running open anti democratic fascists this year. Trump tried to overthrow the election results. Full stop. DeSantis, well, we've discussed him recently. Dude's a psycho. Like, these arent normal conservative politicians. These arent your paul ryans and your jeb bushes and mitt romneys and crap. These guys are PSYCHO. Like, literal threat to the future of the country and democracy level psycho.
So...if a progressive REALLY wants my vote, they need to really offer me a compelling alternative to Biden here. IM not opposed to a primary challenge here. I welcome it to some extent. May the best person win. BUT....i do understand that williamson, especially if she aint gonna run on UBI, might be no better than Biden in my book. Like literally on par without UBI. And I didn't hear anything in her speech about UBI despite her being an open supporter of it in 2020.
Now, it looks like she's already made her campaign website up. I was gonna say "we need to wait for it to be up to look at the details", but given it's right here, let's look at her details.
Here's her economic plan. Just gonna focus on the big plans but let's see here.
Enact fair taxes on the wealthy, corporations, and Wall Street, and reduce taxes on working people. The richest people in America increased their wealth by a total of $6.5 trillion in 2021. The total wealth of the 1% reached a record $45.9 trillion by the end of 2021, and these fortunes increased by more than $12 trillion, or more than a third, during the course of the pandemic. (See my anti-poverty policy page)
I'll have to look at her anti poverty page, but sticking it to the rich doesnt help unless youre gonna be using that money to pay for things.
Support Universal Healthcare, and end prescription drug price gouging. (See healthcare plan)
I'll have to look at her healthcare plan, but that's a good look. Universal healthcare is my literal priority #2 behind UBI. Bernie won my support by focusing on my lower priorities in 2016 and 2020. Let's see how she does there.
Increase of the federal minimum wage to $15/hr. In areas where this is too large a jump to make immediately, the federal government should provide subsidies during a transitional period.
Yawn, Biden supports this. He just cant enact it due to congress.
Protect the middle-class from tax hikes while repealing the 2017 Trump tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy.
A lot of stuff about not taxing middle class families. You could be taxing them more but then providing a UBI that actually gives them more money.
Make Education Affordable: Offer free tuition to public colleges including community colleges and four-year colleges. Offer free trade school tuition to work in occupations such as a carpenter, plumber, bus mechanic, or electrician. Those trade schools will coordinate with organized apprenticeship programs to give students real-world experience.
Okay, now we're talking. Priority #3 met. Now about student loan forgiveness...
Eliminate all interest on student loans and forgive all federal and privately held student debt. Students are too often burdened with school loans that hold them back from following their dreams. Forgiving all student debt will allow students to work in a career they love, launch a business, or buy a home.
Boom, ok. Full 25 points for priority #3.
A modern Glass-Steagall Act, separating commercial banks (which take deposits and make loans) from investment banks, ensuring banks cannot make risky investments. If they fail, they should not be bailed out by the government.
Would help but not an immediate concern of mine.
Holding Wall Street accountable. No bank that is too big to fail should exist. There are benefits to capitalism. One is, things that don’t work should not survive.
Somewhat based, although if we didnt bail out the banks it wouldve made 2008 worse.
Enhanced Union Support. My Administration will expand and protect the rights of working people to organize for better wages and working conditions. (See labor policy)
Biden supports unions
Reduce wealth inequality. See the questionnaire at the bottom of this section for specific actions.
Hmm okay.
Equal pay for equal work, eliminating pay inequalities for women and disabled workers.
Cool i guess.
Paid vacation and sick leave for all employees, even part-timers who cannot work more than part-time hours due to disability or other limitations. Every industrialized nation but ours guarantees this right.
Pretty based.
Portable retirement plans for every worker in this nation. A retirement plan that one can take with them from job-to-job. No one should be afraid of their future.
It's called social security. Or basic income.
Closing the loopholes that give big breaks to large corporations, and ensuring they pay their fair share of taxes to level the playing field so small businesses can compete.
mmkay.
Eliminate predatory lending practices to homeowners and hold accountable financial service companies that engage in usury. Increase access to loan modifications that enable people to stay in their homes.
This actually goes into priority 5 which isnt in my big four metric, but narrowly misses it. Based.
Investing in our infrastructure, creating a green economy with jobs that rebuild roads, bridges, and rails, increasing renewable energy power, updating clean water systems, improving our rail system and massively investing in public transit.
Yeah she seems to be a green new dealer. That Im a bit concerned about.
Expand and enforce Antitrust laws even more forcefully so that new businesses have a chance to succeed.
Cool.
Eliminating the income cap on Social Security payroll taxes.
yeah that keeps it solvant. Good.
Raising the estate tax with special care given to help family businesses pay-off the estate tax bills over time so we don’t shut down small businesses.
More stick it to the rich stuff. What are these taxes funding?
Eliminating the carried interest and Exchange-Traded Funds tax loopholes enjoyed by Wall Street.
Ditto.
We must declare a national climate emergency and end all fossil fuel subsidies to eliminate the use of carbon from the economy to slow global warming. This will create millions of good paying green jobs in renewable energy (solar, wind and water power), architecture and building (green buildings), energy-efficient vehicles (electric cars), new public transit systems, and much more. We must ban all fracking and revoke drilling licenses on public lands. The greening of the economy has already created millions of new jobs – there are twice as many people working in the solar industry than in coal. The best way to decarbonize is to put a price on carbon; this incentivizes people to find ways to use less carbon.
Ugh, she's gone full green new dealer. Dont get me wrong we need to take action on climate change, but again green new deal seems more about a "new deal" than it is being green. Most GNDers seem to exaggerate the climate crisis a little bit in order to promote their vision for massive jobs programs. We dont need more jobs. Jobs are a means to an end, not an end in itself.
Create a caring economy. The real wealth of our nation is our people. Investing in care is both humane and good for our economy. Much of the care for children, the sick and the elderly is now unpaid, done mostly by women and people of color. If this labor were paid, it would strengthen the economic security of millions of workers, especially disenfranchised communities, and ensure that people who need care get it.
If we didnt insist on employing every single person, family could step in more than they would now.
Providing early Education and Universal Child Care. Focusing on these initiatives will prepare the next generation for the knowledge jobs of the future, and decrease crime, poverty, and incarceration rates.
Decent priority, but biden was also for this.
Paid Family Leave (to welcome a new child by birth or adoption), Paid Sick Leave (to care for yourself or a loved one), and Paid Caregiving for caregivers.
Cool, pretty sure bdien was for this too.
A Universal Savings Program. Under my plan, each child will receive a gift from the federal government deposited in a fund created at birth. Family and friends can add to that fund as the child grows, with the government matching those contributions on a sliding scale. (Less wealthy families will get a 100% match and more wealthy families a 10% match.) Eventually the child grows up and can use those funds for wealth-enhancing purposes such as education, training, house down payment, or to start a business. [See Robert Friedman’s book about the Universal Savings Program, “A Few Thousand Dollars: Sparking Prosperity for Everyone” (2018).]
*sigh*, I'd prefer a UBI.
Reestablish the federal Office of Economic Opportunity (OEO), the agency responsible for administering most of the War on Poverty. Change the current Community Service Block Grant (CSBG) back to its original form under the Economic Opportunity Act (EOA), which sent federal funding directly into communities via their local Community Action Agencies to eliminate poverty, expand educational opportunities, increase the social safety net for the poor and unemployed, and tend to the health and financial needs of the elderly. This was successfully implemented before programs were transferred to other agencies and program funds were rerouted through the states, and the OEO was abolished by Ronald Reagan in 1981. Give communities back their power.
Johnson's war on poverty was always flawed. We need a UBI.
Anyway, let's look at some specific plans.
Before getting into her actual plan, she has a lot of mumbo jumbo about promoting nutrition education and encouraging people to do yoga. A lot of feel good stuff, although some priorities are decent. Fixing the environment, removing pollutants from water, etc. Some of this stuff is good, but some of it is feel good stuff. Im kinda glossing over it since i wanna get to her actual plan for universal healthcare.
Preventive Care will be included as part of the single-payer healthcare system. We don’t have a healthcare model of prevention in this country. All the profit incentives are around Treatment, and in the case of health insurance, of preventing Treatment.
Ok, so it sounds like she's heading toward universal healthcare.
We must join the entire rest of the developed world and guarantee healthcare to all through a comprehensive Medicare for All single-payer program.
Okay, yeah, she's improved a lot since 2020 in this respect. Full on single payer. No more mumbo jumbo about public options and buying from exchanges. Okay. So, I am a bit concerned about how trying to encourage people to live in certain ways (assuming she's gonna actually pressure people to "live healthy", ie, control what people eat, do exercise, etc.), but all in all, I'm for single payer.
And of course she wants to lower the prices of prescription drugs. M4A would do that. Okay, I'm starting to be more enthused.
She doesnt mention plans to pay for it though.
We “cannot afford” not to have universal healthcare. Studies show we would spend less money on a universal medicare-for-all system than our current failed system. Moreover, there is no way to measure the amount of money that does not enter our economy based on the fact that so many Americans are too stressed and anxious to create and produce at the level that they otherwise could. “What will I do if I get sick?” “What will I do if one of my kids get sick?” “I hate this job, but I stay because of the health care benefits.” Every one of those questions is a limit on a life that would otherwise produce more.
This is why we need universal health care coverage. In the richest country on earth, millions of people should not be living with chronic fear and anxiety based on the difficulty of providing for the basics of life. The fact that such difficulty exists is itself a problem we need to address. When we do, we face up to the basic inequity of the economic system that dominates our society today.
I agree, but not having a funding plan is a bit cringe. Still, I'll give a tentative 40/50.
Im just gonna list a few points that stand out to get a feel for her, rather than going over her policies line by line. You can read them yourself.
Expand investments to reach 100 percent renewable energy and dramatically reduce CO2 (carbon) emissions by 2035 or earlier.
Seems aggressive. But still, not bad.
I wont link each policy, but she has a lot of policy goals that vary between 2030-2045. Seems like a reasonable timelime. Keep in mind we want this crap solved by 2050. I just dont support the GNDers who are like IF WE DONT SOLVE THIS BY 2030 WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE SO WE NEED TO SPEND TRILLIONS ON JOBS RIGHT NOW.
Anyway, this doesnt seem bad. Again, no specifics on how much it costs, but she doesnt seem OVERLY ambitious here. I support her on paper. I'll give her plan a 20/25 since I'm not 100% sure about some details of it, but I like how it sounds on paper.
Keep in mind biden also had a fairly aggressive plan based on bernie's GND that I supported though too. So not a huge shift in her direction from Biden.
Lots of good stuff in here. I know Biden supports labor on paper, but he also seems kinda weak on it. Remember him ending the rail strikes truman style and then east palestine happening not long after? Yikes. So definitely a plus here. Also, lots of progressive stuff in here. Big fan of much of this. Doesnt go as far as the right to say no, but still.
Ensure universal Paid Time Off (PTO) by passing legislation that provides federally subsidized PTO for all workers, guaranteeing at least 30 total days of paid leave per year. This includes at least a week of sick leave, two weeks of paid vacation, and a week of personal days.
Holy crap that's based. Finally make us like a freaking first world country with time off. Good policy, Marianne, good policy.
Final evaluation
Okay, so...I looked around some more, and basic income is totally gone off of her platform. Im not sure she could pay for it anyway given her other proposals, but all things considered....not bad.She's still pretty progressive otherwise, and does seem to outshine Biden on a lot of stuff. I could see myself supporting her. I won't really know who I'll support until the end of 2023 or early 2024, given someone else might jump in (come on Yang, come back to UBI, man!), but Williamson is looking to be promising. I dont expect her to win, I expect the dems to play dirty, but she has some interesting proposals. My biggest gripe is she doesn't support UBI.
On my big four, she gets 85 points, and that's me being somewhat conservative because she doesnt have all her details out. She could get up to 100. For the record Biden's unaltered score was 70, and I bumped him to 90 due to effort at times.
So 85 without extra points. I'll give williamson 25 extra points. I wanna give her+50 on effort alone, but lack of policy specifics in paying for stuff, I'll knock her down to 25.
So...that's 110 to Biden's 90. So she gets my support over Biden. Shame she didn't run on UBI. That was worth 100 points in itself, although an imperfect implementation is worth less. Still, even partial credit would put that person way in front.
If I were to use more dated metrics, let's compare to Biden.
Using my 2020 early primary metric, Biden gets:
Basic income: 2/10 (CTC)
M4A: 3/10 (weak public option he never acted on)
Economic issues: 6/10 (fairly decent but still milquetoast)
Social/domestic: 9/10 (not bad, progressive where it counts)
Foreign: 10/10 (slava ukraini)
Ideology: 10/20 (meh)
Commitment/history: 0/20 (not progressive)
Experience/competence: 10/10 (dude's freaking 80 and been in politics since he was slightly older than me)
Total: 50/100
Conclusion: Milk Toast
Williamson
Basic income: 0/10 (gone?)
M4A: 8/10 (professes support, details questionable)
Economic issues: 10/10 (based)
Social/domestic: 9/10 (not a lot on her site but I imagine she is supportive where it counts)
Foreign: 2/10 (After watching the Krystal and Kyle interview, leans a little too hard into the anti war crap)
Ideology: 14/20 (better than Biden)
Commitment/history: 20/20 (orb mommy based)
Experience/competence: 0/10 (i mean she's a self help guru trying to make waves)
Total: 63/100
Conclusion: Better than Biden
I mean neither candidate is really perfect for me. She edges out Biden though. Biden ended up in what in 2020 was the tier 3 fauxgressive camp, while Williamson is a tier 2 candidate which means "i like them but they're flawed." Biden made great strides from 2020 where he was a tier 4 craplib candidate. Williamson is downgraded because no UBI, but she's still okay. Kinda at the bottom of tier 2 score wise.
Going with the more comprehensive metric:
Biden:
UBI- 10/50
M4A- 15/50
Climate change- 25/25
Jobs program- 5/10
Free college- 5/10
Student debt- 5/10
Money out of politics- 5/10
Electoral reform- 3/10
Redo FLSA- 1/5
Paid sick leave/vacation time/family leave- 2/5
Strengthen unions- 2/5
Codetermination- 0/5
Total: 83/200
Biden is kinda a weak candidate here. I think he got 93 in 2020 based on this? But I also said he deserved lower, around 80. I guess this is a fair correction.
Williamson:
UBI- 0/50
M4A- 40/50
Climate Change- 20/25
Jobs program- 10/10
Free college- 10/10
Student debt- 10/10
Money out of politics- 10/10
Electoral reform- 0/10
Redo FLSA- 5/5
Paid sick leave/vacation time/family leave- 5/5
Strengthen unions- 5/5
Codetermination- 0/5
Total: 115/200
Better than Biden. Same spread as my new metric more or less. It should be noted no candidate is perfect here. Bernie only scored around 145 and Yang around 125 on this metric. Williamson is a bit weaker but i also dont know her position on some things so she can still go a little higher. She's decent. 100+ is "good" on this metric. No one really meets my purity tests perfectly.
All in all...Williamson is better than Biden, but Im significantly less enthusiastic about her than I was about bernie or yang in years past. Part of this is just me maturing and laser focusing more on what i want. I mean, losing UBI support is a huge blow for my enthusiasm in general since I've doubled down on that in recent years. And williamson...well...she's inexperienced and kinda kooky. And that kind of reflects on not giving her full credit on some of her plans. I dont know how she plans to pay for this, and that normally is a decent part of my score. She talks about taxing this and taxing that, but doesnt really have a budget laid out.
Again, not that it matters, she's DOA anyway. Biden is gonna run agian, the dems are gonna shoot her down and not take her seriously. As others online are saying, her ceiling is 5% probably. If she were really lucky she could get 30% like Bernie did. But yeah. She doesnt have a solid chance.
So I guess if I were to virtue signal with my primary vote, she might be a good candidate. Although I'd ideally prefer someone with a UBI.
Still, putting the holy grail of UBI aside, shes decent. She's evolved on healthcare in a positive way and she outdoes biden on my OTHER priorities mostly. So she's an improvement over biden at least. I could tentatively support her.
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