10 Big Goals for Obama's First 1,460 Days

By Mark Green, Huffington Post. Posted January 13, 2009.

5. Reduce the costs -- and expand the coverage -- of health care. Over 70 million Americans are either uninsured or under-insured, leading to more illness, death and overtaxed emergency rooms. We have both the most expensive and least effective health care system in the industrialized world.

So the new administration should: expand coverage of S-CHIP (State Children's Health Insurance Program) to cover all children in need; create a Prevention & Wellness Trust Fund to provide more preventative services for long term cost savings; order the FDA to focus on and reduce obesity and tobacco use by adolescents; invest in health care information technology to avoid medical errors and better spread effective research; investigate the causes of racial disparities in health care and mandate that HHS reduce them; provide better long-term care through assisted living technology to allow home monitoring, as well as more community health workers and home health aides; require the Surgeon General to issue annually a publicly understandable report on the nation's health; and eventually move to a universal healthcare system that's citizen-based, not job-based.

6. Elevate science over politics in federal decision-making. While most presidents will weigh facts which lead to conclusions, Bush deployed the reverse methodology of "Lysenkoism" - conclusions led to "facts." Repeatedly, political appointees from affected industries ignored data because of partisan or religious concerns, especially in the area of climate change.

So the new administration should: issue an executive order to permit federal funding for embryonic stem cell research on all ethically derived stem cell lines; re-establish the White House Office of Science and Technology; make the Research and Development tax credit permanent; and appoint only qualified experts, not industry cronies, to science-related positions.

7. Restore the rule of law and human rights as American values. Constitutional scholar David Cole, challenging friends to name constitutional rights that Bush-Cheney didn't try to sabotage, concluded, "After the right to bear arms and not quarter soldiers, the game will be over." Apparently, when W swore to "faithfully execute the laws," he took it literally.

So a new president -- who's a constitutional law professor to boot -- should: pay a "decent respect for the opinions of mankind" (Jefferson) by closing the prison camp at Guantánamo and assigning to federal civilian courts the task of trying terrorist suspects; unequivocally ban the use of torture and cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment by any U.S. official or contractor; greatly restrict presidential "Signing Statements" to obviously unconstitutional provisions; renounce the blatant politicization of the Justice Department as occurred during Gonzalez's tenure, appoint judges based on merit, not only ideology; repeal the "Global Gag Rule" which prohibits Non- Governmental Organizations that receive federal funding from promoting or performing abortions in other countries; end the "don't-ask-don't tell" policy for military services and ban discrimination in the workplace due to sexual orientation; and create either a congressional or presidential independent, bi-partisan commission to investigate and expose alleged illegality over the past eight years in order to deter future misconduct--a government that can't impeach or prosecute such illegality for political reasons needs to find some way to deter such corruption.

8. Educate children better for the global economy. In an increasingly global economy based on information - and with production techniques duplicatable anywhere - education is the new gold. Unless our children are better educated and more innovative, they and we will lose out in a world of open trade.

So the new administration should: push expanded learning time for all students especially in low-performing and high-poverty school; expand Early Head Start because of the proven success of high-quality pre-school for all; invest particularly in middle schools with high concentrations of low-income students who, in a sense, start dropping out of college in the 7th grade; enact a college tuition tax credit so that middle-class families can write off up to $4,000 per child; create a federal "Grow What Works" fund to identify and document the best practices to be shared; pay more to teachers who assume added responsibilities or work in challenging schools or in a shortage subjects; and create a program that focuses on teacher recruitment, and preparation and professional development since the difference between a good and a bad teacher can be the equivalent of a full year of school.

9. Fight terrorism by working more cooperatively with allies. Terrorism by non-state actors is a palpable threat to American interests that cannot be diminished merely by invading countries or overreacting with apocalyptic, belligerent language. Al Qaeda and other terrorist groups have grown since the March 2003 invasion of Iraq.

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Mark Green is co-editor of the just-released "Change for America: A Progressive Blueprint for the 44th President," and president of Air America Media.

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