A Message from Joseph Shannon:

Friends,

I am running for Congress because I believe our government should serve the citizens of our country- our families, the communities we choose to raise our kids- not political parties, elected officials or corporate interests. One of the first things Judy Biggert did when she was elected to Congress was break her term-limits promise to the people of the 13th District. And since then, she has consistently put the needs of her party, the needs of her contributors, and the needs of staying in office over the needs of the people of the 13th District.

During her tenure in office, we have gone from budget surpluses to record deficits. The national debt has gone up nearly $3 trillion from $5.5 Trillion to $8.5 Trillion since the incumbent was elected. Nearly 25% of all of our personal federal tax dollars go to pay INTEREST on the debt. Our troops have gone into battle without adequate body armor, resulting in inexcusable deaths and injuries. Yet Congress has appropriated hundreds of millions to fund bridges to nowhere. More illegal immigrants have entered our country than in any other period of our history. The shipping of our manufacturing jobs overseas has decimated families and communities across our country.

Congressmen are resigning, being indicted and going to jail; yet as a member of the Ethics Committee, Judy Biggert has been part of a highly ineffective group. At best, the House Ethics Committee is a toothless tiger.

We need to replace career politicians in Washington with people who will work hard for our families and communities here.

I need your help in restoring the people's voice to our House of Representatives. We need your financial support. You can contribute on-line at www.josephshannonforcongress.com. Please reach out to your friends who want a change in Congress.

Let's make it happen.
Joe


About Joseph Shannon

Joe and his wife Michelle live in Woodridge with their 5 children Emma, Clare, Kate, Will and Nora. They are members of St. Joan of Arc Roman Catholic Parish. Joe is a founding partner of Dolan & Shannon, P.C., a law firm focused on helping people in courtrooms throughout this country. Joe has authored numerous articles and has lectured extensively on consumer protection, insurance and safety issues.

A former collegiate runner, Joe also helps coach youth cross country, track and basketball.


CREATING JOBS AND ECONOMIC GROWTH

The Bush Administration's failed commitment to fiscal responsibility is damaging the future of families in Illinois. Joseph Shannon is committed to stimulating the economy through innovation especially in the small business sector, fair trade policies, enhancing educational opportunities, and providing greater economic security.

1. Economy

The lasting way to strengthen the American economy is to build opportunities for Americans to work. America’s best business is doing business. When businesses are created, good jobs follow. Joseph Shannon believes that the American economy can and should be number one in the world. Our economy has all the ingredients necessary for growth and prosperity for all of our people.

However, family finances of Americans demonstrate that wages have remained flat while health coverage and other expenses are still rising dramatically. What makes people very anxious, however, is they do not see leadership from Washington bringing the nation together to get the job done. Instead Washington seems to be engaging in a massive spend-down of all our inherited capital and focusing on political issues. That's what our deficits in the federal budget and international trade signify. Every dollar that takes our nation deeper into debt is a dollar less for investing in America.

Joseph Shannon emphasizes the need to get our country back on track and restore the economic confidence of the American people.

2. Invest in Long Term Commitments for Hybrid and Alternative Fuel Technology

Joseph Shannon is committed to hybrid and alternative fuel technologies that is now lacking in federal energy legislation. Greater reliance on these technologies will decrease our dependence on foreign oil, spur new industry, and improve the environment.

3. Bolster Retirement Security

Americans must save more for their retirements. We should provide as many incentives as possible to encourage savings. Joseph Shannon believes workers need portable pensions that follow them from job to job. Joseph Shannon endorses development of portable pensions that will be open to Americans of all income levels and that will encourage workers to better protect their savings through diversification of their investments.

4. Invest in Education Plus Research and Development

Our public education system remains the bedrock of our economic growth. More of our students must pursue mathematics and science education in order to have the high-paid skills needed to succeed in the 21st century economy. Joseph Shannon calls for targeted incentives and scholarships to help steer students onto career paths in the mathematics and science fields. Joseph Shannon also supports enhanced funding for the National Science Foundation and the National Institutes of Health as well as making the Research and Development tax credit permanent.

5. Enhance the Small Business Community

Since 2001, the Bush administration and Congress have cut the Small Business Administration budget by 41 percent. We need to encourage entrepreneurs in this country. As a 10-year member of the Naperville Chamber of Commerce, Joseph Shannon understands that small business is the engine that makes this country run.

We need to restore and enhance funding for the SBA as well as such related federal initiatives as Small Business Development Centers and Manufacturing Extension Partnerships.

The Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) program awards about $1.5-2.0 billion in grants to small businesses each year. It emphasizes early-stage financing, which is generally ignored by private venture capital. Some of our nation’s most innovative companies received early-stage financing from this program, including Apple Computer, Compaq, and Intel.

Joseph Shannon calls for increasing the percentage from the current 2 percent level in Research and Development agency budgets. The resulting boost in innovation will greatly benefit federal agency research and significantly stimulate the economy.

6. International Trade

International trade is an essential part of today’s economy. Our trade policies should be fair to American workers and promote American business and American workers first. Since 2000, the Administration has taken its eye off the ball of increasing opportunities for Americans. The government in Washington should focus like a laser beam on how to promote American business competitiveness so we are operating on a level playing field with trading partners.


EDUCATION

We must keep access to higher education open. Joseph Shannon opposes recent cuts in student loan programs, which created further barriers to a college education. Joseph Shannon strongly supports childhood education, school construction and technology assistance for our local schools, and greater higher educational opportunity.

Joseph Shannon deeply appreciates what educators do and what they sacrifice for our state and nation. These public servants deserve our gratitude and respect.

Our current leadership in Washington has taken its eyes off the prize in education. Our nation's greatest competitive advantage has been our commitment to the ideal of high quality public education for all. In today's global economy, the quality of our education system will determine the jobs we produce, the prosperity we create, and the military we build to protect us.

But the ideological agenda in Washington over the past few years has been throwing away our educational advantage. Washington has been slapping under-funded new federal mandates on our public schools. At the same time, Washington has been reneging on our commitment to help more students gain college degrees.

Joseph Shannon's educational priorities in Congress will include the following:

1. Making Sure Our Children Are Technologically Literate

Computer skills are becoming a prerequisite in the new high-tech global economy. We must do more to ensure that all students have access to computers. He will push for additional support to provide computers in the classroom and technological instruction.

2. Reforming The No Child Left Behind Legislation

Washington's No Child Left Behind legislation is actually leaving millions of schoolchildren behind. As it stands now, No Child Left Behind is all stick and no carrot. Its combination of confusing federal mandates and gross under-funding threatens to undermine creative state and local efforts to improve our schools. In contrast, Joseph Shannon will work to provide our schools with the crucial assistance they need to meet high academic performance standards.

3. Assisting School Construction

School districts across the nation desperately need to make investments they cannot afford in new education infrastructure. Their needs include new school construction, repair of aging facilities, and technological modernization. Yet in the last six years, Washington has nearly zeroed out federal school construction money. It’s time that Washington made American education a priority. Joseph Shannon will lead the effort to reverse this trend and re-establish a constructive role for the federal government.

4. Enhancing Higher Educational Opportunity

Joseph Shannon believes our nation is ready to revive the spirit of the GI Bill. This legislation swung open the doors of higher education and created the modern American middle class. Today Washington is cutting back on student loan assistance for middle class students and Pell Grant eligibility for low-income students. Joseph Shannon will work to reverse this trend. Education in America is the key to success. Joseph Shannon will work to establish new scholarship incentives to help steer more students into the fields of mathematics, science and engineering.


ENVIRONMENT

As a Member of Congress, Joseph Shannon will work to promote an energy policy that stimulates the development of renewable energy sources. The present leadership focuses almost exclusively on oil and natural gas as our energy answer. However, oil and natural gas are finite resources. Further, there is a high price for our dangerous dependence on these resources. Our American service men and women are putting their lives on the line to make sure we have a steady flow of oil here in the United States. We need to plan now for the new energy economy.

We are a bold, innovative people. We can fix this problem. That is why we must develop a plan for developing renewable resources with the same urgency and national initiative as we did in bringing a man to the moon. Our 13th Congressional District is comprised of an incredibly gifted and talented workforce, many of whom work in the energy and technology field. Our District should be at the forefront as we begin to develop new and stable sources of energy.

Tax incentives should be in place to encourage development and purchase of renewable energy such as solar, wind, geothermal, and biomass to generate electricity. We can develop alternatives to oil to power transportation by using natural gas and biofuels. By doing so, we will also be developing a new economy that will in turn create new sources of revenue and good jobs.

We are home to the elite Argonne National Laboratory and home to a technical corridor that should be the hub for the entrepreneurial development of these new energies. The American people deserve a cleaner, more environmentally sound source of energy. Developing alternatives to fossil fuel consumption is essential and within our reach. The time for this meaningful reform is now.

1. Returning to the Principle of “Polluter Pays”

Joseph Shannon supports reinstating the “polluter pays” principle for the clean up of toxic Superfund sites. The Superfund program has cleaned up hundreds of toxic waste sites around the country. It was funded by the polluters. But this fee has expired, and Congress has refused to reinstate it. Without this polluter fee, taxpayers will have to pay the cost of clean-ups.

Joseph Shannon opposes efforts in Congress to pass a liability waiver for pollution caused by the gasoline additive MTBE. This legislation would shield big oil companies from having to pay the costs of cleaning up the groundwater that MTBE contaminated across the country.

2. International Trade Agreements Environmental Standards

The United States should lead in energy and environmental issues. Joseph Shannon believes that our international trade agreements must contain provisions that enforce strong environmental standards around the world.

3. Auto Emission Standards and New Technologies

To reduce pollution emissions and our dependence on foreign oil, Joseph Shannon supports increased fuel efficiency standards in new automobiles as well as increased investments in hybrid and alternative fuel technologies.

4. An Energy Plan that makes Sense for the Future of America

The energy bill signed into law last year featured massive giveaways to Big Oil at a time when the industry was already reaping record profits. Legislation containing a real energy plan should focus on conservation, alternative fuel technologies, and renewable power sources. These are the kind of steps that will reduce our dependence on foreign oil, improve our environment, and create more jobs here at home.


ETHICS REFORM

Congress should be in the business of taking care of the voting people they represent. Joseph Shannon believes that laws should be in place that expressly prohibit members of Congress from influencing the hiring of lobbyists. Further, Congress should end the earmarking process and force each budgeting item to be addressed in the regular budgeting process.


FISCAL RESPONSIBILITY

The wasteful spending in Washington, D.C. continues to go unchecked while our national debt spirals out of control. The federal government has grown dramatically since 2000 with the Bush Administration running the show.

Washington is in desperate need of a tough-minded budgetary attitude. Since George Bush and the Republican-controlled Congress came to power in 2001, we have gone from a record surplus to an enormous deficit spiraling out of control.

1. Ending Corporate Welfare

Joseph Shannon will join the growing bipartisan effort to stop this fiscal and economic insanity in Washington. Special corporate interests are increasingly using lobbyists to make money for them through legislation rather than earning it the old-fashioned way in the marketplace.

Senator John McCain has estimated that more than 100 questionable corporate welfare loopholes existed at a cost to U.S. taxpayers of $65 billion a year. As Senator McCain declared, “Terminating even some of these programs could save taxpayers tens of billions of dollars each year - money that could be used to cut taxes for lower-income Americans, bolster Social Security, pay down the national debt, and strengthen our military forces. These programs provide special benefits and advantages to specific companies or industries at the expense of hardworking taxpayers.”

Joseph Shannon will support legislation to form a permanent Corporate Subsidy Reform Commission. The legislation creates an independent bipartisan commission to identify during each budget cycle a list of specific corporate welfare subsidies for elimination. The Progressive Policy Institute projected that a Corporate Welfare Commission could save a minimum of $250 billion over 10 years.

2. Tax Cuts for Working Families

Joseph Shannon supports targeted tax cuts for our middle class and working families. These are the kind of tax cuts that will give people more incentive to work, boost consumer spending, and pump up the economy.

In contrast, according to non-partisan and even some Republican economic analyses, the massive Bush tax cuts for the upper crust of American society have not caused the “trickle-down” economic growth that supply-side economic salesmen promised. In the face of record budget deficits and two expensive wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, George Bush and Congress are determined to keep on trying to sell this idea.

A vote for Joseph Shannon is a vote for smart tax policy that will help our nation grow rather than bankrupt the federal budget and our future.

3. Fiscal Discipline

Joseph Shannon strongly supports a return to fiscal discipline in Washington. As proven in the 1990s, responsible fiscal policies free up more money for private investment, put downward pressure on long-term interest rates, help our position in international trade, and increase consumer confidence in the country's direction. The result is a healthier economy that produces more revenue to help government meet its investment priorities while staying fiscally disciplined.

We cannot afford to continue borrowing more money from the central governmental banks of China and other competitor nations in order to support more unjustified tax cuts for multimillionaires. If we don't stop recklessly adding to the national debt, generations of working Americans will have to hand over more and more of their family income to pay it. Our yearly payment to pay interest on the debts mean less money to make the investments in human and technological capital that will keep America on top.


BETTER HEALTHCARE

We must act now to improve our broken health care system. More than 45 million Americans are uninsured - including 8 million children - and countless others are underinsured. Americans demand action from their leaders on this issue. Every American should have access to quality, affordable healthcare.

In addition, the cost of health insurance has increased by 60% over the past three years. For those with employer based insurance plans, the increased cost of health insurance has placed a greater burden on both the employee and the employer.

It is not only vital for American families that we provide affordable health care, but it is also important to our businesses as well. If we want our businesses to stay competitive, we need to reign in the skyrocketing cost of health care.

Employers cannot be the sole provider of health care when these costs are rising faster than inflation. What America needs is an approach that will provide meaningful reform to assist our ailing health care system.

Joseph Shannon will be dedicated to providing the same kind of innovative leadership in federal health care policy.

Analysts from across the political spectrum have pointed out that a good first step involves the development of a large and open purchasing pool allowing small businesses to join together and negotiate more affordable private coverage. Joseph Shannon supports legislation to create a Small Employers Health Benefits Program (SEHBP). The plan is based on the successful Federal Employees Health Benefits Program (FEHBP), which has provided wide benefit choices at affordable prices to federal employees for decades. Further, we should make better use of technology to lower administrative costs.

Over the last six years, the momentum behind health care reform in Washington has disappeared. The Bush administration and its partisan supporters have instead pushed for draconian cuts in Medicaid and Medicare. At the same time, they have presided over the passage and implementation of a Medicare Part D prescription drug program that has enraged seniors across the country.

Joseph Shannon will make sure that national health care reform gets back on track. His immediate health care agenda will include the following reforms:

1. Medicare Part D

Congress should put the well being of our older Americans ahead of corporate profits. Joseph Shannon believes that the Medicare Part D program is fundamentally flawed. It prohibits Medicare officials from negotiating lower bulk prices with the drug companies. It also continues to block the re-importation of safe, FDA-approved prescription drugs at lower prices from Canada. The law provides extravagant taxpayer-financed incentives on the HMO industry in order to increase HMO participation in Part D and Medicare generally.

The Part D legislation is riddled with “donut holes” in coverage, which require many seniors to pay for all drug costs out of their own pockets. The administration also demanded that the legislation give a privileged position to the complicated administrative and enrollment procedures of participating insurance companies and HMOs. Seniors across the country are now struggling to deal with unnecessary bureaucracy and denied benefits.

Joseph Shannon will demand that Congress do the right thing and engage in comprehensive revision of its Part D legislation. He will lead the effort to demand lower prices from the drug companies and cut out the wasteful incentives for the HMO and insurance industries. Congress can then use the revenue saved to broaden benefit coverage for our seniors.

Small businesses are our economy's main source of new jobs for the last few decades. But the spiraling cost of health care is threatening to sap the energy out of our economic growth engine. Immediate steps must be taken to alleviate the crisis in small business health care. He will push Congress to overcome its current indifference and focus on making health coverage more affordable for small businesses and their employees.

2. Enhancing Medical Research

Advanced medical research has developed treatments and vaccines for many diseases previously thought untreatable. Joseph Shannon believes that funding for the National Institutes of Health should be increased - not frozen as President Bush proposes in his FY07 budget. Such a freeze could have hazardous effects on future medical breakthroughs.


NATIONAL SECURITY

The first priority of the United States must be to safeguard our nation’s people. We must work together to accomplish this mission. We are protected by a superb military. As the world’s most powerful nation, we should promote freedom and democracy in the world. Extending democracy and human rights is the appropriate mission. Democratic nations are less likely to encourage terrorist activity against us or our allies.

Our nation must be committed to crushing the threat of terrorism. At the same time, our armed forces must have a clear mission and the resources to do the job. Joseph Shannon will ask the tough questions and demand truthful answers from this or any other administration that puts our troops in harm's way. He will also push for restoring relationships with our allies and re-establishing the international respect and goodwill.

1. Defeating Terrorism

Our original military actions to destroy Al Qaeda camps in Afghanistan were correct and effective steps to take. Joseph Shannon will push the White House and the Pentagon to redouble efforts to neutralize Osama bin Laden and crush the terrorist threat. Our troops at home and abroad should be honored for their dedicated work and their sacrifice. Joseph Shannon will make sure that same kind of relentless commitment to stamping out terrorism exists in Washington.

2. Keeping Our Homeland Safe

The threat of another deadly terrorist attack hangs over our nation. Joseph Shannon will help lead the effort in Washington to make sure that the homeland security recommendations of the independent and bipartisan 9/11 Commission are effectively implemented. In its recent report detailing lack of progress on the homeland security front, the Commission awarded the Bush administration and Congress with five Fs and twelve Ds. The American people deserve straight As.

3. Maintaining the Strongest and Best Military in the World

The United States military is the best in the world. That means our military must be equipped for the challenges of today - not of the Cold War. Our nation faces a different type of enemy today. Our forces must be configured to respond to terrorist threats and that of rogue nations.

The Defense Department's planning and protections for all our troops in Iraq have been remarkably deficient. But the Department's failure to provide even minimally adequate body armor for National Guard and reservist troops has been especially shocking. Joseph Shannon will be committed to making sure that inexcusable treatment of our troops does not occur again.

4. Iraq

The situation in Iraq has no easy solutions. Our troops are doing an outstanding job in battling insurgent forces. We must act in a bipartisan way to make sure that these troops in the Middle East are protected. Too many Washington politicians continue to shirk their duty to press the hard and necessary questions about our involvement in Iraq. Joseph Shannon will push for a real plan for the Iraqi forces to take care of their own security, and development of a government structure that is widely seen as legitimate among Iraq's various ethnic groups. The Iraqis should be strongly encouraged to take responsibility for their own security and governance.

5. Rebuilding Respect Around the World

Our position in the world must be one of leadership. We cannot expect our troops to carry the entire burden of the free world. It is in our own self-interest and the world's interest for the United States to work with our foreign allies. Cooperation among nations is essential to protect the American people. We must make a serious commitment to restoring goodwill among our allies.

In particular, the United States needs alliances to stop nuclear proliferation. Rogue states and terrorism go hand in hand. Congress has under-funded the Nunn-Lugar program designed to control Cold War nuclear weapons. It is critical to the safety of the United States and the rest of the world that nuclear weapons do not fall into terrorist hands.

The United States should use every tool it has - diplomatic, economic, political, and even leaving all military options on the table - to stop Iran's nuclear ambitions. For too long, the Bush administration failed to exhibit a serious hard-line attitude against North Korea's nuclear program. We cannot afford to repeat such mistakes anywhere else in the world.


RETIREMENT

We should strengthen Social Security, not undermine and weaken the program. Joseph Shannon opposes Social Security privatization that drains away money from the Social Security system and would cut Social Security's guaranteed benefits. The first step to protecting Social Security is to stop the assaults launched against Social Security by the privatization advocates. The next step is to get our fiscal house back in order and grow the economy.

Joseph Shannon supports measures to help Americans save for retirement while not jeopardizing Social Security. He supports strengthening private pension plans and encouraging more Americans to save for their retirement. Joseph Shannon will work to create universal pension accounts that workers can take from job to job without losing their savings. These plans would be an add-on and would not divert payroll taxes or jeopardize Social Security's guaranteed benefits.


VETERANS

Joseph Shannon believes that when our men and women leave military service, our country's obligations to them continue. For their sacrifice, our veterans deserve the very best healthcare, educational opportunities and housing opportunities.

Joseph Shannon believes that requiring full funding of veterans' health care should be the bedrock of our nation's lifelong obligation to our veterans. The Veterans Administration experienced an embarrassing funding shortfall in 2005, and, as a U.S. Congressman, Joseph Shannon will work to make sure that will never happen again.

With the increase in the number of veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan, it should be clear that the federal government must enhance its commitment to veterans' health care. We must keep our promises to our veterans:

Make veterans’ health care funding mandatory and not subject to annual congressional appropriations. The transition from the military to the VA should be seamless. G.I. benefits shouldn't count against college financial aid; and No veteran should ever have to choose between disability pay and retirement pay.


Archive: info gathered from Joseph Shannon's previous races

 
joseph_shannon.txt · Last modified: 2010/06/16 13:42 by 127.0.0.1
[unknown button type]
 
Except where otherwise noted, content on this wiki is licensed under the following license: CC Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 4.0 International
Recent changes RSS feed Donate Powered by PHP Valid XHTML 1.0 Valid CSS Driven by DokuWiki