Columbia area bus and DART riders, along with public transit advocates, will launch the Midlands Transit Riders Association (MTRA) at a 2pm, April 3 press conference at the CMRTA (Central Midlands Regional Transit Authority) Transit Station, at the corner of Laurel and Sumter. Riders and advocates are urged to attend and share their stories about how public transportation affects them and how it can be improved.

Brittany Higgins, a spokesperson for the group, said that riders and advocates have been meeting for months to lay the groundwork for a riders association. “We believe that riders can provide the most informed advice about how CMRTA services are delivered,” Higgins said. “The CMRTA will benefit from organized input.”

Higgins, a recent Columbia College graduate, became a bus rider after years of questioning whether or not she should drive because of the symptoms of her physical disability. “I rely on public transportation,” she said. “I am looking forward to improvements that will allow me to live my life to the fullest.”

The MTRA’s mission statement reads: “The Midlands Transit Riders Association is a nonprofit organization of riders and advocates for safe, efficient, environmentally sensitive, affordable public transportation. We believe that our communities deserve public transportation that meets the needs of those who must use it, as well as a system good enough that people want to ride.”

Virginia Sanders, SC Progressive Network Co-Chair, has been working with riders for six months. She said, “Columbia’s bus riders have never had a voice in how their tax dollars are spent on public transportation, and we don’t want to leave all the decisions up to those who rely on low-wage workers getting to their jobs.” Sanders, a public transit advocate, has been appointed to the county’s penny tax oversight committee that will monitor how the $300+ million designated for public transit is spent.

“Bus drivers are the only connection most riders have with the service they get,” said driver Lucious Williams. “So we are the only ones to hear their complaints.” Williams has been driving a bus in Columbia for 33 years, and is vice president of the bus drivers union.

CMRTA drivers work for Veolia, a French-owned global transportation corporation, and many are represented by Amalgamated Transit Union Local 610. “The riders need to organize if they want to have an effective voice,” said Williams. “This will help overall improvements in the CMRTA system.”

Midlands Transit Riders Association goals:

• Educate the public about the benefits and challenges of public transit.
• Facilitate the voice of riders in public transit decisions.
• Serve as a vehicle for community input to improve public transit.
• Reduce pollution through the use of alternative fuels, smaller buses and feeder routes.
• Assure safe, well-maintained buses, shelters, stops and transit station.
• Advocate for efficient service with expanded routes, days and hours of public transit.
• Strive for affordable rider fees.
• Reduce auto traffic through park-and-ride and expanded service.

Membership in the MTRA is free and open to riders and public transit advocates. For more information, call 803-808-3384 or email MidlandsTransit@gmail.com.

By Hoyt Wheeler
SC Progressive Network Co-chair

As the famous philosopher Yogi Berra once said, “It’s déjà vu all over again.” We are experiencing once again deep challenges to the survival of the American republic that bear a close resemblance to challenges that we have faced before. Our present fix looks a great deal like the rocks upon which our country foundered in the 19th Century.

In the 19th Century, the War Between the States (or the War of Northern Aggression as it is known in South Carolina), in the words of Abraham Lincoln, tested whether the American government “of the people, by the people and for the people” could survive. This was settled only by a massive slaughter in which the Southern states were conquered by the Northern ones. The root cause of this war was an employment system in which human beings were used as mere resources by their owners – human slaves. To protect this system, the Southern states attempted to nullify national laws and, ultimately, to secede from their Union with the other states.

In recent years, under the banner of honoring the 10th Amendment, which reserves to the States those powers not given by the Constitution to the Federal government, legislatures in a number of states have once more attempted to nullify Federal laws.

With South Carolina once again in the forefront, several states have enacted provisions in their state constitutions to enact their own version of labor laws that conflict with Federal law. When challenged, their attorneys general have responded that these laws, which have to do with employee representation by unions, are not contrary to national legislation, although this is patently not the case. Also, in response to the much hated Federal “Obamacare,” some states are attempting to remove themselves from its requirements by state legislation.

The rhetoric used in attacking the national government has reached extraordinary heights. One of the more moderate candidates for the Republican nomination in the last election for South Carolina’s governor told a Tea Party rally that, where the enemy used to be the Soviet Union, it was now Washington. An application of Federal labor laws has resulted in the National Labor Relations Board being accused of being a “rogue agency” by South Carolina’s governor.

To resolve any doubt as to the extremes to which some citizens would take their resistance to the national government, in several states thousands of signatures have been collected in favor of actual secession from the United States. One would think that, in states such as South Carolina that are characterized by extraordinary expressions of patriotism, this should not be taken seriously.

However, it takes place in the context of the extreme libertarianism of many public officials. At least in South Carolina, it is clear that powerful politicians are simply opposed to any government – national or local. Appointments to head state agencies have been accompanied by statements by the governor that the task of the agencies’ leaders is to weaken, not enforce, state laws. Being business friendly, not the welfare of citizens, is seen as the ultimate test of state policy. Gov. Nikki Haley is opposed to cooperating with the Federal government, even refusing millions of dollars of Federal money for expanding Medicaid to benefit health care for the state’s poor.

American government, whether big or small, is in fact a government of, by and for the people. It is not a despotism that justifies rebellion. Although not perfect, it is superior to any alternative. It is a democracy worth defending and supporting.

Brett Bursey
SC Progressive Network Director

Over the past many months, right-wing leadership has lost its credibility and momentum, posing opportunities for progressives to make headway organizing on critical issues. Three policy areas that are especially ripe:

Medicaid expansion: We have discussed a primary legislative focus being on the expansion of Medicaid. It is a major battle in the war over the role and size of government. That said, it seems that major players (everybody to the left of the Tea Party) are taking up the call to accept Medicaid expansion. Gov. Nikki Haley will probably lose this fight, but we need to mobilize our members to ensure this happens.

Voting reforms: The Network has promoted a package of voting reforms for the past decade to make voting easier and verifiable. After the long lines to vote in November – which inconvenienced and disenfranchised even some Republicans – the idea of Early Voting Centers (which we championed in 2006) now has bipartisan support. The voting machines we use (and which the Network opposed the purchase of in 2003) are reaching the end of their life span. We have an opportunity to again push for an new voting system that is publicly owned, paper-based, simpler, cheaper and more reliable. The Network has been a major player in South Carolina’s voting business, and we need to focus on this.

Ethics reforms: The bipartisan clamor for ethics reform has been driven by indictments and investigations of leading politicians. I have testified before the four different ethics reform committees holding hearings. My main point has been that just because something is legal doesn’t make it ethical. Take House Speaker Bobby Harrell’s leadership PAC which legally circumvents campaign donation limits.

The other elephant in the room is that money is not speech and corporations are not people. The best these committees may come up with is “transparancy” that lets us know who is buying our elections. It is timely to again raise the concept of publicly financed elections for those who don’t want to be bought or sold. Common Cause is joining our call for a pilot program to elect the state Attorney General as a publicly financed candidate. Why should the state’s top cop have to take money from the corporations they may be called on to investigate?

By Mary Sullivan
Hilton Head, SC

Now that we are all worshiping at the “Cathedral of St. Drone,” we actually no longer need the institution of war. We have been praying for peace and it is actually on our doorstep! War has most certainly now become a totally outmoded institution.

This new state is thanks to our growing arsenal of unmanned armed aerial vehicles known as “killer drones” (now more numerous than other types of military aircraft) and to a president, comfortable with weekly review of his “kill list” for ordering “targeted assassinations” of people in countries with which we are not at war. Even though we don’t know their names, “signature assassinations” of people who just look like they could become a problem are OK too.

Drone assassinations are now THE weapon of choice and the industry is growing mightily. Hurry up and buy stock in the weapons manufacturers. We shouldn’t miss the opportunity to cash in. It’s good on so many levels — jobs, profits and it’s just plain neater. All those deaths are “over there” and our boys remain OK.

Why maybe we can even close the over 700 US military bases in over 150 countries (not our own Parris Island, of course). Finally the planet will be rid of the scourge of war. Any killing needed by the government can be done with a press of a button from a computer terminal right here. And our kids are already trained to skillfully use the button with games like God of War 4, Modern Warfare 3, Battlefield 3, etc. Stock in XBOX 360 and Playstation should also soar.

Now that at least 30 police departments have been equipped with drones, I am also looking toward the day when we can cut our state and local police budgets, thus rescuing these financially ailing entities. What a wonderful world we have to look forward to! I imagine we will eventually get used to the constant buzzing over head and to the insect sized drones listening at our windows.

But I really cannot understand why have we not been celebrating the end of war and this new, cleaner, more sanitized means of just getting rid of anyone who might remotely be of some challenge to our empire–and their families and friends who are surely guilty by sheer association?

I just don’t understand it. Shouldn’t there be ticker tape parades down 5th Avenue in New York City and along the Magnificent Mile in Chicago and maybe along 278 on Hilton Head and in towns and cities across the country? What could possibly account for the fact that we are not celebrating this momentous change in the way we humans deal with conflict? Surely not because most citizens (polls say 62%% or more approve) or media pundits have any moral compunction about assassination as the new strategy.

So whatever could it be?