David Collins | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
David Collins ran as a Green for US Senate in TX.
| Job History: | |
 | Ten years with current employer, UT-MD Anderson Cancer Center, in Information Services; six years in IT training; ten years as a high school Latin teacher; a variety of other temporary jobs around and between.
In my job as a US citizen, I have been active with the Harris Country Green Party since 2000, though with other Green organizations since 1995. I have served on the Board of Directors of the Houston Peace & Justice Center since 2010. |
| Important Issues: | |
| All the major national issues are interconnected, but everything comes back to peace, justice, equality, and democracy. Let's end counterproductive and wasteful military involvements, as well as the "war on drugs" (which is de facto a war on minorities and the poor). Let's devote our attention to the biggest challenges of all:
1. Making our planet habitable for 7 billion humans, and 2. Making our nation live up to the challenge of its founders, with "liberty and justice for all" not mere words mumbled by school children who know better. The biggest challenge of all is helping the United States and the industrialized world kick this deadly addiction to fossil fuels. Our current habits of consumption are starving, sickening, ravaging, and killing the planet and too many of its people. Climatologists are nearly unanimous on the reality, causes, and potentially disastrous effects of climate change. We have the capability and the technology to reverse the roll back the concentration greenhouse gases in our atmosphere, but our leaders lack the will. This is understandable, since our lifestyles will have to change drastically, but the cost of delaying will be far worse down the road. What is less unanimous is scientific consensus on peak oil, the theory that worldwide oil production has peaked. However, resorting to dirty, expensive, and dangerous sources—such as tar sands, hydrofracking, and deepwater drilling—practically proves that we have reached that peak. Energy giants and their subcontractors exploit these sources because doing so is immensely profitable, but the cost to our natural resources and those who make a living from them is far too high. Natural disasters like the tsunami events in the Indian Ocean in 2004 and Japan in 2011 remind us that we are all connected, and the primary global imperative is cooperation among nations. When a quarter-million people were killed by the 2004 tsunami, the Bush Administration scarcely even blinked, going right on wreaking devastation in Iraq and Afghanistan. Our petty conflicts over energy resources are dwarfed by that imperative: We must devote our resources to healing our planet and helping its 7 billion people. The way to heal and help is a comprehensive change in our energy production and use, which can begin here at home and then be exported around the world, including to the poorest regions of Africa, Asia, and Latin America. A Green Jobs program at a scale similar to that of the New Deal will accomplish that, while providing full employment for our own citizens. Energy questions mostly involve industry, transportation, agriculture, and household use. All four must be completely rethought, redesigned, and reconstructed. Complete Streets must be the Interstate Highway initiative of the 2010s and the coming decades, and not just in major cities. Low-intensity organic farming, within easy reach of urban areas, will save billions of trucking miles every years. It must become easier for homes and businesses to take advantage of solar energy where it is practical to do so. There is encouraging progress on these fronts already, with cities adopting more public transit options, etc., but that progress needs more of a push. Only the federal government can provide that push effectively. I will add more on issues of justice in the near future. |
| Why Vote For David Collins: | |
| The important issue is not that you think David B. Collins would make a great US senator. For all I know, I just might, but it is more important for progressive voters to support the party that reflects their values and principles. In Texas, since 1994, voting for a Democratic candidate in a statewide election has become voting against the wind. Even if one manages to get elected, that Democrat would most likely be a proponent of drug wars and capital punishment and "maintainin' a healthy bidness climate" for Big Energy.
Because of the electoral rules in our state, for the Green Party of Texas, 5% is victory. If a single candidate in a statewide race draws 5% of the vote, then the party is guaranteed a ballot line two years later without having to collecting petition signatures. If I poll 5%, I'll be ecstatic, especially since there will be a Democrat in this race; even 2% would be a great birthday present. For me as a Green, it is more important that Green-leaning progressives get out on 6 November and cast votes for our candidates with no Democratic opposition: Charles Waterbury for State Supreme Court, Place 4, and Josh Wendel for Railroad Commission, Place 2 Please encourage your Democratic-voting friends not to vote a straight Democratic ticket, since that would result in no vote on these two positions. |
| My Campaign Tumbleblog: http://dbc4senate.tumblr.com |
Contact David Collins
| Phone: | (713) 771-2033 |
| Mail: | David Collins for US Senate |
| Houston TX |
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