Speaking up for the 99 per cent, not the 1 per cent

Do we really want governments ruled by corporate bribes or do we want politicians and officials to start serving the 99 per cent – instead of the 1 per cent - asks former US congressional candidate

Taking one issue at a time - the clock is ticking furiously on the chances to stop, and, yes, reverse climate change. The oil, gas, and coal companies have thrown a lot of money out there to distort the findings of thousands of scientists around the world. It is time that the people learn that their children's very existence is being threatened by a bunch of selfish fossil-fuel hustlers. The damage being done by these polluters will never be stopped or reversed by shifting around pieces of papers titled 'cap and trade'. There is no room in this shrinking world anymore for these shenanigans.

The polluters, who are causing climate change, are responsible for the severe storms lacing our planet and their selfish acts are causing the deaths of people all over the world. This is criminal behaviour and the perpetrators should be charged for their crimes, arrested, face trials and be punished with minimum jail time of five years. Their behaviour is threatening the lives of all the inhabitants of our small planet and must not be tolerated any longer. All governments must make their number one priority a switch to safe energy now. Tough laws must be passed in every nation to stop the executives, who are responsible for climate change. The answer to reversing man-made warming is to jail the criminals who are causing it.

Wars can be stopped if we make some much-needed changes. Nationalism, with its reliance on violence, is a major cause of wars. We all must stop drawing lines in the sand and declaring that the people living on the other side of the line are less than we are. We all must become equal inhabitants of a shrinking planet with a growing population. Respect for all peoples must be the meat of sermons in churches, mosques and temples. Stop your religious leaders from stating that your god is the only god.

Billions of people around the world worship different gods. Until we all learn to stop demonising other people's beliefs or non-beliefs, we will continue to shoot each other in the name of a particular religion. If we respect others, it will be that much harder to generate armies to kill each other. Wars are archaic systems that allow older people to send younger people to kill other young people so the older people can steal natural resources, water and land.

We all must learn to pay for things in a peaceful manner. There should be a race to neutrality by each region of the world. Military forces must not be maintained by nation, but by region. For instance, instead of each nation arming themselves to the teeth in Europe - a regional military force could be made up of citizens of each nation, in the region, to stop internal violence or external violence. We must learn to rely on this regional police force to keep order within a region.

No nation, such as the United States with its 1,000-plus military bases should be allowed to assign itself as the world's policeman. No nation should possess nuclear weapons or any other weapons. We all must rely on our regional police forces to protect us from violence. No nation, such as the US, should be allowed to fly drones over other nations and assassinate people there. Assassinations, torture, kidnapping and imprisoning people without due process and access to legal protection should be outlawed in a world of peace.

Poverty can be eliminated with new attitudes toward the distribution of wealth. Hoarding of wealth by billionaires and multi-millionaires must change by tax policies so more people can have liveable wages and hope for a future for their children. Inequality does not have to exist. There should be international minimum wages so corporations cannot continue to exploit the poor all over the world with starvation wages.

We all must debate the type of governments that we want. Do we want governments ruled by corporate bribes? Or do we want governments that offer free education on all levels, including graduate schools. And governments which offer free healthcare for all citizens? And governments who guarantee access to water? And administrations which ban patents on medicines so all people can receive the best of healthcare? Many essentials should not be aligned with profit margins. People are dying because of monopolies, which thirst for profits and care nothing for the lives of people. We need to build governments that care for the 99 per cent.

Environmentalist Howard Greenebaum is a former US congressional candidate and author of the book Don't do it like they did it - in Washington. He is 82-years-old and now lives in New Zealand