BY CRAIG FREILICH

North Country This Week

Green Party Congressional candidate Lynn S. Kahn of Schroon Lake says she is “the people’s candidate and never swayed by money,” knows how to get people with differing opinions to work together, and favors “Medicare for All.

An independent candidate for president in 2016, she is hoping to beat Republican incumbent Elise Stefanik and Democrat Tedra Cobb in the race for the North Country’s 21st Congressional District. She says she has raised “about 0.1 percent of my corporate-funded competitors.”

“My entire campaign I have talked with regular folks including working families, veterans, farmers, small business owners, healthcare providers and people hurt by layoffs, environmental poisons, family court, student loan debt and medical emergencies,” Kahn wrote in an email in response to our questions.

“I have facilitated town hall meetings for 10 to 1,000 people. As a psychologist, I am a deep listener. As an architect of coordinated solutions, I reinvent broken government agencies. I will put Congressional outreach teams in every NY21 county and hold two Town Hall meetings every month,” she promised.

She believes her long experience in service to government qualifies her to represent the North Country.

“I can look under the hood of government agencies to see what works, what does not work and what changes to make so We the People not Big Money drive the priorities and results of government agencies,” she says on her campaign web site.

Kahn spent more than 30 years in Washington, D.C. as a psychologist analyzing organizations, getting deep into the core of government to see how it works, or doesn’t.

“I designed the conversations and meetings that brought people with different views together to agree on shared solutions. As an independent, I provide a unique path to build agreements across the parties for legislation that benefits ordinary people and the North Country, while aiming to unite our nation,” she said.

On health care, Kahn says she “will vote for Medicare for All (HR 676) along with my 8 amendments to that bill so everyone can access free, basic healthcare, including dental, vision and mental health services,” she said.

Her rationale for single-payer medical insurance comes in part from the role the federal government already plays in the health of Americans.

“The last 210 new drugs approved for market came from taxpayer-funded research. My roadmap to universal health care demands that taxpayer funded medical research belongs to We the People not Wall Street or international investors. I will sponsor or support legislation that allows Medicare to negotiate drug costs, encourages quicker sales of generic alternatives, breaks patents in cases of national security, and funds taxpayer-owned critical, affordable, life-saving medicine,” she said.

On federal farm policy, Kahn says the 2018 Farm Bill, still being worked over in Congress, and the new U.S.-Mexico-Canada trade agreements “do nothing to fix the basic problem that our federal government sets the price of farm milk below the Cost of Production – farmers spend about $21.50 to produce 100 pounds of milk and get paid $15.50 or less. Dairy farm income has dropped 52% in the last five years leading to bankruptcy, divorce and suicide. This Farm Bill targets dairy farmers, destroying the economies of North Country towns. We all eat. When we lose family farms, we lose local control of our food supply as international investors buy up American land.”

On building back faith in government that has been lost, Kahn says “I believe full disclosure about government waste and non-performing programs, as well as supporting all legislation that reduces the costs of medicine, are immediate, visible steps to re-building trust in our government.”

On the gap in incomes between the relatively small number of very wealthy people and everyone else, Kahn says “This Congress has favored the rich and super-wealthy through tax policies, corporate giveaways, laws and regulations that put profits over people, peace and the planet. I will sponsor and support all legislation that increases income, reduces taxes and eliminates healthcare costs for working families and small businesses. I will demand accountability for our runaway military budgets. Universal health care will help shrink the income gap and I have proposed corridors of Green Energy Manufacturing in the North Country to create an economic powerhouse with decades of new green energy manufacturing jobs. Shrinking the income gap requires coordinated, whole-of-government actions.”

She also places great emphasis on environmental issues as key to the preservation of human habitat and our future in it.

“It’s Zero Hour for Mother Earth. The quality of life we leave our children requires a whole-of-government response to climate change. That means put climate change responsibilities into the goals and performance measures of all agencies; stop tax breaks and hidden subsidies for fossil fuels; hold people, corporations and government agencies including our military accountable for the damage they do to our environment,” she said.

“I have 30 years’ experience bringing people and organizations together for major change including criminal justice reform. Democrats and Republicans can’t get past hating each other; only this independent Green candidate can call for shared solutions,” she said.

“Make history,” she said. “Send a Green to Congress!”