Thursday, April 12, 2012
I'm Outraged
I have tried to ignore the divide and conquer tactics of our politicians but find myself more and more outraged. I am outraged that my freedom of religion is under attack by people trying to pass laws that state when life begins. I am outraged by Christians being upset when I wish them Happy Holidays, am I to know they’re not Jewish, Muslim, Hindu or Buddhist? Did I try to insult them with this? My religious freedom is challenged when I have to sit through others prayers in a public space. I am outraged that religious zealots can’t tell the difference between secular and sacred and try to deny committed couples the same rights to pursue secular happiness that heterosexual couples can freely enjoy. I am outraged that a nation founded on religious freedom should be called a Christian nation. Much of America’s foreign policy for the last decades has been trying to stop nations from adopting Sharia law because of it’s obvious problems for freedom and democracy. Why are we trying to adopt “Christian” law? I am outraged by politicians whose main motivation is holding power. I am outraged that I may not be able to vote if I shave off my beard. I am outraged that ugly personal attacks have taken the place of reasoned debate. I am outraged when American citizens patriotism is questioned because they hold beliefs that are not common. I am outraged that lobbyists are writing laws and seemingly running the country. America became great because of its diversity and acceptance of new ideas and people. It’s time to stop thinking that we know the TRUTH and begin to listen to others and use logic again.
Wednesday, February 29, 2012
Gutting Campaign Finance
The cost of getting elected has grown so large that our representatives are stuck with spending a considerable amount of time raising campaign funds. In order to do this, they are forced to go to where the money is; Political Action Committees, and Lobbyists. When we, as citizens, desire Congress to take a particular action, we use our special interest group to represent us. The special interest group will find out which members of Congress have the power to accomplish the ends, and then start letter writing campaigns and make campaign contributions to the appropriate committee members. This process results in the most flush special interest groups getting their way.
This reliance on special interest groups (lobbys) is the reason that we will never see the change that
either parties is looking to implement. Obamacare is a great example of this. While America’s Health Insurance Plans Association sent over $83 million to the Chamber of Commerce to fight Obamacare, they were busy helping write the bill that actually became law. They’ve whipped up a frenzy of hatred in people that don’t know much about the funding of health care, while at the same time have reaped huge profits since the law was passed. The well funded fight by the banks to gut the new financial regulations, (which they again helped to write), shows what well funded representation can provide. In both these cases, the group of people who are funding the PAC’s stand to lose their livelihood or at the very least lose substantial amounts of money. The people who benefit from the proposals will stand to gain a much smaller benefit, that they very often don’t fully understand, even though their numbers are much greater than the PAC contributors. Those in the tax industry understand this when they say that tax simplification always makes taxes more complicated. Once a tax benefit has been granted a special interest is created. That special interest will fight tooth and nail to keep any benefit they have even when the reasons for the benefit are long gone. Witness the subsidies the federal government gives to the oil companies, corporate farmers, and airwave users.
Of real concern is the type of person this system is attractive to. Many we see in the political arena are clearly motivated more by the desire to lead then the desire too better the lives of those that are being led. Many of our best leaders never saw themselves in a leadership position until it was thrust upon them. These people will never be involved in our political process as long as the chief requirement of a candidate is to be able to raise sufficient funds to run a campaign.
Lobby’s can provide valuable service to the country in the form of expert testimony about their industries. When they are providing funds to candidates, their purpose has been corrupted while their incomes have sky rocketed. Our political parties also have seen this corrupting influence. They serve a useful purpose in Congress by being able to define and support bills before Congress. When the party holds the purse strings to campaigns, the local candidates are forced into supporting the national line of thinking even if contrary to what’s best locally.
Our Founding Fathers provided us with a Constitution that has each House member representing an equal number of neighboring citizens, and a Senate with equal representation from each State. The beauty of this system hinges on local representation bringing local issues to the National table that can only be acted on if the same issues occur across the Nation. This system, while nominally intact, has been corrupted beyond what I believe our Founding Fathers could ever have imagined. We are now asked frequently to provide campaign funds to elections that are far away from our location in an attempt to sway an election in a district that we know little or nothing about. With the state of transportation and media in the late 1700’s what it was, I don’t believe our Founding Fathers even considered the possibility of people campaigning for candidates that they couldn’t vote for. In many cases, I
believe, people wouldn’t even know who was running in a distant district until the winning candidate was seated in Congress. In the rural economy that we had back then, people’s needs were always more like their neighbors than people in other states. If people that lived a distance from each other shared the same concerns, you could be sure that those concerns were worth addressing at a national level. That is no longer the case.
One of the most important rights in the United States is that of Free Speech. As a country we have recognized the importance of limiting this right in special situations. You cannot yell “FIRE” in a crowded theater just like you can’t lie in order to make money, (fraud). I realize it is probably impossible to stop all politicians from lying. It is possible to lessen the impact of these lies by restricting campaign funding. Electioneering is a special form of speech, that must be limited to the people who are most affected by the election in question. With this in mind I would suggest the following as an Amendment to our Constitution:
Notwithstanding the First Amendment, efforts to influence elections to public office in the United States and its’ subdivisions shall be limited to those who are eligible to vote in said election.
Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.
The enacting legislation would provide for legitimate reporting of news, full disclosure in a timely basis of contributions, and the rights of states to pass laws limiting contributions. Penalties for violators should include the loss of the right to vote.
The difficulty of getting this passed is obvious due to the power inherent in the lobby’s and the political parties. It should be possible, however, as these are two of the groups that are most reviled in the country. It might require a Grover Norquist 'no new taxes' type of action, where we all shame our congressmen into pledging support for the Amendment.
This reliance on special interest groups (lobbys) is the reason that we will never see the change that
either parties is looking to implement. Obamacare is a great example of this. While America’s Health Insurance Plans Association sent over $83 million to the Chamber of Commerce to fight Obamacare, they were busy helping write the bill that actually became law. They’ve whipped up a frenzy of hatred in people that don’t know much about the funding of health care, while at the same time have reaped huge profits since the law was passed. The well funded fight by the banks to gut the new financial regulations, (which they again helped to write), shows what well funded representation can provide. In both these cases, the group of people who are funding the PAC’s stand to lose their livelihood or at the very least lose substantial amounts of money. The people who benefit from the proposals will stand to gain a much smaller benefit, that they very often don’t fully understand, even though their numbers are much greater than the PAC contributors. Those in the tax industry understand this when they say that tax simplification always makes taxes more complicated. Once a tax benefit has been granted a special interest is created. That special interest will fight tooth and nail to keep any benefit they have even when the reasons for the benefit are long gone. Witness the subsidies the federal government gives to the oil companies, corporate farmers, and airwave users.
Of real concern is the type of person this system is attractive to. Many we see in the political arena are clearly motivated more by the desire to lead then the desire too better the lives of those that are being led. Many of our best leaders never saw themselves in a leadership position until it was thrust upon them. These people will never be involved in our political process as long as the chief requirement of a candidate is to be able to raise sufficient funds to run a campaign.
Lobby’s can provide valuable service to the country in the form of expert testimony about their industries. When they are providing funds to candidates, their purpose has been corrupted while their incomes have sky rocketed. Our political parties also have seen this corrupting influence. They serve a useful purpose in Congress by being able to define and support bills before Congress. When the party holds the purse strings to campaigns, the local candidates are forced into supporting the national line of thinking even if contrary to what’s best locally.
Our Founding Fathers provided us with a Constitution that has each House member representing an equal number of neighboring citizens, and a Senate with equal representation from each State. The beauty of this system hinges on local representation bringing local issues to the National table that can only be acted on if the same issues occur across the Nation. This system, while nominally intact, has been corrupted beyond what I believe our Founding Fathers could ever have imagined. We are now asked frequently to provide campaign funds to elections that are far away from our location in an attempt to sway an election in a district that we know little or nothing about. With the state of transportation and media in the late 1700’s what it was, I don’t believe our Founding Fathers even considered the possibility of people campaigning for candidates that they couldn’t vote for. In many cases, I
believe, people wouldn’t even know who was running in a distant district until the winning candidate was seated in Congress. In the rural economy that we had back then, people’s needs were always more like their neighbors than people in other states. If people that lived a distance from each other shared the same concerns, you could be sure that those concerns were worth addressing at a national level. That is no longer the case.
One of the most important rights in the United States is that of Free Speech. As a country we have recognized the importance of limiting this right in special situations. You cannot yell “FIRE” in a crowded theater just like you can’t lie in order to make money, (fraud). I realize it is probably impossible to stop all politicians from lying. It is possible to lessen the impact of these lies by restricting campaign funding. Electioneering is a special form of speech, that must be limited to the people who are most affected by the election in question. With this in mind I would suggest the following as an Amendment to our Constitution:
Notwithstanding the First Amendment, efforts to influence elections to public office in the United States and its’ subdivisions shall be limited to those who are eligible to vote in said election.
Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.
The enacting legislation would provide for legitimate reporting of news, full disclosure in a timely basis of contributions, and the rights of states to pass laws limiting contributions. Penalties for violators should include the loss of the right to vote.
The difficulty of getting this passed is obvious due to the power inherent in the lobby’s and the political parties. It should be possible, however, as these are two of the groups that are most reviled in the country. It might require a Grover Norquist 'no new taxes' type of action, where we all shame our congressmen into pledging support for the Amendment.
Tuesday, December 6, 2011
GET BIG MONEY OUT OF POLITICS!!
Proposed Amendment XXVIII of the US Constitution
Notwithstanding the First Amendment, efforts to influence elections to public office in the
United States and its’ subdivisions shall be limited to those who are able to vote in said election.
Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.
The only way this could happen is through a large grass roots campaign. The threats to the
existing way of doing business is too big for our lawmakers to accept this without a large groundswell.
Enforcement legislation would allow news reporting of the facts of elections by “legitimate news organizations” (defined, for example, as less than 50% of their reporting being political and less than 10% of their revenue coming from electoral campaigns). Complete public disclosure of donors would be required. States would be given the right to set limits on the size of contributions. Penalties for violation would include loss of voting rights, fines, and jail time.
Monday, November 7, 2011
Something that George Souros & the Koch brothers can agree to fight
Herman Cain’s ascendancy should come as no surprise to any that understand that we are no longer represented by our Congressmen. As ex head of the American Restaurant Association, he has acted as “congressional representative” for the lobby. We now take our government concerns to our special interest groups because they are the only effective way to get change through Congress. They are able to not only give us the names and addresses of our elected representatives; they also give us the words to send to them. These 35,000 unelected representatives, called Lobbyists, are able to use money to sway our Congressmen in a way that only rich individuals like George Souros and the Koch brothers can emulate. The use of or the threat of the use of campaign contributions has altered the representative nature of our government. Elected officials have to be concerned about things that have no bearing on their districts because of the funds that will be used in their elections coming from these special interests. The gun lobby has made effective gun control a subject that can’t even be broached by beleaguered inner city representatives for fear of contributions going to an opponent. The health insurance lobby was able to use the US Chamber of Commerce to spread lies about health reform that have taken on a life of their own. The global warming skeptics all seem to be funded by the energy industries. The board of directors of the Financial Industry Regulatory Agency are elected by the exchanges and brokerage companies. It will be interesting to see how the CPA’s and tax preparers will fight the flat tax proposals currently surfacing. With over 70% of our Congressmen being millionaires, (the other 30% can be millionaires after they leave Congress to work as lobbyists), is it any surprise that they have decided to not increase their own taxes. The poor, of course, have no fiscally flush lobby, making it easy to make them a scapegoat. The current “I’ve got mine, screw you” attitude has no one with money to fight it.
The way to break out of this cycle of greed is to pass a Constitutional Amendment that defines “electioneering” and prohibits any from electioneering who cannot vote in the election in question. This would truly return our government to the local people who are really affected by their representative’s actions.
The way to break out of this cycle of greed is to pass a Constitutional Amendment that defines “electioneering” and prohibits any from electioneering who cannot vote in the election in question. This would truly return our government to the local people who are really affected by their representative’s actions.
Friday, October 14, 2011
TAMING THE BUREAUCRATS
If we could stop calling each other names and screaming back and forth, we might realize that the loss of personal power to faceless bureaucracies is the primary motivation behind both the Tea Party and the Occupy Wall Street movements. The Tea Party’s rants against the government are largely aimed at large bureaucracies within the government that are more interested in self preservation than serving the people. The Wall Street Occupation is also ranting about our large bureaucratic banks and businesses. The visible 1% consists of the top tier of the bureaucracies. The nature of bureaucracies is towards self preservation rather than creation or adding value. Because relatively few of us can “buy” a congressman, we rely on special interest lobbies to represent us to Congress. With these lobbies now reaching the size of giant bureaucracies themselves, there is little hope of reform for either government or banking as any effective reform will do a lot of damage to the lobbies. In order to return the power to the people, we have to stop delegating our power to our lobbyists and our employers. I would suggest two reforms that would reduce the concentrated power of this “corporate capitalism and government marriage:
1. Have a constitutional amendment that would define “electioneering” and exempt it from the 1st amendment while prohibiting any contributions for electioneering from anyone who could not vote in the election.
2. Eliminate corporate taxation by forcing corporations to pay out all of their annual profits to their shareholders like subchapter S corporations do today.
The first would focus our congressmen’s attention to what is really important to their constituents and eliminate the problem of voting due to money that has no interest in the electoral district. The second would force CEO’s to sell their plans to shareholders in order to raise capital for expansion, rather than explain to shareholders after they have acted. It would eliminate “too big to fail” problems because shareholders are unlikely to fund many of the projects that corporate boards find compelling due to large amounts of cash on their books.
1. Have a constitutional amendment that would define “electioneering” and exempt it from the 1st amendment while prohibiting any contributions for electioneering from anyone who could not vote in the election.
2. Eliminate corporate taxation by forcing corporations to pay out all of their annual profits to their shareholders like subchapter S corporations do today.
The first would focus our congressmen’s attention to what is really important to their constituents and eliminate the problem of voting due to money that has no interest in the electoral district. The second would force CEO’s to sell their plans to shareholders in order to raise capital for expansion, rather than explain to shareholders after they have acted. It would eliminate “too big to fail” problems because shareholders are unlikely to fund many of the projects that corporate boards find compelling due to large amounts of cash on their books.
Monday, May 2, 2011
Gay Marriage
The hypocrisy of many of our “Christian Patriots” continues to amaze me. Not only do they ignore our constitutional provision about no established religion in the United States, they ignore the Christian teachings about “judging not lest you be judged” and “throwing the first stone”. Marriage is always a secular event involving government licenses, tax and employee benefits. The fact that it is usually a religious event shouldn’t cause us to confuse the two. If all men are created equal, shouldn’t all men and women have equal rights to the tax benefits of marriage? When will our legislators realize that their belief about “between a man and a woman” is a religious belief when even they refer to this as a “sacred belief”. “Rendering on to Caesar that which is Caesars” separates taxes from religion. Have these people so little faith in the Lord that they believe they must make judgments that the Lord has reserved for Judgment Day? This effort to codify religion in law is very similar to the Taliban’s effort to impose Sharia Law and should be treated the same.
Friday, April 8, 2011
Pee Party
It’s become obvious to me that the Tea Party should really be named the Pee Party. I’m sure they would agree that they’re pissed off. They also seem to delight in getting as many others pissed off as they can. Their platform consists of not paying taxes by pissing on poor people, government workers, and others that can’t care for themselves. Taxes are the cost we pay for living in a civilized society. They don’t seem concerned with civility and haven’t looked at where they are taking us. It’s easy to be a critic, (even I can do that), it’s much harder to come up with real solutions.
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