Political Ponderings part three
Part Three, continued from Thursday’s Column
(My opinions don’t necessarily reflect those of the hosts of this website, its subsidiaries or friends or family or anyone else even loosely connected with anyone who may, at one time or another, have glanced at this website! These are my opinions alone. Please don’t sue me.)
Conclusion-ish:
I think we must stop accepting the way things are done just because that’s the way they’ve always been done, because it isn’t working very well. I am fully in support of the “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” philosophy, but our government is “broke” in virtually every sense of the word. If people ran small businesses the way our government is run, there would be no small businesses.
In big business, you’re allowed to cheat, lie, mislead and run your company so far into the red that your eyes are bloodshot and still have a company to run. And, if you’re that far in debt, you can appeal to the government for a loan so that you can continue to do bad business. At least, that’s the way it looks to me. The government seems to behave the same way. Where else can one have a national deficit (debt) that is greater than its income yet continue to exist?
Small business doesn’t work that way. Small business requires that you actually have more income than outgo. In small business, if you don’t pay your debts, you go out of business. If you run out of money, you can’t just go in the back and print up some more. Besides, the federal government doesn’t like that and will arrest you (they don’t like the competition). It seems to me that the federal government likes to say, “Do as I say, not as I do.”
So, just who is it that will stand up and say, “Wait a minute. This isn’t working. Before we go telling other people how to live and operate their businesses, shouldn’t we fix our own?”
How do we change our government? How do we fix it? Who will do the fixing? Has our government become so large and segregated that we can’t change things? Have we become a society of people so much more concerned about the latest fashions and whether or not a sports star is having an affair that we have no room for concern about the state of our country’s future?
Many years ago, when I was much younger and a member of 4-H, I had the opportunity to perform at the Evergreen State Fair as a member of the horse drill team. I remember feeling very powerful and in control as I directed my very large horse within the group of twenty or so other horses. There was no little pride for me as I trotted and loped and turned and twirled in time with my team-mates. Then, after we’d finished, I was sitting astride my horse outside of the arena.
The act that followed us was the team of Budweiser Clydesdales. There were eight of those huge horses pulling an equally huge wagon, and their finale included running from one end of the arena, at a full gallop, through the exit. While it definitely took a bit of time to get those horses up to speed, once they were at a full gallop, there was deafening thunder and awing, intimidating power… and it was coming toward me and my suddenly-tiny horse very, very quickly.
I think about that image when I ponder our current government. Has it gotten so big, so fast and so wildly powerful that all we can do is get out of the way? Is the person driving those horses capable of holding on to all of those sets of reins, let alone capable of controlling the beasts? Is anyone actually driving the team at all or has the driver simply gotten so out of control that all they can do is hold on and hope the horses choose to stop before they kill someone?
I don’t have the answers, I have only questions and a few, simple ideas. I don’t know how to get those ideas enacted. I don’t even know if my ideas should be enacted. I do, however, recognize that what we’re doing currently isn’t working.
They say that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, expecting a different result.
It is, indeed, a time for change, but who is going to change things, what are they going to change and how are they going to do it?
Until next time…
D. S. Vic
Please include Northwest Journal in the subject line of all Email. JD_DSVic at Yahoo.com
Copyright © 2010 D. S. Vic
All rights reserved.
Political Ponderings part two
Part Two, continued from Tuesday’s Column
(My opinions don’t necessarily reflect those of the hosts of this website, its subsidiaries or friends or family or anyone else even loosely connected with anyone who may, at one time or another, have glanced at this website! These are my opinions alone. Please don’t sue me.)
Thing Two: No more electoral college.
In this day and age, when a simple computer program can count millions upon millions of “clicks” for a specific ad on a specific website, why can’t we have a simple program to calculate votes? One legal adult gets one legal vote. It’s simple.
Each adult citizen of the United States, legal immigrants included, has a unique-to-them Social Security or Immigrant Identification Number. Enter that number in the box on a secure website, make your specific selection then tabulate those results. If McDonald’s can verify whether or not I’ve already entered a specific game piece code, and stop me from entering that code again, certainly a voting website can do so as well!
I don’t think individual votes count within the electoral college system. Since we now have the technology to count each individual vote, I say we do that.
Also, the voting website should be simple. The name should be simple, vote.com for instance. There should be an absolute minimum of graphics/pictures/images. The first page says “hello”, gives a very brief (three sentences or less) explanation of what “click the link” means and provides links to the main pages of the website (ie: list of candidates and the secure voting page). The list of candidates is exactly that, a list of names which link the websurfer to that specific candidate’s page (not a separate website, but a single page within the Vote.com website). This list of candidates can be grouped by federal, state and local governmental offices so that they’re easier to locate.
Thing Three: Campaign Spending.
Since civil service will be an unpaid position, there should be no charge for public announcements of candidacy or commercials for each candidate. Each candidate gets two thirty-second ads on television and two on radio. The first ad is aired during September. The second ad is aired during the last week of October, immediately before voting commences. If candidates want to enter debates, they are allowed to do so, but the venue must be public and free (ie: a public park).
Candidates must, of course, apply for candidacy, but anyone who meets the standard requirements is welcome. Those standard requirements would be simple and few. Each candidate must be at least thirty years old, be a citizen by birth (or an immigrant who has been granted naturalized citizen status for at least thirty years), have no criminal record (including misdemeanors) and have the skill set appropriate for the desired office (ie: if you want to be a mechanic, you have to have mechanical skills/experience).
The ads are to be a statement of the candidate’s qualifications for the office. The first time a candidate implicitly or tacitly says anything negative about another candidate, they are given a slap-on-the-wrist fine. The second time a candidate “slings mud”, they are ejected from the race. One should NEVER be voted into office based on how bad the other guy is. You don’t go to a job interview and bad mouth your previous employer, co-workers or customers; at least, not if you want the job. Instead, you state why you’re qualified for the position for which you’re applying.
Also, each candidate’s application and qualifications will be posted on the candidacy website. If a candidate wants buttons, bumper stickers or promotional items, they can go to CafePress and create those items. The candidate is then allowed to include the URL of their specific CafePress site in the links on their specific page of the candidacy website. Any profit made on those items will go into the account with all the other tax payer money, thus eliminating financial gain.
*End Part Two
Until next time…
D. S. Vic
Please include Northwest Journal in the subject line of all Email. JD_DSVic at Yahoo.com
Copyright © 2010 D. S. Vic
All rights reserved.
Political Ponderings
(These Political Ponderings are spread out over three columns. This is part one.)
At no other time in history has the U. S. political climate been so volatile – unless, of course, you remember as far into the past as 2009. If your memory stretches that far, you might well find some volatility. Still, the current political climate is rather… bumpy. (How a “climate” can be “bumpy” I don’t know. Just try to follow my mental spew-age.)
For the first time in my public life, I am going to state my political opinions. This is a dangerous thing to do as it could cause some rather negative results. I could, A) lose a large portion of my 2-member readership (thanks for reading, Mom and Dad.), B) irritate someone a lot, C) confuse someone (a lot) and/or D) get – God Forbid! – sued. So, to anyone who might get offended at what I’m about to say, please, please, please don’t sue me. I don’t get paid enough to pay you if you win a court case. Also, I’m fairly certain that anyone who would sue me wouldn’t drop the suit just for a batch of home-made chocolate chip cookies.
In addition, my opinions don’t necessarily reflect those of the hosts of this website, its subsidiaries or friends or family or anyone else even loosely connected with anyone who may, at one time or another, have glanced at this website! In fact, I’m pretty sure that my specific opinions aren’t shared by anyone else in the entirety of the world. Bottom line? Please don’t get ticked off or offended by anything I say in this column. Please. I’m begging here.
That said, my opinion is this:
I think that our (the U. S.) current political system is dysfunctional in a big, big way. I think that our elected officials, generally speaking, have become little more than glory hounds seeking ways in which they can get something for nothing (or get a lot for very little) and prima donnas in search of attention. The elected officials who seem to work FOR the people are few and far between. I haven’t seen or heard of any, save Rudy Giuliani and one gentleman in Southwestern Idaho, in a long, long time.
I hear a lot of people complain about politics and politicians, but I don’t see or hear many suggestions for doing it differently. To that end, the following are my ideas for a “fantasy” government. I have no clue if my ideas would work, but they’re ideas and there’ve been a significant lack of those lately.
Thing One: Is one’s governmental position a “job” or a “service”?
It seems to me that most political offices have become little more than jobs candidates do in order to get prestige, glory and/or goods. While the actual paycheck may not be so great, the gossiped-about “perks” of the job more than make up for it. Personally, after doing a bit of research, I don’t think the paycheck is bad at all. I specifically cite congressional pay below.
According to US Government Information at About.com, the Speaker of the House earns approximately $223,500 annually. House and Senate Leaders earn approximately $193,400 annually. Rank-and-file members of the House and Senate are paid approximately $174,000.
I believe that in concert with the salary, most political offices also provide a few standard perks, such as housing and transportation allowances. However, after about 45 minutes of research through various sites, I still couldn’t find any list of standard perks/benefits of political office. So, I gave up.
The point is these are “civil servants”. Should they be “earning” more than four times their publics’ annual salaries? Since when does a servant earn more than their employer? And, if a servant isn’t accomplishing the job they were hired to do, don’t they get fired?
My suggested solution? I think that public servants should not get an annual salary at all. I think there should be a modest house, purchased with already-collected taxes, in which the civil servant lives. (I see no need for a government official to live in opulent splendor.) The house, however, belongs to the office, not the elected official. Personally, I think a nice, four bedroom-three bathroom house should be sufficient.
Likewise, there should be a vehicle or two (I’d suggest two; one for the official and one for the spouse), which the official can use while in office. Said vehicle will be replaced when it costs more to repair it than to purchase a new one. As with the house, the vehicle belongs to the office, not the person holding it.
Each office would also have a living expense allowance (ie: grocery budget, gas money, modest clothing allowance, etc). Additionally, gifts/monetary awards go to the office, not the official; financial gain is deposited in the account along with the rest of the taxes the citizenry pay.
– As a side note, where do the taxes go? Is there an account? Are they put in the bank? Where, exactly, does the actual money go? –
All in all, there is no financial gain during one’s term of office; with one caveat. After one has concluded their term in office, whether it was one year or thirty, the people they served are allowed to give a one-time gift – of up to $100 per legal adult – to the servant. It logically follows that if the civil servant did a good job, they’ll get a bigger “bonus” than one who wasn’t as effective. (I might go as high as $500 per legal adult, but I’m not sure.)
I think that if one took the monetary motive away from the position, a great many people would opt out of politics. Atop that, I think that a “better class of person” would seek such office. I don’t know if you’ve noticed or not, but it takes a certain breed of character and integrity to do a thankless job on a voluntary basis. If there’s a higher level of character and integrity in those who hold positions of office, the logical result would be a higher level of character within government itself.
*End Part One
Until next time…
D. S. Vic
Please include Northwest Journal in the subject line of all Email. JD_DSVic at Yahoo.com
Copyright © 2010 D. S. Vic
All rights reserved
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