FIX THIS! No more "the system obviously works because nobody was beaten with a cane" excuses.

[TrollBuster9090]

Does anybody remember this golden moment in Satyrical Theatre after the economy was nearly wrecked for the second time in three years over the Debt Ceiling Crisis? Harry Reid took to the Senate floor and told us to cheer up, because your Government isn't really as dysfunctional as you think. After all, nobody was beaten nearly to death with a cane, the way Charles Sumner was in 1856.

So, apparently, THIS is the high water mark for a dysfunctional government, and there's no reason to be upset over the one we have now?



Sorry, but like you, I don't think that's good enough. As we race towards the 'fiscal cliff' (simultaneous tax increases and spending cuts during a recession...aka the worst of both worlds) there will be only a small window of time when Barack Obama will have LEVERAGE over both chambers of Congress.

The President has chosen to make his last stand, and use this leverage over the idea that the wealthy should stop getting a free ride, and pay more to support their country. He needs to add three more things to the list:

1. Voting Reform.
2. Campaign Finance Reform, and
3. Reformation of the Senate Filibuster rules.

I don't want to see ANY Democrats giving the pathetic excuse for a voting process we now have a PASS just because A) Obama got re-elected IN SPITE OF Republican State governments throwing everything but the kitchen sink into the path of Democratic voters, , and B) Maybe next time WE'LL control the State governments, and we can do the same to them.


1. The Voting System is BROKEN and needs to be REPAIRED!

It's EASY! Congress has the power to regulate voting in Federal Elections (look it up...it ain't another stupid 'States Rights issue.') Simply get the Treasury to print up PAPER BALLOTS with serial numbers on them, that can be counted by optical readers. Then mandate a certain number of voting stations and machines PER CAPITA in each district. NO BALLOT INITIATIVES ALLOWED on the Federal Ballot! If states want to screw around with ballot initiatives to flush out their favorite voters, that's fine. They can use all the ten page ballots and crooked Diebold voting machines for that, but it cannot intrude on the Federal PAPER ballot, which will be kept around after the election for recount purposes. If the serial numbers on the ballots don't match, you know there's some fraud going on. Early voting periods and absentee ballot requirements will be mandated by federal law, too, so they're the same everywhere.

2. Campaign Finance Reform might be a bridge too far this time around, but it can at least be used as a BARGAINING CHIP. ie-asking for BOTH donation limits and complete transparency (naming donors, and not allowing PACs to operate as charities or money laundering operations), and then 'settling' for the latter.

3. Again, as a BARGAINING POSITION, push for elimination of the Senate Filibuster and then 'settle' for a RETURN to the way Senate Filibusters USED to work. ie-if you want to filibuster you literally have to hold the Senate floor until you drop from exhaustion. If that method was good enough for the Civil Rights legislation battle of the 1960s, it's good enough for issues now. Yes, that means Republicans wanting to filibuster Democratic initiatives in the Senate will have to be prepared to stand on their feet for 20 hours, with a bursting bladder, reading names from the phonebook; and Democrats will have to be prepared to sleep in their offices for a month with the expectation the GOP will call a surprise vote during a filibuster. SO WHAT? So you have to put a little PASSION back into your law making. It's about time somebody shook up that comfortable old boys club anyways.

We've got both TRADITION and HOLLYWOOD on our side. The public will ACCEPT a return to the traditional filibuster.

[TrollBuster9090]

2. I'm a product of badly funded public schooling, what can I say? ;P

I'll edit.

[Dark n Stormy Knight]

4. You know, the forward slash means "end," so the off is redundant. For instance,

"/rant" means "end of rant." So when people put "/rant over" or similar, that's just wrong.

Sorry. /terminology police mode

[TrollBuster9090]

6. Yeah, I've been chewed out for using a ;) winkey as a closing bracket.

All of this internet etiquette is too much for me.

[Dark n Stormy Knight]

9. Just to be clear, I was responding toNMDemDist2 who had corrected you, so I was good-naturedly

ribbing fNMDemDist for his/her own error. S/he deleted his/her post, which makes this confusing.

Also, sorry your thread ended up being mostly this meta crap, because it deserved better, but the meta is still a bump. Sometimes posts just sink due to timing.

[NMDemDist2]

7. ahh, love to learn something new

thanks!

[Dark n Stormy Knight]

8. Cool. I love people who love to learn. I'm a teacher, by profession, so, not a surprise. Btw, that

particular use of the forward slash comes from computer programming.

When you're typing a reply on DU some time, highlight a word you've written and click the "i" up there under the "Reply title" text box. You will see a bracketed i, for italic appear in front of the word. And you will see brackets containing a forward slash followed by an "i" appearing after it. That's tells the browser to start italicizing at the beginning of the word and to end the italicizing after it. Click the Preview button to see it rendered.

I'm no coding expert by any means, but that's basic HTML. Now you know almost as much as I do about it.

[NMDemDist2]

10. yes

and i deleted my post as soon as the OP changed the spelling. I agree the topic was important so i'll just give it one more kick eh?

[Dark n Stormy Knight]

11. The problem is deleting after you have replies. No biggie, but you can see why. And here's another

kick.

[NMDemDist2]

12. maybe someone will think i got too edgy

a girl can hope.....

[Dark n Stormy Knight]

14. I can start a rumor you used the forward slash in a provocative manner, if that would help.

[AndyTiedye]

3. What is this "Leverage" that Obama is Supposed to Have over the House of Teabaggers

Only one man has any leverage over the House, a man that was never elected to anything by anybody:
Grover Norquist

[TrollBuster9090]

5. That's a good point, but even Norquist was squirming to find a way out of his own rhetoric during

the debt ceiling crisis. He left the window open for his gang of Frankenstein's monsters by saying that closing loopholes and 'lowering rates' does not amount to a tax increase. So...who cares if the arithmetic doesn't add up. Teabaggers don't DO arithmetic.

So....you close every loophole in the tax code to those who earn more than $250K (from any/all) sources, and then 'lower the rates' by 1%, to give Norquist and the GOP some 'cosmetic cover.'

This is probably the only time in history when the President will have this kind of power over Congress. IF THEY DO NOTHING, taxes will increase, and the Presidential VETO gives the President the power to make sure they can't do anything about either the tax increases of the sequester. It's the biggest Presidential 'CLUB' I've seen in my lifetime.

[Odin2005]

13. Reid was wrong, the political climate has not been this bad since the 1850s.

There is a new book out on the beating of Sumner and it's context in the downward spiral towards civil war called The Caning, the the similarities between then and now are scary. the hysterical, violent, and apocalyptic rhetoric of the Right today is very similar to that of the "Fire-Eater" Southrons in the 1850s. During the lead up to Bloody Kansas the anti-slavery settlers in Kansas were peaceful settlers while the pro-slavery settlers were violent ruffians subsidized by slave state governments and told to "lynch every damn abolitionist". Much like all the violent rhetoric from the Teabaggers today.

[Dark n Stormy Knight]

15. Hoping the mass media can serve at least one purpose in its ability to report this crap at a certain

point early enough that a non-violent backlash would be effective.