End lobbying by "for-profit" entities, and change election financing rules.

[SoCalDem]

and we could get control of our government again.

The way things are now, we will keep riding the merry-go-round of bust-boom.

We have all been told about how wonderful the new digital revolution in television is going to be..and we have heard about all the wonderful NEW channels we will all get..

so why not this scenario?

PART 1

Every state gets two new channels...

Democratic politics
Republican politics

and we get two national channels of the same..

ALL politics would be relegated to those channels, and every politician would get free air-time on them..and NO commercials by politicians would be allowed on any other channel.

NO PAID POLITICAL ADS...anywhere..

So....we would have an election where politicians would not NEED to have 38 million dollars to run for a 2 yr job that pays a total income of less than $250K..

we would also have representatives/senators who were not beholden to lobbyists who were stuffing money into their pockets for "favors".. Anyone who DID accept money (or any compensation) from a lobbyist would be breaking the law, and terminated immediately.

CORPORATIONS ALREADY LOBBY US ALL..every time we buy their products..every time we see their commercials..

The only "need" for campaign money could easily come from internet participation (as evidenced by the way dean and Obama raised money in small increments from millions of people).. There should be a LIMIT of $100 per donation, with an upper limit of $1k per person,,per cycle.. If you cannot drum up enough support to pay a staff and buy signs & mailings, then maybe you don't have enough good ideas to inspire enough people to deserve to win..:evilgrin:

PART 2

Limit government participation to :

2 consecutive 6 year terms for any senator
2 consecutive 4 year terms for any congressperson.

NO PENSIONS FOR ANYONE SERVING LESS THAN 20 CONSECUTIVE YEARS..
12+8=20..

the only way to get a pension is to serve 2 consecutive terms in each body of congress.

Serve your country and then GO HOME!! (like the founding fathers intended)

PART 3

Expand the senate to 3 per state
Expand the house to 1 congressperson per 200K people in the state
Re-draw ALL congressional districts on rational dividing lines (we have computers that can easily do this..maybe by zip-code)

PART 4

Make voting an "opt-OUT" system, instead of an "opt-IN" .. Every citizen is automatically registered to vote at age 18..

Voter registration should be NON partisan.. Parties would be like "clubs", that voters could choose to "join", but the voting records would be secret.

When a primary happens, all that's needed is to choose which ballot you want..you can only get one..(R or D), but no notation of what party YOU are, should be included in the official records.

A national voter ID card should be issued to everyone on their 16th birthday, and just proof of address (for voting in local elections ) would be all that was necessary. Convenience stores can swipe your debit card easily, so why couldn't polling places do the same.. that would register the fact that that particular voter has voted, and since they signed in too, it could easily be verified..

Elections would be broken into TWO distinct ballots.
1)..nationally held offices (senate/congress/president)
2)..local/state offices/issues

Standardized Paper cardstock ballots with a sharpie pen..and real live people to count those votes IN PLACE..at the end of the day, and CCTV video of the whole process .. is all that's needed..

Local/state ballots could be done any way the state/county/city wants them to be.


We got where we are now, by lobbyists funding legislators, in exchange for "sweet deals" to those lobbyists & their clients.

When we refused to take control of our elections, we assured that some "wrong" people make it to DC, and occupied seats of power that allowed them to create laws that never should have been ... One or two "wrong" senators led to a majority that obstructed investigations that might have mitigated the troubles we are in now..

And the collegial "covering" that senators like Lieberman, and other "bi-partisan" democrats do, adds to the nonsensical legislation that allows massive fraud to take place. When ONE democrat takes money from a lobbyist, they are complicit when frauds occur..Even is 99% of the smelly deals are perpetrated by republicans, that 1% will be ballyhooed by the press with equal alacrity.

Lobbying is not ALL bad..just the lobbying by corporate entities and organizations who are profit-driven.. If their product/ business plan is not strong enough to stand-alone, they do not deserve to stay in business..Laws should be about protecting ALL of us..not the few corporations/ richest of us whose only reason to exist is to make money..at any cost to the public.