“Romney heard about an award that goes to the lyingest liar who ever lied in the history of liars, and now he’s so eager to win the award that he’s becoming a parody of himself.”
Breaking new ground in Chutzpah Politics
Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan intend to end Medicare, replacing it with a private voucher scheme. So, naturally, the first campaign commercial from the Republican ticket since the weekend’s announcement is an attack ad going after President Obama on … Medicare.
While millions of ordinary Americans are struggling with unemployment and declining standards of living, the levers of real power have been all but completely commandeered by the financial and corporate elite. It doesn’t really matter what ordinary people want. The wealthy call the tune, and the politicians dance. [...]
The poor, who are suffering from an all-out depression, are never heard from. In terms of their clout, they might as well not exist. The Obama forces reportedly want to raise a billion dollars or more for the president’s re-election bid. Politicians in search of that kind of cash won’t be talking much about the wants and needs of the poor. They’ll be genuflecting before the very rich.
…and that means corporations.
The only way to stop this is to stop the flow of money between corporations and the politicians they want to buy.
As any average person will tell you, the heart of the problem is that elected officials take money from interested parties.
Whether it’s technically legal or not, accepting money as a public servant is a form of bribery, and it serves to fundamentally corrupt democracy.
We don’t let cops, customs agents, or federal judges take money from the people they’re serving. We should hold elected officials to the same standards. They should be out of the fundraising business altogether.
To pull this off you would first need an underlying constitutional amendment to provide a solid foundation. So here it is, in less than twenty words:
No elected member of the legislative or executive branch shall accept money, in-kind donations, offers of employment or anything of value from non-citizens of the United States.
What this does is recognize the (unfortunate) reality that, while corporations have been deemed “people,” there is nothing that recognizes them as citizens. That said, this amendment would be a solid first step in excluding the ability of corporations, sovereign wealth funds, PACs and others from providing money to the campaigns of any incumbent politician.
More work needs to be done, of course. But this is the first step.
I know what you’re thinking: no congressman will vote this amendment through to the states; no state politician will approve it. No matter. Under Article V of the Constitution, two-thirds of the states may apply for the creation of a convention to propose amendments and the Congress must then create one. I think we are at a moment in time that this could easily happen — and it would have very broad support across the the political spectrum from the “tea party” Republicans to progressive Democrats and everyone in between.
If Egypt can do it, we can too.
If I were running for election in 2012, these are the three issues I’d run on:
Green Jobs: Move our workforce into a sustainable future. For example, take workers off the oil rigs in the Gulf of Mexico and put them to work making wind generators and solar panels. You heard me: the pay is the same; it’s less dangerous; and it’s sustainable. Like Pres. Obama says:
We need to get behind this innovation. And to help pay for it, I’m asking Congress to eliminate the billions in taxpayer dollars we currently give to oil companies. I don’t know if — I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but they’re doing just fine on their own. So instead of subsidizing yesterday’s energy, let’s invest in tomorrow’s.
…and this leads to Big Thing #2…
Clean Air and Water: No more oil rigs in the Gulf means no more volcanos of oil soiling the water, the beaches and marshes of the Gulf coast. Come on, stop being in denial — you know it’s going to happen again and again and again. So stop tempting fate. There’s too much at stake.
And another thing: hunters and fishermen — not typically a Democratic constituency — will be with you on this. You will get their votes in great numbers because they respect what a clean environment means to them and their children.
In Lousiana, for example, it means giving your children what your parents gave you: an opportunity for a job, an opportunity for recreation, an opportunity for freedom. A filthy environment takes all of that away from you. It forecloses the future.
[Sotto voce: You're also doing the right thing to mitigate climate change.]
All Americans have that common goal: to eventually give the environment to our children so that they can carry on the legacy we received from our parents.
Strong National Security: Energy independence means you can eventually stop being held hostage by hostile oil-producing states that use the money we pay at the pump to fund terrorism around the globe. Dry up that money and you take away a lot of their power.
Again, this is something that everyone — Democrats and Republicans, liberals and conservatives — can agree on: when you buy foreign oil, you are funding terrorists. So move our economy into a greener future. It will provide sustainable jobs and will give our children a cleaner safer world — and make us safer against the outside forces of terror.
So my imaginary stump speech would conclude with this: No one — no nation — has ever cut its way to prosperity. To prosper, you have to do big things.
UPDATE: Here’s what my Congressman Rep. Bill Cassidy (LA-06) says:
“We in Louisiana understand that wind and solar can never replace natural gas and oil, and that’s what he spoke about doing tonight,” Cassidy said after the president’s speech.
That reminds me of what Henry Ford once said: “If I had asked my customers what they wanted, they would have said a faster horse.”
…Or what I’ve seen on more than one motivational poster: “The best way to predict the future is to create it.”
…Or what Marshall McLuhan said: “The future of the future is the present. And this is what people are terrified of.”