as great as that would be to make elections fair you know that will never be passed.

Maybe not just yet, but soon - I think as popular pressure builds, and popularity grows, every politician wants more than anything to be re-elected, and if the pressure to pass an amendment exceeds all other motivators, they will pass the amendment. Although, it does take a very well organized, well funded, effective organization to apply this pressure, so that's the one thing which must be done to fully mobilize citizen pressure, and I think Occupy Wall Street is starting to build that in coordination with many non-profits that work for the public good. The whole issue really cuts across ideological lines, clearly a government of, by, and for we, the people, which has been hijacked into a government of, by, and for the .1% cannot stand. I have faith in the movement, it's time for many changes to happen.

Progress happens in waves, gradually momentum builds and long overdue corrections happen; seen from a day-to-day view, it's a back-and-forth motion, but from the long-view it's clear we make progress this way.

Today was an interesting one for the Occupy Movement - the US Supreme Court was briefly occupied! and K street's occupation began; plus more news from sunny California: Occupy Wall Street | NYC Protest for World Revolution

BOSTON OCCUPY MOVEMENT CAMP CLEARED (between 10 and 11.12.11)

Good to see more voices joining the chorus of occupiers demanding economic justice, democracy, freedom, and wholesome food in the occupy camp. Farmers and Community Business join the movement:

Turnstyle: In Occupy Wall Street, Some Small Farmers Find a Natural Ally

 

Main Street small businesses stand with occupy Wall Street - Community Times: Perspectives

Occupy Wall Street | NYC Protest for World Revolution

I actually got to make it to see Occupy Wall Street and went there w/ Nick (Mr. Lick) when he came to visit nyc... unfortunately there was only like 5 people there...

I actually got to make it to see Occupy Wall Street and went there w/ Nick (Mr. Lick) when he came to visit nyc... unfortunately there was only like 5 people there...

> :stunned::stunned: Mike, that's fantastic! And Nick too, wow, I'm impressed!! I sure missed this post, my apologies!

So the movement is somewhat overwintering I gather? Anyhow, I hope it stays alive, I feel it must as the issues are still there, we've got to fix what's broken with our system, it surely won't fix itself.

Occupy Wall Street | NYC Protest for World Revolution

Occupy Wall Street | NYC Protest for World Revolution

 

Occupy Retakes Liberty Square in NYC!:sunny:

 

> Lawrence Lessig proposes caps on candidate donations to restore true democracy, and proposes a State's Constitutional Convention governed by a citizen body selected at random, much like jury duty: [ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ik1AK56FtVc]@Google: Lawrence Lessig: Republic, Lost: How Money Corrupts Congress—and a Plan to Stop It - YouTube[/ame]

 

He was on On-Point today, his proposal was to offer everyone a $50 tax rebate to all taxpaying individuals, to be sent to candidate of choice during a given election cycle, and a maximum contribution limit of $100 per person to the candidate of their choice.

Reverend Billy's Message to us all!!

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aJ8sjHweKgg&feature=player_embedded]Reverend Billy's Holy Day Message from Zuccotti Square - YouTube[/ame]

 

Come May, we will be celebrating:sunny:

+Direct Democracy

+Fair Economies

+Protecting Earth

 

Revolujah!

He was on On-Point today, his proposal was to offer everyone a $50 tax rebate to all taxpaying individuals, to be sent to candidate of choice during a given election cycle, and a maximum contribution limit of $100 per person to the candidate of their choice.

 

I guess it's better than forcing people to pay for unnecessary wars, but it still amounts to a tax to be given directly to the political machine itself.

 

Chuck, I find it interesting/ironic you're not a huge fan of Ron Paul. After all, he has raised the most money in individual donations. And he leads all the other candidates in military donations (times two!). Power to the people, as you like to say.

I guess it's better than forcing people to pay for unnecessary wars, but it still amounts to a tax to be given directly to the political machine itself.

 

Chuck, I find it interesting/ironic you're not a huge fan of Ron Paul. After all, he has raised the most money in individual donations. And he leads all the other candidates in military donations (times two!). Power to the people, as you like to say.

 

His idea is that it's better it go to us first, then to their campaigns, than just circumvent us and go from plutocrats to politicians, that way the politicians will work for us. A rather expensive stone to cast into the proverbial Greek jar, it may add up to a sum much larger then what they currently shake the elites down for and maybe tip the balance. Personally, I'd rather cap the donation limit at 1/2% or 1/4% of median income level per citizen, use census figures to determine that, and no outside money used in campaigns - yes to public candidate forums, all equal time slots, open debates (no horse trading of topics), and no ads.

 

Well, I'm not a big fan of Ron Paul quite yet because I believe we do need a reasonably sized government, especially to provide social and economic safety-nets for average citizens, and for public works and basic research, things common to us all but often unsupported otherwise. I do think however that our military budget is very excessive and should be greatly reduced, much of that money then applied to peace initiatives to foster good will and real tangible economic improvements in places which truly need them.

I haven't followed his proposals fully, nor looked into his finances (if they are fully disclosed), I will do that!

My philosophy is that we can achieve true representative democracy, permitting agencies to do their jobs, and we do need oversight and regulation to protect those things we share in common from unethical practices, and more promotion of public works and basic research.

Chuck, please don't view me as a total pessimist. I am a government-skeptic (anarchist, even) but I do think that decentralized government is superior to big, centralized government.

 

So I look to a country like Switzerland or Liechtenstein as good examples of small governments. Even Denmark, with it's massive government-spending (as a % of GDP) is preferable to me over America's massive geographic area/population. Democracy is a "signal system" which doesn't work quite as accurately as the voluntary price system of the market, but it can... function (for a time). I believe it functions best on smaller scales.

Chuck, please don't view me as a total pessimist. I am a government-skeptic (anarchist, even) but I do think that decentralized government is superior to big, centralized government.

 

So I look to a country like Switzerland or Liechtenstein as good examples of small governments. Even Denmark, with it's massive government-spending (as a % of GDP) is preferable to me over America's massive geographic area/population. Democracy is a "signal system" which doesn't work quite as accurately as the voluntary price system of the market, but it can... function (for a time). I believe it functions best on smaller scales.

> Jay, those countries play different roles than the US does, they act as either secure banking hubs (Lichtenstein, Switzerland) and hence a greater standard-of-living, or places of well-managed businesses with government safety-nets for citizens (Denmark). If you're thinking about revisiting the idea of stronger states loosely confederated into a federal system here, I see what you're suggesting, but I think we're better off with a greater role for the Federal Government, since it can help equalize opportunity for all in the form of educational opportunities and access to quality schools, guarantees of protection of our shared commons, and a greater striving for our shared rights as citizens. When we had separate states, there was a great deal of friction and isolationism between the states (each printing and coining their own money, fighting over land claims, very unequal citizen's rights, less unified defensive strength in the world, a hampering of commerce, a drawing inwardly into each, a sort of fort mentality. I'm not sure I find that an attractive option in this day and age, as exciting and creative as those times were during and just after the American revolution.

What I am suggesting is to reform what we've got, since the central problems seem to be the unaddressed issues, the ones the framers didn't foresee; they assumed that representatives would naturally be selected by local citizens with no need for campaigns like we see today, and those elected would dutifully represent their constituency, and act as members of an enlightenment, just government. The main reason our central government is dysfunctional, as well as our states' governments, is because of the undue influence of the wealth of a few ultimately controlling the political process, and obtaining great favoritism in return, to the detriment of our democracy. Hence, the need for amendments, and for reform legislation to put teeth into those rights to fair, equal, and honest representation. Then centralized government can serve us well, and improve those things that we need most and are common to us all, like revamping roads, dams and bridges, access to quality education, fair and affordable health care, improved communications infrastructure, a defense department that is in line with what is called for, not excessive nor inappropriately applied.

I believe that is possible, simply by stating our rights clearly and by demanding laws be written to ensure that our democracy is representative of our will as citizens, respectful of individual rights, and promotes the common good.

So in thinking about how to reassert our rights as citizens over our governments, and set up the right conditions within the governing bodies to act on our behalf to protect our rights and our shared commons, some ideas passed through my mind in adding amendments and laws to restore our democracies:

1.) Declare and define our right to fair candidate contests for office & fair elections as essential for honest government and thus for protection of all rights we hold dear.

 

2.) Limit campaign contributions from any individual to no more than a level affordable to the broad majority of citizens. 1/4 of 1% of the median income level, for instance. Make clear that only live human beings can be considered citizens - not corporations, nor groups of any sort.

 

3.) Put a citizen's panel in charge of the debates. Use a random selection of citizens charged with this responsibility to oversee the debates, keep open the questions so a broad spectrum of the voting public's concerns are addressed.

 

4.) Open up the debates to all qualifying candidates garnering a reasonable level of public interest; 1% of a constituency seems sufficient a level for anyone seeking office to garner for their candidacy to be salient and for the public to see them as potential representatives.

 

5.) Set reasonable term limits constitutionally. Enough to permit a representative of the people time to become familiar with office to do their duties and become effective, but not so much that the dangers of them becoming entrenched power-brokers becomes a real possibility.

 

6.) Open up the airwaves to all qualified candidates on an equal basis, for in selecting representation all candidates having ideas and proposals in managing our government should be heard equally well.

 

7.) Place a citizen's representative between lobbyists and elected officials, to check any potential conflicts of interest and protect our right as citizens to honest government.

 

8.) State clearly that no outgoing representative of the people be allowed to enter into lobbying or consulting with present representatives; the clear conflicts of interest we see today, with all their negative impacts on our government, must be addressed, and the need to fix this is as urgently as ever.

 

9.) Create a department of the future, to better prepare for that future, since long-term thinking and planning seems to be lacking.

Chuck, please don't view me as a total pessimist. I am a government-skeptic (anarchist, even) but I do think that decentralized government is superior to big, centralized government.

 

So I look to a country like Switzerland or Liechtenstein as good examples of small governments. Even Denmark, with it's massive government-spending (as a % of GDP) is preferable to me over America's massive geographic area/population. Democracy is a "signal system" which doesn't work quite as accurately as the voluntary price system of the market, but it can... function (for a time). I believe it functions best on smaller scales.

Are you sure you want to be calling yourself an anarchist? Because you're right, that's not pessimism. That's plain stupidity.

Personally I don't think companies should be ever be bailed out from the government. It doesn't make any sense. When you think about it, why should anyone get bailed out and what makes them more deserving than other companies or organizations?

 

If you cannot run your business properly or run it into the ground then you deserve to fail and shouldn't be bailed out. If I as a person (for an example) made bad decisions completely ignoring the warnings to my bad practices or not even caring about eventual consequences then why should I be allowed to be helped out?

 

As cruel or as cynical as it sounds I think you have to follow this, because if you put the option on the table of a bail out it opens the door for companies to be easily careless.

What about the thousands of people who work for these large companies that have absolutely no say in how the business is being run?

 

Company bankruptcy does not only negatively affect the big bad CEOs. It affects every person who works for the company. If those people lost their jobs, how would the economy be then?

 

It's rather infuriating that these big businessmen/women are so incompetent, but like it or not, our economy is primarily built off of them. The bailouts were necessary. You can't change an entire system in a day. You have to bandage the wound before you can stitch it up.

What about the thousands of people who work for these large companies that have absolutely no say in how the business is being run?

 

Company bankruptcy does not only negatively affect the big bad CEOs. It affects every person who works for the company. If those people lost their jobs, how would the economy be then?

 

It's rather infuriating that these big businessmen/women are so incompetent, but like it or not, our economy is primarily built off of them. The bailouts were necessary. You can't change an entire system in a day. You have to bandage the wound before you can stitch it up.

 

I'm not saying that there's not going to be damage done on one end or another. Of course it affects everyone who works for them and it sucks.

 

But at the same time the bailouts shouldn't be done by the government. What right do they honestly have to meddle into what companies survive or not? And how do you choose those companies or banks? How is that fair to the thousands of companies over the years that have gone under?

 

What infuriates me most of all is the fact that even though all this happened neither Bush or Obama did a single thing to put any kind of accountability on these people, and they still run the companies! It's absurd and makes me think that it was all done to help their crony friends.

Are you sure you want to be calling yourself an anarchist? Because you're right, that's not pessimism. That's plain stupidity.

 

Why don't you listen to what people have to say instead of calling names?

 

Company bankruptcy does not only negatively affect the big bad CEOs. It affects every person who works for the company. If those people lost their jobs, how would the economy be then?

 

Do you even understand how bankruptcy works? Employees aren't always fired during a bankruptcy.

 

And the goal of an economy isn't to create jobs. It's to produce goods and services that consumers demand.

I'm not saying that there's not going to be damage done on one end or another. Of course it affects everyone who works for them and it sucks.

 

But at the same time the bailouts shouldn't be done by the government. What right do they honestly have to meddle into what companies survive or not? And how do you choose those companies or banks? How is that fair to the thousands of companies over the years that have gone under?

 

What infuriates me most of all is the fact that even though all this happened neither Bush or Obama did a single thing to put any kind of accountability on these people, and they still run the companies! It's absurd and makes me think that it was all done to help their crony friends.

 

Exactly. All arguments in favor of bailouts are favoring the existing power structure. If the existing power structure doesn't add value to society, it isn't worth keeping around.

 

There's an easy way to know if a business or institution is adding value to society - just ask yourself, "is it profitable?" If not, then it shouldn't exist. It's a waste of scarce resources that could be better-used in another way.

Why don't you listen to what people have to say instead of calling names?

 

 

 

Do you even understand how bankruptcy works? Employees aren't always fired during a bankruptcy.

 

And the goal of an economy isn't to create jobs. It's to produce goods and services that consumers demand.

I didn't call any names bro. And I read all of what you had to say, which is the whole reason I responded in the first place. Anarchy is a word to be laughed at and nothing more. Minuscule government isn't much better.

 

And you're wrong, by the way. The economy can be divided into two parts. Macroeconomics, whose goals are mainly full employment, stability, and general growth, and microeconomics, whose goals are primarily equity and efficiency.

 

Yeah not always. But a lot of the time. Is that really a risk you want to take? Look at General Motors. They cut over 20,000 jobs when they went bankrupt.

 

The flawed system we have going on right now will not be magically fixed by simply letting businesses go under. It will make things a LOT worse before they get better, if they even get better at all.

I'm not saying that there's not going to be damage done on one end or another. Of course it affects everyone who works for them and it sucks.

 

But at the same time the bailouts shouldn't be done by the government. What right do they honestly have to meddle into what companies survive or not? And how do you choose those companies or banks? How is that fair to the thousands of companies over the years that have gone under?

 

What infuriates me most of all is the fact that even though all this happened neither Bush or Obama did a single thing to put any kind of accountability on these people, and they still run the companies! It's absurd and makes me think that it was all done to help their crony friends.

I'm not saying I'm in favor of bailouts all of the time. But when these companies were getting close to going under, and so many at once, the economy was already sitting a a very precarious position between depressing and just plain terrible. There really just wasn't any room for the damage that would have resulted from those companies going under.

 

If you really think that Bush and Obama were both just trying to back up their buddies, what makes you so sure that anybody else wouldn't do the same? There's hardly such thing as an honest politician. But anyways, Obama's situation cannot be compared to Bush's. Bush's decisions are what brought this economy down in the first place. It's as if Bush broke your mom's favorite expensive vase and then handed it to Obama, leaving him to try and fix it before mom gets home and blames him for everything.

 

I don't know that many people are being as realistic as they need to be about the ability of Obama to get things done. So many people are grossly disappointed, for some crazy reason, that the economy is not 100% fixed yet. He's made honest efforts but nothing is ever good enough for some people.

 

In four years, if Obama isn't still in office, people will be saying the same thing about the new president as they had said about Obama, that he hasn't accomplished anything and that he's a failure and that it's "time for a change." How many times is it going to be "time for a change" (in a mere four years, I might add) before people start realizing that no wave of some magic wand is going to fix everything just like that?

 

I've probably gone a bit off topic....I apologize.

I didn't call any names bro. And I read all of what you had to say, which is the whole reason I responded in the first place. Anarchy is a word to be laughed at and nothing more. Minuscule government isn't much better.

 

And you're wrong, by the way. The economy can be divided into two parts. Macroeconomics, whose goals are mainly full employment, stability, and general growth, and microeconomics, whose goals are primarily equity and efficiency.

 

Yeah not always. But a lot of the time. Is that really a risk you want to take? Look at General Motors. They cut over 20,000 jobs when they went bankrupt.

 

The flawed system we have going on right now will not be magically fixed by simply letting businesses go under. It will make things a LOT worse before they get better, if they even get better at all.

 

I understand what you are saying, in that there is a lot to the economy and how it works and it's almost impossible to predict or control. The way I see it is if you help out these big businesses by bailing them out then how are you teaching them a lesson to not do it again? Especially considering how neither Bush or Obama had any accountability by having full on investigation or getting these people fired.

 

To me it doesn't seem fair at all to essentially let these people get away with what they did w/o being brought to justice. It's like if for example I made poor financial choices, and maxed out my credit card and bought things I couldn't afford which lead me to bankruptcy, why should I be allowed to be helped out by someone else? From a personal standpoint it seems irresponsible and not ethical to help out these people, when considering that multi-million bonuses are still being given to these rich CEO's that partially tanked the economy.

 

There needs to be accountability, end of story.

I understand what you are saying, in that there is a lot to the economy and how it works and it's almost impossible to predict or control. The way I see it is if you help out these big businesses by bailing them out then how are you teaching them a lesson to not do it again? Especially considering how neither Bush or Obama had any accountability by having full on investigation or getting these people fired.

 

To me it doesn't seem fair at all to essentially let these people get away with what they did w/o being brought to justice. It's like if for example I made poor financial choices, and maxed out my credit card and bought things I couldn't afford which lead me to bankruptcy, why should I be allowed to be helped out by someone else? From a personal standpoint it seems irresponsible and not ethical to help out these people, when considering that multi-million bonuses are still being given to these rich CEO's that partially tanked the economy.

 

There needs to be accountability, end of story.

Accountability might make you feel good for a little while. But someone "getting what they deserve" isn't going to solve the economic problems, in the same way that the death penalty is not going to keep people from committing horrible crimes.

I'm not saying I'm in favor of bailouts all of the time. But when these companies were getting close to going under, and so many at once, the economy was already sitting a a very precarious position between depressing and just plain terrible. There really just wasn't any room for the damage that would have resulted from those companies going under.

 

If you really think that Bush and Obama were both just trying to back up their buddies, what makes you so sure that anybody else wouldn't do the same? There's hardly such thing as an honest politician. But anyways, Obama's situation cannot be compared to Bush's. Bush's decisions are what brought this economy down in the first place. It's as if Bush broke your mom's favorite expensive vase and then handed it to Obama, leaving him to try and fix it before mom gets home and blames him for everything.

 

I don't know that many people are being as realistic as they need to be about the ability of Obama to get things done. So many people are grossly disappointed, for some crazy reason, that the economy is not 100% fixed yet. He's made honest efforts but nothing is ever good enough for some people.

 

In four years, if Obama isn't still in office, people will be saying the same thing about the new president as they had said about Obama, that he hasn't accomplished anything and that he's a failure and that it's "time for a change." How many times is it going to be "time for a change" (in a mere four years, I might add) before people start realizing that no wave of some magic wand is going to fix everything just like that?

 

I've probably gone a bit off topic....I apologize.

Yeah. I mean I can understand and at the time I agreed that a bailout was a necessary option considering we might go into another and possible worse depression. Of course hindsight is 20-20, and looking back I'm not so sure it was a good idea from what I said of there being no accountability.

 

I agree. There really doesn't seem to be any honest politicians around, and if it was anyone else it probably wouldn't be different. And that's the main issue! The people vote them in. Essentially we are their employers. They should be helping us out rather than these people who already have everything.

 

I agree that the economy can't be 100% back to normal right away or in 4 years. What happened started w/ Clinton by letting banks give loans to people that could not afford them. I guess what angers me most about Obama in relation to the economy is that he spent so much of his time focusing and forcing to get health-care passed in this country when the economy and jobs should've been the #1 issue at hand. Does health-care need to be reformed? Of course... but get the economy working again.

 

If anything I blame Congress most of all, with their stupid fucking games they play to make one party more popular than the next. Work together, and get things done that will better the entire country!

Anarchy is a word to be laughed at and nothing more. Minuscule government isn't much better.

 

The problem is that empirical evidence shows this to be false - the more regulations and taxes a government imposes, the worse the economy gets for the average person.

 

If you look at the most "economically free" countries in the world, they tend to have the highest quality of life in the world: http://www.heritage.org/index/

 

And you're wrong, by the way. The economy can be divided into two parts.

 

What you're describing here are academic distinctions, which are artificial. I'm a Rothbardian/Misesian Austrian, which is a branch of economics that doesn't make this artificial distinction.

 

Only individuals act, and therefore only individuals have goals which are unique to themselves. When a person acts within a group to effectuate change, they are doing so because they think that change will help themselves in the long term.

 

Yeah not always. But a lot of the time. Is that really a risk you want to take? Look at General Motors. They cut over 20,000 jobs when they went bankrupt.

 

Right, and many jobs in the buggy industry were lost when Ford started mass-producing cars. Those workers shifted to producing other things that were more in-demand at the time, like oil and leather.

 

You can't freeze time and force employers to keep unproductive jobs, in the same way you can't force employers to continue producing goods/services that aren't in demand.

 

The flawed system we have going on right now will not be magically fixed by simply letting businesses go under. It will make things a LOT worse before they get better, if they even get better at all.

 

There's nothing "magic" about a market economy. It involves the individual decisions of millions of different people, all trying to provide things consumers demand. What you're trying to do is override these signals and replace them with government fiat.

 

The government could employ everyone in America (in theory) by just printing up the money (or taxing it away from the productive class) and then using it to pay for workers to dig ditches and fill them back up again. But this work is unproductive - it's not actually in demand by consumers.

Accountability might make you feel good for a little while. But someone "getting what they deserve" isn't going to solve the economic problems, in the same way that the death penalty is not going to keep people from committing horrible crimes.

 

i disagree. it's not even about the people (the citizens) in making things accountable. If you make companies accountable for their bad decisions and actions then in the future other companies will realize that them cutting corners will not pass and they will fail. It's like if you have a class full of children and they misbehave, if you show accountability of their bad actions by giving detention or whatever then I'm sure it will limit the amount the possibility for them to do it again.

 

 

(i'm not for the death penalty btw. [/random comment])

Work together, and get things done that will better the entire country!

 

Haha, well the problem is they DO work together! Way too often.

 

The parties are basically the same at this point, they only pretend to fight. It's like professional wrestling.