Anniversary and Fix Congress Wrap Up

Sorry about no posts for a week and a half. My wife and I have been away for a 50th wedding anniversary celebration put on my our two sons and their daughters. It was quite an affair a chauffeured (number 1 son) ride to northern Virginia, some visiting, an elaborate and fancy dinner, a reception after the dinner with cake cutting and such, then a chauffeured (number two son) ride back home. We were out of town for four days and I purposely did not take my laptop.

Running Horse, 18x24, charcoal

Fix Congress Wrap Up

Based on the number of readers and the time spent on my blog, my Fix Congress series is not very popular. Perhaps I've not communicated well, perhaps I've not presented it properly, or perhaps you readers are not interested in the problems with Congress. I hope the reasons you readers are not interested in fixing Congress is that I've failed. If it is because you are not interested, then I'm concerned for the nation's future.

Whatever the reason, I'm going to wrap up the series and get on to other things.

My previous posts covered the overall picture of Congress and its problems in a historical context, the failure of the budget process, earmarks, and inaction on entitlement funding. I've also talked about lobbyists, who serve a useful purpose, but serve interests other than our middle and low-income class folks. In fact, many of these lobbyists push interests that are detrimental to the average American (think drug companies, mortgage banking, big oil, etc).

I'll not discuss personal corruption of individual Congressmen. It exists and is detestable. You can't out them without luck and a more general fix to the way Congress does business. A check of web sites that do try to out corruption. I find many wrongs were committed after they served in Congress, and those are not crimes against the voters. And I just do not think personal corruption is serious problem for Congress as a whole.

Pick a Fix

I said I would give a list of different approaches to fixing Congress and their web addresses.

rute Force or Nuclear Option: All members of Congress are bad, or all members of Congress are a permanent political class. All are out of touch with the public. The solution is to get rid of all of them - vote all of them out of officer and get a new, compliant bunch.

I don't like this approach. Not all Congressmen are bad. Most, I believe, start out by wanting to do what's right. It's the system that changes them and it is the system that needs changing. Voting out incumbents does not address the Congressional system. It stay and, sooner or later, the new Congresses will fall into the same abusive routine.

To work, we would have to vote out the majority of incumbents within a few short years, otherwise those who remained would keep the system unchanged and would convert the new members much as is now done. To vote out the majority would require a massive voter movement that's not going to happen. Typically in most democracies folks are elected by small margins of just over 50%, usually less than 60%. Too many voters would not jump on this bandwagon.

Still, if nothing else works and the voters do reach a state of rebellion, this might be the only option. Check out VOID (Vote Out Incumbents Democracy).

ind Better Candidates: Some folks believe that we elect incompetent people. While I would agree that we elected an incompetent (and dishonest) President, I don't think most of our candidates are incompetent. Because our elections have become arenas for character assassination, the candidates are certainly more brave than most of us. How does one determine incompetence? As Republicans, do we tend to Democrats as less competent? As Democrats, do we - you get the idea. As an Independent, I don't like anyone very much anymore (Kingston Trio line).

Check out Vote None of the Above if you think incompetence lies inside the Beltway.

ix the System: Larry Lessig, once an aspiring Congressman, has started a web site that is getting some attention. Lessig believes that our Congressmen should not author earmarks (do away with them completely) and should abjure connections of any kind with lobbyists. While I might quibble with some details, this approach is the only one that has a chance of working and he has set up a program where voters can determine the progress toward the fix.

Lessig says "It's not a dependence that reveals itself in the way evil people act, but a dependence that corrupts even the way good people solve the problems they come to Washington to address," he said. "We need to solve this problem now." Also, "We just need to recognize that money in certain places is destructive of trust."

Lessig has called for a joint effort on the part of Congressmen and voters. Both can visit the sight and sign an oath to support four tenets:

• accept contributions from individuals only, lobbyists excepted.
• support the fundamental reform of congressional earmarks.
• support reform to increase transparency in Congress.
• support public financing of public elections.

There's little fire-breathing rhetoric in these tenets, just clear steps toward changing the way Congress does the business of the people. The tenets are clearly geared to making Congress the prime lobbyist for all of us rather than special interests.

If you are interested visit Lessig at Change Congress. You can view the list of Congressmen who have taken the pledge and you can sign up to take the pledge and donate. You can also view a map, locate your local representatives, and see how much of their financing came from special interests.

I have joined Change Congress, signed the pledge, made my own pledge to contribute a certain amount of money to Congressional candidates who also pledge. Since my own Congressman, Virgil Goode of Virginia receives 43% of his 2008 campaign financing from PACs and he is unopposed, I plan to contribute the money to candidates outside my district.

Goode has supported military and veteran issues important to me, but I believe the greater good is to convince Goode and his pals to think hard about representative the people first.

My list of Fix Congress web sites has not been exhaustive as I first planned. For those who want more info on our government and our elected officials, I found that Sunlight Foundations, Insanely Useful Web Sites is the best list you can find in one place.