This Is How You Fix Congress
This article, which has been making the rounds as an email forward recently, is not directly related to our usual topics but we thought that the regular readers of this blog would enjoy reading and discussing it.
Introduction
I am sending this to virtually everybody on my e-mail list and that includes conservatives, liberals, and everybody in between. Even though we disagree on a number of issues, I count all of you as friends. My friend and neighbor wants to promote a “Congressional Reform Act of 2009″. It would contain eight provisions, all of which would probably be strongly endorsed by those who drafted the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.
I know many of you will say, “this is impossible”. Let me remind you, Congress has the lowest approval of any entity in Government, now is the time when Americans will join together to reform Congress – the entity that represents us.
Thanks,
A Fellow American
Congressional Reform Act of 2009
1. Term Limits: 12 years only, one of the possible options below:
A. Two Six-year Senate terms
B. Six Two-year House terms
C. One Six-year Senate term and three Two-year House terms
2. No Tenure/No Pension:
A congressman collects a salary while in office and receives no pay when they are out of office.
3. Congress (past, present & future) participates in Social Security.
All funds in the Congressional retirement fund move to the Social Security system immediately. All future funds flow into the Social Security system. Congress participates with the American people.
4. Congress can purchase their own retirement plans just as all Americans.
5. Congress will no longer vote themselves a pay raise. Congressional pay will rise by the lower of CPI or 3%.
6. Congress loses their current health care system and participates in the same health care system as the American people.
7. Congress must equally abide in all laws they impose on the American people.
8. All contracts with past and present Congressmen are void effective 1/1/10.
The American people did not make this contract with congressmen, congressmen made all these contracts for themselves.
Serving in Congress is an honor, not a career. The Founding Fathers envisioned citizen legislators. Serve your term(s), then go home and back to work.
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all sounds great and I do think they need some corrective action because they are out of control. Here is the problem they would have to vote themselves this bad news!!!!!!! do you really think they are that stupid?
Randy Opined: “You are right though George about lawyers being in charge. If they were not in charge we would not have criminals getting off because of a very minor technicality that had nothing to do with the fact that the person was guilty.”
If that were true why does the US have a greater percentage of its population in prison than any other industrialized nation save for maybe China?
Like it or not our justice system is technicalities; it’s called “due process” and following it is something we advocate very strongly here at the NMA. Yes sometimes a guilty person will go free because somebody screwed up, but that is the price we pay for a system that for the most part makes sure that everyone and anyone who stands accused of a crime gets the same fair shake.
Randy it is frankly getting a little tiring every few days having to walk you through things you should have learned in sixth grade civics. You appear to be woefully ignorant about the most basic things and you only goal seems to be disruption. Why do you continue to post here?
Hubcap some of the technicalities I talk about is when NMA recommends that you go to court in the hope of the officer being busy and not showing up so you get off. That is a technicality that you like but is not correct. I for one do not believe in your due process when they let a rapist or murderer off for something that has nothing to do with the facts that show they are guilty. You fight all the time when you are caught breaking the traffic laws but you say it is ok to let a serial killer off also. At least OJ is in jail now. Let the jury decide if they are actually guilty.
Hubcap the reason I post here is because of the lies that are put on this site as fact. For example this is a recent statement written by James Baxter. Tell me how the police would have an incentive to write a bogus ticket?
1) The State of Massachusetts passed a law requiring traffic ticket defendants to pay $25 to contest a ticket; non-refundable.
To appeal a case to a more legitimate court requires payment of $50, again; non-refundable. Win, lose, or draw the court gets $75 — regardless of the merit of the ticket. What an incredible incentive for the police to write bogus tickets by the thousands! Why not, every ticket will generate at least $25 to $75, regardless of the outcome.
Randy, you really cannot be that dense can you? How does repect for due process translate into “it is ok to let a serial killer off also.” How exactly do you manage to conflate traffic violations with rape and murder?
And in case you don’t remember, a jury did decide OJ’s guilt; they said he was not.
You are so ignorant of the fundamentals of American government that I doubt if you are even a citizen. Your one-man crusade against the “lies” on the NMA site is nothing more than a self-righteous delusion existing only in your head. Please stop spamming here.
Hubcap you did not answer my question about the statement written by James Baxter.
This site is all about telling lies to help to promote hatred for police and the governemt. People that read this kind of site build upon that hatred and finally as you and others here believe everything you read on a site like this no matter if it is true or not.
@Randy —
[/quote]Hubcap the reason I post here is because of the lies that are put on this site as fact. For example this is a recent statement written by James Baxter. Tell me how the police would have an incentive to write a bogus ticket?[/quote]
In general it would be easier for all if all statements were cited by all people so people can easily judge for themselves the credibility of various sources.
Hypothetical (since I have no facts to support)
Suppose there are no “quotas”
Police track records of previous tickets for a given time period.
Last 5 years there have been X-amount of speeding tickets per month in a given location (+/- 15%)
For what ever reason the number of speeding tickets written by an officer is below this previous level. (Maybe more people are obeying law?)
The town aware of a drop in ticket revenue goes to chief – who goes to captain – all the way down to the officer.
Officer is chewed out for being below the historic ticket average.
In order to put himself in a better light before his superiors, the officer will try to do what is possible to raise his ticket totals. He may possibly write some questionable tickets figuring it is better to write the ticket and let the Judge/lawyers/defendant to sort out.
Is this scenario possible? yes. Again it is hypothetical (since I have no facts to support)
The nonrefundable fees just help to increase the profitability of fighting court cases against defendants.
No hatred towards cops (just doing their job) but the gov’t is supposed to be for the people. It should not be set up to inconvenience people as much as possible. Laws should be reasonable to make it compliance more likely.
A type/system of term limits seems appealing since it appears that there are too many people that are unable to vote the rascals out of office when given the opportunity.
mithrandir the only thing I see wrong about your statement is that if as you say the people are following the law as you say then the police chief should be able to back that up and for that matter the town as you say it should have realized that people are not breaking the laws anymore because they drive on the same roadways. If in fact the people are not following the laws and the town as you say it says what is going on with the ticket numbers going down and people are breaking the law as much or more than ever? The town should be saying why are you not doing your job?
I do not know the legalities about charging the extra $25 for going to court but it does make sense to me since it is costing a lot of money to run the court system and $25 does not cover that total cost. If you go and challenge a ticket without any evidence that you did not break the law and in fact you did break the law then it is costing the town/county as you call it a lot of extra money. The only thing that I can think of is that they were getting a lot of people that were fighting speeding tickets in the hope that the policeman would not show up. In the past it was a benefit to go to court because the individual would either get off on a technicality or be charged the same as what the ticket had on it. If the $25 is not legal then I like it where one county charged an extra fee above the ticket cost if you are found guilty without giving any evidence to support your innocense other than “well I just came hoping the cop would not show up”.
As far as your term limits I do not have a problem with that as long as the people vote to have term limits. The only problem with term limits is if the people want to have someone to represent them, they would not always be able to have who they want. I would rather have a good experienced representative than an inexperience bad one.
@Randy
[quote]if as you say the people are following the law [/quote]
I offered that as a possibility. That is why I used “maybe” and a question mark. There could be other possibilities for drop in tickets. (Chance, incompetence, etc.)
Everyone have a Happy New Year.
Randy, in the new year keep off the cooking sherry. ;)
Randy, Here in America there are two very fundamental aspects of our justice system you completely overlook.
One is that the courts are–or should be–available to everyone. Justice doesn’t have a monetary value attached to it and its administration should carry no financial incentive.
But that is exactly what is happening and what we at NMA oppose. In the mid-80s a law was enacted in California which essentially requires that the local traffic ticket revenue sent up to the state increase by a certain percentage each year.
If the law requires an ever-increasing revenue stream from tickets, that is obviously going to put the pressure on cops to write more tickets. And if per chance people should start obeying the law, then the cops have no choice but to write tickets that are a little questionable.
Secondly if I am charged with a crime, no matter if it is murder or an illegal U-turn, I do not have to prove my innocence; it is up to the government to prove my guilt. Being forced to pay a fee to use the court system to defend myself is like a poll tax. And it is a particularity onerous constitutional violation when applied–as in this case–to a selected class of individuals, drivers. A fee is not applied to someone charged with a more serious crime.
So it is all about the money because our politicians are too gutless to impose a level of taxation sufficient to finance everything. Instead they masquerade as fiscally conservative and create all kinds of fees and surcharges which they extort from drivers because traffic tickets are an easy mark.
Hubcap I will let you make the decision then. Instead of the law breakers paying for the court system you would rather have me pay for it. You are right that you do not have to prove your innocence but if you are speeding well over the limit and the policeman sees it and records it on some kind of radar gun then there is little chance you are going to get off unless the policeman does not show up. If you are going to court just because you are hoping the policeman does not show up then you have no defense. Maybe they should delay the court until they get the policeman to show up. That is the good thing about photo cameras. You do not need to have a particular policeman show up to view the evidence against you. You and NMA are against that though because you lose your easy way to get out of the ticket and you can no longer break the law without consequences. This is the law breakers club. You can see that in that why else would they advertise radar detectors? They are even against the law in some states from what I hear.
I do not know if they charge court fees to more serious crimes or not. I do know that the fines for more serious crimes can be much higher and ultimately you can be thrown in jail for most all crimes if found guilty. Maybe you believe like George does that traffic tickets should be a criminal offence. I have no problem with that. That means that if you are found guilty of breaking the traffic laws on purpose then they could throw you in jail. That would cause less people to break traffic laws and then you would have your decrease in traffic fines that you are looking for.
The money has to come out before anything will change. We need publicly funded campaigns and severe restrictions on lobbyists. As it stands now the big industries essentially get to write their own legislation while we the people are shut out of the process.
Term limits should be removed, at least at the moment and replaced with an anti-incumbency provision.
No person elected to a public office, shall be eligible to hold said position for consecutive terms.
If you are good enough in your first term, you will be brought back.
If you are there for profiteering, you won’t be back-ever.
This protects against bad politicians, the ones who think they are senators for life, and allows for good statesmen/women to serve multiple times [e.g. Ron Paul]
Someone might be good [or just average], but if they serve sequential terms they are preventing someone who is excellent from coming into public service.
Now if this doesn’t help reform Congress, then bring in term limits.
George I was waiting for you to reply to this. It makes sense to me what you said. Once someone gets some experience toward the end of their first term so that they are productive then throw them out. A senator then could come back in 6 years if they are not too old to do anything and if they did not forget everything 6 years ago. It makes sense to remove bad officials but to throw out the good ones also does not make sense but George you never do.
George how productive do you think you would be your first two years at a job you have no experience at?
If there are term limits, two terms, and no anti-incumbency clause…
Well, have you seen something called a cash booth-where you try to hold onto as much money that is flying around. A political smash & grab, if you will.
Is this you kind of ‘official’ that you like?
http://www.boilingfrogspost.com/2009/12/28/dennis-hastert-a-portrait-of-a-political-system-termite/
or Mark Kirk who voted FOR the cap & trade. See ClimateGate
My representative had better be productive from day one!
Good representation, the people who make their mark, the few who will protect the people’s interests will be remembered.
The bad ones, aka: scumbags, will be forgotten, and if they try to ‘sneak’ back in, thinking that the people have short memories, or revisionist history, they will be looked up, and any thought of a ‘come back’ is dashed.
This system tosses the bad, keeps the good.
I’d like to see something similar for President (but this might be too difficult for Randy to comprehend). 1 term on, 1 term off (to enrich their life experience so that they will be better in their next term. Call it quality control) 1 term on, 2 terms off, and 1 follow up if the country goes to hell, and they need someone good.
Imagine Kennedy, or someone similar: 51,52,53,54, 55-58, 59,60,61,62(retire), 63-70, 71,72,73,74
The fraudulent 17 Amendment, the one that changed the way Senators are elected needs to be tossed into the garbage. Senators should be chosen by the State representative.
Ideally, there should only be two numbers on your refrigerator, your State Representative, and US representative.
Randy go read what Congress was supposed to be. To prevent Congress from meeting once a decade or so, it was written into the Constitution that Congress be convened every year.
They were supposed to convene for a short amount of time, say three months of the year, then your representative was supposed to go home and do his REAL job.
Too bad the 13th Amendment never passed the first time around, the one that prohibited lawyers from being Senators/Representatives.
Maybe in time technology will eliminate the need for indirect government.
Only one problem with your simplistic view George. The world and the US is 10,000 times more complex than it was when the constitution was written. If the US congress was to meet once a year we would not have a government. Just as you would like it. Instead of 3 months a year we need 12 months a year and more.
Too bad you have zero common sense George.
You are right though George about lawyers being in charge. If they were not in charge we would not have criminals getting off because of a very minor technicality that had nothing to do with the fact that the person was guilty.
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x8rl4w_the-american-form-of-government_webcam
No, I am not a moron, also know as an ‘anarchist’. They are pro-psychopath. So to are maximal government types.
Do yourself a favor, no television at all in January 2010.
George I have not idea what you were trying to explain in your statement but the video was good. You are right though. Most people from this site are “anarchist”. Let them make up their own laws that they want to follow. Break all others. It was a very good video showing the NMA members. Let us drink and drive and run through red lights and drive as fast as we want. What does that sound like to you George?
I think you missed the point of the video.
Anarchy isn’t a state of being, it is a state of flux.
You also don’t understand right & privileges. You have the right to drive, but with those rights come responsibility.
The DUI issue was settled a LONG time ago. 0.05 is the start of impairment for lightweights, 0.15 was the end of impairment for heavyweights.
So, looking for the median, 0.10 was settled upon.
If I remember correctly, the push to 0.08 was not even supported by the person who founded MADD.
No one wants people to run red lights. Correctly timed and synchronized lights promotes compliance.
That is analogous to highway, flow=safety.
Stopping spamming this site. You are not contributing, nor are you offering a ‘devil’s advocate’ position.
Here is a new year’s resolution for you, go find a skier’s enthusiast blog [or Ford Focus] and post there, not here.
George I am not suffering from trying to be a ‘devil’s advocate’. I think you are truely wrong. As far as drinking and driving is concerned I have seen statistics that some people are negatively affected by as low as .03 and also everyone is negetively affected by the time their BAC is at .08. If you are meaning at the level that people swerve all over the road then you may be correct but I believe impaired means a significant decrease in driving ability.
Are you stupid enough to say that it is ok to run red lights that are not synchronized? Tell us which lights are not synchonized and what the distance and speed limit is between lights. Most lights are already synchronized if they are able to do it. In my town they are syncronized but you have to drive 30 mph in a 45 mph zone for it to work. If you drive fast you will end up being stopped from one direction or the other. It is distance and speed that allows synchonization of lights. Did you ever think of something like that or are you stupid enough to think all they have to do is add a computer to it and it will work no matter what speed you travel .
I will make it my new years resolution to not post here again if you tell the facts instead of making things up.
If you were playing a [statist] devil’s advocate, your ‘contribution’ here would not be looked upon so negatively.
No, you just use ad hominems, spew non-sense, and attack people with triple digit IQs.
Think of the average joe hillbilly. If they believe that the lights are timed against them, then they might be inclined to mentally justify ‘stretching’ a stale yellow, or early red.
Do you understand, that you are a guest on this website? Do you act like this in the real world?
George people do not have triple digit IQs if they say the death rate is down because people are driving faster. I have seen that and many other dumb statements on here. You may say they have triple digit IQs but it sure does not show.
George the reason they have red light cameras is because people were ’stretching’ a stale yellow, or early red and getting into accidents. This site would never acknowledge that fact. They say the “only” reason is because of a need for increased income. That is the fundamental difference between us. I look at facts. When there is a yellow light you are supposed to stop unless you are almost at the intersection when it turns yellow and you do not have enough distance to stop.