Chapter 1
CAN CONGRESS BE REFORMED?
Anyone with a thimble-full of political sense can readily determine there is no way to fix America unless the influence of big money is eliminated from the political process. Any other plan is mainly a big waste of everyone's time, if we don't as all-partisan citizens, regardless of religious, political or other persuasion, rise up and demand the complete elimination of bribery from sea to once shining sea.
Nothing illustrates this need better than the current crop of malfeasant Democrats, who since regaining control of Congress in 2007, haven't done a single thing we the people obviously want. Other than passing a minimum wage law that was over ten years too late and as many dollars too low, lack of health care, education costs, poverty, infrastructure decay, joblessness and homelessness have all dramatically increased.
Rather than helping average Americans, Congress has engaged in endless bend-over political charades, increased rather than reduced troop levels and war funding and signed away even more of our quickly disappearing rights. And since 2008, they have sold our children's future down a no-strings-attached, golden-platter river of unprecedented corporate bailout malfeasance.
Because the Supreme Court will always otherwise, declare any and all manner of corruption-eliminating reform “unconstitutional”, ¹ the only way to get rid of big money influence is by constitutional amendment. Attempts at other methods of reform have left a long historical trail of tears of utter frustration and defeat.
We need an amendment making it punishable by life in prison without parole, for any organization or group of people of any kind, for any reason, to contribute one penny or anything of higher value, to one small-town city council office seeker on up to president of the United States. And we need to limit individual contributions to 1% of the median income per candidate per year, including candidates themselves; approximately $480 in 2008 dollars.
In order to be licensed for broadcasting on what are theoretically “the people's” airwaves, we need to require all radio and television stations to grant free equal airtime to “qualified” candidates; qualification determined by obtaining enough signatures of registered voters, amount determined by office and number of people represented. And, we need to eliminate the electoral college, elect everyone by popular vote, hold all party primaries on the same date and require a verifiable paper trail.
There is much tweaking necessary for the amendment proposed here, but this sketch outline is sufficient to grasp the basic idea. No law will eliminate all corruption, but what is suggested here would eliminate well over 90% of the current problem and, would allow the majority of we the people to actually have a voice.
Will the bottom-feeding miscreant corporate-puppet juvenile delinquent treasonous reprobates of Congress ever be eliminated and put in federal prison where they belong? You decide.
NOTES:
1. Many, mostly highly inadequate forms of graft control legislation, have been proposed over the years and a few half-baked ideas have actually been passed into law, only to be struck down by the Supreme Court as "unconstitutional". The anything but justice highest American court has a long crooked history stretching back even before the infamous Dred Scott decision, of siding with big money interests at the expense of we the people, repeatedly pretending that corporations have the same "rights" as actual living and breathing citizens. The sun is more likely to rise in the west and set in the east, than anything short of Constitutional amendment achieving any semblance of adequate bribery control.
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