How Would You Go About Truly Reforming Our Political Parties?

Earlier Posts under <i>Loyal Opposition</i> ^ | October 27, 2001 | Avoiding_Sulla

[Avoiding_Sulla]

... IMHO, the best advice: WORK HARD. Here's what that work requires:

OFFENSE -- Form a group of like-minded individuals to watch all PRIMARY races.
-- Identify all RINOs and potential RINOs you can.
-- Make sure all RINOs have real opposition.
-- Work like the Dickens to keep like-minded real conservatives from running against each other.
-- Now, more than ever (as you pointed out) Dems are outa favor. So don't let the RINOs even try to sell you that their form of compromise is the only thing will win in the general election. Being laughed off the stage is the kind of humiliation RINOs deserve. It might even scare 'em straight.

DEFENSE Every party committee has its Establishment thugs and RINO disrupters. Be prepared.
-- Your group must attend these things in force and not let "those in charge" dictate the agenda.
-- Make sure one of you is expert in Roberts' Rules of Order. Then you will be heard.
-- The size of your group will grow, and the RINOs' will shrink. Be accessible and receptive.
-- Be on the look out for attempts to derail you. Threats, bribes, flattery and personal attacks. Hard ball.
-- Be on the look out for attempts to stall you. Phony adjournments, committee assignments not of your choosing (being made chair comes under flattery), and other red-herrings.

I'm sure there are others to whom you can turn to add to this list. Nothing worth achieving comes easily. This all requires hard work. The Progressives haven't brought us to what appears to be the brink of annihilation (but that's another story) because they didn't work hard.

Either not voting or, worse, voting Democratic because some Republican doesn't do what he ought is the conservative's form of throwing a tantrum. It's not only disruptive and counterproductive, it looks and sounds liberal. For recent examples of this, look at those phony pacifists (nee anarchists) turning violent.

Stop whining and sounding like a spoiled liberal. If you really want to change things, you must work at it. Now that I have given you a formula for how to go about it, what's your excuse?

[Avoiding_Sulla]

For your consideration in an election year.

[philman_36]

If you really want to change things, you must work at it. Now that I have given you a formula for how to go about it, what's your excuse?

A story, 'bout po'boys...titled "The Boat is Sinking and the Water is Rising Fast"
"Don't yell at me Leroy, I see the hole and I know the boat is filling with water!
I'm bailing as fast as I can, but until Stupid and Jack Ass start bailing too we're sure enough going to sink.
Hey...just a minute there Jack Ass, don't go inviting more of your friends into the boat...Hey Stupid, throw it out of the boat.
All right by jiminy...I'm going to swim to the shore...Leroy, you staying or swimmin'? Stupid and Jack Ass deserve to drown.
I thought we were all in the same boat "together", but I see how it is now..." as he dove in the water.

As for me, Leroy thought, I'm swimming with po'boy too. I'll be damned if I'm going down with the ship. Nobody made me Captain.

"Good luck bailing by yourself boys. We'll watch the side show from the shore."
Jack's friends pile on and Stupid throws water back in the boat...LOL!

[A CA Guy]

No lobbying for 20 years after they leave office.

Shorten the length of time to 1/3rd of how often all politicians meet to pass laws.

Jail those who take monies from companies or people who are NOT American.

[max61]

There is only one way to "reform" political parties, if it is at all possible and that is to return the parties to the voters, you know, the actual people whom do the electing. As it stands, the major parties are owned by those who finance the parties and the campaigns.

There is only one way to correct this, that being to limit contributions to some level per eligible voter ($50K per election cycle would be my limit), and to only allow candidate contributions from persons who are eligible to vote for a candidate.

Thus, all the nations voters could contribute to a Presidential campaign as this is nation wide election. State wide, voters in a state could contribute to their senatorial candidate of choice. Congressional reps would only be able to receive contributions from their district, etc, etc.

This would also force candidates to actually solicit input from their constituents, a very novel concept.

---max

[max61]

Would you prefer a one-party system here? I hope not.

We have a one party system here, it known as the Socialist party and it has two major factions.

---max

[M.K. Borders]

My biggest complaint against George Will was his stand for term limits as laid out in his book

Restoration,Congress, Term Limits, and the Recovery of Deliberative Democracy

(I'm sorry, I don't have a link). After watching the Republicans of Congress betray Newt, and wilt before Clinton, I now am willing to accept that Mr. Will was right and I was wrong.

Secondly, I would abolish the Primary Election process and return to multi-vote, brokered conventions. IMHO if you want to get big money out of politics, then you MUST make politics less expensive. When a candidate must spend millions just to get the party nomination, well, then money will always be the dominate force.

Why are nominations so expensive? Because the candidate must travel the whole country, winning multiple elections, with campaigne staffs in nearly every state. That requires a ton of money.

Now just think of the cost, if a candidate who desires his party's nomination, had to only campaign to a select group of party faithful, located in a central location, (a convention). Coupled with term limits, (incumbants would have a clear advantage) this would greatly reduce the amount of money needed for a given election.

Thirdly, I would require public debates. Real debates, between TWO candidates. No questions, no panel of experts, just a panel of moderators who would hold the candidates to the rules of the debate.

And the rules? One man is choosen to be the proponet, the other the respondent. The proponet has 90 minutes to make his best case. the Respondent has 90 minutes to make his reply, and must stay on subject! Each man then has 30 minute to rebute. Yes it takes alot of time, but this is how issues are to be debated, not with a 1 hour series of media sound bites.

[wolfman]

What do political parties do? They wield power. In fact in this post industrial age, they exist to retain it. 5% of work currently done in this country is all we need to supply our basic needs of food, shelter and clothing. The rest of the work is busy work.. producing junk we don't need or even want. Paper shuffling in industries like banking, insurance, real estate etc. This 95% of work keeps powerful men powerful, while they keep the food locked up and use it as a carrot on a stick.. be it businessmen or beaurocrats. Both are a scourge to mankind.

[Avoiding_Sulla]

Thanks M.K.

Yours is the most republican form of response I've had yet. It's too bad that a few machines were so outrageous that they gave the "reformers" a strawman to shoot down the old ways. This let them bring us to this:

• where the powerful could accumulate power on a wider scale.
  
• more people could be promised what they wanted to hear.
  
• most would get less than ever before in return.

I see the media as both a major beneficiary and the cheerleader/enabler of the current system.
Please see my current commentary on that related subject: Zooming in on Media's Complicity

[birbear]

I don't think you can fundamentally change what's been going on for 200 years, without really changing things fundamentally.

I'm not a political or social expert, but from what I've been able to see, I don't think representative reppublics work well when you have 270,000,000 individuals spread across (what is it, 1.8 million?) square miles.

It just isn't practical. To think that the third most powerful person in American politics (Speaker of the House) (perhaps that post is even second most powerful) is only voted into power by a very small percentage of the American populace... I think it's hard to justify that amount of power that is only voted on by one district, in one state. And I think that's where a lot of the "disenfranchisement" comes from in America today.

Proposal? Divide up the country. As a citizen of Washington state, I couldn't care less about the problems of Bangor, Maine, Des Moines, Iowa, or even Aurora, Colorado.

I propose that the country be divided into the Northwest, the Southwest, the Northeast, The South, and the Midwest. Each region would have the ability to ratify their own constitution. And the constitutions, in reality could be identical to what is already in place...but at least the citizens of each region would have a knowledge that what's going on is really going to have an effect on them. And that way poor Joe Sixpack in Huntsville, Ala. won't be at the mercy of a John Q. Democrat from California...

I really believe that representative republics crumble once the population gets too large. 500 some odd individuals represent 270million. It's not logical.

[Avoiding_Sulla]

Thanks for your response.
I think even though you lack some fundamental knowledge*, your concerns are not totally unfounded.
Maybe tomorrow I'll address some of those if you ask.

*You wrote:

To think that the third most powerful person in American politics (Speaker of the House) (perhaps that post is even second most powerful) is only voted into power by a very small percentage of the American populace...

Here's some facts mixed with commentary

• It is true that each member of the House represents but 1/440 of the U.S. population.
• and is beholden (ostensibly at least) to just his locals' parochial interests as their representative
• he has to work with the other 439 representatives (part of the checks and balances of government -- so it doesn't pass laws too easily -- was original intent)
• and this is the United (ostensibly true too) States
• and the members of the house can vote whomever they choose to lead them as we elected them to do as our representives (again, ostensibly)

and here's the clinker

• there is no requirement that they even elect another representative to be speaker. It may be any citizen (and maybe not even that?) they choose to so honor.

So you see, the Speaker of the House is not voted into office by a small group of people concerned solely with parochial interests. He is the President of the House of Representatives and gets there by an indirect vote of all the people, via the vote of their elected representatives.

Anyone care to substantively dispute this?

[Lucius Cornelius Sulla]

You want the truth? Cull the herd. The basic problem is that most people are just too stupid for self government.

Culling has been tried, it had bad results (see my profile).

[SwinusMaximus]

>Culling has been tried, it had bad results (see my profile).

Ach! My comment was more tongue in cheek than anything. Culling the herd would be a gross violation of rights. My comment that many people are too stupid for self government, of course, still stands.

[Avoiding_Sulla]

This is the post of which I spoke.

I invite your contributions, ammendments, critiques.

BTW, why is Absalom "no current freeper by that name?" Have I misspelled him?

[MotleyGirl70]

Start working on getting rid of Voter Fraud .. then maybe OUR votes would actually count

Wrong...try again. We're still waiting for E. Michael McCaan (Milwaukee's D.A.) to prosecute individuals for voter fraud here for the 2000 presidential election. There was PROOF of it and still NOTHING has been done. I called his office three times and was treated in a very, very rude manner. Remember 'smokes for votes'. We have major problems here in Milwaukee with voter fraud and no criminal charges have been filed yet, TWO YEARS LATER. The joys of living in flaming liberal city. It never ends with liberals, it just keeps going and going and going and going....

[al_possum39]

we have a democratic republic set up that was supposed to be small. however, nowhere in the constitution does it enforce this.

Hamilton, Jay and Madison all seemed to think that the States would act a check to Federal growth. Guess they never counted on the Feds buying the States off with income tax dollars.

[freeeee]

My idea:

NEVER donate money directly to the party. Or campaign for it. Or do anything else that allows RINO's access to your efforts.

Instead, donate directly to and campaign ONLY for truly constitutional candidates. NEVER allow your efforts to be used by those in positions of power in the party to support RINO's. Work hard, REAL HARD in your efforts to be an effective campaigner, so that you and your group are something that is valued and cannot be discounted.

Make it abundantly clear to the party why you are doing this. Send every solicitation of theirs back with a note that they won't get a cent from you until they clean up their act. Tell them every dollar, every effort of yours is going only directly to constitutional candidates.

Tell your candidate that he has only one chance with you. If you get him elected and he sells out, do everything in your power to make sure he loses his job come election time.

Fight ferociously at primaries. Make it well known that failure to nominate a constitutional candidate will cause you and your group to vote third party, or for an unnominated write in candidate.

Fortunately, you don't have to start from scratch. The Republican Libery Caucus (RLC) is already in the fight.

[Avoiding_Sulla]

Hamilton, Jay and Madison all seemed to think that the States would act a check to Federal growth. Guess they never counted on the Feds buying the States off with income tax dollars.

Yes they didn't anticipate the complexities that led to the states relinquishing their sovereign influence by passing the 17th Amendment to the Constitution. Direct election of senators traded the problems associated with republicanism's parochial interests for the demogoguery we've come to enjoy.

It appears to me that today's senators are little beholden to their state capitals and what's left of republicanism except through their party connections, and are mostly beholden to the moneyed interests who predominate over urban centers and who influence the rest of us through their spending in the media.

[Avoiding_Sulla]

At first glance I like your suggestions. Would like to know of cases where you know of success. Aside from the morale boost, empirical results would be better than the theoretical in this.

Will check out RLC next few days.