The Voter Bill Of Rights - Taking Back Our Demcoracy

Last week was spent reviewing the incompetence, negligence, and disastrous behavior and lack of accountability that our politicians have displayed over recent history. Their disgraceful behavior has resulted in the dire economic mess the country and every American finds themselves in today. Skyrocketing national debt, high unemployment, broken budget processes in the Senate, etc. are the consequences of their inaction, dereliction of their Constitutional and legal responsibilities, and focus on their own self enrichment.

We also reviewed two methods that could be used, via our judicial system, to fix Washington. The first method is already underway with a massive Federal law suit having been filed in Brooklyn to expose and bring down the cronyism relationship between Washington politicians and Wall Street bankers (”banksters”).

The second method is a proposal to sue the Federal government from a citizen’s perspective for running annual TRILLION dollar deficits as a result of not executing their required budget making processes. That method, proposed in last Wednesday’s post, asked for legal aid and advice from any reader who might be able to support this effort.

Today’s post is centered on other steps that could and should be initiated in order to enforce accountability on Washington politicians. We will call them a “Voter Bill Of Rights.” These steps involve forcing accountability on these politicians who seem to think that getting elected is the end game, not the beginning of their work.

Additionally, there are other proposed steps on how to retake control of our election processes from the political class and their big money supporters (e.g. unions, corporations, PACs, etc.). It is the money of these supporters which now drown out the desires of average Americans.

Many of these action items/voter rights come from an Internet effort previously discussed in this blog to reform Congress (the so-called “Congressional Reform Act Of 2011”) and also includes some of the steps originally laid out in “Love my Country , Loathe My Government:”

1. Washington politicians will receive no tenure and no traditional pension for serving in Congress or being the President or Vice President, i.e. all Washington politicians collect a salary while in office but receive no pay, pension, benefits, etc. once they're out of office.
2. All former Washington politicians would immediately forfeit their current pension benefits and payouts if their personal wealth exceeds one million dollars. Since the vast majority of  American citizens no longer can obtain a traditional pension, there is no reason why these same Americans should be funding a traditional pension benefit revenue stream for current and former politicians.
3. Washington politicians are to be limited to one Congressional term only and one Presidential term only, no exceptions, “one and done.” As a result of this term limit rule, a Presidential term would now be six years long, a Senate term would be five years long, and a House Of Representatives term would be four years long. (Step 39 from “Love my Country, Loathe My Government.”)
4. As a result of this new term limits rule, current politicians would serve out their current term and no longer be eligible for a Washington politically elected office, i.e. no “grandfathering” of current politicians currently in office.
5. Congress will no longer be able to vote themselves a pay raise. Future pay raises would be based on well they execute their jobs, either via economic benchmarks (I.e. unemployment rate, deficit reduction goals, etc.) and/or via an annual citizen satisfaction survey to be conducted by an independent source. (Step 37)
6. In no cases would Congressional pay rise by more than the lower of the CPI or 3%.
7. The President, Vice President, and all members of Congress would lose their current, taxpayer supported, gold plated health care plan and benefits and would have their health care covered by the health care exchanges that were established by Obama Care. If Obama Care is such a great program, than those who voted for it and those who wrote the legislation should have to abide by the same rules it established for a typical American family.
8. Congress must equally abide by all laws they impose on the American people. These laws include, but are not limited to, all insider stock trading laws, equal opportunity and affirmative action rules and quotas (Step 45), etc. Failure to do so would result in the same penalties that typical Americans are subjected to including fines, imprisonment or both.
9. Failure of the executive branch or either branch of Congress to meet their Constitutional and lawful budget development dates will immediately result in a suspension of all compensation for those people who were responsible for missing those dates and associated deadlines. Pay and benefits would not be restored until the proper budget processes were completed and no back pay or benefits would be paid out, what is lost is lost forever.
10. Corporations, unions, and PACs of any flavor would no longer be allowed to contribute money or resources to any Presidential or Congressional campaign. It is assumed that when the nation’s Founders established freedom of speech as an essential part of liberty they were referring to an individual citizen’s freedom of speech, not the freedom of speech of a PAC for example. Thus, in the future, the only campaign contributions that will be allowed is a contribution and donation from individual citizens directly into an official candidate’s campaign. (Step 6)
11. Future political campaigns would only be allowed to accept and use contributions from citizens who are voting in that particular political campaign/race. For example, a Kansas citizen could not funnel a campaign donation into a New Jersey Congressional race. In fact, a New Jersey citizen could not contribute to a House of Representatives political campaign that was outside of that citizen’s Congressional district. (Step 7)
12. The Federal Election Commission (FEC) would be totally revamped so that it was no longer a toothless election watchdog, staffed by political cronies of existing politicians. The head of a revamped FEC would be a nationally elected position, preferably being staffed by an experienced criminal prosecutor than the current political lapdogs. (Step 8)
13. The personal financial assets of each elected Washington politician would be put into an ironclad, personal blind trust while they are serving in office so that they are not tempted to take advantage of insider government and insider trading information while in office. This rule would extend down into the top members of Presidential and Congressional staffs.
14. Given the widespread voter fraud that likely occurred in this past Presidential election, future voter fraud should be considered a treasonable illegal act, given that it robs honest Americans of their right to vote in a democracy, punishable in court as a top felony.
15. Given the widespread voter fraud that likely occurred in this past Presidential election, in future Presidential and Congressional elections, four selected states will have their votes counted by two independent vote counting organizations to ensure that critical states and critical elections are indeed honest. The Republican Party would get to select two of the four states and the Democratic Party would get to select the other two states.
16. In the short term, divvy Electoral College votes in each state on a proportion of vote basis rather than a winner take all basis to reestablish the principle that everyone's vote counts the same. Longer term, scrap the Electoral College process all together and elect President's on popular vote only (Step 16).
17. Stop gerrymandering Congressional districts, a process which usually ensures the reelection of incumbent candidates and their political parties (Step 14).
18. Stop funding Republican and Demcoratic Party conventions with taxpayer money, all convention expenses including security should be borne by the parties themselves (Step 13).

Why are these “Voters Bill Of Rights” required? Consider what the current state of our political processes and political class:

• Persistently high unemployment and under employment.
• Skyrocketing national debt.
• Skyrocketing health care costs.
• Burdensome tax levels and burdens while the Federal government and the politicians that operate it waste hundreds of billions of dollars every year.
• Crony capitalism that grows more disgraceful, wasteful, and inefficient every day.
• Major issues of our times that never get resolved, issues that include a lost war on drugs, failing public schools, no national energy policy, no coherent or compassionate illegal immigration plan, etc.
• The American people did not make this contract with Congressmen/women, Congress made all these contracts for themselves.
• Serving in Congress should be an honor, not a career or a path to self enrichment.
• The Founding Fathers envisioned citizen legislators, so ours should serve their term in office and then go home and back to work.

This is what is needed to take back and restore our democracy from our politicians, the “banksters,” the moneyed interests, and the failed political processes. Anything short of this Voter Bill Of Rights is an eventual abdication of our democracy.

We will operationalize this effort in the coming months and will let you know how you get involved before it is too late. Until then, please consider reviewing one of the most popular blog posts we have ever done, a post that clearly defines how fall we have fallen away from our concept of freedom and liberty:

http://loathemygovernment.blogspot.com/2010/11/american-freedom-pyramid-where-it.html

Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at www.loathemygovernment.com. It is also available online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Please pass our message of freedom onward. Let your friends and family know about our websites and blogs, ask your library to carry the book, andrespect freedom for both yourselves and others everyday

Please visit the following sites for freedom:

http://www.reason.com/
http://www.cato.org/
http://www.robertringer.com/
http://realpolichick.blogspot.com/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08j0sYUOb5w