Archive for 2008
Effective Regulation
Regulations are needed because human beings tend toward selfishness and shortsightedness. Business needs regulation to enable leaders to justify spending money on things like air pollution controls, stopping toxic discharges, and product safety that competitive businesses would not otherwise spend profits on. Laws become the justifiable excuse used by management to do the […]
Citizen Voice
Our constitution guarantees citizens the right to petition the government. And when the will of the public is galvanized our legislators listen. Our most effective presidents have been able to amplify our voices to overwhelm the petty voices of special interest or powerful fringe groups so that we could unite for the common […]
WE NEED YOUR IDEAS!
We need your best most thoughtful ideas about how we as a nation might create laws and establish policies to make these imperatives rise again in American life. Every so often we’ll all vote on the best ideas and send them to our elected representatives and hold them accountable for real action. It’s past […]
Strong, Wise and Good Foreign Policy
It’s time to reexamine our nation’s “foreign entanglements.” Our founders knew our best defense was a strong civil society and a productive economy. What if we spend some of our defense dollars on providing worldwide education to global citizens in dozens of languages to promote tolerance, self-reliance, collaboration, integrity, and the thirst for learning in […]
Fair and Simple Taxation
Our tax system is complicated and unfair. We all know that. Individuals and businesses with very similar incomes pay very different taxes based on their tax “strategies.” It’s all legal but unfair. When state taxes, user fees, social security taxes, Medicare taxes, property taxes and sales taxes are counted most of us have 40-45% of […]
Universal Access to Capital, Health Care, and Education
Capital: Capital is protein in the diet of freedom. Investment is necessary to produce sustainable growth and financial security. America’s great original promise was the right of individuals to own land. Land was the prized income-producing asset until the industrial revolution. It was productive capital. Today financial capital is […]
Absence of Corruption
Corruption is giving special advantages like regulatory exceptions, tax breaks, subsidies, and government contracts to specific people, companies and industries in secret, usually in exchange for money, support, or future jobs. Sometimes it is legal because politicians create loopholes allowing them to be immoral without breaking the law. It’s still wrong. Corruption, especially bribery and […]
Dependable Government Services
The government’s obligation to its citizens is the work of providing for the common good. The U.S. Federal budget is $3 trillion. It’s not too much to expect our roads and bridges be safe, our air traffic be competently directed, dams and levees be able to hold back water, and if there is a disaster […]
Leadership Accountability
Our President and his executive staff should not be able to hide behind executive privilege. We’re a democracy. Our president is a servant leader; he doesn’t have privileges; he as has responsibilities. Members of Congress who don’t vote on legislation ought to lose their seats. They’re elected to lead, not hide. […]
Lack of Violence
This isn’t the Wild West or a video game. It’s real life. The first responsibility of government is citizen safety and security. It is time to provide security for children in schools. No student or teacher in America should be afraid of being hurt by simply going to school. We need to increase the size […]
