Missing Link

One of my good friends from my days in military school offered a challenge to me after reading my last post. I guess I’ve complained enough about our government that my friends are now wanting to know exactly what *I* would do instead. I can’t say that I blame them, and at least in part I expected this to happen sooner or later. The challenge, viewable in the comments of my previous post and reproduced here, is one I gladly accept.

MattyP wrote:

Mr. MMtMM,
I propose to you a challenge. I know how much you like analyzing and breaking down problems into fixable situations. I, like you, am extremely frustrated, disappointed, disillusioned, and generally fed up with the majority of American politicians. My challenge to you is this: IF provided with the necessary clout and authority, how would you re-work our current government to finally live up to its supposed task of representing our best interests?

I want to know specifically what, if you were elected President and chose to totally reboot the government, would you do? How would the Presidency of President Milton Waddums differ from every disgusting, corrupt, and morally bankrupt Presidency before it?

I am MOST interested in reading what you have to say, old friend!

First, let me say – this is quite the challenge. I find so many things that need improvement that it’s very VERY difficult to put it all into one post and keep it fairly concise. As such I am going to break it up into smaller posts. This is part one.

The first thing I would do is reform how elections happen. I would destroy the idea of a two party government that seems to permeate our government. You can’t represent the entirety of the US population and society in a system that only allows for two parties. The current system allows for significant stagnation, which harms everyone. We need some fresh ideas, new platforms and, most importantly, we need the will of the people to become a reality.

Beyond that, I would reform how campaign financing can be done. I would eliminate any contributions from companies or corporations, they cannot vote and should not be financing campaigns. It allows for corruption, kickbacks and the government working for the corporations and not the people. Government is for the people, not companies.

On the topic of HOW voting is done, I would say electronic voting machines WITH integrated paper backup. The software should be open to scrutiny by third party experts – no proprietary stuff.

Presidential signing statements would be made illegal, or at least limited in the scope of their use. If you don’t like a law as written then veto it, no ammending the law at the last second and with no recourse for debate or change.

I would eliminate the bureaucracy that is the Department of Homeland Security. It is a huge spender and isn’t doing much to really protect the people.

I would, as fast as is possible without further endangering our troops, get us out of the war in Iraq. I would then focus our efforts on the home front to try and repair our damaged economy and bring the US back into a prime position as a world economic powerhouse. This would include helping in the research and development of alternative fuel sources and new forms of technology. If we spent as much money on these things as we do on the unpopular wars we find ourselves fighting now, I have no doubt we’d succeed beyond our wildest dreams.

These are, in short, just a couple of things I would do. I will post part 2 later this week.