Great post. I took the time to breakout each topic and kind of give you my thoughts. Again thanks for the thoughtful reply. Some very good stuff.
Mr. Clean said:
Scrub, good talking points.
I struggle with the idea of term limits for senators and congressional reps. Of course they do have term limits, and in theory if they are not meeting the people’s expectations their term limits are set when they are not re-elected. On the other hand we have often seen the power of being the incumbent. I just can’t come to a right answer for that situation. One are where term limits are definitely needed are in the judiciary, there is no way that any judge federal or supreme court that merits a lifetime position. Term limits and mandatory retirement ages should be enacted.
I agree with the judicial side, but for the congress why not. Early on in American history information flow was poor. Travel was also poor. A central location for government ensured each state had a voice there. It would be easier to send a few as the voice of many. With the advent of cable news, the internet, and even Cspan voters have more information available to them. Having an influx of freshman reps and senators would hurt legislation flow back then. Today the time to get up to speed should be reduced.
For example, the first computers seemed pretty complicated. I wouldn’t have believed 10-15 years later I could run to Best Buy and pick up some parts to build my own computer. The point is with more info and resources available we gained more experience and knowledge.
How does this apply to Washington? I don’t think we need 25-30 year senators or reps in office, simply because they know how Washington politics works. That's selling ourselves short.
Mr. Clean said:
We have turned into a nation of special interest groups. Those groups with the most money to hire the best lobbyists seem to fare the best, regardless if it in the best interest of the community.
Campaign reform is indeed needed, unfortunately the people that are most affected by that are the people who have a vote to change it. They also get to vote themselves raises, and have cleverly crafted the law so that the raises can be affected without a vote. In other words they have to vote to reject the raise. Have we seen that happen? Since we are their employers, shouldn’t we have some say so as to whether they should receive the raise?
This goes hand in hand. The big donors to campaigns are the special interests. Get rid of this soft money. This is buying people and votes. As I stated before it shouldn’t cost as much money to buy a seat in the House or Senate. Even local elections, in some cities and states, winning comes down to who has the most money rather than the best candidate. Why did Howard Dean become the DNC chair. Because he can raise tons of money. It sure wasn’t for his great debating and interviewing skills.
Mr. Clean said:
And speaking of fiscal responsibility, of course it is our money though they prefer to act as it is theirs, unfortunately again we cannot vote on each expenditure, but we sure as heck should hold our representatives accountable when they do not toe the line on frivolous spending. Of course it is difficult and time consuming to keep up with the spending bills that get passed. It would be much easier if the legislature would commit to a reasonable budget and commit to meet the budgetary guidelines.
True. If we only influence a few in the legislature we still lose because of the minority of that opinion.
Mr. Clean said:
Boy, you hit a hot spot of mine on the judicial branch of our government. You and I are in total accord. As construed and constructed by our founding fathers, the Legislative Branch enacts laws. The Judicial Branch applies those laws and ensures no laws violate the Constitution. I’ve already stated my opinion on term limits for the federal and Supreme Court justices.
Agree
Mr. Clean said:
I thought that line item veto has been available since the first Bush term?
I’m not sure. I thought congress didn’t want the president to have that kind of power. I recall a bill that the president said he would veto due to some rider on the bill. He didn't say anything about vetoing the rider.
Mr. Clean said:
Foreign aid I think is or at least can be a good thing. It should be spent wisely of course.
My point there was we give our money away to countries that don’t like us. We could use that money here at home in more programs or tax cuts.
Mr. Clean said:
The no child left behind program is still around (I think) but I don’t know how effectively the program is being implemented, or even how well thought out it was at conception. Yes, we need Americans working. This was a sticking point for me with the second Bush campaign, I could not believe that only the second president in history (anyone can correct me if they have different data) who lost jobs during his presidency. The other being Hoover, and we know how his bid for re-election went.
I’m not very fluent on this particular program. I was just trying to remember some domestic programs that Bush has talked about and ask where are more programs for Americans. That’s my point there really aren’t to many domestic programs for Americans from this president. It’s all about war. He hardly acknowledged the gas price problems. He's a bury his head in the sand president when it comes to the care and feeding of the citizens. He'll put the "well I took us to war" spin on it.
I'm really uncomfortable with America's position in the world today. We've alienated many countries. One thing I agree with Mr Bush is not needing UN approval to defend our borders. We don't!
Mr. Clean said:
As far as free trade, we need that. It is a good thing. The problem is, trade imbalance. A large part of the blame for business, particularly manufacturing business, going overseas should be put right at the feet of corporate greed. That is companies taking money from the business and paying off corporate officers and stockholders rather than reinvesting in their infrastructure to allow them to compete. Look at the steel industry decades ago. Entire towns were devastated when the mills closed because we could import a superior product for less money. A good example right now is the BP’s Prudhoe Bay field that is shut down because of 16 miles of bad pipe. Does the term preventative maintenance come to mind?
You are correct a trade balance needs to be in effect. Free enterprise prohibits the forceful use of government to limit profits or keep business in America. But boycotts by consumers can really send a message. Another thing is businesses should have more loyalty to this country than to profits.
Let’s talk about gas prices. That’s the biggest sham going. During a national crisis, rather than reduce profits and cut prices the oil companies raised their prices. Now I understand if the supply price went up to raise their price to maintain profitability. The problem was the oil companies profits continued to rise meaning the supply side price was stagnant and the demand side sales increased which lead to increased profits.
No big deal right. This is the business world right. It’s the law of supply and demand right. WRONG! Gas is a commodity that can cripple this country. And its not a matter of supply and demand.
Let’s look at hamburgers for the example. If McDonalds drastically raised their prices we the consumer have choices of other places we could go. In addition let’s say all the burger joints conspire together and raise their prices at the same time to the same price. No big deal I just go get a pizza or some fried chicken. Consumers have other choices due to competition. Herein lies the problem when gas prices go over $4.00 a gallon where else can we go to buy gas or another source of fuel. We can’t. Our hands are tied. That’s why I feel the oil companies shouldn’t be allowed to drastically raise prices. We have to have gas and can’t go without it. We have no other choices.
Go ahead and throw out the hybrid cars. Do a cost analysis. When we were looking at a new Accord we priced the hybrid Accord. It was $10,000 dollars more than the fully loaded Accord we purchased. I’m not sure of the fuel savings by driving the hybrid. But how long would it take to break even with the fuel savings cost compared to the extra $10,000 spent on the vehicle. Probably longer than I would own the car. E-85 isn’t any better. The car manufactures won’t tell you fuel economy goes down with E-85 because it’s less efficient.
Mr. Clean said:
I have lots of thoughts on Iraq, but specifically why things seem to have fallen into disarray IMO, Bush has valued the counsel of the likes of Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, and Cheney over the military leaders whose job it is to implement the plans of those civilians. This is another weakness of Bush in general. It appears that it doesn’t really matter to him that you know what you are doing, as long as you are blindly loyal to him and his core advisers and do not go against the grain. Just ask Powell.
Bush is a chuckle head. He got tons of credit for having some of the best advisers. If you ask me the advisers are just party leftovers from the Regan administration. The good ole boy system at work.
Mr. Clean said:
Guaranteed health care is another subject that I don’t have an answer for, but I do know that it is far cheaper to apply preventative medicine than it is to have to try to cure after the fact. That goes for the very young, the very old and all persons in between. How to fund it and administer a program for those that can’t afford it (ie. the working poor, those that can’t work) I don’t know. Avoiding the staggering costs that unnecessary bureaucracy can add to such a program is another significant dilemma.
No help here. Managing costs seems to be a good thing. Its trickle down from the Docs to the patients because we have to pay the doctors for their expensive malpractice insurance.
Mr. Clean said:
Americans need to be able to earn a living wage, but at the same time I understand that jobs have a certain value to them and you can’t expect to earn more than a job is worth. Affixing a true market dollar value can only be achieved when all workers are working on a level field. Allowing illegal workers into the market place does not allow that to take place.
I was thinking about this at work yesterday. Look at it like this and tell me what you think.
If I make minimum wage ($5.75 I think) and gas cost $3.00 a gallon and I use 10-15 gallons a week how much is left for rent and food. Not much. Not mentioning the food prices are outrageous too.
We are killing the lower income workers. These people do important work too. In a society we need all types of skilled workers and incomes. These folks should be compensated for it. We all can’t be Donald Trump. We need the fast food employees, supermarket employees, sanitation workers, stock brokers, doctors…for our society to function. We all should not make the same money but we all should be fairly compensated to earn a decent living.
This country is the land of opportunity, not the land of guarantee. For some folks though they never seem to get ahead. That’s who we should help out, those that are trying but can’t keep up, not those that expect a free ride.
Mr. Clean said:
True we are a country is founded on immigration, but it was legal immigration. And those immigrants were proud to be Americans and anxious to learn the American ways including speaking the language of the country which is English. Today we are a country of hyphenated people it is not merely enough to be an American you must be a (insert the nationality of choice)-American. I guess I’m just a Texican
So what are some ideas on how to make changes to our government? If we could come together as a group and influence some change maybe that might get the ball rolling. I feel we can all agree some change is needed.
:ass :ass :ass
