Endorsing Change
This year's political discourse has been nothing short of amazing. I'm almost hoping against hope that good things will start happening soon. The positive participation and energy from this season, however, has to go further than just one election cycle. It needs to go further than just one presidential choice. It needs to go through the entire apparatus of Washington D.C.
For much too long, the basic interests of people of all political philosophies—Democrats, Republicans, Libertarians, and other Independents—have taken a back seat to the rich an powerful interests that our political machine currently services. We all have our differences, and government is how we resolve those differences to a degree that we can all live with. But, at this point in history, our elected officials are so far out of tune with our interests, and so in tune with the interests that power their re-election machines, that we the people are out in the cold.
In many elections recently, I've been tempted to vote out any incumbent. But that's just arguing for change with out a plan. And simply turning over the actors in congress without changing the system won't fix a thing. Change without a plan will lead to no change at all.
It is therefore with great interest that I've been watching Larry Lessig move forward with his next great endeavor. Larry has identified several organizations that are helping to facilitate change to Washington on multiple fronts and is bringing them together in a mash-up of sorts. It's called Change Congress. Some of the positions Change Congress encompass, such as encouraging congressmen to not accept contributions from registered lobbyists or PACs, are more from the Democratic side of the political spectrum. Others, like supporting the abolition of earmarks, are more from the Republican side. All are good ideas.
If we can break our representatives from serving the interests of the lobbyists, if we can focus them back on serving the needs of the people who elect them rather than the dollars that pay for the ads that the campaigns use, then maybe, just maybe, we can get the government that we want to have. One that will govern the interests of we the people rather than just some of the people and the corporations and foreign interests that we currently have.
Speaking publicly on a blog about politics can be risky, as I've found out in previous years. For better or worse, however, I'm going to throw my hat publicly into this particular ring and state the following:
I endorse change with a plan. I specifically endorse Change Congress, which aims for the changes needed to ensure that our elected officials worry about us and not spend all their time chasing the money. And, if you don't want to punch through to the Change Congress website, to see what they are all about, here are the four planks in their platform:
- No more money from lobbyists or PACs. Congress should be beholden to we the people, not special interests. You've heard Senators Edwards and Obama talk about this during their campaigns for president.
- No more earmarks. Stop pork barrel projects like the "Bridge to Nowhere". President Bush has brought this issue up many times, including during the State of the Union address.
- Increase Congressional transparency. The public's business should be available to the public. The Sunlight Foundation is a great source of information.
- Support publicly-financed campaigns. Plug campaign finance loopholes to keep big-money's influence at bay. Public financing has support from both Democrats and Republicans alike.
I'll be contacting my representatives and encourage them to support the things that make up that change. And if they don't, I'll support those that will. Beyond ideology, beyond any particular position, the most important aspect of a representative is that they will represent the people instead of the interests that give them the money to market their re-election.
I hope you will consider doing the same. At the very least, I hope that you'll watch the video of Larry introducing Change Congress. Maybe you won't agree with all of the mechanisms that Change Congress is advocating, and that's OK. If you're for real change in Congress, see which of the mechanisms you do agree with, then make your support felt. Help make your voice count for more than just one day in November.
9 Comments
yay. I can say I agree with that thought; it's an extension of the Military-Industrial Complex, and it's a sad affair to watch. I mean, I may be giving away my affiliations a bit here, but WHY exactly are our friends/family dying in a foreign country? Are we really any safer for their deaths? Yeah thought so.
But damned if some rich folks are a smidgeon richer, huh? And they didn't have to give anything up for it...
I've said it for years to anyone that will listen: To fix the problems, we have to cut the dragon's head off. Sever it. That dragon is Money. PRIVATE MONEY has no place in PUBLIC FORUMS. It's a recipe for... well, for what we have now.
I mean, what the fuck? How much money is EACH CANDIDATE going to spend this year trying to get elected? How much better a use could that money be put to?
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Nice goal, but the root of the problem is not addressed here...
James - The reason that our representatives subject themselves to the appeals of lobbyists is a function of the expansiveness of our government; i.e., the more the gov't regulates/controls our lives and businesses, the more incentive for individuals and groups to effectively influence it to their advantage.
Take the tax code, for instance. Loopholes, anyone? How did they get there. If a tax regimen such as a flat tax were the law of the land, there would be no cottage industry whose sole purpose today is to create special loopholes. And how are the loopholes created? Yeah, lobbyists. Ditto for earmarks - they are a function of government transferring our hard earned income to their favorite constituencies. Get the government out of the wealth-transfer industry, and watch the issue diminish or evaporate.
You cannot have a large, intrusive government while at the same time expecting a clean government; the goals are contradictory. The cry should be for LESS government; endorsing "change" is as likely to succeed as a leopard's changing its spots.
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Eric: Don't misunderstand me as saying that I want change for change's sake. Change Congress is neutral on the topic of expanding government or contracting it. It's aimed right at the same things you're talking about: trying to reduce the influence of lobbyists, eliminating earmarks, and getting the government out of the wealth-transfer industry moving money.
I've fixed a link at the bottom to the introduction video as well as added a description of the four planks to the blog post and made sure to change text that implies I just want change for change's sake.
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See I don't tend to agree with the "less government" theory. To me, it's a nice "theory," but in practice never works. It's like communism (yes, communism): it sounds all cheery, but the reality of it never, ever plays out like the theory; too many levels of corruption are created and exploited.
Gov't is supposed to be the community watchdog. They are supposed to make sure that the capitalists (that's us) play fair, and don't cheat their fellow man to get ahead. Less government is basically the same as more cheating. Pollution a problem now? Less gov't exasperates the problem, because who tells PG&E to stop? Who fines them?
Now of course the gov't is corrupt. And yes its size has a matter to do with it, but more importantly I think it's the concept of who's paying the bills. And I really maintain that if you pull PRIVATE MONEY out of PUBLIC POLITICS, then you remove the corruption factor. What's left to bend the will of a public figure if not monetary gain (and we include "gifts" in that as well, so no yachts or free homes).
I think the idea of simply changing gov't to be "smaller" is less a step in the right direction as it is a step in another direction still full of hornet's nests. I think it'd basically be the same gig as now, only instead of big corporations being in bed with the gov't to do the thing's they're doing, they simply wouldn't have to sleep around to do them; no one would be around to investigate or stop it.
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HI, totally off-topic, but I just wanted to ask...
Are you now using Aperture 2 or Lightroom as your main processing tool?
Regards
- Rory
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Rory, that's a different kind of change, for sure :) I'm using Aperture 2 quite a bit and now, with the release of 2.1, am continuing to dig in. In short, I'm using both of them quite a bit currently.
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I think there's a lot of interesting ideas at Change Congress that can get the support of people from all political persuasions. It's a nice start.
I disagree about public funding of campaigns and banning lobbyists, though. I think there is nothing wrong with lobbyists or someone wanting to donate $1m to a candidate *as long as* it's all immediately transparent. If I know that "Rich Person A" gave $1m to a candidate it's easy to spot the influence in voting patterns.
However, I think a lot of people who have never run for office don't understand how much time the fundraising takes. When you have to spend 4-5 hours of every single day on the phone sweet-talking donors, that's 4-5 hours you're not listening to your potential constituents. Allowing bigger donations allows less time raising money and more time with the people who should matter more - but this can only work if we have true transparency.
Kudos to you for being willing to speak your mind. We sure need a lot more honest discourse between adults and less of the shouting matches we see for ratings on tv. I'd love to see us come together as Americans to work on these issues. I actually think there's a lot of overlap between honest people.
Best line I heard recently was describing the experience in a bakery: we all choose something different but we come to the same place and enjoy the time spent with each other and sniffing all the goodies.
P.S. I've lurked here for several years enjoying your work - first after buying your book on Cocoa then watching you develop your photography. I look forward to seeing where you go next.
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Thanks Dan for the comment. Indeed, it would be nice to have more discourse about these things—and to talk about them to see how to make things better.
One of the things I like about the Change Congress approach is that it doesn't require buying into the whole platform. There is a freedom to indicate preference and to say "Hey, I like these three bits, but that fourth bit, nah. I can't get behind that". If enough people do that, then we can see what changes are most likely to get some traction.
It's an interesting thought you bring up that limiting the amount of each donation ends up meaning the the congresspeople have to spend more time raising funds. That's an interesting ramification I hadn't thought of. I'm not sure what I think of it yet, but...
As far as the overlap between people, I agree. On the big roadtrip last fall, we ran into all sorts of people. People that were Republicans, Democrats, and everything in between. Almost all were good, earnest people that deserve representation for their ideas and needs. And almost all felt a bit shut out.
Thanks for reading all this time! I hope to keep on doing cool things with the blog going forward.
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to Dan:
Yeah see the point is, if you TAKE OUT private funding, they spend NO TIME WHATSOEVER on the phones fundraising. They spend all their time campaigning, honing their message, and doing something. And what's more, since all the candidates would get equal funding (from the public source), they'd have to –gasp!– debate the issues! Instead of making corny "flip-flop" commercials! Holy Crap!
Plus I'm not naive enough to think that people or who fund lots of money – transparent or not – require a contract to ensure votes go their way. This is not always the Disneyland world we live in, people are capable of all sorts of cruel things...
Not a conspiracist by any measure, but the president doesn't have the Secret Service for nothing, right? Right? :-)
Anyway my point is not that I think candidates should have to solicit low-dollar contributions and eschew high-dollar gimmes; it's that i think candidates should not be allowed to TOUCH or even look at ANY TYPE of funding that is not given to them by the public pool. Remove private money, you remove private incentives.
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