Do away with earmarks, no more free trips for Congress, no more free lunches, dinners, golf outings, no more skybox tickets for games, end it all. You want perks? Go work for big business, those doing the people's business should know better. Stop hiring these lobbyists or allowing former congressional employees to become lobbyists.
Give us some Congresspersons who will make such a pledge, I might become a one issue voter if you do....
16 comments:
That is a good one to get rid of. Can I be opposed to stupidity? I would vote against those that don't do what is best for their constituents and then tell them why it was good for them. Senator Grassley would be the first I would go after. I used to respect him and think he at least cared about Iowa, but now I just think he is crazy.
I would support a platform of being opposed to stupidity. We have two! I think we could get a quorum on this one.
:-)
I would certainly support a platform against stupidity!
That's why I support VOID!
Okay, that's three with Stephanie getting bonus points for working VOID in...
Looks promising for a clear majority on this one!
:-)
Agreed about stupidity.
I have too much of it on my own site from the Nazis; that's why I like this board, as there are far more intelligent posters here.
But seriously...
We are mortgaging our kids' futures, and no one seems to care. They just keep the Ponzi scheme rolling right along.
Okay...we have FOUR!!!
Mike, you have alot of intelligent posters, like Stephanie, HT, and I to name just a few that post both places, as well as some that only post on your blog (Like Bob Frantz who won't post on either one of my blogs but will yours :-)) but I appreciate the compliment.
I didn't forget Val, but I don't want her to think I did.
:-)
or Lloyd, who posts on Glass City Jungle...and I'm sure there are a few others too.
Here is the cold water...
While "earmarking" or "pork" may be bad, the biggest contributor to the debt is Dubya's tax cuts and the war.
Enough said...
Frank, that is very true, another reason why such fiscal irresponsibility should not be happening during this budget or the next one.
However, someday the war will end, so we do have to do something about earmarks and lobbyists.
:-)
Frank makes a good point - the presidents responsible for the biggest ballooning of the deficits (and national debt) have been the most conservative - Reagan and Bush 43.
I was always taught that conservatives were for smaller government and fiscal restraint.
Guess I'd better read those textbooks again...
Even Reagan realized when he went too far and raised taxes once. I am not sure what President Bush is doing. Unless he is trying to bankrupt everyone but the wealthiest so that there is the ownership society he envisions where the rich rule and we thank them for doing so.
I like how he is blaming Congress for not being responsible. Maybe someone should give him a civics lesson about the veto.
Count me in on the anti-stupidity platform. But here's the difficulty in abolishing pork & the accompanying lobbying.
Suppose there are 50 states (not too wild an assumption, for an economist). Suppose further that the reps & senators from each state come up with a gov't program that will cost each state $1 but pay the home state $2. Every one of these projects is a bad deal, since it generates $2 in benefits at a cost of $50.
But each delegation will support their respective home state projects, and be willing to trade votes to get *all* the projects passed, since they'll be able to return to their constituents and say "hey, look at the great $2 project I managed to get for us! And it only cost us a dollar."
If we want to get rid of this pork barrel stupidity, we have to start axing the congresspeople who bring home the bacon.
Charles, that is a very accurate statement and one I agree with. Ohio recently has risen to getting a slightly higher number of dollars given vs dollars collected, but there are a great number of states that receive more and less. It shouldn't be that way. With the exception of natural disasters, when one Congress person "brings home the bacon" it is realistically most times paid for by other states.
A thought:
Every time taxes have been cut, the Government's income has risen.
Unfortunately, most of the time Government has chosen to respond by spending even more...
I'd like to offer:
Line item veto
No riders (every bill is a stand-alone separate bill
-and-
A goal of a balanced budget by 2008, with a debt reduction to Zero by 2016.
So that our grandchildren's children will grow up in a debt free country.
One more thing:
Zero foreign aid starting in 2007.
Lets lend our foreign aid to US (the US).
Maybe then social security can stop being stolen from workers qualifying for additional pension sources, and it will no longer be in trouble.
We know our foreign aid "investments" yield very little return, so let's invest it in ourselves.
Hooda is right on. The so-called "tax cuts" are really just postponed taxes, since there's no corresponding cut in spending (spending continues to rise, of course). So guvamint borrows to make up the difference, and we end up paying through future taxes.
Hooda does go off target on the foreign aid issue -- an enormous part of U.S. foreign aid goes to Americans. When USAID awards contracts for foreign development projects, you didn't think they awarded them to foreigners, did you? They award them to American beltway bandits, For-Profits and non-profit NGOs. Yes, some cash does eventually trickle down to the furreners, but not so much. After all, it's the American firms and NGOs who have the political pull, not the poor foreigners.
No foreign aid would be a bad policy move in my opinion. I agree we need to help ourselves first, but if we don't help the rest of the world, we just make ourselves more hated. Not to mention the spread of disease that could occur.
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