A Constitutional Revolution: how citizens can take control of the government
The House of Representative is controlled by profligate spenders and the politician-oligarchs that only serve the special interests, not the citizenry. This is how we can take back the House and thwart tyranny.
Please read Walter Williams' article "Political Monopoly Power" in which he mentions Thirty-Thousand.org and states that "restricting the number of representatives confers significant monopoly power that goes a long way toward explaining the stranglehold the two parties have and the high incumbent success rates. It might also explain the power of vested interest groups to influence congressional decisions."
Also listen to Listen to Lew Rockwell’s short interview of Dr. Mark Thornton Dr. Thornton has written two papers providing empirical evidence that total governmental expenditures decrease as the number of representatives increases. (These reports and others are available here.)
For those who want to learn more about how enlarging representation relates to our Bill of Rights, be sure to read this important account of "Article the first". (The text of Article the first itself can be read here.)
Please read the 15 Questions & Answers on the Thirty-Thousand.org home page.
Thirty-Thousand.org is a non-partisan and non-profit 501(c)(3) organization.
Excellent Post
Putting aside whether there can be true representative government with a population of 300+ million people, this would go a long way to improving the situation. A thirty thousand district would mean maybe twelve thousand potential voters.
Perhaps over time a congressman could actually meet most of the voters, and even answer his mail.
I'd even like to find a way to keep the members at home, and let them vote electronically from there.
This is a much needed reform putting power back in the hands of the people and away from the moneyed interests.
Well if you want to see
Well if you want to see these changes implemented on a national level people(more representatives) THE MEANS to do it is via an Article V or National Constitutional Convention. Clearly, the Congress, dominated by the 2 major parties, won't very likely support such legislation. They like their 2 party monopoly. See link below for one Convention effort now underway for AUTONOMOUS REGIONAL GOVERNMENT.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NationalConstitutionalConventi...
Extremism in the pursuit of liberty is no vice and moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue.
Barry Goldwater
Extremism in the pursuit of liberty is no vice and moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue.
Barry Goldwater
Thirty-Thousand.org is on to something really important!
While reading the Constitution a few months back, it occurred to me that our House would have to be much bigger to keep the people represented as well as in the beginning. Little did I know that somebody had already mapped all that out and had come up with so many compelling arguments for reform!
I recommend Thirty-Thousand.org to anybody. I just found it this week for the first time and was thoroughly impressed. It's smart, concise, and thorough.
Jack Pelham
Rule of Law Revolution
www.ruleoflawrevolution.com
Jack Pelham
www.jackpelham.com
www.ruleoflawrestoration.com
Pork Barrel spending
Wasteful spending and earmarks have always been some of the issues in the government today. In this regard, there is no difference between the two political parties. But a certain project by the government details the “pork” spending done by the federal government every year. It is known as the Citizens Against Government Waste. If more people had their hands on it, a lot of legislators would doubtless put an online cash advance to stop it. The CAGW makes the Pig Book available for free download and a hard copy of the yearly report available for a cash donation. The donation asked for isn't huge, so you can get a copy of the Pig Book of government pork without worrying about short term loans.
Please ignore thread hijack below.
atrickpay has attempted to hijack this thread. You are encouraged to move on to the discussions below his post for more interesting and relevant discussion.
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Walter Williams is an anarchist in denial
He recognizes that taxation is theft, but he (subconsciously) cannot accept anarchism because it is "too crazy" or something.
So, it's typical that he would right articles like this promoting statism (ie. "let's get more goverment officials so that government will work better! Yay!").
A rhetorical, fear-based opinion statement.
Can you backup your claims? Or are you God?
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I'll try to
Which claim(s) are you referring to specifically?
That increasing the value of
That increasing the value of the individual's vote is statism.
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OK.
I would argue that it is stat-ism (the philosophy of support of the State) because quite simply Walter supports the State, and this reform is not to attack the doctrine of statism, but rather just to make the State more efficient and more compact.
So your position is that we
So your position is that we should have no government?
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No
If you want to set up a government over your own property that's fine with me.
But, for myself I want no part of any government. I'm an anarcho-capitalist. I would rather have the free-market protect my liberties than a tax-funded monopoly (ie. government).
Okay, just wanted to clarify
Okay, just wanted to clarify that point.
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YEAH!!!
Restrict the amount of elephants and donkeys. Sounds good to me. But what do ya do about the wolves in sheeps clothing?............. Which is common place today. It looks like it comes back to the same thing.
I.E. The system MUST be run by the Constitution.
P.S. I'm not for growth of congress though.
This is exactly what I'm talking about.
Doug, have you considered what is required to be elected to the House of Representatives? The Chairman of the Silicon Valley GOP told me there are only 3 ways to get elected to congress:
1. Be the selected (appointed) candidate for either the Democrat or Republican Parties.
2. Be independently wealthy and willing to flush $5-10 million down the toilet.
3. Already be famous.
I cannot think of any other way to get elected, can you?
I live in a town with about 30,000 people in it. He told me that if I wanted to 'conquer' our city council I would need 10-20 volunteers working 30 hours a week and about $20,000. With this I would have a "nearly invincible armada" with which to win the election.
This is because on a small scale the size of the budget and number of volunteers does not heavily impact the election beyond a certain point, similar to the old adage 'too many cooks spoil the broth'.
How likely is it that under the current system we will ever see anything other than what we have in office right now? I have always said the difference between the Democrats and the Republicans is like the difference between a glass of cyanide and a glass of arsenic - they may taste a little different but the outcome is the same.
Right now, since the people who are elected are elected based on little more than charisma, it is easy for them to maintain control, and their loyalty is to the special interests, the real problem. Special interests are the true debasers of liberty. They hijack parties, ideologial movements, and political causes and distort them to suit their own agendas.
For most of us, contacting our congressman is a complete waste of time, as evidenced by the futile public outcry against the TARP bill. They have no fear of the average nobody because there is no reason to fear the average nobody. I have no connections, I don't have any large circle of influence, and I'm poor, so the congressman can just blow me off to his or her heart's content.
But what if a congresswoman knew that if she were to piss off someone contacting her, then that person may be her next opponent? And this person could actually take the election if they can scrape up $20,000 and find volunteers to help them. In this scenario, the congresswoman would have much more respect for her constituents and would be forced to substantively support her positions instead of providing meaningless rhetoric. She would also have to know that the things she supports will actually achieve the intended outcome because otherwise some unknown opponent will send her packing at the upcoming election.
It is, for all intents and purposes, impossible to unseat the current plutocracy without dramatically decreasing the number or voters per representative.
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MyFirstNameIsPaul understands this well
Thank you for explaining it to others.
Everyone please read the articles (and listen to the audio) referenced in my original posting.
Quite frankly, I don't know how to "market" this concept. I think it has to be explained from person to person. This is a major paradigm shift for most people and, interestingly, it is not a new idea; it was the basis for the very first amendment proposed in our Bill of Rights. Try to find anyone in academia who knows that the very first amendment proposed in our Bill of Rights was never ratified, and that this amendment contains an inexplicable defect which sabotaged its intent. By itself, that is an important story that is never told.
It was supposed to be our House.
Thirty-Thousand.org
It was supposed to be our House.
Thirty-Thousand.org
California Prop 11
I wish I had recorded the commercials for Prop 11 here in California. They basically said, and I'm hardly exaggerating:
End political bickering.
Lower taxes.
Cure cancer.
End world hunger.
The claims of the ads were so incredible one could hardly believe that one amendment could do all that. The funny thing is that the amendment was really an abomination to democracy. But it passed with 50.9% of the vote and most analysts said the campaigning is what 'saved' the initiative.
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CaliforniaCommonwealth.com
Speaking of California, see this site:
http://www.CaliforniaCommonwealth.com
Michael Warnken is trying to enlarge California's legislature (which is a true oligarchy)
It was supposed to be our House.
Thirty-Thousand.org
It was supposed to be our House.
Thirty-Thousand.org
Representation numbers
I like the numbers in New Hampshire. They have 400 assemblymen to 800,000 people. You only have to shake 2000 hands to convince 1001 of them to vote you their representative. That is as close to "grass-roots" as we have in this country.
The more representatives we have the better the chance someone you like will get elected and make a difference.
Jerry Hammond
Jerry Hammond
Good, interesting discussion
in this thread
This isn't marketed correctly
If this is ever to gain popular support, the marketing is going to have to change completely.
I don't think any political cause has ever succeeded using graphs and studies. You have to sell rhetoric.
"Would you like to live in a world where your representative will actually take your phone calls, no matter who you are?"
"This bill will make your representative care about all the things you care about."
"End lobbyist power: support this bill."
"Stop the pork: support this bill."
"Give Washington back to the voters: support this bill."
"Put an end, once and for all, to deficit spending."
"Don't care for how your representative does business? Support this bill and then do it yourself!"
See where I'm going with this?
Also, the total number of representatives is more or less arbitrary and should be mentioned last, if at all. The first thing that the target should be sold on is what the world would be like with representatives who are worried about losing their jobs in 2 years (or less) and how the target could make a very serious run at office if he or she desired. Once convinced of how much better this is, then discuss how most of the spending in Washington is generated by special interests. Usually, if you've done your job well, the target will make the leap and realize that special interests cannot possibly control 10,000 people and this system would be much better than the current system.
In my opinion, the ideal target is one who doesn't vote. 40% of voters did not vote in the last election, that's close to 90 million voters. I find that most people I meet in this category didn't vote because they don't like the system.
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"This isn't marketed correctly"
To "MyFirstNameisPaul", you are correct: this isn't marketed correctly.
I'm doing the best I can. We need others to market this. Please go forth and market! This will only happen if we the people make it happen. This is opposed by every vested interest. This is a true revolution.
Another question: I know that Ron Paul the person would support this, but I wonder if Ron Paul the Representative would support this. The difference is that Representatives oppose this because they don't want to subdivide their massive fiefdoms. Moreover, neither they nor the lobbyists want to open up their comfortable little country club to ordinary citizens. The only Representative who has promoted enlarging the House (that I know of) is Alcee Hastings.
It was supposed to be our House.
Thirty-Thousand.org
It was supposed to be our House.
Thirty-Thousand.org
Well, Ron Paul supporters
Well, Ron Paul supporters generally don't support it on the grounds that they don't like to increase the size of government and that is what they perceive this as being. They tend to imagine that it would be 10,000 more of the same types of representatives that we have now, and I can never get them to think critically on the topic. However, I think that is a problem caused largely by the medium of communication.
I doubt Ron Paul would support this as it is my opinion he hasn't really thought critically on it (I feel the same way about his opposition to Fair Tax). He is stuck in trying to build an ideological movement that, even if he were to succeed at everything, would be completely erased within 30-50 years. Simply getting rid of agencies created by congress doesn't do anything for the root cause of the problem, which is special interest control of D.C.
There has to be a fundamental change. Everything else is temporary.
My opinion is that support comes from places like Richmond, California. When we landed on Mars, I wanted to do a video survey of residents of Richmond to see how they felt about the billions of dollars spent to take potting samples on Mars with an RC car. I wasn't sure if they or anyone else would get it.
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Agreed
"Hell! These young kids are not going to be willing to go to the barricades in defense of lower transaction costs!"
- Murray Rothbard, as reported by Butler Shaffer
~jaq
~jaq
Sounds vaguely like Mike Gravel's platform
I rather liked Mike Gravel and his sincerity, but one of his pet projects that he's been touting for decades has been something on the order of this, but I think he cranked the volume up all the way. If I understand Mike's position (and I might not, it's been a while since I read about it) he wanted a great many things decided by some sort of national plebicite.
It's an interesting concept, but I think if we retain the cultural problem of "bread-and-circus" mentality that we've been nurturing for a few decades, what you end up with is lunacy and mob rule.
"Democracy is based on the assumption that a million men are wiser than one man. How's that again? I missed something.
Autocracy is based on the assumption that one man is wiser than a million men. Let's play that over again, too. Who decides?"
- Robert Heinlein
~jaq
~jaq
That is why we have a
That is why we have a democratic republic, and it is why we should have smaller districts - one person cannot effectively represent 700,000 people. It looks like we're in agreement here. (o;
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bump
bump
bump
for others...this is a lot to read and I don't want to see the thread drop off before others have a chance to see it.
. @ @ . Power to the People!
@ O @ -----> PEOPLE
. @ @ . NOT Corporate Entities!
Good read, JE
I haven't read each report, but so far they are very informative. Thanks for posting.
Spread the word!
Qwerk,
Representation is a little understood subject, and most people don't understand the important distinction between government and governance. Informed people realize that the crisis this country is facing was caused by the government, and now the government (under oligarchic one-party rule) is throwing more fuel on the fire.
Unfortunately, the solution (as described in my original posting) is not a magical quick fix; it's a long-term solution which requires replacing 435 politician-oligarchs with 6,000 citizen representatives.
It was supposed to be our House.
Thirty-Thousand.org
It was supposed to be our House.
Thirty-Thousand.org