This New Year 2018 (politics)
Jan. 1st, 2018 09:11 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
strredwolfAll right, time to get serious. 2016 and 2017 have punched us down. 2018, we're not letting it throw a punch.
In the United States, this year is a mid-term election year. That means it's time to be active in voicing your grievances against your elected Congress critter. He or she is responsible for this mess along with Trump.
So here's my platform:
Term Limits on Congress: If a Congress critter has been in Congress for longer than 12 years, vote them out. They're out of touch with your issues, and have been far too long away. Put someone fresh in there. A productive Congress is one that's changed often.
Transit and Transportation: The roads are clogged and falling apart. Trains of all types are getting delayed or canceled. Buses are packed. But nothing is getting done because nobody wants to fund the right projects. Thus, require any road expansion project getting Federal Transportation Administration funding to list all road and bridge repair, and transit projects that are currently unfunded. Direct the FTA to fund REPAIR efforts first, then TRANSIT repair and expansion. Transit projects that take people completely off the road should be emphasized (and I don't mean buses on the very same clogged roads -- I mean completely separate "rights of way").
This is why I don't like my governor, Maryland Governor Hogan. Getting people off the road and into buses means they're still on the road!
Related is fully funding the Hudson River tunnel project called Gateway. NY and NJ identified their part of the funding, but the Trump administration effectively canceled it. This affects people trying to get in and manage the financial capital of the world. If your Congress critter doesn't want to support that, vote him out, because what happens in New York reverberates across the nation. Remember 9/11? I do.
Commit to a Federal Reorganization: Want to cut down the deficit? Reorganize the entire Executive branch of the government! It should fall under three categories: Internal to the US, External to the US, and Both(Global). Departments that affect only the US go in Internal (USDA, FDA, etc). Stuff that only affects international affairs goes in External (State Department, CIA, NSA), with the rest being Global (FCC, CDC, all Military branches, Immigration and Naturalization, FBI, Justice Department). Create a Research and Development department combined from all other department's groups to consolidate all R&D efforts and cut down on overissuing of grants.
The overall goal is to reduce the actual cost of government. Once we get to the bare minimum, we can set a proper budget.
Require all spending bills to identify income sources: This is the biggest bug-a-boo right here, and it's what is giving us a ton of trouble. Money doesn't grow on trees, you know!
Reform the tax code again to age out most corporate tax breaks: A good chunk of tax breaks can be aged out because the company has no trouble affording the extra taxes, and it's been more than five years. Identify tax breaks that can be "claimed for up to five years", and plug any holes that would allow abuse (like a subsidiary company is claiming it for a parent).
Besides, I'm hearing that corporate taxes should never be more than 28% of all income.
Require any funding for telecom services, including Internet services, be audited to ensure they are being used properly: Right now, the Universal Telecommunications Fund is unaudited, and reports of funding being used for other things are rampant. If the telecom and backbone providers aren't expanding, they have no right to the UTF.
Related, make all telecom providers get all their intended tax breaks if they commit to network neutrality principles.
Commit to Single Payer Health Care: Senator Bernie Sanders is right, in terms of cutting paperwork, which saves a TON of cash and would pay for itself.
In the United States, this year is a mid-term election year. That means it's time to be active in voicing your grievances against your elected Congress critter. He or she is responsible for this mess along with Trump.
So here's my platform:
Term Limits on Congress: If a Congress critter has been in Congress for longer than 12 years, vote them out. They're out of touch with your issues, and have been far too long away. Put someone fresh in there. A productive Congress is one that's changed often.
Transit and Transportation: The roads are clogged and falling apart. Trains of all types are getting delayed or canceled. Buses are packed. But nothing is getting done because nobody wants to fund the right projects. Thus, require any road expansion project getting Federal Transportation Administration funding to list all road and bridge repair, and transit projects that are currently unfunded. Direct the FTA to fund REPAIR efforts first, then TRANSIT repair and expansion. Transit projects that take people completely off the road should be emphasized (and I don't mean buses on the very same clogged roads -- I mean completely separate "rights of way").
This is why I don't like my governor, Maryland Governor Hogan. Getting people off the road and into buses means they're still on the road!
Related is fully funding the Hudson River tunnel project called Gateway. NY and NJ identified their part of the funding, but the Trump administration effectively canceled it. This affects people trying to get in and manage the financial capital of the world. If your Congress critter doesn't want to support that, vote him out, because what happens in New York reverberates across the nation. Remember 9/11? I do.
Commit to a Federal Reorganization: Want to cut down the deficit? Reorganize the entire Executive branch of the government! It should fall under three categories: Internal to the US, External to the US, and Both(Global). Departments that affect only the US go in Internal (USDA, FDA, etc). Stuff that only affects international affairs goes in External (State Department, CIA, NSA), with the rest being Global (FCC, CDC, all Military branches, Immigration and Naturalization, FBI, Justice Department). Create a Research and Development department combined from all other department's groups to consolidate all R&D efforts and cut down on overissuing of grants.
The overall goal is to reduce the actual cost of government. Once we get to the bare minimum, we can set a proper budget.
Require all spending bills to identify income sources: This is the biggest bug-a-boo right here, and it's what is giving us a ton of trouble. Money doesn't grow on trees, you know!
Reform the tax code again to age out most corporate tax breaks: A good chunk of tax breaks can be aged out because the company has no trouble affording the extra taxes, and it's been more than five years. Identify tax breaks that can be "claimed for up to five years", and plug any holes that would allow abuse (like a subsidiary company is claiming it for a parent).
Besides, I'm hearing that corporate taxes should never be more than 28% of all income.
Require any funding for telecom services, including Internet services, be audited to ensure they are being used properly: Right now, the Universal Telecommunications Fund is unaudited, and reports of funding being used for other things are rampant. If the telecom and backbone providers aren't expanding, they have no right to the UTF.
Related, make all telecom providers get all their intended tax breaks if they commit to network neutrality principles.
Commit to Single Payer Health Care: Senator Bernie Sanders is right, in terms of cutting paperwork, which saves a TON of cash and would pay for itself.
