Positive Changes and Suggestions

First off, Merry Christmas! If you’re on the blog on actual Christmas morning, go open presents! Read this later. *grin* I’ll be doing the same, because I’m writing this in advance, so that I don’t have to look at the blog today. There.

Right… last week the Continuing Resolution was supposed to pass. All 1500 pages of it. Musk made We The People aware of it, and We The People made the decision to call our politicians to say HELL NO. Those 1500 pages were not passed. I considered that incredibly positive. And then I heard the commentary from the Left and others:

“House Republicans have been ordered to shut down the government. And hurt the working class Americans they claim to support,” Jeffries posted on the social platform X. “You break the bipartisan agreement, you own the consequences that follow.” (1)

“They come in and undermine us two days before the government shutdown deadline?” she asked. “That doesn’t seem like, at all, a good way to do business.” (2)

“I thought it was a reasonably good compromise,” he added. “The problem was one or two people in our conference, instead of just opposing it, had to go out and demonize and distort things, provisions in the bill.” Republican Rep. Kevin Bacon (3)

There are bunches of other comments that made me wince. One senator I caught a clip of basically said that because We The People chose to tank this pork-ladened CR, we were snatching disaster relief from the Carolinas and elsewhere. That one made my blood boil. Biden just sent a billion to Africa. We HAD money to take care of our own, and Biden and his people sent it elsewhere. Coming in at the last second and tacking aid onto a CR that’s meant to keep the government running is just trashy.

There is a LOT going on with all this. The bottom line is, we want to see an end to the bloat in Washington. That means that a lot of Democrats and probably quite a few Republicans are going to get their panties in a wad. I am really okay with that. I’m okay with anything that reduces the size of government. Here’s the thing… our Founders never imagined career politicians like we have today. They couldn’t have. It’s so against their beliefs, because it essentially mimics the aristocracy in Britain. That’s exactly what they were trying to avoid.

So… Trump and his team have come in, and they’re up to making changes. To the people who’ve suggested Trump is overstepping by attempting to lead the country now instead of waiting for January 20th, I say, “At least *someone* is attempting to run the damn country. Biden sure isn’t.”

So what things can we encourage Trump to get in place over the next four years? What things can we encourage Vance to put into place during the 8 years after that? Here are some of my suggestions:

• TERM LIMITS. I want to see politicians have no more than 8 years in any given office. I’d love to see it be no more than ten years in ANY office, but I think that’s probably asking too much. But 8 years of service per office seems reasonable. I don’t want anymore career politicians. That is NOT what our Founders wanted.
• No salaries/low salaries. I want to see our politicians either have no salary, where their time in office is donated to the American people because they care that much, or have their salaries be ONLY while in office, and their pay be linked to the median take home pay in their state. They should get the same insurance options as everyone else in their state. They are not “better than us” in any way, and they should live like we do in order to understand what we’re going through. I understand that “no salaries” has historically been frowned upon because it could lead to politicians taking bribes, but if they’re taking bribes anyhow, maybe that’s what we need to do.
• All bills, CRs, budgets, etc etc must be posted in a public place (newspapers and on the government’s website, for instance) for We The People to read, at least 7 days prior to it being voted on. The text must be the final version that will be voted on, meaning no changes can be made between that posting a week prior, and the vote. I can’t make people read this stuff, but if they’re forced to pay to put this into a newspaper, with all the freakin’ pages it’ll take up, maybe it’ll make them pare it down.
• One issue, one bill. No more pork. You want pork, sell it to your constituents and make it into its own bill. You don’t get to add it as a rider on something else. ONE ISSUE, ONE BILL. If you cant write out your issue in less than ten pages, then you don’t understand the problem well enough.
• For really important stuff like the budget, maybe we need to come up with some new rules. Just spitballing here, but perhaps we need to have a jury of We The People look at all of these things. They’re picked at random, like any jury. Their job is to read the text of the budget, ask questions of the people putting it together, and understand well enough to render a verdict on it. I’m not saying they should necessarily be able to pass or fail a bill, but they should be able to translate it into “American speak” for the rest of us, so that everyone knows the basics of what’s going on. Different people would serve each year or quarter or budget or whatever.
• Get young people involved in politics. This means having bigger names (State senators, whatever) come to high schools and interact with the kids, one on one or in small groups. Teach the kids what it means to be a representative of the American people, and why it’s so important, and what makes it hard, and what makes it fulfilling. Walk the kids through something passing in State legislature. Let them have an actual experience of what it means to BE a politician.

What sort of ideas do you have? Policies for the People wants to know, by the by. Go share! But share here, too, please. What realistic things do you think can be done in the next year? Four years? 12 years?

1. “Jeffries Suggests Democrats Will Oppose a ‘Clean’ Funding Bill after Johnson’s Plan Falters.” Yahoo News, 18 Dec. 2024, https://www.yahoo.com/news/jeffries-suggests-democrats-oppose-clean-223255795.html.
2. ibid
3. “Republicans Blame Democrats after Blowing up Their Own Funding Bill.” Newsweek, 19 Dec. 2024, https://www.newsweek.com/elon-musk-democrats-cr-government-shutdown-2003895.