How Would You Make A Better USA

I've seen you claim that debt doesn't matter, deficits don't matter, let's just spend, spend, spend and print imaginary money to make it all good. Well OK then. You've convinced me... on one condition. Since it's all made up BS, and debt doesn't matter (in fact it's GOOD), then let's also abolish ALL forms of taxation. If the government can just pull money out of thin air without consequence, then why should people who have to live in reality (where money can't just be printed off) have to spend one cent funding the madness? If the government wants to spend trillions, and they can just pull trillions out of their ass, fine. But real people need their hard earned money.

 

EXACTLY!! You understood perfectly!! Thank you.

 

Any "money" going to the politicians (whether presently serving or running for office), will be paid to them via PUBLIC funds.

If they want some other form of income, get out of government and go earn it.

 

Operationally taxation does not matter. The govt can tax 0% and still spend whatever they wanted. BUT, inflation is real, and taxation plays more of a role of inflation control more than any type of "funding" for the government. So even if you think you'd be keeping more money with 0% taxes, inflation would be very very high, pretty much making any of your real gains null. There is literally no magic remedy and every single decision they make whether it's tax rates, interest rates, or spending has serious consequences if it's not done in according to the balance.

The funny thing, is I'm a self proclaimed elitist. Like I do not like poor people, I do not like ghettos, etc. But because of my economic beliefs, I understand that poor people with money makes me rich. Tons of poor people with out money makes me poor. Pump money in to the bottom feeders and they will do what they do best, spend it. That money flows throughout the economy, we pay taxes with some of it and the cycle continues. The problem I think many people have is they cut the economy off at a certain date. Like right now, you look at your bank account and you say "hey if I can keep all this money without paying taxes, I'd be able to afford so much more". But everyone else would be able to afford so much more, and inflation would devour us.

The economy is a balancing act.

 

Do you mean campaign finance? Or do you mean personal income?

Again, that sounds like bribery to me... which is already illegal.

 

America in the 1800's was as close as we ever got to a truly free society. It's been downhill since then.

My thoughts on a better America (more like my perfect society but whatever):

Role of the Federal Government:

1. To protect the people, with a military force, from foreign or domestic attack; and, should the people will it, participate in any other armed conflict; and to represent the citizens of the country in international matters.
2. To uphold the law, determine guilt or innocence of wrong-doing, and punish appropriately those who break the law of the land and violate the rights of others, through an internal police force and a judicial system of courts, presided over by judges and a jury of the citizenry; and to allow for a system by which civil disputes between private citizens or entities may be settled, through the opinion of a jury.
3. To protect the property rights, human rights, civil liberties and economic freedoms of the citizens; where all citizens are equal before the law, and have equal opportunity in the free market economy of the country; and no preference or deference shall be given by the state, monetarily or otherwise, to any private entity therein.

What kinds of things would this entail? Well, to give practical applications to America's issues today:

- all drugs and food products would be legalized; the FDA would be abolished, and the effectiveness and safety of drugs and foodstuffs would be decided on in the marketplace by the people
- all subsidies would end; all private businesses would be forced to earn every cent they make from consumers of their product or service (Power to the People!)
- environmental regulation, to protect the property of citizens from pollution produced outside their own properties, would remain
- all Federal welfare would be abolished; welfare could be continued at the State level, should the people desire it, where it is easier for its effectiveness and suitability for the populace to be more easily seen and overseen by the citizens
- Freedom of Speech is ABSOLUTE; NO hate speech laws
- Property Rights, excepting taxes and in cases of criminals, are also absolute; no repossessing (thereby implying no property taxes)
- marriage is no longer recognized as a special legal standing, as per the separation of religion and state
- as with Welfare, Federal Education would be abolished and given to the States to direct as the people wish - continue with public schools, abolish public schools, vouchers, privatization, whatever they think is best for their kids
- the US Departments of Education, Agriculture, Homeland Security, Health and Human Services, Housing and Urban Development, Labor, and Commerce, would be abolished
- the Department of Veterans' Affairs would be merged into the Department of Defence
- the Departments of Transportation and Energy would be merged into a "Department of Infrastructure"
- the Departments of State, Treasury, Justice, Interior and Defence would remain

Personal Preferences (not required by my "Role of Government" statute, just what I think is best:

- a negative income tax is better than old fashioned welfare
- a Parliament is better for dmeocratic representation than the current Legislative and Executive Branches
- abortion should be legal
- open borders; immigrants built America, and they'll keep building America if you let them; plus, it improves their lives beyond what they would be if they stayed in their own country
- cede possession of all US territory outside the 50 states not delegated to Embassies; Puerto Rico should be the 51st state, if it so wishes
- withdraw all US troops from everywhere except current combat zones
- withdraw from Afghanistan
- stop foreign aid

You could consider this my Liberty Manifesto.

 

With the exception of the Vollsted Act, the US under Calvin Coolidge got it about right.

 

What we call Liberals today, is not what we called Liberals back in 1960 and before.

At one time, I proudly called myself a "Liberal", think in terms of Thomas Jefferson, Teddy Roosevelt, JFK. Today, I do not self-identify with the term Liberal, because, as you say, it has come to define a group of people who are Authoritarian Statists.

There are a number of other very unpleasant habits of the group we refer to as "Liberals" today:
0] Blatant expansion of Central State control and power to gain Political Power
1] Blatant abuse of Racial Preference Pandering to buy votes to gain Political Power
2] Blatant abuse of Environmental Regulation as a means of control and extortion to gain wealth and Political Power
3] Blatant abuse of Education System Radical Ideology Indoctrination as a means of population opinion control to gain Political Power
4] Blatant abuse of Racism Accusation to block criticism, reform and retain Political Power
5] Blatant abuse of Education Licensing Political Correctness to Extort Political Power
6] Blatant abuse of Environmental Threat Scientific Falsification and Fear Mongering to Extort Political Power
7] Blatant abuse of Class Envy to Justify Wealth Re-distribution
8] Blatant abuse of Government Agencies to Identify and persecute political enemies.


Do you start to see a trend here?

What we call "Liberals" today, are anything but "Classic Liberals".

They are people who will ruthlessly stop at nothing to gain and retain Political Power.

They have no guiding/limiting code or principle to restrain them in their quest for power.

Today's "Liberals" are anything but Liberal.

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What I'm against, is anyone but the voters handing politicians money. That is, money should never give a candidate or serving politician some special 'advantage'.

If you enter into public service, then let it BE service to the public (not special interests, or whatever detracts from serving the people).

Right now, we have 'legalized' bribery... and it is destroying our democracy.

 

I don't agree with the assertion that "Class Envy" is being used as some tool... but Lord knows, the wealth inequality in this society is dangerously imbalanced.

However we do it, we'd better re-distribute some of the wealth or we'll surely capsize.

 

Creating all that money out of thin air and then flooding the economy with it by the trillions is what actually causes inflation. But you're only worried about it when it means people get to keep the money they actually earned, and not just printed up.

 

But your premise was that you wanted to "give the people a voice." So let's say I am a supporter of gun rights and I give my money to the NRA. Are you saying that the NRA can't then take my money and use to support candidates who share my views?

 

Why don't you find out who the candidates are that share your views and give it to them directly?

 

I don't have a problem with that. But are you saying I can't give my money to the NRA or NARAL if I wish to support their efforts on my behalf?

 

Nothing's stopping you from doing that; it's just that their "efforts on your behalf" should not be able to include bribing politicians.

 

That is correct.

If we don't do that, then money is capable of diminishing the voices of those without enough money to actually be heard.

 

I'm going to have to agree with this. It's supposed to be 1 person=1 vote. NOT 1 dollar=1 vote.

 

Though my question was to Johnny-C because I'm still not sure what he's trying to say, who's talking about bribing politicians? As I've already noted--that's illegal!

 

Johnny! Bribery is--as I've already noted--ILLEGAL. So please: Let's get really really clear here. Can I give money to the NRA or not? And once I give it to them, what can they do with it?

 

What exactly are you agreeing with? That I can't give my money to NORML if I want to see pot legalized? That I can't give a dollar to a presidential campaign? How else do I "get my voice" heard as Johnny wants if I can't fund efforts to legislate on my behalf?

 

What about the effect of corruption of government office holders and their abuse of power to gain votes?

Isn't

Official Power Abuse = 1000s of Votes Bought or Extorted

a bigger problem than 1dollar=1vote?

I don't like big money in politics, but a Democracy cannot long survive the levels of political abuse and corruption being used by the Democratic Party in the 2010 time frame!

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since when was the internet a basic necessity?

 

Well how do you think people have money in the first place in our economy if it isn't created out of thin air?

 

Here are things concerning money, that I think would be an improvement for ALL American politics/government"

1. Public financing of elections (any of them). No 'private' money allowed.

2. Lobbying will be allowed. However, no 'money' changes hands... only ideas/values or goals are offered.

Private citizens may give to any organization they please. However, none of those organizations are allowed to offer money to anyone in government for any reason.

In general, money which competing candidates or government officials receive for services rendered, will be a set amount which comes from the tax payers.

 

1. Reform welfare
a. Significantly draw down on all welfare payments. Start over by issuing a subsistence allowance, enough to cover the most basic food, clothing, and housing costs for an individual. It should be based on the national average, not area, thus encouraging people to look at cost of living, rather than it making no difference where they live, or (if you know how to scrape) advantageous to live in high cost areas. This would be given to everyone, from the highest to the lowest, with a reduced rate for children.
b. After creating a subsistence allowance for everyone, establish minor programs attached to that allowance to account for special costs (this could replace WIC, and should be automatically distributed when a birth certificate is issued). Since there would already be a subsistence program, all welfare programs would be significantly reduced from what they are today.
c. Change disability programs to provide cost of living adjusted to the individual's loss (minus subsistence allowance), and shift it to a shorter time period. people receiving unemployment should never be penalized for their holdings, but unemployment should only run for three months. If someone can't get a similar job within three months, they should adjust sooner to their lower income, but they would be able to live a lower quality lifestyle off of their subsistence allowance.
2. Health care reform
a. Insurance companies should not be allowed to drop people new conditions or jack their rates, BUT insurance companies should be able to factor in a new customer's (pre-existing) conditions. Such a requirement as exists regarding pre-conditions in Obamacare helps a minority at the expense of the majority, and is injust.
b. Allow 'gender discrimination' in health insurance policies again, just as car companies are allowed the same exact 'gender discrimination' to charge men more. It's inequitable feminism that see's a state of affairs injust not based on the principle of the matter, but based on who it affects.
c. Repeal Obamacare. Instead, calculate the average cost of a certain middle standard of health insurance and give every individual a tax credit for that cost (calculated by age group, such so that a 20 year old will get a credit for the average cost of standard health insurance for a 20 year old, while a 70 year old will get a credit for the average cost of standard health insurance for a 70 year old).
d. Adjust prescription drug laws so that drugs manufactured in select (trusted) foreign countries can be imported (at a lower price than they are produced here), ending prescription drug company protection and aiding the consumer. At the same time, innovation should be recognized and so any such import manufactured without proper patent permissions would be assessed a set tariff, which would go to the patent owner minus the costs of administering the tariff.
3. Labor
a. Establish a government program designed to help employers find qualified workers. There are a lot of government websites that exist for this purpose, but which are cumbersome, difficult to navigate, and offer niche jobs with high requirements. This program should be set such that an individual can enter some basic information about themselves, experience, age, status, etc. and get a return for what jobs he or she could apply for. The government could then offer a loan, interest-free for a short period (say 3-6months) for relocation costs, so as to widen opportunities and encourage moving to seek better jobs.
4. War/diplomacy
a. bring the troops home, draw down military strength, cut down on foreign bases. As it stands we have a lot of forward bases that exist in preparation for a war with other countries like China, Iran, etc. Closing most of these bases, while maintaining our ones on our coasts (to include Hawaii and Alaska), the base in Guam, bases in western Europe. The reality is that our military is in a forward offensive position, positioned such so that we can attack any of our enemies quickly should war come. We should draw back and reduce our costs slightly (apart from current Mid-East operations, we should really only reduce our costs by about 15%). This would make it easier to get along with different parts of the world, and the saved money would (ideally) result a slight reduction of tax rates.
5. Religion
a. It should be obvious that this item isn't one of government policy, but of social interaction. There is so much hate today in our own country, but it mostly seems aimed at Atheists and Christians these days (by each other). This has long baffled me, because while people who disagree with you on fundamental things can be annoying, Christians and Atheists in the American tradition actually share so much in common (I've noticed more and more exceptions as of late, though). We value, more than agreement, our freedom to believe and speak as we believe. Anyone who says that Christians or Atheists (as wholes, and not "this one Christian...") are trying to force their beliefs on others or deny others their freedom - quite frankly, has their head up their ass. In light of history, Christianity in 21st century America is as far from oppressive as dominant religions come, and that's not even considering what we can look at in our own world today.
6. Immigration
a. Immigration quotas should be established and enforced, with exceptions made for highly skilled workers (let's be honest - we can always do with another aeronautical engineer, physicist, doctor, etc.). Immigration in and of itself is a good thing, but it becomes problematic when large numbers of one group of people immigrate at one time. These groups will tend to stick together and, being in such large numbers, are better able to live like they did in their foreign country, slowing assimilation and Americanization. Americanization is not just desirable for us, to have one more worker who speaks our language and eats hot dogs on the 4th, but those who haven't assimilated are more likely to turn to crime (there was a study on this, I have no idea how I would google search to find it, so forgive me - and I don't remember the degree of correlation). It artificially prolongs barriers that are normally worn down within a lifetime, usually completely torn away by the 2nd generation.
b. Allow more work visas, but provide fines for those who violate their visas (usually by staying over their term). Create agreements with countries to facilitate the process and better regulate it.
c. Create a Swedish model front-of-line program. Everyone would benefit from more Swedish models walking around America.
d. If you've read this far, thanks for reading, and please make note of 6d in any response so that I know you read the whole thing.
7. Social Security
a. make it an opt-in program. As long as there is a subsistence allowance for everyone, there is enough there for an individual to survive on. Further, the SSI program is a scam for the lower class, as it unfairly benefits the middle classes.