The National Punishment Act

Whereas, we of Congress recognize our failure to the American People to perform our congressional duties, we pass this legislation as penance for our failures, and further to allow future congresses to suffer if they fail in the same manner.  We are not the first congress to fail, but we shall endevore to be the last.

1. Every year this act shall be law, an attempt shall be made to make its provisions an amendment to the constitution of the United States.  This shall override all other parliamentary procedures and trump all considerations save a direct threat to the security of the United States.

2. Congress shall receive no pay of any kind when the government is shut down due to the failure to pass a budget.

3. Failure to raise the debt ceiling after passing a budget that exceeds the income of the United States shall be considered Treason against the United States of America and punishable by death.  Legislatures may cut spending or raise taxes but they may not threaten the Full Faith and Credit of the United States.

4. While attempting to resolve a shut down, Congress may pass no legislation save a budget.  The budget may not contain anything but funding procedures.

5. Any member of congress who fails to pass a budget is barred from seeking employment by any government contractor.  This shall be enforced in that any private or public company hiring a budget failure member of congress shall have all funds within the jurisdiction of the United States immediately placed in escrow until they release the budget failure member of congress from their payroll.

Territorial Punishment
1. If, after failing to pass a budget, a district composed of the same geographic space reelects a congressman who failed to pass a budget; upon passage of a continuing resolution, all federal spending in the district of the reelected failure causing congressman shall be delayed an additional 30 days.

2. If, after voting to assault the full faith and credit of the United States, the members of the same district reelect the traitor or elect a second traitor within the span of 10 years, all federal funds shall be prohibited from being spent within that district saved for Earned Benefits such as Social Security, health care, etc.

Equality

1. Congress shall be forced to accept all benefits that it creates by legislation for the American populace.  Any pensions, retirement benefits, salaries, perks, gifts or other paraphernalia of any kind that is regarded by the public at large as a benefit shall henceforth be forbidden if not available to the public at large as well.

2. All elected or appointed (ie confirmed by the senate) Federal officers in the legislative, judicial and executive branches shall maintain a public view of all financial assets and transactions at all times, updated, to the extent realistically possible in real time.  All transactions must be posted within 60 days.

[Cons] Article 1 Section 6 - Pretty much fine as is

This one works.  This, plus the amendments that fix it are good enough.

Note, lobbying is a problem, but there is no way to limit that without limiting speech, and while I am starting to think for democracy to work you at least need to compel truth in certain sectors, it isn't a qualification of office per se.

Keeping this one short, though obviously it needs to be modernized in language so that someone with an IQ of 100 and 8th grade English skills can understand it.  But that applies to the whole thing.

[News] Maturity By Eating Poop

A young child, like a baby, might try to eat poop, because it doesn't know any better.

You're not going to give a child like that a gun are you?  Are you going to let a child drive?

Now, I am pro individual Gun rights, and hope to educate my children on how to handle a fire arm early...but not if they eat poop.  In fact, if they're eating mud or dirt, that means they're probably not old enough to handle important responsibility.

Now, metaphorically, Germany used to eat poop.  In WWII, they pretty much happily slammed the stuff into their mouth like it was candy.  And then, after WWII, they grew up.

But the South?  The South is Peter Pan.  The South didn't just eat more poop after the civil war, it held out a plate Oliver Twist Style and said, "Please Sir, may I have some more?"

For a hundred years they ate poop with legalized lynchings and murder and terrorism.

Then, finally, FINALLY the Civil Rights movement happened.

Now, the south likes to pretend it doesn't eat poop any more.  But how big a battle was it to remove the confederate flag?  Why is the south trying to suppress voting rights?  Why is the South denying that it has a problem? It's like an alcoholic and an eater of poop all in one.

Self Governance requires a basic level of ethical understanding.  If you can't understand that owning people as property is wrong, you can't be a state.  If you can't understand that denying the vote to citizens is wrong, you can't be a state.

Germany learned from Nazism.

The South hasn't learned from Confedercyism.

Until they stop eating poop, I think we might need to suspend the constitution in Red States.

It's not like it really worth anything but toilet paper right now thanks to the Bush Patriot Act and the Obama Collaboration.

Let's stop eating poop or having adult conversations with people who think eating poop is OK.  It is not OK.

[News] We All Agree There is a Problem...BUT

For those living under a rock, or reading this 20 years from now (in whatever obscure archive or rubbish bin to which it might be relegated) the news have been awash with Snowden, a former NSA employee who has brought to light what we suspected all along....that they have been listening in to our all phone calls.  All of them.  Guilty or Innocent.  We are all made equal by the intrusion in our lives.

Unlike a lot of the frankly ridiculous things that have come up lately against the President, this has serious weight.  It started during Bush, but Obama consciously chose to continue it.  People believe it.  Snowden's proof is conclusive.  While there are potentially questionable elements of Snowden, we must remember what happened to Manning and Assange....so any charges that come out against him have a very high burden of proof.

Regardless of the messenger, the message is quite alarming.  Many, if not most, on the left and the right who aren't asleep, finally agree that this is unacceptable, and that something must be done.

Right...so...alone, those on the right and left are not going to make a difference.  We need to join forces.  And the conservatives need to be the one to initiate action.

Ever hear the phrase 'only Nixon could go to China?'  It came from the view that a liberal or democratic president could not go to China without being painted as a 'weak commie loving liberal' thanks to the images painted on democrats by the GOP during the cold war.  Mainly thanks to McCarthy.  Thanks McCarthy.

Now a democratic president has to act tough.  Probably some of the reason Obama is going to war in Syria...he can't appear weak.  Democrats must not appear weak.

When Republicans begin attacking the president as incompotent, and that government can't work....and everything else that liberals do...and lie...and attack over and over again, no democrat who has any credibility can be seen working with dirty disgusting conservatives.  They can initiate bills, but finding bipartisian support is not a priority.  Republicans need to quit talking about Benghazi and Obamacare and the lies of the IRS "scandal" and focus on what is really important....

Like an intelligence community and the DHS and TSA gone frankenstein.  THEY are the real threat to our liberties....and yet....

And yet they are incapable of doing this.  Republicans not only can't apologize, they can't work and reach out to democrats for the good of the country.  Republicans have attacked Democrats to the point that democrats can't do the same because to give an inch to insane Republicans is to allow them to put more insane things like birth control or the like.

I'm sure conservatives don't see it that way.  They expect democrats to just do what they want.

It isn't going to happen.  Democrats are cowardly, but they're not cowardly against the democrat in charge...they won't revolt against Obama in a case like this.

[Link] Is The United States the Dumbest Country in the World?

I didn't write it but it's a legitimate question.

After Sandyhook, we need to ask ourselves if Conservatism is even a philosophy that can be maintained in civilization, and the continued willingness of moderates to play with it as if they were somehow acting rationally means we should probably rethink how we interact with them.

The questions are asked here, and I think the thing I like the most are the questions he asks about the ruthless government crushing of Occupy as compared to the whining we're seeing about the IRS actually daring to question if the Billionaire Front Groups were somehow actually unfairly targeted.

ACORN?  Yeah.  Conservatives don't care about that.  To them it was all real, just like Benghazi.

And many many moderates agree.

[Link] Couldn't Have Said It Better Myself

The Filibuster is Unconstitutional

[Cons] Article 1 - Section 5

The biggest problem with this article is that it allows a legislature to determine its own membership, answer disputes in its election of its own members and set their own rules.  It also states that the two houses can't disband without the permission of the other houses.

What this does is create the worst of all possible worlds, where you have the senate which can create its own arcane and highly stupid rules, while at the same time, can't disband to allow recess appointments when those same rules are used to stymie executive appointments.

But the alternatives can be abused as well.

There are no good solutions here, but at least with rules, you should require approval by the other legislature to prevent abuses like the filibuster.

If you do need both houses to pass legislation then I guess you also need to chain them together in approval of disbanding. 

That's about it for this section really.