Is It Just Me?

Broken System

• Pols grant themselves pay raise while cutting social support systems.
• Business heads overseas due in part to high health costs of american system.
• Average CEO makes one bazillion times the common employee wage.
• Congress votes to exploit remaining natural resources in race for consumption.
• etcetera, etcetera, etcetera......

Excuse me, but is it just me that thinks this system is broken? I have some suggestions. I would like others to join in a discussion on their merits and make some of their own in an attempt to find new, and more sane, ways of moving all of us into the future.

My first suggestion is the abolishment of congressional elections. Instead, we should institute a draft that is mandatory and random within current electoral boundaries. My thoughts are these:

• The current electoral process is too long, requires too much money, and tends to filter out all but the rich, the power hungry, or those willing to hitch their wagon to the nearest cash-laden special interest.
• An arbitrary, mandatory, and random draft would select a representative group from amongst the governed instead of the elitist bunch we have in there now.
• The draftees would enjoy the same benefits as the "common" person they govern. In other words, there pay would be tied to the "average" wage, their health care would be the same as the statistical "average" american, their pension would likewise mirror the conditions of the average Joe/Joette.
• They would serve one term, but their non-governmental compensation "package" (what they were earning prior to being drafted) would be adjusted up or down by a percentage to bring them closer to the "average".
• Since we would be trading "experience" for "uncommitted common folk", the goverment would have to be served by a dedicated civil service, not subject to replacement by the Congress. This civil service branch would also be rewarded in a fashion that would be tied to the "health" of the average american.

These are starting points for discussion. Obviously, much needs to be thought out and diagrammed. Let the fun begin.

Copyright ©2003-2007 Phaedrous
posted by Phaedrous @ 2:13 PM