Political ideas that will keep me from ever being elected

[mikekn]

If elected I will push for the following:
1. $1-2 per gallon gas tax (in addition to all current gas taxes), collected money to be used for alternate energy research.
2. Federal law making smoking illegal in all public spaces (especially bars, restaurants, casinos and sidewalks).
3. $1-2 per pack cigarette tax (in addition to all current taxes), collected money to be used for Medicare (or some other heath care program that needs it).
4. Impose an export tariff on all tobacco products.
5. Legalize marijuana, and make it subject to all of the taxes and restrictions imposed on cigarettes.
6. Term limits on congress.
7. Line item veto for the president.
8. Constitutional amendments supporting same-sex marriages and abortion. And one making the death penalty illegal.

There are probably more, but I think those will do the job.

Comments

[serista.livejournal.com]

Those don't seem too bad, though I think auto companies should be required to increase their fuel efficiency.

[mikekn]

I figure we could let the market drive that portion. I'd be more inclined to force them to continue to reduce car emissions.

[singewulf.livejournal.com]

Oh man, SEX MARRIAGES!!! What a revolutionary concept!!! You have my vote, good sir!!! :D

(I know you meant same sex marriages, but just reading that made me burst out laughing at work).

[mikekn]

Heh. Edited :)

[paquerette.livejournal.com]

Wait, but wouldn't that be if you were automatically married by having sex? THAT would be scary.

[loosecanon.livejournal.com]

heck, tax weed x10. Once it's legal the costs come down, so taxing it more would still likely be cheaper than the street prices.

[serista.livejournal.com]

Granted, my college days are long behind me but I never thought weed was costly.

[bertana.livejournal.com]

Maybe you weren't smoking the good stuff? ;)

[think-too-much.livejournal.com]

I'd vote for you.

[moirla.livejournal.com]

I could get behind that. My platform (assuming we had the technology to back it up) would also include mandatory sterilization reversible upon completion of a Fit for Parenting assessment and licensing process (ala Bujold's Beta Colony).

I don't think people should have the right to fuck up more people.

[bertana.livejournal.com]

I'm going to guess this is at least somewhat tongue-in-cheek (always hard to tell, online); if not, I think the glaring contradiction between Statement 1 and Statement 2 speaks for itself.

[moirla.livejournal.com]

You have a point.

Mandatory sterilization is probably the most extreme solution to a problem that could be solved if people would stop being so uptight about sex and actually *educate* their children.

Unfortunately, I don't see that happening en masse any time soon.

[bertana.livejournal.com]

[...]that could be solved if people would stop being so uptight about sex and actually *educate* their children.

Hell, I think it would be a great start if more people actually started actively RAISING their children, instead of assuming the TV and the overburdened school system will do an okay job of it.

[moirla.livejournal.com]

yeah, that would be nice, too...

[paquerette.livejournal.com]

Yeah, because sterilization surgery is completely without risks, always reversible, and good for your health even if things go properly. Not to mention how all of society agrees upon what constitutes fit parenting and what doesn't. And all of us who had fucked up parents would prefer if we'd never been born.

[moirla.livejournal.com]

well, I certainly don't think we have the healthcare technology to back up that kind of policy NOW, that's for sure.

I know it's a very extreme and unpopular viewpoint, and I think it probably works far better in my head than it would in application. It's really based more on the fantasy of "wouldn't it be nice if all children could be born to parents who are healthy, financially & emotionally able to support them, and who CHOOSE to have them."

I love my niece and nephew to pieces, but my sister is really struggling right now with a lot of things. I just wonder if they wouldn't have all been happier if they born under the above circumstances, instead?

[mikekn]

Given the basis of the comment (Bujold story) we're talking science fiction right now, so it would be without risk, reversible and fine for your health. That said, the rest of your comment still holds.

[paquerette.livejournal.com]

Heh. I'm probably the only person around here who's not really a scifi reader. ;)

[aeliakirith.livejournal.com]

As painful as #1 would be, I think you're right and would probably vote for you, depending on the specifics of the constitutional amendment supporting abortion.

[mikekn]

I don't really have specifics - I would like to see abortion: legal, safe, accessible and rare.

[aeliakirith.livejournal.com]

I would be really opposed to a Constitutional right to abortion after 21 weeks gestation (that being the record for the earliest preemie to survive). Reason being that if the fetus is potentially viable, it becomes infanticide, at least in my mind, at that point.

[mikekn]

I agree.

[aeliakirith.livejournal.com]

Ok then, just let me know what you're running for & when. ;)

[glenmarshall.livejournal.com]

1) Adjust taxes enough to establish and maintain parity with EU prices.
2) Require Medicare, Medicaid, and private insurers to NOT cover smoking-caused disease
3) Adjust taxes enough to establish and maintain parity with EU prices.
4) Use taxes from #3 to pay farmers to not grow tobacco.
5) Legalize and tax all recreational drugs, and use tax to increase funding for Medicare and Medicaid pharmacy benefits.
6) 2 terms for Senators, 6 terms for Representatives.
7) I'd like to veto the current president, line by line.
8) I support polyamorous and sexuality-neutral marriages, regulation of abortion on parity with all other medical procedures, and commuting all death penalties to life at hard labor.

[aeliakirith.livejournal.com]

For 2, doesn't that give an insurance company an easy out to avoid paying for heart disease or lung cancer ever at all, ignoring the fact that these have other causes (including but not limited to second-hand smoke)?

[glenmarshall.livejournal.com]

That could be remedied without changing the basic premise, i.e., that smoking is a avoidable harmful addiction with well-documented health consequences. I see no reason why Medicare, Medicaid, or other payers should underwrite it, especially when it increases overall insurance costs to those who do not smoke.

[paquerette.livejournal.com]

What would people who suffer these diseases from secondhand smoke do? Say, someone who developed (insert disease) after a childhood of living with smoking parents who were total asses about it (smoking in the house, refusing to quit when their kid was sick, etc). Would the person then be stuck when they grew up either paying out of pocket or dying? Or would there be legal recourse to force the jerkass parents to pay? What if the jerkass parents didn't have any money or assets? I dunno, it just seems like you should separate cases of people who smoke personally and people who were subjected to others' smoke.

[glenmarshall.livejournal.com]

In my experience the legislative and regulatory processes, which are inclusive of all stakeholders, would deal with the relevant fairness issues.

I'm deeply involved in healthcare IT standards, and peripherally in the regulatory and legislative/lobbying arenas. It's like the proverbial process and ingredients for making sausage that one doesn't want to know about, especially if one likes sausage. I make some of the sausage and am trusting of the process, if not the ingredients.

My two cents ...

[greene-man.livejournal.com]

Mike,
I like yours, even if they're unlikely to occur. Here's some things I'd like to see enacted.

1)Eliminate tax exemptions for all religious organizations. That includes eliminating Dubya's "Faith Based Initiative", which is nothing more than government subsidizing of religion. Keep religion out of government, AND govermment out of religion.
2)Voting days to be a holiday.
3)Some form of national health care. The current system is FUBAR.
4)Stop encouraging wasteful and counterproductive ethanol production by eliminating subsidies and tax breaks. Build more nuclear power plants.

[hairness.livejournal.com]

If you drop the sugar import tariff as well you've got my vote.

[jkusters]

I'd support most of that platform, so you'd have my vote.

My only objection is #6, unless the term limits were way up there.

JOhn.

[mikekn]

What is your objection to term limits? Would you object to removing the term limits on presidents?

[jkusters]

In general, I have found that people clamor for term limits as a reaction to bad politicians who just seem to keep getting elected, the so called "career politician." It's an understandable reaction. But I've seen some very good lawmakers, people who were champions of the people, who stood up to the corruption of state legislatures, be removed from office by arbitrary term limits. Here were people who could continue doing a very good job but were precluded from doing so because of the actions of a few rotten politicians.

I'd rather people work to remove the bad apples from office than apply an overly broad "solution" like term limits.

As for the President, I'm on the fence for that one. While my previous statement should apply for Presidents as much as city council members, the President holds a LOT more power than any other individual, so I think it warrants a special case.

JOhn.

[charles-midair.livejournal.com]

Let's try this again :)

That is a very good list. I only disagree with #6 and #7. #6 because we can always vote people out of office. If we don't, well, that is what we want. And #7 because, well, imagine Bush with a line item veto. It would make it almost impossible to Congress to function.

[mikekn]

Both of those two items relate to my belief that Congress abuses its powers. I'd also be willing to remove term limits on the president (same deal then - we can always vote him/her out).

The line item veto just makes sense to me. Most governors have it and the states still seem to function. If congress wants to pass something that the president opposes then they need to have enough support to override a veto.

[hedewigis.livejournal.com]

I would vote for you!

[jducoeur]

I actually disagree with a few of these:

4. Impose an export tariff on all tobacco products.

Why? Export tariffs rarely serve much useful purpose: they shove supply around a bit, but they usually don't achieve all that much meaningful. I see no likely effect save to cause other countries to buy their tobacco elsewhere.

6. Term limits on congress.

Mixed feelings here. The incumbency effect is an unfortunate one, and I'd like to combat it, but I generally dislike term limits.

Writing good legislation is hard work, and takes a long time to learn: some of the more senior legislators are also conspicuously among the best at making the hard choices and compromises that make government work. So I tend to view term limits as throwing out the baby with the bathwater: I'd rather look for other ways to fight the incumbency advantage.

8. Constitutional amendments supporting same-sex marriages and abortion. And one making the death penalty illegal.

Absolutely not as stated. I'm opposed to amendments supporting the first two for much the same reason I'm opposed to amendments banning them -- these are matters of *law*, and don't belong in the constitution, which is about higher-level philosophy (and governmental structure).

The closest that would possibly be appropriate IMO would be higher-level (and more difficult) statements of philosophy. The first isn't about marriage, it's about *equality*. If you're going to make a statement, it shouldn't be a narrow statement about marriage (which belongs in law), it should be essentially an equal-rights amendment. That would, frankly, be a much harder fight, but it's the only correct one. (And it should be about more than sexual orientation -- it's really all about what the government's rights are to discriminate among its citizens, and what its responsibilities are to prevent discrimination. That's a broad, difficult, and important topic.)

The second is harder yet, because it's legally messing in philosophical and religious territory. Unfortunately, most people in the pro-choice camp are unwilling to viscerally admit that this is really a debate about how you define a "person" -- at what age a lump of cells becomes a citizen. There is, in all likelihood, no objective measure that actually works for this. The pro-choice view is one way of slicing that decision -- giving the mother the decision -- but that's not really any more philosophically valid than the pro-life view, which gives the state that decision.

Putting this whole mess together, I honestly don't think the constitution is the right place to put it. We have to decide these issues as a society before it's appropriate to codify it at that level: otherwise, we're just as guilty of politicizing the constitution as the right wing.

As for the death penalty, I'm actually a little more sympathetic to that one, but again I'm suspicious that we're not ready for it as a society. That one is code for the more fundamental debate about whether we are focusing on retribution or healing in our judicial system -- one of many related problems. The only reason I'm sympathetic to it is in a variant form: "The State does not have the right to kill its citizens". That one I actually like philosophically, but it's not at all the same statement...

[mikekn]

Excellent :)

Why? Export tariffs rarely serve much useful purpose: they shove supply around a bit, but they usually don't achieve all that much meaningful. I see no likely effect save to cause other countries to buy their tobacco elsewhere.

You pretty much answered that one for me. My only goal is to reduce the tobacco being grown in the US. Someone above suggested paying farmers to grow other crops, but I don't like that method as much.

What are your thoughts on removing the term limit on the president?

As for the constitutional amendments, I believe that eventually they will all be the law of the land. My only reason to put them in the constitution is prevent future legal attacks on them (sure, you could try to repeal the amendment, but that is much harder then filing yet another lawsuit)

[jducoeur]

What are your thoughts on removing the term limit on the president?

Again mixed. The basic principle is the same -- term limits are a fairly clumsy way to fight the incumbency effect. But I'm a bit more sympathetic to it in the case of the President, simply because I suspect that humans are deep-down hard-wired to like Kings, so there's a danger there. Also, the President has a little more power to steer things than any individual legislator.

That said, I'm not really attached to the presidential term limit, and there is excellent reason to believe that it is unnecessary. Given that we got through 150 years before it became a problem, it looks to me like the system is reasonably well-designed to function without them. I mean, it's worth keeping in mind that the term limits were introduced mainly to deal with FDR, one of those examples of a President who might well have been worthwhile to keep around had he lived. Signs are that the system works, terms limits or no. History indicates that it requires a truly extraordinary person to get elected President more than twice in the face of a fickle electorate.

My only reason to put them in the constitution is prevent future legal attacks on them (sure, you could try to repeal the amendment, but that is much harder then filing yet another lawsuit)

I understand, but that's not what the constitution is really for. It's about stating the underlying philosophical principles that the laws are based on, not a way to make "harder" laws. It's notable that good constitutional amendments (such as the Bill of Rights) are generally broad, sweeping, and require thought and interpretation. Bad ones (such as Prohibition) are precisely these issue-of-the-moment attempts to write "big law".

(The sections of the constitution about election mechanisms are conspicuous precisely in that they are an exception to this principle. That's because you have to have the *system* pretty carefully locked-down, or it's too easy to abuse it. It's a remarkably insightful design, really.)

If you use the constitution as simply another law book, you cheapen it, and turn it into a political football. I despise it when the right tries to do that, and just as much so when the left does...

You get my vote!

[riversol.livejournal.com]

Okay, the line item veto is one more executive power I would have major issue with, however, substantial pork barrel reform is needed!

I would not ever win in a political election either. My top 3 platforms.

1) Design extensive human breeding legislation (every effort to reduce world population is needed) as every other world issue is exacerbated by the growing human population. 10 Billion by 2035...unbelievable!

2) Ban US military involvement except to respond when directly attacked (on attackers only with sufficient evidence disclosed to the public) or as the UN requires by majority vote. Citizen owned weapons limited to hunting weapons or sports weapons....all requiring wireless security locks that are unlocked during registered periods.

3) Strengthen separation of church from state legislation. Only a truly secular government can support the liberties and freedoms of people of all faiths and none.