Things turning around in Europe?

[blackeagle603]

maybe if it was paid/set up like serving in the National Guard...

[Aesop]

That is a nice theory, but what you get is a high percentage of lawyers. http://americanindependent.com/188127/r ... of-lawyers

I am not in favor of a full time legislature (even at the federal level). I'm just saying that their is not an easy answer to this question and their are trade offs.

If you want a government to reflect middle class values, then you need to make sure that someone middle class can actually serve in government. My take on that would be to limit the length of the legislature meeting and also pay them enough that someone who is not a rent seeker could justify the time.

If they can't justify the time, they aren't the people we want.
Paying them more is the problem.
You'll still get the lawyers, and now they'll have two income streams.
I'd pay $1/yr for anyone under 65, and a small stipend for those beyond that age that didn't count against any entitlement payments (currently; my ultimate goal would be to get rid of the entitlement payments in the first place).

When you have a well-compensated full-time legislature, they start trying to justify their existence, then expand their jurisdiction, then eventually make serving so onerous that they need hired help. Truth be told, a day or two a year and no staff would be more than enough time to solve recurring problems like nominations and appropriations, and force the legislature and the populace to live inside the original draft guidelines under any but extraordinary circumstances, and then everybody would know on Jan. 1st what the laws were and would be, what the tax rates were and would be, and there'd be no impetus to invent new ways to f*** with folks and jam both of the State's hands into their pockets in the process.

It's none of the government's gawdam business what lightbulb I use or what kind of toilet I flush, or whether or not my car has seatbelts or how many miles per gallon it gets. This hedge of intrusive bullshit was lovingly tended by busybodies that shouldn't have been voted out of office, they should have been escorted out at the end of a noose.

Part of any new legislature should be the provision that annually, there would be a universal vote, and the most reviled member of each branch, legislative, executive, and judicial - and there would always be at least one apiece - would be removed from public office for life, escorted to the public stocks, and pelted there by crowds with the vegetable products of their choice, as much as they could personally carry in their arms, non-stop from sunrise to dusk on the appointed day. (With an umpire, a line judge for the 10-yard minimum distance, and a physician in attendance to remove anyone knocked insensible.) And televise it live.

That is checks and balances, and it would rein in the extremists on the fringes admirably.

[Kommander]

Part of any new legislature should be the provision that annually, there would be a universal vote, and the most reviled member of each branch, legislative, executive, and judicial - and there would always be at least one apiece - would be removed from public office for life, escorted to the public stocks, and executed at dawn

FIFY

[Aesop]

No.
Merely being the most reviled member of the government shouldn't be a capital offense.
And for those who crave the limelight, public humiliation stings far more harshly than any death penalty ever could.
Every day.

[Rich Jordan]

In this country you can become pretty reviled, with enough people actively driven to vote you into the stocks, if the mainstream media and new york times crowd decides to make it so.

[Aesop]

Yes, but.

So, what's HopeyDopey's current approval rating, even with most of Hollywood and the media talking heads and every newspaper but 1 and 1/2 shilling for him?

There's also the fact that they can jump up and down, but they only report the sizzle and fan the flames. Frequently, almost invariably, the target of the interest has to provide the beef.

And we're still missing the banning for life part, and the veggies.

[Vonz90]

That is a nice theory, but what you get is a high percentage of lawyers. http://americanindependent.com/188127/r ... of-lawyers

I am not in favor of a full time legislature (even at the federal level). I'm just saying that their is not an easy answer to this question and their are trade offs.

If you want a government to reflect middle class values, then you need to make sure that someone middle class can actually serve in government. My take on that would be to limit the length of the legislature meeting and also pay them enough that someone who is not a rent seeker could justify the time.

If they can't justify the time, they aren't the people we want.
Paying them more is the problem.
You'll still get the lawyers, and now they'll have two income streams.
I'd pay $1/yr for anyone under 65, and a small stipend for those beyond that age that didn't count against any entitlement payments (currently; my ultimate goal would be to get rid of the entitlement payments in the first place).

When you have a well-compensated full-time legislature, they start trying to justify their existence, then expand their jurisdiction, then eventually make serving so onerous that they need hired help.

What in the heck are you replying to? I said above (in the section you quoted) that I am not in favor of a full time legislature, and you follow with a long argument against full time legislatures. WTF?

Don't get stuck on hyperbole.

1. Keep the time requirements relatively short, but there are duties involved, so it can't be nothing. One major problem if you strip out the time of the legislature too much is that the full time parts of the .gov/.state (executive and judicial) get a free pass to do what they want. The idea is to make the government more responsive, not less. The National guard model (one weekend a month and two weeks a year) probably makes sense as a decent balance between getting stuff done and allowing people to still have an alternate career.

I would also fix the time for the legislature meetings by statute and require a certain minimum amount of hearings and oversight for each section of the government. This would put them in a zero sum game of time. If they want to add more government, then they would have to take something else away to fit in the oversight time.

2. If you pay nothing, you will only get people who are (A) rich enough not to care or (B) think they can gain enough influence/rent through the duties to make it worth their while. You will also systematically exclude anyone who is middle class and not retired (and on average old people are the worst rent seekers as a percentage of the population). This will not get you what you want and will give you the exact opposite of the results you say you want.

Again, I would pay them about what an O-4/O-5 in the NG/Reserves makes on a typical drill weekend. (I pick that rank range as that is the minimum level at which one is typically expected to travel long distances to drill with a paid billet in the reserves.) We want middle class professionals, these are not people (generally) who can just eat that time without compensation.

3. Also, do not allow anyone to vote on anything related to their business. So if you own a trucking company, you can't vote on transportation issues. And if you are a practicing lawyer, you can't vote on any laws that might be at issue if you were in court (which is to say, all of them).

[blackeagle603]

I'll vote for that referendum Vonz...

[Aglifter]

So, no one who knows the subject can vote on it? Would you exclude them from the committees which set policies on such matters as well?

You may dislike the TX system, but it seems to have worked well for TX...

What are "middle-class" values?

[Aesop]

I'd go for most of that, but I still want them meeting for less time and less money. I'm not buying the argument about how onerous travel is. We're talking a round trip plane ticket, and one or two overnights in a motel, at most. The fewer times a year that happens, the less onerous it is.
I'd also make the capitol a district not unlike Vegas, where virtually anything goes. The more time they spend gambling with their money and screwing prostitutes, the less time they'll have left for gambling with our money and screwing us. It will also take the sting out of the trip, and make the inevitable leeches and press types feel more at home. I never heard anyone bitch about going to Vegas for a weekend in my entire life.

I'm not so worried about the executive and judicial running wild in their absence, because the key with minimal time in session and little to no compensation is that the entire legislature would have to live under the exact laws they passed 24/7/365 just like everyone else, which is the best disincentive I can think of for passing stupid and onerous laws, or creating the exact army of civil service ne'er-do-wells in those posts that we have now.

No more lifetime judiciary. 10 years max, appointed by the executive branch, but renewable (or not) by the legislative, until they reach 70, at which time they're out for good. No more senile bastards answerable to no one but God for their peculiar decisions and delusions.

And I still want the guys on the bubble in each branch dragged out annually.
That's not hyperbole. That's lawn maintenance.