Friday, January 07, 2011

Rascals and Scallywags Who Feed at the Public Trough (or anywhere else)
My Reforms For Congress

  1.  Henceforth all Congressmen shall be chosen by lot from citizens who put themselves  forward for the seat.
  2. Institutionalized persons are ineligible.
  3.  Convicted felons are ineligible.
  4.  If after a two year term, any Congressman who wants to retain the seat shall put his name forward to do so.
  5.  To allow for some institutional memory, half of the incumbent Congressman who apply for another term shall be chosen by lot to retain the seat.
  6.  No one who does not have a residence in a Congressional district may lobby the Congressman of that district to support or oppose any legislation.
  7.  No money or gifts can be contributed to any Congressman since there will be no more campaigning.
  8.  Violation of 6 or 7 is a felony offense for both Congressman and lobbyist or gift-giver. 

Think about it. The average citizen would provide better representation than the damn lawyers now in charge of Congress.
Elections have been totally corrupted beyond redemption. 


Addendum:


10. The size of Congress shall be increased. It will be harder to buy or corrupt so many. A larger Congress is a more representative Congress. At the founding of the Republic a congressman represented about 50,000 people. Today it is a little over a million, depending on the state. To get the representation today that we had at independence we would need a Congress of about 6,000. Such a Congress, chosen by lot, would truly be representative. 

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