Independents Day (book by Lou Dobbs)

I finished The Kite Flyer yesterday and picked up Independents Day by Lou Dobbs. I had time to read just the inside flap and introduction but I think I am going to really really enjoy this book. Quoting from the inside cover of Lou Dobb's Independents Day Awakening the American Spirit:
In his bestselling War on the Middle Class, Lou Dobbs reported from the front lines of a conflict that threatens to tear our country apart: the war that the government and big business have waged against working Americans. But in every war there comes a counteroffensive, when resistance arises, stirred by the fundamental human desire for dignity and self-determination. Independents Day is a rallying cry for a new vision of what the country could--and by all rights should--be in the twenty-first century.

What has happened to America? Lou Dobbs opens Independents Day with a critical and sobering view of where we stand today, and how a century of misguided policy and misplaced values has brought us here. A government that was created to be of the people is now one dominated by elites; a government intended to be by the people has become one run by politicians who are unresponsive to the needs and will of the American citizens who voted for them; a government founded for the people has become instead a willing partner in serving the demands and interests of business. The casualty of this betrayal of our national legacy is nothing less than democracy, and Dobbs charts its tragic effects in every aspect of our society. From the expenditure of trillions of dollars to underwrite a war in Iraq that the great majority of voters does not support, to an administration that has brazenly done away with public accountability while amassing debt that will burden taxpayers for years to come, to a steady decline in jobs, education, and health care, we stand on the threshold of a future that only a generation ago would have seemed inconceivable.

But with the most important election in years facing us in 2008, there are signs that the public has begun to reclaim its voice in the national dialogue, asserting its right to be heard in a new, vitally engaged populism. Having been failed by Republicans and Democrats alike, the electorate is rejecting the pointless turf wars of partisan politics and confronting the genuine challenges that face us with a passionate commitment to the ideals of independence and equality and to the common good. Independents Day is a stirring celebration of the emergence of this populist spirit, and an inspiring vision for an America that will flourish by honoring the cherished principles on which it was founded.

Open Primaries, Play by Play

Unrivaled in popularity perhaps only by curling is the issue of open primaries. I had a letter published in the Davis County Clipper today clarifying the finer points of unaffiliated voter registration and voting in Utah Primary elections. As luck would have it, the letter appeared in print next to the bi-monthly left/right column Her Point / His Point by Dawn Brandvold and Blaine Nichols. The column is aptly named "Political parties should stop playing games and just cooperate"

You can read the links for yourself, and I encourage you to do so, but if you have perservered this far and just want the highlights so you will have enough time for the curling highlights, here is the play by play action summary for you.

The page opens up with Davis County independent Randy Miller thumping for a non-partisan option to be added to Utah primary elections allowing the non-partisan Utah majority to advance worthy candidates regardless of party. The ball rims in and out with just under 12 to go here in the 2nd quarter.

Brandvold clears the rebound and speculates that maybe this is the year that independents will support Sam Granato over the yet to be determined tossup between Republicans Mike Lee and Tim Bridgewater. Maybe, but from where I'm sitting I see a lot of independent voters headed for the concession stands on this one.

Nichols inbounds to himself and crosses the half court line. Nichols holds up, yo-yo's left and heads for the extreme right. 19 on the shot clock, Nichols pulls up and shoots for 3. Airball, and that is the Morgan Jeweler's play of the game. When asked, Nichols says "Until recently Republicans held “open primaries”, encouraging everyone to show up and vote. It became apparent that those primaries were being infiltrated by Democrats fruitlessly trying to swing elections to the more liberal candidate. One day, Republicans woke up, slapped their collective forehead and said, “Hey, Why don’t we close our primaries so Democrats can’t play games?”

I guess now that 'their' primaries are closed they are encouraging everyone to not show up and vote? We'll have to go to overtime on that one.

(What Mr. Nichols doesn't know is that we have secretly switched the voter registration of thousands of Utah Voters, and less than 9% of all voters in Utah are registered as 'Democrats', so the extent of their 'game playing' is really quite limited.)

The buzzer sounds and that's it folks. You declare the winner and let me know please. Hopefully in the end it is the people of Utah that win. I mean, for Pete's sake, I'm tired of losing to the dog gone Washington Generals.

But Wait There's More

Before I can even get the html unfolded and a post up discussing Carl Wimmer's foiled "opperation chaos" diabolical plot, the conservative loyal underground is right back at it. Evidently undeterred by the appearance of deliberate crossover election manipulation, some behind-the-curtain figure has brought to life a website encouraging Utah 2nd Congressional District Republican voters to infiltrate the Democratic Primary race between Claudia Wright and incumbent Jim Matheson on June 22nd; http://www.jimmatheson.com. Interesting it is not independents advocating for this.
The Salt Lake Tribune story on that pesky operation chaos. Yet another no acknowledgement that this is a 4 way race between the Morgan Philpot, a yet to be named Democrat, independent Dave Glissmeyer and Constitution Party Candidate Randall Hinton
Besides, you had an itch for another music video didn't you?

Utah 3rd District Debate Digest Part 1

I setup a fan page on Facebook this week as a means to publicize a historic first in many ways; 1. a civilized debate 2. online between the candidates for the 3rd Congressional District in Utah. The debate to date has been primarily between Libertarian Jake Shannon and independent Joe Puente. I have not been able to contact Douglas Sligting yet. Jason Chaffetz and Karen Hyer have not been invited to participate yet.

I'm hoping this experiment will succeed in generating a very civil dialogue and bring some ideas to the light of day that otherwise would be obscured by the smoke and mirrors of traditional partisanship.

Two topics from 5 topic submissions from each candidate were selected to kick this week off:
1. Publicly Funded Elections by Joe Puente
2. The Ward on Drugs by Jake Shannon

Here is a digest of the debate so far.

Publicly Funded Elections

Joseph Puente

There is legislation in Congress right now to bring about publicly funded elections. It's called the Fair Elections Now Act. Under this law, candidates for the House and Senate who raise a threshold number of small-dollar donations would qualify for public funding—several hundred thousand dollars for House, millions for many Senate races. If they accept this funding, they CAN'T raise big-dollar donations. But they can raise contributions up to $100, which would be matched 4-to-1 by a central fund. The bill also calls for reduced fees for TV airtime, providing an incentive for politicians to opt into this system and run people-powered campaigns.

I am challenging all Candidates for the U.S. Congress in District 3 to put elements of this legislation into practice for THIS election. Most notably, incumbent Jason Chaffetz. I'm calling on him specifically to give up the nearly quarter of a million dollars in special interest money he has been paid and promise to accept nothing more from corporate and special interests and to limit personal contributions to $100 per person. Let's test this legislation and see if it can genuinely level the playing field for all those who wish to participate in our participatory government.

If Chaffetz chooses to ignore this challenge, then will make it clear to the people of District 3 that he embraces the status quo. That he values corporate interests over the public interest and that he would rather live with a corrupt and hijacked political system that favors a few wealthy people over the average individual.

For more information on publicly funded elections and the Fair Elections Now Act, I invite you all to visit the following web sites:

http://www.fixcongressfirst.org

http://www.publicampaign.org/node/38166

Jake Shannon

Again, this is another example of the road to hell being paved with good intentions. Publicly funded elections have been found to be unconstitutional and ineffective, a bad combination in my estimation.

A 2003 study by United States Government Accounting Office (GAO) found that publicly funded elections in Maine and Arizona failed to produce measurable benefits (http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d03453.pdf). In 2008, "Judge Roslyn Silver ruled that the Matching Funds provision of the [Clean Elections] Act violates the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution because it opens up new avenues for possible corruption in the electoral process" (http://goldwaterinstitute.org/article/2534).

Campaign finance is an important issue but must be carefully vetted so as not to infringe upon First Amendment rights. In particular I find my opinion matches that of Robert A. Levy:

"[A]re there any campaign contributions or expenditures that should be illegal?

Yes: First, misuse of a government office by favoring donors who seek government contracts and services. That would breach an official's fiduciary responsibility to his constituents. Second, payoffs to a candidate — secretly contributed, then spent on personal pleasures like a new car. Numerous laws are already on the books to prosecute such abuses. But when a candidate fully discloses a donation and puts the money in a segregated fund that can be used only for constitutionally favored political expression, that is not corruption. And the First Amendment does not allow treating advocacy as if it were a bribe. Our system may not be perfect; but it is, after all, the system that the Constitution has established" (http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=11176).

Joseph Puente

Then how do we make sure that candidates are beholden to the people and not the corporate interests that fund their campaigns? This has nothing to do with the first amendment. No one's right to free expression is being infringed through publicly funded elections it simply assures the public the that their interests are placed above those of special/corporate interests.

Jake Shannon

Well, as I quoted earlier, there are already many laws on the books already to prosecute abuses. But first I am concerned that the method you've proposed has been demonstrated to be A) ineffective B) and unconstitutional (having Judge Silver ruling against "clean" elections as a violation of Amendment 1).

My solution has three parts. First, I'd propose enforcing the laws already on the books.

Second, I suggest the most effective way to make sure that candidates are beholden to the people is to require all those that seek office must enter into a "surety bond" type of contract where if the politician does not live up to promises made during their campaign, they would face some sort of penalty or incur a serious cost.

Third, I would propose an Amendment to revise the 14th Amendment of the Constitution of the United States to revoke corporation rights to contract, and to have those contracts honored the same as contracts entered into by natural persons. Corporations are not people, and as such should not be able to be protected by the First Amendment with regards to campaign contributions. This would make the only persons able to contribute to political campaigns be actual, natural persons, not corporations.

I know of no other candidate for office suggesting my second and third parts (but that doesn't mean that haven't been suggested like this before) as a solution.

Joe, do you have any substantial rebuttal to the evidence I've provided that demonstrates publicly-funded elections are inefficient and unconstitutional?

Gentleman, thanks for your thoughts--looking forward to much more.

American independents: The success of the two parties is also their failure

by Randy Miller
Every American, every thoughtful student is an independent at heart. Many however by means of cowardice and dereliction or perhaps just being uninformed choose the easy path of partisan loyalty over the hard right of independence, liberty and organizing.

Every substantial positive and empowering step in our quest for a more perfect union has sprung up from an independent movement of citizens motivated to organize.

Your children are free to go to school without being exploited for their industry; thank you organized labor.

Women are now free to vote and to own property. I'm sure the women of our state and nation will raise a glass to honor the lifetime sacrifice of those stalwart independent women who took on the establishment repeatedly.

The independent paradigm that is taking shape today is both epic and historic.

All people regardless of race, creed or color can now be citizens and vote. This right always existed. The 2 party aristocracy just needed it's wings clipped. Thank you black independent movement.

Segregation is no longer legal. It was always morally wrong. Thank you again black independent movement, the score is now 2 for you and 0 for the two-party establishment.

The two parties have historically evolved to either oppose or take credit for these popular uprisings.

Women's suffrage, equitable labor conditions, black enfrachisement, desegregation--all these prominent and equitable conditions are great, but there is another shackle that must be cut. This new direction, this new paradigm is bigger than all those great and victorious developments.

We see today segmented uproars over nearly every piece of legislation and a constant castigation of partisan figures of the prominent 2 parties. The success of the two parties is also their failure. The uproar of every jot and tittle is a testament that the voice of the people is not being heard and acted upon. If 'We the People' had a shred of confidence that we were being heard then policy that doesn't go 'my' particular way would be more palatable. Individuals would be convinced that the people had spoken and that they had just been at odds with that voice and lost. However, this confidence does not exist. The two parties in their successful quest to dominate elected positions and policy conversations, have established an accurate portrait of an out of touch aristocrcy with 2 factions.

The independent paradigm that is taking shape today is both epic and historic. We are confronted with the task of completely changing the way we do politics and conduct elections. We are charged with returning to a government by and for the people. It is a remarkable form of government. It is not a suitable governing framework for a lazy and apathetic citizenry. It requires involvment. It requires discourse. It requires reconciliation and apology at times. It requires that we now begin doing what the two parties have taken upon themselves to do for us. It requires that those factions who are disappointed by the various outcomes of the voice of the people remain committed to our union of states and not let insurmountable differences fester with the feverish plague of secessionist thinking.

Thanks to Nancy Hanks for urging me to prepare this and for posting on her blog The Hankster
And for blogger Politea for inspiration and information

Getting started

Hi everyone,
Just getting started. It's nearly 11 pm on Friday, but it feels good to be making this kind of progress. Look for some great content soon. Want to be a contributor? Contact me and make your pitch. randy atttt uliv dott org

I think this will soon be a great place to host interviews with stalwart independent activists throughout the state and nation.