Introduction: the Fundamental Reform Network

"Against a great evil, a small effort does not produce a small result. It produces no result at all."
-- John Stuart Mill

The truth is that there is a very small body of extremely wealthy people and radically conservative intelligentsia – the only real elites in our society – who have been eminently successful in implementing their plan to gut what they call the problem of “big government” through a “bait and switch” program they call “starving the beast.” In the words of Nobel Prize winning economics Paul Krugman:

"Rather than proposing unpopular spending cuts, Republicans would push through popular tax cuts, with the deliberate intention of worsening the government's fiscal position. Spending cuts could then be sold as a necessity rather than a choice, the only way to eliminate an unsustainable budget deficit."[1]

What they carefully hid from the public eye is that they cut their own tax rates from maximum 70% prior to Reagan's tax cuts to a mere 35% today -- in half! The tax give-back "they bought themselves" nearly bankrupted the federal budget and gave them the money to continue and expand their purchase of our government,the media, college professorships, a host of ultra-conservative think tanks and more. They sold the rest of us on these cuts through bare tokens amounting to a few hundred or thousand dollars in tax savings per year; their cuts amounted to amounted to tens of millions of dollars each. Their tax cuts on the very top incomes robbed upwards of $2 trillion per year from government revenues. That’s the truth. Does that make you angry?

In order to sell a program from which they are the only meaningful beneficiaries, they have used outright deceit and propaganda to create mistrust, fear and hatred of government itself supposedly run by or catering to communists, socialists, elitists, monarchists, terrorists, homosexuals, minorities or immigrants, labor unions, liberals, progressives, reformists, the creators of restricting regulations that strangle business… [all of which have been applied to President Obama and the Democrats]. The tactic is name calling and it is used by those who cannot make a rational argument against the policies they oppose. Name calling is designed to control people through their ignorance, beliefs and fears that divide them from the very people whose efforts benefit them directly.

Recently, Glen Beck, one of their most highly successful propagandists, lead a panel discussion denouncing all “progressives” and even the word "progress" itself declaring such programs to be un-Christian, unconstitutional and evil. They stated boldly that reform itself, any attempt to make the world better, is somehow bad. They made claim after claim all without any attempt to explain how things like the progressive tax are in fact unconstitutional. Why? Because they can't. Their arguments won't stand up to the test of fact. It is scary to think how many people actually believe them, but they do. If we are going to change things, we have to confront their tactics clearly and boldly.

They have convinced many that only unfettered profit and the free market can create a thriving economy to the benefit of us all. That all taxes and regulation are bad, restrict creativity and small business and depress economic growth. They are wrong. These are all “beliefs” unsupported by the fact. Contrary to the way they espouse them, it is their beliefs which are un-American, fascist, elitist, undemocratic, monarchical, often unconstitutional, undemocratic and tyrannical-- that is they are all the things that they claim all who disagree with them are.

At this point, they have succeeded in driving our government into deficits that threaten our ability to sustain our government at all – from Social Security and Medicare to any and every other function of government – highways, schools, police and fire protection,… It’s true: As things are the way they created it, "We don't have free speech. We can’t afford it." That's the truth.

They are now in the horns of a dilemma: Again in Krugman’s words,

"Since they're adamantly opposed to reducing the deficit with tax increases, they would have to explain what spending they want to cut. And guess what? After three decades of preparing the ground for this moment, they're still not willing to do that."

Under the circumstances they have created they have no viable plan to solve our nation’s problems. With no real solutions to our country's problems, their current strategy is to be “obstructionist,” to block every action, bill and appointment so as to cause the Democrats to fail and then to blame them for the failure. They are counting on public frustration with the gridlock that they themselves have caused to sweep them back into power in coming elections. That's their only goal: To regain the direct control of our government. Buying favorable results is not enough for them. They want to own the entire process. Does that make you angry?

Our economic and political problems today are not accidents but the result of very conscious and intentional actions to re-establish the unfettered right of the economic elite to dominate our country through the power of their wealth as they did before the reforms of the past century which have limited that power in favor of the public interest. To a very large degree they have been highly successful and that is the major reason the world is in an economic crisis.

That’s what we are up against – a cabal of intensely self-interested people who have usurped the reigns of our democracy. What they have done is the evil Mill makes reference to above. Tinkering here and there won’t solve it. If we are to regain power for the citizens of our country as are supposed to be protected by our Constitution, it is necessary to eliminate every avenue for them to purchase our government, our economy, our media [free press].

We further need to confront their distorted beliefs by which they justify their actions directly. Progressives often wonder why the extreme right wing people on the lower economic scale often cannot be reached by logic or debating the objective facts of the matter. It is because the beliefs they have been systematically taught by the many right wing front organizations organize how they see the world. Any fact that does not fit into a narrow belief system is automatically and unconsciously rejected. As long as people believe as they have been taught that all reform and government and taxes are bad, there can be no solution.

The reforms necessary to accomplish the goal of unseating this conservative cabal are not new, not unconstitutional or un-American. The necessary actions represent the highest of the American ideals and were the basis of the reforms leading to the last century of economic and social progress. They have a proven history. They substantially broke the power of the ultra-rich to control everything and allowed our democracy to prosper. If we want to unseat their power, we need to re-institute and rewrite the economic and regulatory reforms of the past century -- updating them as necessary to take into account of innovations which have affected how we communicate and make decisions. The most elemental of these reforms must focus on the process of how decisions are made and to eliminate the ability of the ultra-conservatives to control the process through the power of their money. All other reforms, all progress on the crying needs of our broken world depend on this fundamental effort.

If you agree with these goals, please sign our Petition

Annotated Table of Contents:

Next: Imagine -- Beginning the fix. Imagine people coming together in “one voice” to change how the world works. Creating a shared vision.


[1] Paul Krugman: New York Times Published: Tuesday, Feb. 23, 2010 - 12:00 am | Page

Imagine

It has been said “a house divided cannot stand.” In a world traumatized in literally millions of ways, it is so easy for us to become so absorbed in one small, albeit important, aspect that we can no longer see the forest for the trees. Alternately, we are so overwhelmed that we become so depressed that we are almost incapable of any action at all. Doesn’t that describe the frustration many of us feel? The problems are so immense that we become overwhelmed and just want to hide and hope the world goes away. But it never works, does it?

Imagine the house that is not divided…the house which can stand strong against the flood…

Imagine a "politically neutral" super-coalition, a Network of individuals and organizations whose focuses include politics and economics, being able to afford quality public schools and universities with quality teachers,… law enforcement and fire protection, highway and bridge construction and maintenance,… Head Start and child nutrition programs, other governmental services that are being cut to the bone,...

Which includes concerns for the well being of our lovely planet, environmental, green energy, global warming, the loss of the last remaining rain forests that give us the oxygen we breathe, organic agriculture not depended on toxic petrochemical fertilizers and pesticides that are poisoning us, resource depletion and the growing world demand for energy, water, land and goods,…

Imagine a coalition of people who don’t understand why we are the only developed nation in the world without quality universal, single payer health care [without huge co-pays, lifetime caps or disallowance of pre-existing conditions – these ways that are the largest cause of bankruptcy, preventive health care and screening, inoculation programs and disease prevention,… why we pay more than any other nation, but are only ranks 37th in quality by the World Health Organization?

People who imagine that we can do better regarding poverty, social and economic justice,…caring for those who cannot care for themselves, the mentally ill...care for those injured in the military, including counseling PTSD,...

People of faith who believe we are called to be the good stewards of the bounty of God's creation and that God instructed them to "Welcome the stranger, for you were once a stranger in a strange land." Or who believe their Lord said to them personally,"Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." Or who told us to care for the widow and orphan and those who cannot care for themselves? "In so much as ye have done it to the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me." People who are spiritual, but not religious or simply moral and believe that as a nation, we could do much better?

People who believe that generosity beats domination as a path to our own security, that programs like the New Global Marshall Plan building rather than destroying can turn our arch-enemies to our friends in a few short years as the Marshall Plan rebuilt war-torn Europe and Asia after World War II,... people who believe that the right kind of domestic and foreign policy is a better investment than arms,[End note 1)] ... that they can lift people out of poverty, who seek immigration policies that work, who are concerned about the effects of business practices on foreign nations,…

People who are unemployed and under-employed at no fault of their own and without a safety net, social security and other crucial programs, business and financial regulatory reform, health and safety, anti-trust, legal and labor issues, consumer protection, peace, civil rights and liberties, gender issues and reproductive rights, church organizations, civic organizations, electoral and legislative goals…. The list goes on...

That, my friends, is a lot of people! It's the majority of Americans. And that is not imagined!

Imagine if people who care deeply about healing our broken world found they could agree on a core issue that affect all of these issues and more,…and a plan to make them happen.

Imagine we found that our hopes and dreams are not communist or un-American or unconstitutional at all, but are rather exactly what our founders imagined however imperfectly. Imagine that we rediscovered that from the Great Depression up to the 1980s we were making great strides on most of these fronts -- i.e. it's been proven historically to work. Imagine that we are the ones who stand up for our flag and the very best of the American vision and calling,…a calling that we deeply want to be,…a vision that still inspires the world even when we fail in so many ways…

Imagine if this core of change included "finding the money" needed for all these programs and services providing for our common needs which the Wall Street brokers with their multi-million dollar bonuses tell us we can't afford while they laugh at us all the way to the(ir) bank. Imagine we stop buying their self-serving vision of "reality." No, if their view defines "realism," then we're not buying realism any more. We are going to have to show them what is real in the end…

Imagine that we could make the fundamental changes we need through a “Network” without giving up or compromising our unique individual or organizational identity and/or concerns, our membership lists or funding sources…or any of those other things which keep us from forming a common cause…

Imagine we could do this mostly through an Internet-based Network without forming yet another separate special interest organization with all the issues of licensing, membership and funding efforts, tax and accounting issues, and other steps necessary to function as an organization…whose purpose may be very important but further divides the attention and resources available to work on these issues…

Imagine we could create this Network virtually without monetary cost….

Imagine that this Network allowed signatories to continue to express their own concerns, in their own way,...

Imagine the Network would allow them to become known and available to others who share their particular concerns…

Imagine we used this Network to realize that we are not alone in this work or in this world and then focus all this energy this realization releases on determining only that issue which affect us all as the necessary starting point for all of our concerns,...

Imagine if we could agree to speak with "one voice" on moving from a world driven by greed and corruption to a world based on caring for each other “block of issues” – thousands of organizations, millions of people who know that only this fundamental change we all agree to will begin to solve these challenges …this fundamental change and nothing less.

Imagine we are the ones,...the ones we've been waiting for.

Imagine we can reach the tipping point to make this happen much easier than we might have believed It only takes securing that last 10% of the vote that tips the election every time. We have this number and far more. A recent Pew Research poll shows that 74% of Republicans, 81% of independents, and 85% of Democrats agree that it's past time for this sort of fundamental change in the way our government works. This is not just imagination! We only need to show a hopeful way on which we can all proceed…

Imagine having the faith to step out on our plan to create, not utopia, but a world that is far kinder and gentler then the one we have now...

Imagine that we could clearly show our representatives that we have the numbers, the organization and the commitment to make these reforms happen with or without them. [That's a message they understand!] Let them know that no amount of money is going to buy our vote any more. No fear, scare tactics or name calling will make us cower. It will only deepen our ardor. In fact, the more money they take in huge campaign contributions, the harder we will fight to replace them -- because taking that money IS the problem. We aren't going to stand for that any more. Not even now while most of it is still legal. We don’t care. Cut it out! Now! We’re tired of it and won’t tolerate it anymore…

Imagine this is an issue that can really grab all those voters we described above,...they are the votes on which elections always turn. Give them real hope, and they'll turn out to vote in even bigger numbers than they did for Obama or any candidate for any office. We're all getting on this team and we’re going to win this one big.

Imagine that these issues tap the young and minorities -- the same people who were largely responsible for Obama's "unimaginable" victory...

Imagine, just imagine…

But imagining is not enough! It needs to become more than just imagining. The catastrophes we see every day won't change as long as selfish interests control the decision making process. There has to be a game plan that we can understand,...a plan that can work and where we can all play a position.

We’ve got the right package of reforms to be enacted at one time,…with one comprehensive piece of legislation,…a package which the public will immediately see and say, "Yes, this is the change we need to begin to turn things around,"… This is what we need to energize the electorate to demand that change until our representatives make it happen. If they don’t, we’ll work and we’ll vote until we have replaced the entire lot of them who are more concerned with their own position of power than giving us the government we elected them to provide. We're calling them into account. Starting right now and going on for as long as it takes.

Approaching such reforms piecemeal will not work. There is a management principle about problem solving -- the question is: if you accomplish an action, will you be at your goal? If not, you have not defined the problem and the action necessary to solve it. Start over. Only fundamental change that takes big money interests out of the political process and fund our government can change that.

Or back to the levy analogy, it doesn’t work to fix just one hole in the levy. You’ve got to fix them all or the water still floods through. The reform package has to stem the entire flood of selfish private interests, and then to say – we will accept nothing less.

We are going to change the way things work.

That is our goal: To create that Network, to define these fundamental goals on which we can agree and which determine how our government conducts its business, to educate the public in support and to take political action to make it happen. And we are going to do this in a way that respects and protects the autonomy of all the participating people and organizations regardless of their own particular issues and beliefs. We will not let the little issues divide us on this most fundamental of issues -- getting big money out of our governmental process once and for all. Will anything less solve the problem? No. It will not get us to our goal, and therefore we defined the goal wrong. Only together can we make this magnitude of change possible. Will you with join us? We're ready to join with you.

If you agree with these goals, please sign our Petition


End notes: 1) If you doubt this because of what you have been told, or if you want to know more about how this kind of aid really works, please read Jeffrey Sachs’ revealing case studies in his book Commmonwealth. He shows how the intelligent investment in clean water, disease prevention, roads and infrastructure has made it possible for whole nations and cultures which were below the subsistence level were able to become self-supporting. The evidence is in. 2) For more on the Global Marshall Plan and what you can do to support it.

Annotated Table of Contents:
"Next: The Problem Why we feel so bad: Because the world is messed up and we don’t know what to do about it.

Reframing the Public Dialogue

The following article is an important conceptual background for all progressive issues and how those issues are framed radically affect how people perceive them.

Untellable Truths Monday 13 December 2010
by: George Lakoff, t r u t h o u t | Op-Ed;
Democrats of all stripes have been so focused on details of policy that they have surrendered public political discourse to conservatives and with it the key to the nation's future.

Materialist Perspectives
The differences between Democratic progressives and the president over the tax deal the president has made with Republicans is being argued from a materialist perspective. That perspective is real. It matters who gets how much money and how our money is spent.

But what is ignored is that the answer to material policy questions depends on how Americans understand the issues, that is, on how the issues are realized in the brains of our citizens. Such understanding is what determines political support or lack of it in all its forms, from voting to donations to political pressure to what is said in the media.

What policies are proposed and adopted depend on how Americans understand policy and politics. That understanding depends on communication. And it is in that the Democrats - both the president and his progressive critics - have surrendered. The Democrats have left effective communication to the conservatives, who have taken advantage of their superior communications all too well.

From the progressive viewpoint, the president keeps surrendering in advance - giving in to conservatives before he has to and, hence, betraying Democratic principles. From the president's perspective, he is not surrendering at all; instead, he is a pragmatic incrementalist - getting the best deal he can for the poor and middle class one step at a time.

Progressives differ on the reasons for the president's behavior. Either he has no backbone to stand up for what he believes in, or his actions define his beliefs and he is more conservative than those who voted for him thought.

The progressives' economic policy arguments are sound: continuing reduced tax payments for the wealthy will not work as a serious economic stimulus and will greatly increase the deficit and make the economic picture worse. From a progressive moral perspective, it isn't fair; it increases an economic disparity that is already much too large.

The president's pragmatic incrementalist arguments seem reasonable from his perspective: He got more immediate money for the poor and middle class than he gave to the rich, and the poor and middle class need as much as possible now (pragmatism), and further incremental steps can be taken later (incrementalism).

Those are the materialist arguments among Democrats. I want to shift the frame to the major causal factor that is being ignored on both sides: the role of communication in shaping what Americans understand.

Helping the Other Side
As someone who studies how brains work and how language affects politics, I see things somewhat differently. From my perspective, there is a form of surrender in advance on both sides - a major communications surrender.

Let's start with an example, the slogan, "No tax cuts for millionaires." First, "no." As I have repeatedly pointed out, negating a frame activates the frame in the brains of listeners, as when Christine O'Donnell said, "I am not a witch," or Nixon said, "I am not a crook." Putting "no" first activates the idea "Tax cuts for millionaires."

Next, "millionaires." Think of the TV show "So You Want to Be a Millionaire" or the movies "Slumdog Millionaire" and "How to Marry a Millionaire." To most Americans, being a millionaire is a good thing to aspire to.

Then, there is "tax." To progressives, taxes are revenue that lets the government do what is necessary for Americans as a whole - unemployment insurance, Social Security, health care, education, food safety, environmental improvements, infrastructure building and maintenance, and so on.

But the conservative message machine, over the past 30 years, has come to own the word "tax." They have changed its meaning to most Americans. They have been able to make "tax" mean "money the government takes out of the pockets of people who have earned it in order to give it to people who haven't earned it and don't deserve it." Thus, "tax relief" assumes that taxation is an affliction to be cured and a "tax cut" is a good thing in general. Hence, conservatives make the argument, "No one should have their taxes raised."

The conservative slogan activates the conservative view of taxes. But the progressive slogan, "No tax cuts for millionaires," also activates the conservative view of taxes! The progressives are helping the conservatives.

Conservatives have a superior message machine: Dozens of think tanks with communications facilities, framing experts, training institutes, a national roster of speakers, booking agents to book their speakers in the media and civic groups and owned medias like Fox News and a great deal of talk radio. Their audience will hear, over and over, "No one should have their taxes raised."

There is no comparable progressive message machine. But even if one were to be built, the Democrats might still use messages that are ineffective or that help the conservatives. Why?

Language, The Brain and Politics
When democratic political leaders go to college, they tend to study things like political science, economics, law and public policy. These fields tend to use a scientifically false theory of human reason - enlightenment reason. It posits that reason is conscious, that it can fit the world directly, that it is logical (in the sense of mathematical logic), that emotion gets in the way of reason, that reason is there to serve self-interest and that language is neutral and applies directly to the world.

The brain and cognitive sciences have shown that every part of this is false. Reason is physical; it does not fit the world directly, but only through the brain and body; it uses frames and conceptual metaphors (which are neural circuits grounded in the body); it requires emotion; it serves empathic connections and moral values as well as self-interest, and language fits frames in the brain, not the external world in any direct way.

Conservatives who are savvy about marketing their ideas are closer to the way people really think than Democrats are, because people who teach marketing tend to be up on how the brain and language work. And over the past three decades, they have not just built an effective message machine, but their repeated messages have changed the brains of a great many Americans.

For Democrats to do effective messaging, while being sincere and factual, takes insight into the nature of unconscious reason and the role of language.

It's Complicated
I am often asked, "Is there a slogan I can use tomorrow that will turn things around?" Certainly there are better things that can be said tomorrow. But things don't turn around so quickly. There is a lot do and to bear in mind over the long haul. A brief list:

* Communication is a long-term effort. Political leaders rarely say anything that isn't already in public discourse. That means that people who are not in office have to start effective communication efforts, including new ways of thinking and talking.
* All politics is moral. Policies are proposed because they are assumed to be right, not wrong. The moral values behind a policy always should be made clear.
* Conservatives and progressives have two different conceptions of morality.
* Democrats need to unite behind a simple set of moral principles and to create an effective language to express them. President Obama in his campaign expressed those principles simply, as the basis of American democracy. (1) Empathy - Americans care about each other. (2) Responsibility, both personal and social. We have to act on that care. (3) The ethic of excellence. We have to make ourselves better, so we can make our families, our communities, our country and the world better. Government has special missions: to protect and empower our citizens to have at least the necessities. I don't know any Democrats who don't believe in these principles. They need to be said out loud and repeated over and over.
* Leaders need a movement to get out in front of. Not a coalition, a movement. We have the simple principles. Those of us outside of government have to organize that unified movement and not be limited by specific issue areas. The movement is about progressivism, not just about environmentalism, or social justice, or labor, or education, or health, or peace. The general principles govern them all.
* Many people are "biconceptual," this is, they have both conservative and progressive moral systems and apply them in different issue areas. These are sometimes called "independents," "swing voters," moderates," "the center" etc. They are the crucial segment of the electorate to address. Each moral system is represented by a circuit in their brains. The more one circuit is activated and strengthened, the more the other is weakened. Conservatives have moved them to the right by repeating conservative moral messages 24/7. The Democrats need to activate and strengthen the progressive moral circuitry in their brains. That means using only progressive language and progressive arguments and not moving to the right or using the right's language. This is the opposite of "moving to the center." There is no ideology of the center, just combinations of progressive and conservative views.
* Don't use conservative language, since it will activate their moral system in the brains of listeners. Don't try to negate their arguments. That will only make their arguments more prominent. Use your own language and your own arguments. Truth squads and wonk rooms are insufficient.
* Remember that, in the conservative moral system, the highest moral principle is to preserve, defend and extend the conservative moral system itself. For example, from their perspective, individual responsibility is moral; social responsibility is not.
* Learn the difference between framing and spin/propaganda. Framing is normal; we think in frames. If you want to formulate a policy that is understandable, the policy must be framed so it came be readily communicated. Framing precedes effective policy. When you use framing to express what you really believe and what the truth is, you are just being an effective communicator. Framing can also be misused for the sake of propaganda. I strongly recommend against it.
* Educate the press and the pollsters to all of these matters.
* Find a part to play in getting an effective communications system going!

For a detailed background, take a look at my book, "The Political Mind."

Untellable Truths
The conservative message machine has so dominated political discourse that they have changed the meaning of words and made some truths untellable by political leaders in present discourse. It takes a major communication effort to change that.

Here are just a few examples of presently untellable truths:

* There is a principle of conservation of government: If conservatives succeed in cutting government by the people for the public good, our lives will still be governed, but now by corporations. We will have government by corporations for corporate profit. It will not be a kind government. It will be a cruel government, a government of foreclosures, outsourcing, union busting, outrageous payments for every little thing and pension eliminations.
* The moral missions of government include the protection and empowerment of citizens. Protection includes health care, Social Security, safe food, consumer protection, environmental protection, job protection etc. Empowerment is what makes a decent life possible - roads and infrastructure, communication and energy systems, education etc. No business can function without them. This has not been discussed adequately. Government serving those moral missions is what makes freedom, fairness and prosperity possible. Conservatives do not believe in those moral missions of government and when in power, they subvert the ability of government to carry out those moral missions.
* The moral missions of government impose a distinction between necessities and services. Government has a moral mission to provide necessities: Adequate food, water, housing, transportation, education, infrastructure (roads and bridges, sewers, public buildings), medical care, care for elders, the disabled, environmental protection, food safety, clean air and so on. Necessities should never be subordinated to private profit. The public should never be put at the mercy of private profit. Public funds for necessities should never be diverted to private profit.
* Services are very different; they start where necessities end. Private service industries exist to provide services - car rentals, parking lots, hair salons, gardening, painting, plumbing, fast food, auto repair, clothes cleaning, and so on. It is time to stop speaking of government "services" and speak instead of government providing necessities. Similarly, "spending" does not suggest providing necessities. "Spending" suggests services that could just as well be eliminated or provided by private industry. Economists should drop the term "spending" when discussing necessities.
* The market is supposed to be "efficient" at distributing goods and services and, sometimes, with appropriate competition, it is. But the market is most often inefficient at proving necessities, because every dollar that goes to profit is a dollar that does not go to necessities. Health care is a perfect example.
* Public servant pensions have been earned. Public servants have taken lower salaries in return for better benefits later in life. They have earned those pensions through years of hard work at low salaries. Pensions were ways for both corporations and governments to pay lower salaries. Responsible institutions, public and private, took the money saved by committing to pensions and invested it so that the money would be there later. Those corporation and governments that took the money and ran are now going broke. Those institutions (both companies and governments) are now blaming the unions, which negotiated deferred earnings in the form of pensions or benefits for the lack of money to pay pensions. But the institutions themselves (e.g., General Motors) are to blame for not putting those deferred salary payments aside and investing them safely.
* Education is a public good, not a private good. It benefits all of us to live in a country with educated people. It benefits corporations to have educated employees. It benefits democracy to have educated citizens. But conservatives are only considering education as a means to make money and, hence, as a private good. This leads them to eliminate the public funding of education, which is a major disaster for all of us, not just those who will either be denied an education or who will be forced into unconscionable debt.
* Huge discrepancies in wealth are a danger to democracy and a cause for major public alarm. The enormous accumulation of wealth at the top of American society means unfair access to scarce resources, a restriction on access to necessities for many and a grossly unfair distribution of power - power over the media and political power.
* Tax "cuts," "breaks" and "loopholes" sound good (wouldn't you like one?) even for super-wealthy individuals and corporations. What they really mean is that money is being transferred from poorer people to richer people: The poor and middle class are giving money to the rich! Why? Money that would otherwise go to their necessities: food, education, health, housing, safety, and so on is instead going into the pockets of super-wealthy people who don't need it.
* Markets in a democracy have a fundamentally moral as well as economic function. Working people who produce goods and services are necessary for businesses, and should be paid in line with profits and productivity. Salary scales in private industry are a matter of public, not just private, concern. Middle-class salaries have not gone up in 30 years, while the income of the top 1 percent has zoomed upward astronomically. This is a moral issue.
* Carbon-based fuels - oil, coal, natural gas - are deadly. They bring death to people and animals and destruction to nature. We are not paying for their true cost because they are being subsidized: tens of billions of dollars for naval protection of tankers; hundreds of billions for oil leases; hundreds of billions in destruction of nature, as in the Gulf of Mexico and Alaska coast. Death comes from the poisoning of air and water through pollution and natural gas fracking. And global warming pollution destroys nature itself - the ice cap, the creation of violent storms, floods, deserts, the blowing up of hilltops. The salesmen of death - the oil and coal companies - are profiting hugely from our payouts to them via subsidies and high prices. And with the money, ordinary citizens are giving to them in subsidies; they are corrupting the political process, influencing political leaders not to deal with global warming - our greatest threat. We are dependent on them for energy, to a large extent because they have politically blocked the development of alternatives for decades.
* What is called "school failure" is actually a failure of citizens to pay for and do what is needed for excellent schools: early childhood education, better training and pay for teachers, a culture of learning in place of a culture of entertainment, a poverty-free economy.
* Taxpayers pay for business perks. Because business can deduct the costs of doing business, taxpayers wind up paying a significant percentage of business write-offs - extravagant offices, business cars and jets, first-class and business-class flights, meetings at expensive lodges and spas, and so on. Businesses regularly rip off taxpayers through tax deductions.
* The economic crisis and the ecological crisis are the same crisis. It has been caused by short-term greed. Thomas Friedman has described it well. The causes of both are the same: Underestimation of risk, privatization of profit, socialization of loss. But those truths lie outside of public discourse.
* Low-paid immigrant workers make the lifestyles of the middle and upper classes possible. Those workers deserve gratitude - as well as health care, education for their kids and decent housing.

Notice that it takes a paragraph to tell each of these truths. Each paragraph creates a frame required for the truth to be told. Words are defined in terms of such conceptual frames. Without the frames in common understanding, there are presently no simple commonplace words to express the frames. Such words have to be invented, and will only come into common use when these presently untellable truths become commonplace truths. Try to imagine how public understanding would have to be enhanced for expressions like the following to come into normal public discourse:

* greed crisis in place of economic crisis
* blessed immigrants in place of illegal immigrants
* government for profit in place of privatization
* public theft in place of tax breaks
* failing citizens in place of failing schools
* corporate cruelty in place of profit maximization
* deadly coal in place of clean coal

Presidents can have a discourse-changing power if they know how to use it and care to use it. But they cannot do it alone.

If there is a teachable communication moment for President Obama, this is it. Bring back "empathy" - "the most important thing my mother taught me." Speak of "empathy" for "people who are hurting." Say again how empathy is a basis of democracy ("caring for your fellow citizens"), how we have a responsibility to act on that empathy: social as well as personal responsibility. Bring the central role of empathy in democracy to the media. And make it clear that personal responsibility alone is anti-patriotic, the opposite of what America is fundamentally about. That is the first step in telling our most important untellable truths. And it is a necessary step in loosening the conservative grip on public discourse.

For videos of the president speaking about empathy, Google: Obama Empathy YouTube and Obama Empathy Speeches.

The Problem

“Against a great evil a small effort does not produce a small result. It produces no result at all.”
John Stewart Mill

The world is a total mess. For the past thirty years we have been told -- and many of us believed -- that the problem with our world is big government, regulation and taxes...that if we trust in the free market and big business, all boats will float up with the tide. The evidence is now in. It worked exactly the opposite of what was promised. Big business exported our jobs, cut our pay and benefits, cut their own taxes by 50% while the rest of us saved pocket change on taxes, deregulated financial institutions and environmental safeguards, cut the safety net programs which we need even more than before their "reforms" which were supposed to benefit us all...

We face a drastically shrinking middle class and an apparently permanent underclass while the incomes for those at the top rose 2,184% [1] in the decade of the 1980s when it all began and have soared ever since. It's been the biggest "reverse Robin Hood" -- take from the poor and give it to the rich -- since the robber barons of the mid 1800s. How did they accomplish this? By substantially controlling our government giving mega-corporations subsidies at the same time we can't find the money to repair our roads and schools. By deregulating the banking insitutions, environmental and consumer protection safeguards. By selling tax reductions that gave most of us pocket change at best while their taxes went down by 50%. By writing legislation which prevents the genuine entrepreneur and small business from competing... That's the truth of the matter and it's time to set the record straight. And it's time to change it!

Most of us don’t want to believe that things are really bad. It’s not comfortable to see the world this way. We don’t like what it does to us emotionally and physically –what it does to our gut. It’s even worse for us socially. Nobody wants to be with anyone who is always pessimistic – just ask your "significant others." It’s a downer. “Get a life. Get over it. You can’t change it,” they tell us. We’d rather just go about our business believing that if everything is not exactly fine today, it will get better. The economy seems to be improving. Stocks are gaining value... Yes, but substantially because the ultra-wealthy are playing the exact game they did before -- creating a bubble of paper wealth, selling it to us taking their usurious commissions off the top and leaving us holding the empty bag again. Just wait and see.

What this ignores is the fact that things won’t get better unless we choose to create the changes. What messes up our gut is feeling like there's nothing we can do about it. The deck's stacked. The problem is we don't have anything creative to do with that negative energy,...the frustration,...sometimes anger. Deep down every one of us feels this even when our lives are going along generally well. Suppose we were able to find things we can do which plays a direct part in changing the way the world works.

Here's what we propose to do: We're going to talk about what's wrong only long enough to begin to see what we have to do to fundamentally change the way things work. We can work our tails off trying to fix a mess here or there, but the big picture doesn't change -- what makes it all happen. It's the process and how it works that we need to first concern ourselves with.

Our problems have causes – many causes. But there are root causes that underlie most of the things that plague us. Anyone who is half awake knows that big money interests own our economy and our government and that probably 90% of the problems we face are the direct result of that over-arching truth. They have the power and they use that power in ruthless and destructive ways.

The problem is not the government. The government doesn't have much power since deregulation began -- except when it serves the rich and the powerful. The problem is that big money interests own our government. “Power corrupts; absolute power corrupts absolutely.” We need to call a spade a spade. The abuse of power by the very rich who continue to take untold millions of dollars while the world economy languishes, that’s evil. Or as Mill says, it’s “a great evil.” We are up against a great evil. If we start our thinking from any other point …if we make only a small effort, we will produce no result at all.

When the financial tycoons [end note 2] who created toxic mortgages based on fabricated information and misinformation about the meaning of an ARM mortgage,…when they knew that this would result in foreclosure as the expected rate increases hit,…when they took their commission off the top with no risk when the mortgages they wrote failed,… and when they backed toxic mortgages with derivatives that they knew were unstable [because they knew that the derivatives were based on toxic mortgages that they wrote],…when they paid the ratings companies we have always trusted like Standard and Poor to give AAA ratings to these investments both knew were junk,…when they gambled, not with their own money, but with ours,…when that lead to the collapse of the world economy,…when we lost our jobs, our insurance, our homes, our retirement funds,… when they took our tax dollars to bail themselves out and then gave themselves $20 billion in new bonuses, and when they get away with all of that, that’s evil. That's the truth. Does it make you mad?

When health insurers spend the first third of the inflated premiums we pay them to eliminate every high risk person and refuse payment of insured claims in order to increase their record high profits,…when we pay more for health care than any other nation on earth but only rank 37th in the quality of care we receive according to the World Health Organization, …when we are the only country in the western world that doesn’t have universal health care leaving millions of people unable to afford the care they need to save our children’s lives,…when even those who are employed and have the best health insurance are often forced into bankruptcy because of high co-payments, life-time caps, and disallowing even standard forms of treatment,… when health care costs are the number one reason for bankruptcy, when health care profits are running more than twice the Dow Jones average return on investment, when they have eight well-paid lobbyists per each of our Representatives, when the health care industry pours millions of dollars into campaign funds to block the health care reforms which would help us all, that’s evil. That's the truth. Does it make you furious?

When business tells us that the “free market” is the only way to prosperity,…that all government and regulation is bad,…that profit is the only measure of value and must be unchallenged,…that, therefore, all taxes are bad,…when companies know they are destroying our environment by pouring toxic chemicals proven to cause cancer into our water,... with the rapid depletion the world’s resources and then hide and deny these facts as people die of the cancer they caused,…when they produce shoddy and toxic products,…when they hire teams of lawyers to deny and delay as medical care bankrupts the people they poisoned,…when they pour money into campaign funds so that our representatives gut the environmental regulations which protect us all as excessive,...when they eliminate enforcement saying that the cost of compliance -- the compliance that protects us from them -- is excessive, that big government is excessive, when they call for tort reform so they can’t be forced to pay for the harm they have caused, that’s evil. That's also the truth. Does it make you mad?

Selfish big money interests are the forces that underlie most of our other problems including many of the psychological and addictive problems resulting from our inability to cope with the economic hardships they have created. As long as we allow them to continue their stranglehold on everything, we will not be able to make real change,...not on any of the other fronts which concern us. At some point we need to quit hiding our heads in the sand. At some point, we need to get angry. At some point we need to turn that anger into productive action. At some point, we have to take control of our own destiny. When we start taking actions that can change our world for the better, then we start feeling good about ourselves again. It's worth the journey.

Against a great evil… That sounds harsh. It is harsh, but not because we make it so. We are just honestly observing what is going on in our world. It's harsh because those self-serving interests make it harsh. Please, don't blame the messenger. If we are to succeed, and succeed we must,it's going to take the effort of many, many people who want their world to be better,...who believe the world can be better,...who are willing to work to make it better. Many of us are already working as best we know how to make it better. Many more want to take their lives in that direction. But most of us don't have a vision or a plan of action which can materially affect the way things are.


We have a vision and a plan. If our solutions don’t end the power of big money to corrupt our society, our economy and our government, nothing else will change. Do we have a nation "of the people, by the people and for the people…" or a nation of the extremely wealthy, by their corporations, for only themselves and against the rest of us? In our representative democracy, we have the power to change this. We only have to quit allowing big money to buy the process and to take the power back to ourselves. The key fact is: No one goes to Congress without our vote. Money can't buy our votes except if we allow ourselves to continue to be duped by their misinformation about what is really going on. If we decide to unite our actions, we can change this in one election.

How about we quit making excuses? How about we quit believing it's not possible? How about we start to find the ways of proving it is possible. That, Friends, is our common task. Please join with us. Together we can eliminate the power of big $$$$ over our government and economy through one act of Congress. All we have to do is convince all candidates that they will not be elected if they don't get on the winning team.

[1] Barlett & Steele, America: What Went Wrong?, p1.
[2] Under intense questioning by Senator Levin, the CEO of Washington Mutual, the largest of the banks that were saved from failing due to the toxic mortgages they wrote only by being bought out at the ninth hour, finally admitted that top management knew they were fabricating information on mortgage applications to insure approval. He stated that he was aware that their brokers were "cutting and pasting" information on income and assets from other people's applications. The FBI has found that over 80% of all toxic mortgages were caused by the mortgage companies, not by fraud on the part of applicants.

Contact us:
Annotated Table of Contents:

Concepts Behind the Network Design

We who are creating the Network know that, without significant change in the way public decisions are made, we will have little chance of achieving our many specific issues goals, and that’s not acceptable to us. We have a plan which describes the essence of change necessary to begin to heal the world.

In order to achieve such a "modest" plan of changing the world, we need to cast the widest, most inclusive net we can. We want to be very careful in defining what, not who the enemy is. The "enemy" is the way that selfish interests act in the way of selfish interests. Yes, that sentence is a circle and that is exactly the way it works -- extremely wealthy self interests reinforcing and supporting each other. There numbers are few, but they have the power to control the process through their wealth.

We have made every effort to eliminate any political bias in the concepts and language of our site. However, if you find anything that offends, please put that in the comment box at the bottom of each essay or send us an email. We will take every reasonable step to ovoid confrontational or offensive ideas except where we feel they are entirely necessary to understand the ways in which our world is badly broken. What we believe is wrong and who is responsible we will state as clearly and openly as we are able. We will not hesitate to be entirely critical of those who created much of the mess we are in.

If we are going to change the way things work, we want and need every one's personal and organizational input on any level and every level that suits their talents, concerns and skills. This is a dream begging, praying to become real. Please join with us to breathe life into this vision?

The "Fundamental Reform Network," hereafter simply called the Network, operates through a website created entirely through the efforts of volunteers. Why? If we are going to defeat the power of money, we will have to prove that we can do it with the least money possible. If it can be done well for free, that’s our goal. Only this way can we go to the people and say big money must be completely out of the decision-making process -- period.

It's time for the concerns and needs of the average citizens to be heard. That's the American Way. We have to prove that this can be done on its own merits. We have to "be the reform we seek." If we try to reach our goals through raising our own money, there's no way we can compete with the billions the economic elite can throw at the issue through their surrogate organizations and a media assault to create fear and deception. Only then can we really say that we will oppose every incumbent or candidate who does not agree to remove the influence of money from our governmental functions.

Money in government is the problem. The Network will oppose any politician --right or left, Republican or Democrat -- who does not commit to removing the influence of big money in government entirely. This is our message to every incumbent and candidate who would represent us from dog catcher to President starting right now. Those are the only issues that unite us. We are going to change the process. That's the goal. Then and only then we can get to work to argue out and solve all the particular problems our world faces on their own merits, not in ways that serve only the smallest minority at the top. And this is one of the reasons why the Fundamental Reform Network is, as far as we know, unique among Networks for change.

How does the Network itself function?

(a) It’s only existence is ideas on a website.

(i) It has no office, overhead, insurance, payroll, taxes…making its existence and function as close to cost free as possible.
(ii) Our only existence is a website with all the capabilities to present multiple issues, to hyperlink ideas and organizations, Email lists and blasts, action alerts and petitions, poll taking and much more.
(iii) The website is like Wikipedia. No one person or organization owns it. It is a cooperative effort which everyone has the potential of contributing to.
(iv) Its only function is to be a networking website to create and provide for the communication of our program ideas. "Co-munication" is necessarily two way, not a monologue. Please add your voice by making suggestions for the effort and make it your own.

Contact us WeDontHaveFreeSpeech@hotmail.com
Annotated Table of Contents:

Background and Rationale

Big news! Stop the presses. Something’s wrong in our world – fundamentally wrong! It seems symptomatic and systematic on almost every front. The economy is in shambles with the highest unemployment since the Great Depression, our retirement funds bankrupted, our homes devalued and foreclosed due to causes beyond our control, our tax dollars used to save those institutions that created the economic crisis in the first place while they give themselves bigger bonuses than ever.

We seem to be able to afford to bail out the rich and conduct two questionable wars which are bankrupting our government, but we can’t afford human need in our own country. Deregulation and tax breaks for the very rich have produced the exact opposite of what was promised – “trickle down.” It didn’t happen. What happened is exactly what we see today. No, it’s been a torrential flood of money upwards with little or no positive affect for the rest of us.

Our government is clearly complicit in this process. It has proven itself ineffective and we seem unsure as to whether the problem is too much [bad] government as the right wing argues on the one hand, or too little [good] government on the other. Is it too much [bad] regulation or too little [good] regulation? Is it government waste and corruption or is it the ability of big money interests to corrupt our government and to allow waste and corruption in both government and the economy at large? If we quit arguing and pay attention, the answer is virtually always all of them! Perhaps the one thing we can agree on is that big money owns and corrupts our government on every level and that we are not likely to change anything until we take the power back for the people and hold our representatives accountable to us. That's the best of the American Way.

That’s it inn a nutshell. We are up against a great evil. Before we try to understand what that evil is, it’s important to what it is not: It’s not a particular political party; it’s not liberal or progressive or middle of the road or conservative; it’s not left wing or right wing; it’s not business interests per se; it’s not automatically those who manage to make inordinate amounts of money and it’s rarely genuinely creative and entrepreneurial people. It’s absolutely not the majority of people who work hard and honestly to earn their way in the world and to produce a quality and competitive product or service that is valuable to the society at large. In fact, what’s wrong is not people.

It’s what some people do that reaches the point that can only be called rampant greed and which is clearly detrimental to the rest of us or to the environment – i.e. not in the public interest. To them profit is the only measure of what is beneficial and the unlimited accumulation of wealth by the top 2% is considered an absolute right. It is the people who think nothing of lying, cheating, deceiving, misrepresenting, using fear or domination to gain economic advantage. This group is not defined by extreme wealth alone, but that is definitely a major factor. In a world of extreme poverty and starvation, … of global warming,…the incomes of the 400 top earners exceeding $87 million with an after tax net averaging of more than $67 million is to morally repugnant. That needs to be said. That needs to be understood. They have substantially achieved their wealth by controlling how things work to their own advantage. It's time to change this.


But what makes this greed truly obscene is the belief that it is their right, even duty to dominate others without regard for who is hurt in the process… It is the use of the power implicit in that wealth to manipulate and control others – including the ability to own and use the media to effectively control the information on which we form our opinions… The evidence is clear that allowing these people to dominate our economy and government has reached a point of abuse which can no longer be tolerated. They are entitled to their own opinion about this, but they are not entitled to have the power to subject us to these opinions.

These observations are not about judging or dwelling on what’s wrong. It’s about discovering what is necessary to return the power to the citizens of our great nation and to make our representatives responsive to the public needs and interest. It’s true that you can’t legislate morality. You cannot make or enforce enough rules to eliminate every possible misdeed. The question is: Are there simple ways of limiting actions that are harmful to others and society that are moral without being moralistic or legalistic – without trying take away free will or control every minute action? We believe this is possible and have the plan to accomplish it.

Many say this cannot be changed. Our first observation is that it can’t be changed if we continue to believe change of this magnitude is impossible. All change has to start with the right idea, and the right idea is that this change is not only possible, but it is entirely necessary!

It is important to know that in fact it can change. In our democracy, it only takes the right reform legislation and a majority of one vote which can’t be bought with money or fear. The problem is not that our government is too big or too small: It’s that it’s bought from top to bottom and that it only works for those who are able and willing to “pay to play.”

America is founded on the principles of a representative democracy of the people, by the people and for the people – not of the corporations, by the corporations and for the very rich. If our democracy doesn’t work, we have no one to blame but ourselves. If we do not fundamentally change the corporate control of our economy and government, we deserve what we get. Nothing short of ending the practices by which they exert this control will ever produce results – period!

On that assumption, we propose a package of reforms necessary remove the corrupting influences of wealth and power and their affect on our government, economy and society on every level. At the same time, we seek the simplest ways to accomplish this. We will start with the fundamental change which influences virtually everything needed to reverse the current course -- redefining “free speech” in order to change the election policies to level the playing field. This goal mitigates or eliminates the worst abuses in virtually every aspect of our culture, without a gagillion laws, rules, regulations, complex enforcement, systems of punishment, etc.

If you agree with these goals, please sign our Petition


Contact us WeDontHaveFreeSpeech@hotmail.com
Annotated Table of Contents:

How the Network Functions

(a) BASIC CONCEPTS AND PRINCIPLES

(i) The network has no membership; only Signatories/Signers
(ii)Becoming a "General Signatory" is like signing a petition. It is only an indication of agreement with the Network's principles and goal centered on free speech/campaign reform.
(ii) It exists only as an Internet Networking function for individual and organizational Signatories with the sole purpose of supporting this mutually agreed “body of reforms”-- nothing else.
(iii) This allows both individual and organizational signatories to participate in a way that does not compromise their own organization, membership, fund raising, etc. It does not ask environmentalists to change their focus to universal health care, etc. It welcomes, respects and supports this diversity.
(iv) At the same time it allows all manner of sundry organizations to cooperate in a common effort which is to all our interest and benefit and includes only those issues which make the process by which governmental decisions are created open and democratic.
(v) Becoming a Signatory is not a matter of joining "yet another political interest group" further dividing our attention and support;
(vi) The purpose of the Network is to join individuals and our many existing organizations together in a common cause. We can only do this together.

(b) WHAT IT MEANS TO BECOME A "SIGNATORY"

(i) Becoming a Signatory involves your individual or organization's commitment to support the means and goals of the Network as the critical foundation for all other reform efforts. It is at least similar to signing our petition but in a deeper way that supports the Network which created the petition and a commitment to participate actively in educating others regarding the petition and its underlying importance for removing the corrupting power of big money from the political process.
(ii) Becoming a signatory implies acceptance of the general guidelines such as respecting all involved parties, a desire for the broadest possible inclusion not only those "politically correct” from our personal or organizational point of view as long as they also agree to the principles and goals of the Network...

It is our hope that all signatories will actively use their own skills, talents and contacts to further Network goals.

Become an Individual Signatory of the Network now.

(c) THE IDEA CONTENT

(i) All content is created and edited entirely by individuals and groups of volunteer signatories with any and all participating as they choose and in the degree they choose. Final copy is determined by committees on each plank with final approval of the Executive Committee made up of "Network Founders" to insure that the content is consistent with Network principles.
(ii) Using only volunteer efforts eliminates every possible expense beyond the cost of providing the site, the server and the programming on the site – i.e. there is no paid staff.
(iii) This allows the network to function without the implicit control moneyed interests exert over most decision making processes.

(d) THE NETWORK HAS NO SPECIFIC POLICY CONTENT OF ITS OWN

(i) The only agenda is to create an environment which fosters open, democratic, and participatory dialogue...
(ii) accomplished entirely through volunteers – both individual and organizational signatories – to identify, define and propose changes in the process by which public decisions are made...
(iii) to refine the list of reforms and perfect their presentation...most of the remaining work to be done will be determining the other electoral reforms needed to replace big money in the elections process and the actual language of our proposed legislation.
(iv) issues are strictly limited to changing the process rather than dealing with the specific issues and concerns like global warming or campaign reform. The only goals: Public interest decisions determined by merit freed of corrupting interests of money...
(v) to educate signatories, their organizations and the public on these matters of concern...
(vi) to poll the signatories and the public regarding the inclusion or exclusion of issues and their presentation in a continuing refining process...and to encourage their direct input through the comment boxes that appear at the end of each essay
(viii) and then to support the political effort to make this change in the form of a single piece of comprehensive reform legislation [if possible]...
(ix) to create an action alerts: Automated editable letters sent to governmental representatives urging their support...
(x) and more as the occasion and need arise...

Become an Individual Signatory of the Network now.

(e) Becoming an "Organizational Signatory"

Network Communication Through Organizational Signatories

(1) All Organizational Signatories make a commitment to educate their own members on the importance of our underlying issue and to recruit them to sign the Network Petition and undertake other actions as they deem appropriate regarding Network goals vis-a-vis their own organizational focus.
(2)All communication from the Network will be forwarded to each participating group which will -- at their own discretion -- edit them and forward them to their own members and contacts. This approach for disseminating information through members insures that no attempt will be made to recruit their members, to seek funding from them, or to bypass their leadership to present ideas and issues directly to their membership. These aspects of the program guarantee that no one tries to speak for you, “mine” your membership, or seek funding from them. These are very important to allow organizations to join our common effort without compromising their own efforts.This respect for the autonomy of members and their own identity is essential to overcome the natural and appropriate protectiveness which often divide us making coalitions to nearly impossible.
More details are listed in the "become a signatory" section.
(3) With the consultation of others, our founders have created The Network. They have produced the basics of the Network proposal as it is presented here only as a starting point. All Organizational Signatories are invited to participate in creating and refining the materials and ideas of the Network.
(4) All organizational signatories will be listed under appropriate interest categories as appropriate with a hyperlink for their email and/or website address, plus a short description of your organization. This will allow interested people to find you easily. Please repeat the complete information for each individual within your organization whom you wish to receive updates of issues of your concern directly.

The Idea in a Nutshell

In 1994 Newt Gingrich proposed his Contract with America outlining a series of values and goals which became the center around which conservatives organized. It provided a clear picture of what they stood for which became accepted almost unanimously on the right – by their churches, civic and political organizations… They brought it to their school boards, city councils, legislators,… all the way to their presidential candidates and they kept politicians toes to the fire – even within their own party. Every incumbent or candidate who did not sign on to their Contract was opposed in the next election by a well-funded conservative. About this observation, we make no value judgment for or against what they did. The point is: What they did worked and can work again.

The Network will establish the means of determining those issues on which the broadest spectrum of Americans can agree are necessary to change the way our country operates by removing the virtual big money control of the process so that our representatives will again represent the will of the people, not just private business interests.

If you agree with these goals, please sign our Petition


">Contact us: WeDontHaveFreeSpeech@hotmail.com
Annotated Table of Contents:

Making a Printable Petition

It is easy to participate in a petition drive. You don't have to commit hours or days on end although the Network certainly encourages that. Think of it this way, when you go to the store,church, the park or anywhere people gather, take a few minutes to stand out front with the Network's petition and a brief flyer to hand out.

A Petition sponsored by the Fundamental Reform Network

We the undersigned agree with the goals to form a national “politically neutral” super-coalition with goals strictly limited to 1) completely eliminate the corrupting power of money over our political process and 2) to increase the income taxes of only the top 5% of incomes to eliminate the Federal deficit and to fund necessary public interest programs like Medicare, schools, etc. by returning over a up to two trillion dollars in revenue to the Federal Treasury.


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Possible Issues for Inclusion

The first goal for fundamental change is free speech, election reform and public financing of elections. These combined are our frontal assault on the flow of billions of dollars into the campaign funds of virtually every candidate and incumbent from dog catcher to President[1]. Both parties are equally guilty with little or no distinction between them on the matter of becoming compromised by huge campaign contributions. Anyone who thinks this doesn’t buy our government isn’t paying attention.[2]

There are many potential aspects to electoral reform which we will mention below. But with the recent Supreme Court decision Citizens United confirms corporations as “persons” carrying the 1st Amendment rights to free speech. Dealing with this issue comprehensively seems a necessary precursor of other forms of electoral reform, lest the Supremes follow this same approach and declare these reforms as unconstitutionally denying corporate free speech. So the first goal is making the process of buying our representatives directly illegal.


[The following items are suggested for inclusion. Development awaits the work of committees made up of those knowledgeable about the subject.]

Section 1.01 [Re]defining “free speech”

Please refer to http://boughtspeech.blogspot.com Free speech issues directly affect the “legality” of many electoral reforms and therefore are an important antecedent to making the reforms. We believe that the necessary changes can be made through legislation rather than the more difficult process of amending the Constitution.

Section 1.02 Internet: free and equal access guarantee
Please refer to http://boughtspeech.blogspot.com/2010/02/proposed-legislation-free-speech.html
Many organizations exist which have put much work into understanding the issues and proposing the necessary actions to remedy the corporate takeover threats as they exist today. This is currently a hot issue with actions before the FEC, etc. We hope they will be joining our effort and writing this material.

Section 1.03 Electoral reform:
Our government is bought and paid for on all levels. Very few people can enter elected office on the basis of the desire to actually serve the public without immense personal or other funding. The only way to eliminate the corrupting influence of big money from our governmental process is to eliminate every possible form of advantage altogether on all levels so that the playing field is guaranteed to be level. While it is desired to keep things as simple as possible, at the same time we want to design it free from loopholes as we can.[6]

These are some of the issues which may become included:

(a) Public financing of all campaigns for public office on all levels.In order to create the money to finance public funding of elections, we propose a corporate excise tax in an amount equal to the average money they spent on lobbying over the past 3 years to create revenues equal to or greater than that needed to fund the creation and operation of the National Elections Website and public funding of elections. It is a perfectly logical approach. They are already spending that money to influence [buy] our representatives. In a sense, it would only transfer money that they are already spending -- i.e. it's not taking anything away from their owners' profits. So suppose we simply take that same amount, and use it to share the cost of elections equitably among those who have used the power of extreme wealth to buy our government. We believe that's entirely fair.

Seven states already have public financing of election laws on their books: Arizona,Connecticut, [Albuquerque]New Mexico, [Portland] Oregon, Maine, New Hampshire and North Carolina. Their laws typically include four rules: Collect a set number of small contributions from their own district; agree to voluntary spending limits; accept no donations from private [corporate]sources; and not spend one’s own money on the campaign. If a candidate agrees to abide by these rules, they receive full public financing. Note: 2004 elections cost $4 billion. Mostly from groups seeking legislative favors or contracts.

(b) Instant run off elections
“Instant runoff voting (IRV) is the American English term for a voting system in which voters rank candidates in order of preference, most commonly in single-winner elections. Indeed, IRV can be considered a special case of single transferable vote for the case where there is a single position to be filled. If no candidate is the first preference of a majority of voters, the candidate with the fewest number of first preference rankings is eliminated and that candidate's ballots are redistributed at full value to the remaining candidates according to the next ranking on each ballot. This process is repeated until one candidate obtains a majority of votes among candidates not eliminated. The term "instant runoff" is used because the method is said to simulate a series of runoff elections tallied in rounds…” Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instant-runoff_voting

There are a number of important advantages: Runoff elections are extremely expensive. They delay the filling of the office. Allowing the candidate receiving the largest number of votes, but not a majority, makes voting for an alternative candidate— often called a "spoiler" – in effect a vote for the candidate who least represents your point of view. E.g. voting for a Green candidate who has little chance of actually winning, but who best represents your views, takes away from the Democratic candidate who would be your second choice. Or on the other end of the spectrum, voting for a single issue right to life candidate of Libertarian background takes away from the Republican candidate and almost guarantees a Democratic victory even in a conservative district. It works both ways.

The corollary of this observation is that instant run off elections encourages the participation of minority candidates to run for office as the fullest expression of our democratic values.

(c) Proportional balloting
Choice Voting is a form of proportional representation (PR) that is widely used by the world's established democracies. Under choice voting, representatives are elected from multi-seat districts in proportion to the number of votes received. Choice voting also assures that political parties or candidates will gain the percentage of legislative seats that reflects their public support. Source: http://www.fairvote.org/choice-voting

This system is often used to choose from a large field of candidates for multiple positions such as members of a board or committee.

(d) Ballot qualification [preliminary]
o Standardized to be uniform, reasonably fulfilled and fair to all parties seeking office.
o Must be a resident of the district which they would represent
o Must be registered to vote in that district
o Other qualifications such as minimum age, citizenship or other reasonable factors and/or as constitutionally [?] established
o Some public financing of election laws or proposals requires small individual contributions and/or signatures of a small percentage of the registered voters in that district
§ This number should be large enough to discourage purely vanity candidates, but small enough to encourage serious minority candidates

e) Required disclosures [preliminary]
o The requirement that every candidate fully disclose any personal, professional or monetary relationship with any entity that has or could receive benefit from the office for which he is a candidate
o Any personal health or other limitations which would materially affect the candidate’s ability to represent his constituency [?]
o Must fully disclose the [x] most recent income tax filings [?]
o Any material misrepresentation of the candidate’s background, qualifications for office or relevant experiences shall be grounds for immediate disqualification from that election prior to the voting date or shall result in automatic and immediate impeachment if in office.

(f) Any Use of Deceit or Distortion of the Facts in the Electoral Process is a crime
This needs a lot of thought, but the way the extreme right is willing to make up stories out of whole cloth, like the “Swift Boaters” who besmirched Senator Kerry’s Viet Nam record, or the “birthers” who deny Obama’s American citizenship, or Palin and others insisted that the health reform legislation included “death panels” – all of them preposterous and without factual foundation, but repeated so often as to have a major impact on public opinion and the election results. This list also included the notions that Saddam Husein had large stockpiles of Weapons of Mass Destruction and that he was in close collusion with Al Quaida which are still widely believed today despite overwhelmingly clear evidence to the contrary. The list of examples goes on and on. Can we draw meaningful legislation without genuinely crippling free speech? It is illegal to shout “fire” in a crowded theater or to directly incite people to violence. Certainly we can formulate a reasonable law which will make dishonest people think twice about using outright lies to attempt to change the outcome of elections. It needs to include personal responsibility for the truthfulness in the conduct of elections. Our other proposals on the limits of free speech and the use of money in the electoral process will do much to curtail these abuses. Still, it’s wrong! People shouldn’t be allowed a free hand to do this without any recourse for the rest of us.

(g) Election campaign funds [7] [preliminary]
o only individuals people may make contributions to campaign funds
o Individual contributions are limited to [a small number or the order of $500.00 maximum].
o It is a crime for any companies, unions, educational organizations, interest groups including non-profits to make contributions to any political campaign or ballot initiative.
o It is a crime for any organization [as above] may make any attempt to require or otherwise induce individuals in their employ to make individual contributions or to give them money for that purpose.

Note: see the sections on the universal Internet Campaign Website, and the requirements for all relevant media to provide free and equal access in order to present their views and respond to opposing views elsewhere.

(h) The conduct of political campaigns [preliminary]
o Permanent rules that guarantee fairness by law as follows:
§ The legal provision of equal and free access to all media for the conduct of campaigns-- e.g. weekly articles of a given length written and endorsed by the candidates themselves – not by others.
§ All media shall be required to provide a clearly identified section for the print media and an election segment for all broadcast media which announces the times and locations of all election related town meetings.,
o “Town meeting” with open access to all qualified candidates
§ Number of meetings
· At least one meeting for local races
· 2-4 for state wide races by agreement among all qualified candidates
· For all national offices – Congress and the President at least 4
· Subjects shall include at least domestic policy, foreign policy, economic policy goals
§ The venue to be provided free of charge in a location reasonably near the center of the district to be represented [if local] by the appropriate level of government [e.g. a local school for a school board position]
§ Standard formats should be established suitable to the office and the issues in such a way as to create no advantage to any candidate.
· Overall time would normally be 2 hours, with one half hour equally divided among
· In the first election cycle all candidates would make their proposals and the format then chosen by consensus
· Those formats would then remain constant unless there is a new consensus
§ Selection of Moderators shall be determined by consensus of all qualified candidates from a list they themselves create.
· Candidates would be invited to submit suggestions for questions to be asked.

(i) Bribery
o In our democracy, public service is one of the highest callings and demands the complete moral integrity insuring that the legitimate public interests of one’s constituents are served. Zero tolerance is permissible for infraction of laws governing the offering, giving or receiving of bribes as herein defined.
o It shall be criminal for any individual to offer or give any material inducement to any public servant for any reason [or in any amount over $500.00] It shall be illegal for any organization or corporation to make any campaign contributions as all.
o The individual and/or organization so doing shall be fined in the amount of a reasonable estimate of the material benefits they may have received as the result of their bribe, forbidden to ever again hold any government contract and subject to a mandatory 10 years in jail.
o It shall be criminal for any public official or candidate to receive any financial or material benefits from any source other than their public salaries and benefits – period. [Exceptions may be made for their own earned income independent of their elected office as long at this employment in no way influences or gains benefit from their public office.]
o Any infraction by a candidate or office holder will result in immediate and automatic dismissal from office on proof of receipt of such bribes, the complete return of the value to be placed into general revenues of the level of government the office serves, a prohibition of ever holding public office again and a sentence of not less than 10 years in prison.

Section 1.04 Senator Harkins “filibuster” rule
The filibuster is not without merit as a safeguard against abuses of the majority against the minority. The danger is in its abuse by the minority against the majority making a so-called "super majority" necessary to conduct the normal business of government. Senator Harkins outlines the abuse by Republicans to block over 200 bills plus even routine appointments virtually crippling the government; his rule reduces from 60 to 58 to 56 votes necessary for cloture every two days.

Section 1.05 Eliminate a single senator’s ability to “hold” bills

Section 1.06 Simple majority vote to pass revenue bills

Section 1.07 Remove all ear marks

Section 1.08 Line Item Veto [?]

Section 1.09 Decentralization of the public media with strict limitations on control of any meaningful sector of the public.

Section 1.10 Election of the President by popular vote and the elimination of the Electoral College

The below is retained as a model for future use.
Preamble:
Whereas, government service and/or engaging in the business of government in any form is meant to be an honor requiring the highest dedication to serve the public welfare and to improve and maintain the common wealth for the public.
Whereas, any actions contrary to the above are directly detrimental to the nation’s business and its democratic function, and is a direct affront to all that our nation stands for;
Whereas, it is therefore incumbent upon the Congress to pass and the Courts to rigorously enforce the most rigorous safeguards against any abuse of that public trust by any party as part of or in relationship with the business of government on any level – Federal, state or local:
Whereas, sound business practices requires that all business relationships with the government to procure goods, services, or other needs of the public shall be solely based on demonstrable objective criteria such as price, quality and/or reliability, or other reasons germane to the specific relationship.

“Corruption of public office” shall be defined as and will include at least:
The above and/or other issues will be created by the combined work of people working on election reform and legal advisors who are working on these issues.


[1] Ever wonder why our representatives can’t hear our voices? The following FEW lobby groups dole out $294,000,000 per year on which representatives are totally dependent for getting elected. Lawyers $58M, retirees $36 M, real estate $33M, Health professionals $32m, securities and investments $29m, insurance industry $21M, commercial banks $16M, pharmaceutical $14M, Defense $13M, electric utilities $12M, oil and gas $11, Computers $10M Israeli lobby $9M. Source: “The Israeli Lobby” by Stephen Zunes, Tikkun Magazine, Nov./Dec 2007, page 50

[2] Please see the separate article showing the magnitude of only a few campaign contributions
[3] Income tax is a real knee jerk issue even among liberals. Please read the entire tax presentation before you decide whether or not we can and should include it. It really is the second pole of the issue of big money controlling everything. If it takes a direct confrontation with a mistaken belief, it just may be worth it. Even if we have to back down in the end, including it will certainly help raise tax levels above their recent historic low level of 35% tops.
[5] They don’t like to say “huge” incomes which they are as that raises possible moral objection.
[6] My thought process tends towards the complex. Many of the specific details I cover may be covered far more simply and comprehensively. Your input and suggestions are welcome.
[7] I personally like the model used in the ballot initiative “The California Fair Elections Campaign” of 2008 [newsletter @caclean.org ]or watch Bill Moyer’s video on the clean money campaign at http://www.caclean.org/materials/watch.php


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