Tag: Downsize DC

Re-Founding America

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photo credit: Why Tuesday?

I don’t pay attention to talk radio because even though I am very conservative I find that the conservative perspective shared on talk radio is generally laced with too much thoughtless and inflammatory perspective that is designed to stir reactions rather than provide information. Despite that general disinterest I was intrigued when I heard about Glenn Beck calling for a re-founding of America. The idea fit so well with what I have been focused on that I thought I would share my perspective on the idea here.

On January 1, 2008 I wrote that what America needs is a new birth of freedom. Before I wrote that, and even more since then, I have been looking for exactly that within our nation. The final answer is as difficult as it is uncomplicated – we need people to be converted to the idea of America – no more is it enough to be born here – we must individually be converted to the idea of liberty that our founders fought and died for. During the last couple of years I have found two groups that give me hope for a way forward in giving this nation that new birth of freedom.

Tags connections, Downsize DC, Elevated, liberty, patriotism

National

An Effective Response on Health Care

Post author By David
Post date August 18, 2009
13 Comments on An Effective Response on Health Care

Those who wish to oppose the current health reform plan wending its way through Congress will not succeed simply by opposing the current bill, nor by offering an equally complex alternative bill. This is a major mistake being made by those in Congress who are not ready to back the overhaul currently being proposed (mostly Republicans). The only hope is to offer a simple bill that can gain wide support and propose to pass it as a first step to real health care (or health insurance) reform.

A simple bill allowing the purchase of health insurance from other states could be just exactly the medicine this health care reform fiasco needs to turn it from the current monstrosity to a real, effective push for sustainable reform. This could not be a full solution to our health care problems but it could be an easily understandable bill that could gain wide support and show clearly that those opposing the bill being thrust upon us now are serious about reform and offering clear alternatives. In fact, such a bill plays directly to the president’s latest soundbite that the important thing to satisfy the President is that there be “choice and competition in the health insurance market.” (See remarks by Robert Gibbs among others.)

Perhaps passing such a bill would be just the thing to get the White House and Congressional leaders to come back to the bargaining table and work with the rest of Congress on this issue to get bipartisan reform (and preferably to approach reform as a series of small, easily understood bills passed in succession) instead of trying to craft their preferred bill (hiding who knows what in a massive reform bill that few people have read and nobody truly understands) and then trying to convince some Republicans to support it so that they can call it bipartisan.

I wrote to my congressional representatives to say as much. I told them:

Republicans in the House and the Senate should be able to put together such a bill (likely only one or two pages) and a coalition of support and be ready to present it in both houses of Congress as soon as the August recess is over. I’d like to see all my representatives sponsoring or cosponsoring such a bill within the first week after the Congressional session resumes.

For anyone who would like to send a similar message to their representatives (anywhere in the nation) they can do so by going to the Make Health Insurance More Affordable campaign from Downsize D.C.

Tags change congress, civic participation, Downsize DC, health care, issues

National

The Healthcare Issue Simplified

Post author By David
Post date June 19, 2009
4 Comments on The Healthcare Issue Simplified

DownsizeDC has a post entitled Complexity, Simplified that promises to make our national issue with health care reform understandable. And they deliver on that promise. They say more than this, but it all boils down to these few statements:

But we think the complexity can be simplified to two simple questions:

For whom does your doctor work?

Do you pay for your health insurance directly?

If your doctor tailors his or her care to the policies of your insurance company, or some government program, then you don’t really have a doctor who works for you, and health care hasn’t really been reformed.

You’ll know health care has really been reformed when the following things are true…

You and your doctor deal with your health insurance provider as rarely as you currently do with your car insurance company

Doctors post their prices, and compete with each other based on price and quality

It’s really that simple. As long as insurance policies and/or government programs fund most of your health care, doctors will work for them and not for you.

The same holds true for health insurance. As long as our health care coverage comes mostly from employer controlled insurance or the government, we won’t have a competitive health insurance market, and the cost of both insurance and health care will grow constantly.

When Americans care about the impact that their use of health care has on their insurance premiums in the same way that they care about the impact that speeding tickets and minor scrapes have on their car insurance, you’ll know that our health care system has really been reformed.

There – in two questions to ask, two systemic changes to watch for, and two paragraphs decribing what real reform would look like – is the entire health care issue.

Tags change, Downsize DC, health care, issues

National

Enumerated Powers Act

If the United States is truly a nation that is ruled by law then the Enumerated Powers Act should be a no-brainer. When the Constitution was adopted it laid out the specific powers of the various branches of government. As the supreme law of the land and the document defining what Congress is meant to do, it should be a simple thing to require that each bill cite the section of the Constitution granting authority for the bill in question. The Constitution is short enough that our congressional representatives should be able to quickly find the applicable section. If the authority is not specified in the Constitution there is a means in place to acquire that authority if it is warranted – that is the amendment process. This limitation to the codified law was so important to our founders that they specified in the Bill of Rights that any power not specified in the Constitution was to be reserved to the states.

When Congress felt it was necessary to levy an income tax the appropriate steps were taken to amend the Constitution to allow for such a tax. That is an example of the rule of law. Unfortunately, most of our Congressional leaders do not care if they have the authority to do what they are doing – they only care if doing what they are doing will jeopardize their chance for re-election. Maybe Congress should try to repeal the Tenth Amendment.

If the Enumerated Powers Act were passed it would enable people to verify the authority of Congress on any bill they passed and it would highlight any passages of the Constitution that were being used to justify excessive or undesireable legislation. If such passages were identified, the people have the ability to clarify those specific passages of the Constitution – through the amendment process.

Tags change congress, Downsize DC, EPA, government

National

One Subject at a Time

Today I would like to introduce DownsizeDC.org’s “One Subject at a Time Act”

Most Americans probably believe a bill has to have majority support in Congress before it can become the law of the land. Sadly, this common sense expectation is totally wrong. Congressional leaders routinely pass laws that a majority opposes. DownsizeDC.org believes every bill should have to stand or fall on its own merits. Toward this end we have crafted the “One Subject at a Time Act” (OSTA).

One thing that i like about the Downsize DC approach is that most of the legislation they promote is written as a regulation for Congress and not for the people of the United States at large. OSTA is no exception. This bill recognizes the smoke and mirrors effect perpetrated by congressional representatives when they are allowed to bundle or misrepresent pieces of legislation in order to pass them.

The premise of OSTA is that if a piece of legislation is not able to pass on its own merits then the bill does not deserve passage. There may be good bills that generate opposition, but more often there are bad bills that are slipping under the public radar by being passed under the shadow of a deceptive title or hiding behind bills that do deserve the support of congress.

Tags change congress, Downsize DC, government, OSTA

General

Downsize D.C.

KVNU had a post today about a movement to let the Protect America Act (PAA) expire. That caught my attention and led me to DownsizeDC.org. This is the kind of site that would attract any self-proclaimed Constitutionalist, Ron Paul supporter, or advocate for limited government. Among the various things they advocate for is a bill to require that members of congress have a chance to read any bill before they cast votes on it. That just makes sense. Anytime one of our senators or representatives votes on a bill they have not read it is like signing a contract (for their constituents no less) without reading the fine print. Worse yet, it’s like my one-year-old raising his hand to sustain someone in sacrament meeting when he has no concept of what is happening – he just raises his hand because the people he knows are raising their hands which is a lot like a game we play at home called “Isaac Says.”

Tags contracts, Downsize DC, government, issues, RTBA