No more golf trips. No basketball tickets. Not even so much as a beer at the bar. I've never taken a dime from a lobbyist or a special interest group, and I never will. Send me to Congress and I'll work to make sure that no one else does, either. The founding fathers never intended for us to make a career out of politics - let's set term limits in order to limit influence peddling. We have to stop the earmark sharks and get the Cardinals out of Congress. We need rules that require sufficient time for appropriations bills to be reviewed before passage. The way that the process works at present is nothing short of criminal.  Let's make members of Congress fully disclose the terms of any employment offers that they receive. Let's see them do the job for love of country, not money.

Problem: Campaigns have become too expensive.

It's all about the media buy, isn't it? Whoever spends the most money wins. Only multi-millionaires, or those who become beholden to them, can afford to run for office. Modern media costs have made campaigns prohibitively expensive. Too many talented people will never run for office. The common voter has become disenfranchised from the process.

Solution: Take the money out of political campaigns.

Ban commercial political advertising. I'm not kidding. Thirty-second TV and radio spots with Madison Avenue voice-overs tell us nothing about a candidate, anyway. Let's use the power of the internet, media coverage, and fair, open, public debates to get candidates' messages to the voters. Will that work? Let's give it a try.

Problem: Butterfly ballots and the County Commissioner for Water Table Control.

I try to be a well-educated voter, so I make notes before I enter the voting booth. Still, I find the ballot confusing, touch screen or no touch screen. There are candidates seeking the office of County Commissioner in charge of Water Table Control, and I've never heard of any of them. There aren't enough retirees willing to man the polls, so the lines are long.

Solution: Adopt Oregon's ballot-by-mail.

They've done it successfully for years. It reduces costs. It increases voter participation. It lessens confusion and reduces errors. It makes the voting process more accessible for persons with disabilities. And it takes exit polling and its associated hype out of the equation.

Problem: Sometimes the winner loses.

Andrew Jackson, Samuel Tilden, Grover Cleveland, and of course, Al Gore.

Solution: Get rid of the Electoral College

Read what Thomas Jefferson had to say: "I am certainly not an advocate for frequent changes in laws and constitutions. But laws and institutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind. As that becomes more developed, more enlightened, as new discoveries are made, new truths discovered and manners and opinions change, with the change of circumstances, institutions must advance also to keep pace with the times. We might as well require a man to wear still the coat which fitted him when a boy as civilized society to remain ever under the regimen of their barbarous ancestors." Those words are chiseled in stone at the Jefferson Memorial in Washington.
 

This site was designed entirely by James W Moore, and I am the sole author of its contents. Since it runs on my own web server, I can legitimately claim that it was paid for by James W. Moore for Congress, even though I didn't charge myself.