https://www.realclearpolitics.com/articl...42424.html

Review of book by Neal Simon:

"...I also believe that his solutions rely too heavily on federal legislation or constitutional amendments to fix things. Both require Congress to act – and gridlock on Capitol Hill is the problem right now, not the solution. The movement is changing America one state and city at a time, aiming to take on Washington from the bottom up....

There are 10 solutions suggested.
1. Open primaries-personally I think that should be left to the states.
2. Nonpartisan Federal debate administration to control federal election debates.
Personally I think that is very scary. The idea is to allow 3rd parties access. But it can be easily co-opted.
3. Term limits-2 6 year terms for Senate and 3 2 year for House. I am very strongly for this. But I would be fine with 6 2 year for House.
4. Donations of over $100 disclosed. I'm guessing Simon is a Democrat. This is a very low threshold and like #2 speaks of excessive government involvement.
5. Article skipped #5
6. Ballot access to anyone with over 5,000 signatures. While this sounds like a good idea, I am very opposed to putting more power with the feds and less with states.
7. Federal law to require independent commissions to re-district. Again federal over-reach. I have seen too many "independent" groups get captured by a small group. We need to allow states to experiment in ways to deal with the excessive gerrymandering.
8. Ranked choice voting. Think this is just a bad idea. First past the post prevents domination. Also suggests multi-member districts for proportional representation. This sort of thing is what creates such a mess in places like Israel where small special interest groups have outsized power.
9. Rewrite Senate and House procedures. While some of his ideas are good, the idea of 60% for a House Speaker is just stupid. Again, see Israel. They can't even get a majority.
10. Culture of unity. Good luck with that.


Good thought process, but seems like a lot of bad solutions to real problems.

The only thing in any of that I could entertain being on board with is term limits. As was said, most relies too heavily on federal involvement. Just what we need, even more government intrusion.

I would put high on the list, IMPROVE the electoral college by awarding votes based on the congressional districts won by each candidate in each state. This change is much more equitable than winning overall national popular vote.

(02-18-2020 07:43 PM)THE NC Herd Fan Wrote:  I would put high on the list, IMPROVE the electoral college by awarding votes based on the congressional districts won by each candidate in each state. This change is much more equitable than winning overall national popular vote.

States can do that if they want.

But it would need some red and blue states with similar number of votes to agree to do it in tandem. True Purple states could do it, but I'm not sure how many of those there are left. New Hampshire? Iowa, Missouri, Ohio and Florida seem to be trending red. Colorado, New Mexico and Nevada seem to be trending blue.

I used to be all for term limits, but that has changed as I've become more cognizant of the power of the non-elected class that is not subject to such restraints. I believe that hard term limits would only increase the power and leverage of these deep state actors and they would end up controlling nearly all policy.

At least with elected lifers you know they won't willingly hand over their power completely to the non-elected lifers. It's the only balance we have have against it unless Presidents get more serious about turning over staffs and voiding security clearances when elected.

I think the most important thing is to curb the power of the nameless, faceless, unelected, and unaccountable bureaucrats who comprise the true deep state. I would propose the following changes to the Administrative Procedures Act (APA):

1) All new rule making is subject to congressional review and approval, automatically if the estimated dollar impact exceeds some threshold ($1B has been proposed), and in any event upon the request of 20% of Congress.
2) All existing rules, and the agencies themselves. are subject to sunset review by Congress every ten years.
3) For dispute resolution, replace hearings before Administrative Law Judges (ALJs), who report ultimately to the Executive Director of the agency, with proceedings before a truly neutral tribunal, as required by the due process amendments to the Constitution. This could take the form of an independent executive agency for administrative hearings, like Texas and Oregon, or preferably Article III administrative law courts in every federal judicial district. Appeals to executive agency rulings would be to the Circuit Court in the district where the cause of action arose, and upward through the cognizant Circuit Court, rather than through the DC District and Circuit. This would greatly decrease and diffuse the power of the DC Circuit, which is fine with me.

I'd also look at moving federal departments out of DC. State and Defense, and possibly Treasury, need to stay there. But the rest can go elsewhere. IMO this would go a long way toward breaking up the Beltway mentality.

(02-18-2020 11:55 PM)banker Wrote:  I used to be all for term limits, but that has changed as I've become more cognizant of the power of the non-elected class that is not subject to such restraints. I believe that hard term limits would only increase the power and leverage of these deep state actors and they would end up controlling nearly all policy.

At least with elected lifers you know they won't willingly hand over their power completely to the non-elected lifers. It's the only balance we have have against it unless Presidents get more serious about turning over staffs and voiding security clearances when elected.

To use a term from the Shawshank Redemption, they get "institutionalized."

And from things like "47%" and "deplorables," they get disconnected from the real world. They live in their little DC bubble where they are treated like royalty. They go to all the same cocktail parties, travel in the same circles. Net result is they get contemptuous of normal Americans and overestimate their own abilities.

You need fresh blood that doesn't know how its always been done.

(02-19-2020 09:28 AM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  I think the most important thing is to curb the power of the nameless, faceless, unelected, and unaccountable bureaucrats who comprise the true deep state. I would propose the following changes to the Administrative Procedures Act (APA):

1) All new rule making is subject to congressional review and approval, automatically if the estimated dollar impact exceeds some threshold ($1B has been proposed), and in any event upon the request of 20% of Congress.
2) All existing rules, and the agencies themselves. are subject to sunset review by Congress every ten years.
3) For dispute resolution, replace hearings before Administrative Law Judges (ALJs), who report ultimately to the Executive Director of the agency, with proceedings before a truly neutral tribunal, as required by the due process amendments to the Constitution. This could take the form of an independent executive agency for administrative hearings, like Texas and Oregon, or preferably Article III administrative law courts in every federal judicial district. Appeals to executive agency rulings would be to the Circuit Court in the district where the cause of action arose, and upward through the cognizant Circuit Court, rather than through the DC District and Circuit. This would greatly decrease and diffuse the power of the DC Circuit, which is fine with me.

I'd also look at moving federal departments out of DC. State and Defense, and possibly Treasury, need to stay there. But the rest can go elsewhere. IMO this would go a long way toward breaking up the Beltway mentality.

I think moving departments out of DC is an excellent idea. Interior should be in the west, someplace like Denver, where the federal lands are. Energy should be in the energy capital of the world, Houston. Agriculture shouldn't be in the northeast where the least amount of agricultural land is. It should be someplace like Kansas City or Chicago. Education and the VA should go away. VA was a disaster under the DoD and its been a disaster as its own agency. Ought to be in Health and Human Services. Education is a state function, not federal. What the feds do should be in a re-worked Department of Labor, designed to be a Workforce training department.

(02-18-2020 11:55 PM)banker Wrote:  At least with elected lifers you know they won't willingly hand over their power completely to the non-elected lifers. It's the only balance we have have against it unless Presidents get more serious about turning over staffs and voiding security clearances when elected.

But here's the problem with the elected lifers. Their main concern is being lifers. They don't want to take a stand on an issue, because that might cost them votes. So they pass some broad-brush bill loaded with platitudes, and tell XYZ agency to fill in the blanks with regulations.

Net effect: Bureaucratic deep state gets more power, elected representatives cede it willingly to foster job security.