The Congressional Reform Act of 2011 - It IS Time

someone emailed this to me and it made so much sense, i'm blogging it. please repost/forward/reblog/twitter and send, send, send. it's time.

apparently, congress does whatever it wants. or do they? the jury is still out on that one. the vietnam war came to a screeching halt because people marched and demanded it. but that was, what -- 40 years ago? we aren't a generation that takes to the streets in defiance. we take to our laptops and smart phones. the problem with this reform act is that ultimately, congress has to ratify it. isn't that like asking a bad kid to punish themselves?

with six figure salaries and self-regulated pay raises, solid health insurance, a pension and excellent retirement plan, and (yes believe it or not) not working for months on end, being a congressman (or woman) is like riding a gravy train with bisquit wheels. that is, compared to how the average american is doing.

congress should draft everyone at the age of 18. get personal. hit home, hard. that would make for a politically astute and very much involved populace, with a quickness.

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The 26th amendment (granting the right to vote for 18 year-olds) took only three months and eight days to be ratified! Why? Simple! The people demanded it. That was in 1971 -- before computers, before e-mail, before cell phones, etc.

Of the 27 amendments to the Constitution, seven (7) took 1 year or less to become the law of the land -- all because of public pressure.

I'm asking each addressee to forward this email to a minimum of twenty people on their address list; in turn ask each of those people to do likewise.

In three days, most people in the United States will have the message. This is one idea that really should be passed around.

Congressional Reform Act of 2011

1. No Tenure / No Pension. A Congressman collects a salary while in office and receives no pay when they are out of office
2. Congress (past, present & future) participates in Social Security. All funds in the Congressional retirement fund move to the Social Security system immediately. All future funds flow into the Social Security system, and Congress participates with the American people. It may not be used for any other purpose
3. Congress can purchase their own retirement plan, just as all Americans do.
4. Congress will no longer vote themselves a pay raise. Congressional pay will rise by the lower of CPI or 3%.
5. Congress loses their current health care system and participates in the same health care system as the American people.
6. Congress must equally abide by all laws they impose on the American people
7. All contracts with past and present Congressmen are void effective 1/1/12. The American people did not make this contract with Congressmen. Congressmen made all these contracts for themselves. Serving in Congress is an honor, not a career. The Founding Fathers envisioned citizen legislators, so ours should serve their term(s), then go home and back to work.

If each person contacts a minimum of twenty people then it will only take three days for most people
in the United States to receive this message.  Maybe it is time.

do you know who your elected officials are?

because there are so many americans that are flat-out ignorant of the political process and how things work, i think we should start with the basics. you know.  all that junk we learned in social studies class in grade school.  the thing is, we should not only know how things work but specifically who's representing us and how to reach them.  here's my short list.

the united states congress has two chambers: the senate (the upper house) and the united house of representatives (the lower house). both must approve legislation before it can be passed.  thanks to the wonderful world wide web, every elected official's contact information is online. you can call, you can email, you can do it the old fashioned way and write a letter -- and many of them actually have websites.

1. if you want to reach out and contact president bush or vice president cheney, you can -- and you should. click here to find out how.
2. every state gets two senators. i live in new york, so i've got senator charles schumer and senator hillary rodham clinton.   to contact your senator by state, click here.
   
3. how many representatives each state has depends on how densely populated it is, but each state is guaranteed at least one representative.  they count heads to come up with these numbers, which is a part of the reason why the census is so important.  new york has 29 representatives. at 53, the state of california has more than anyone else.  the current total is 435.  i live in new york's 15th district and i am represented by the honorable charles b. rangel. to contact your representative by state, click here.
4. of course, each state has their own executive, legislative and judicial systems.  new york has the state assembly (lower house) and the senate(upper house).  we have a pretty good idea of who's representing us nationally because one of them just ran for president and the other one is in the news quite a bit. the breakdown for new york state is: governor david a. patterson, state comptroller thomas p. dinapoli, and attorney general andrew cuomo. new york state has 60 senators. i have two senators in my zip code: bill perkins (district 30) and eric t. schneiderman (district 31). to find yours in new york state, click here.  to find the senator in your state, click here.
5. ...and then there's all the action that happens in the counties, cities, towns and villages, from comptrollers to judges. to find out who's who and what's what in your state, click here.

make no mistake: our votes (or lack of them) put each and every single one of these officials in office and in power. our tax dollars pay their salaries. they are supposed to be representing us and working for us, to better our communities and give us a good quality of life.  and when they don't, they should be held responsible -- and if necessary, prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.  

you can abstain from voting if you feel like it. you can ignore who's doing what and why. but by choosing to not participate, you are participating.  if you are a citizen of the united states, there is no wrangling your way out of it.  you're in on this and voting is your responsibility.  

9/11 documentary -- did you know?

do i expect you to sit and watch this 90 minute documentary in its entirety? no, i do not. what i would hope is that you would not simply accept anything that the government tells you regarding 9/11 -- or anything else, for that matter -- as fact. then again, i think that the american public has a very hard time flat-out believing what the powers that be have to say about their colossal screw-ups since president kennedy was murdered in office. and senator kennedy's murder. and rev. dr. martin l. king, jr's murder. and malcolm x's murder. and fred hampton's murder .

i know that assassination attempts are made against presidents all the time -- but when was the last time a republican president was murdered? why are they so successful at offing the leaders who want to empower the general populace and who genuinely intend to do the people the most good?

they wiped out virtually everyone in the entire chicago headquarters of the black panther party. and why? because they had a free breakfast program for black children? because after dr. king died, things began to shift from racial issues to social and economic ones? because they were "commies"? think of the leadership we would have in our midst as african-americans right now if that particular massacre -- perpetuated by the chicago police and the fbi and "ignored" by the federal government -- hadn't happened.