corruption reform

All throughout history nations have been overthrowing each other. The reasons are usually pretty straightforward and self serving such as taking land, money, and resources. I can’t think of any other time or place where countries fought to overthrow each other not to take them over but to determine what form of government the other has. Americans have had it pounded into our heads for years that any form of government other than democracy is evil, and God wants us to change those evil governments no matter how many of their people we have to kill to make it happen…and it’s okay to kill them, because by believing in a different system of government they have proven themselves evil and worthy of death.

Boy are we fucked in the head. The truth is that any government that continually tries to improve itself will be good to its people, and if every government constantly tried to improve itself then they’d probably all end up looking pretty similar eventually. However, when any government becomes poisoned with corruption the end result will be the same: the suffering and death of the citizens within that country.

Make no mistake, America is corrupt as shit. Does that mean other countries aren’t? No. Other countries are corrupt too, but that doesn’t mean America’s government isn’t. Anyway, the result of America’s corruption is obvious. There’s suffering out there. Life sucks. Most people aren’t too hopeful of the future. We’re looking to make all sorts of strange changes to fix it, but it’ll all be for naught if we don’t fix the holes in the government that are leaking all our money, security, and freedoms out.

How to do that is surprisingly straight forward. It’s pretty mind blowing that basically none of these measures have been implemented yet.

1. Hold all government officials to the same level of screening used when hiring school janitors and the lowest level enlisted military troops. That includes a drug test and a criminal background check. If it’s too dangerous to have a janitor on drugs then why don’t we make sure our leaders aren’t on drugs? If it’s too dangerous to give a soldier with a felony conviction a gun then why give members of Congress with felony convictions the ability to control our troops? About two weeks ago Senator Ted Stevens from Alaska got convicted of 7 counts of felony corruption. Guess who got reelected to the Senate two days ago? Senator Ted Stevens from Alaska. Guess who couldn’t vote for Senator Ted Stevens from Alaska because he has a felony conviction on his record? Senator Ted Stevens from Alaska. What the fuck? Is this any way to run a government? This is shit you expect to hear about in the Philippines, not the most powerful country in the world.

2. Make corruption a treasonous offense. Look here now.

(Political) corruption is defined as:

“the use of governmental powers by government officials for illegitimate private gain.”

Treason is defined as:

“1. the offense of acting to overthrow one’s government or to harm or kill its sovereign.

2. A violation of allegiance to one’s sovereign or to one’s state.

3. The betrayal of trust or confidence; breach of faith; treachery.”

On a side note, if George Bush did in fact steal the 2004 election then he overthrew the government. He’s also violated his allegiance to the nation by selling out our safety to big business, and by lying to us about the war in Iraq which has resulted in the deaths of thousands of American soldiers (not to mention the 1 million Iraqis) he has betrayed our trust, our faith, and committed atrocious acts of treachery. It would be damned near impossible to argue that he’s not guilty of treason.

Anyway, when a politician uses government powers to for illegitimate gain (which is always at the expense of the people) treason is committed. The punishment for treason in America is death. I’m usually not all about the death penalty, but when George Bush lied to us and Dick Cheney handed the keys to our treasury to Halliburton they both committed treason and earned a place in a noose. Anybody who is given as much power over other people as our leaders on Capitol Hill should be held to the highest level of accountability, and if they abuse that power they should be punished not only for the wrong they committed but also for the good they failed to accomplish. Hey, if you have to worry about being killed for a bribe I’ll bet you’re not going to be likely to take it. At the very least make corruption punishable by life in prison…and certainly don’t let people who’ve been convicted of corruption run for public office again.

4. Outlaw campaign contributions and lobbyists. Our government already gives money to political campaigns. Take all that money and make a couple of websites/television stations devoted solely as a platform for campaigning. If it’s illegal to spend any money on campaigning you automatically accomplish two things. First of all, anyone can run for office. You don’t have be a millionaire or well connected. As it stands, those are the two most important requirements to run for office…as opposed to be qualified. Secondly, politicians won’t have to pay back their campaign contributors with political favors. If lobbying is outlawed then they can’t do under the table personal favors for politicians in return for political favors.

If we can do at least these simple, common sense things we can eliminate the vast majority of corruption in our government and begin to head away from the fate of Rome, Russia, and every other corrupt nation that has fallen from glory. Then we can begin to move towards Utopia and the glory that we ignorantly boast so loudly about having today.