Be careful what you wish for remember you might get a great statesmen! "Nevermore" 

jrchaff:
I think that the base problem is not that Martha is a politican-like waffler; She was saying that a GOOOH representative will have a conflict of interest between GOOOH and district voters. A politician would say something like "Mmm.. Abortion is bad, but people should have the liberty to choose, but I personally oppose it..." etc.; you never can be completely sure of what they will really vote for until the issue actually comes up. Or, a politician would decide on an issue during a campaign and then later say "On reconsideration, I changed my mind because of etc etc." This is not the kind of thing that Martha is doing; rather, as you can see from her posts, she has strong ideas (No term limits), and emphatically discusses them. She is not being deliberately ambiguous and vague in order to improve her electoral chances; rather, she is specifically naming some potential problems with GOOOH, were she to participate.

I also notice that although you condemn her for not having any common sense, you have not responded at all to her argument. Have you by any chance heard of argumentum ad hominem? If we all want GOOOH to work so we can kick the corrupt politicians out, then we shouldn't resort to shallow name-calling of those who don't agree with our own views. This is meant to be a non-partisan organization, after all.

Tim and Martha:

Martha has clearly identified herself, to my satisfaction, as a "politician" thinker (as you describe a waffler in the your book). I am satisfied that she represents what is wrong - the very inability to commit. In addtion, she is a "debater" who is more interested in scoring small (and logically minute) points than in coming to a sound conclusion.

If you were in a group I was in, Martha, you would be the first to be excluded from running. You completely fail the 'Common Sense' test. Have you read Tim's book??

John R. Chaffer / Bozeman

Hi, I think it's Sean?  I had to go back to look at your e-mail address since you didn't sign your long posting.  America is a far cry from Rome.  I'm sure we will have to agree to disagree.  You digressed into a long tirade about abuse of power, naming the Clinton, Kennedy and Bush families.  Teddy Kennedy is the only person named who has served more than two terms.  Think about it, and recall that presedential terms are already limited.  I don't care for the man (Teddy) myself, but a big part of your argument is baseless.  The people of Massachusetts are inherently far left liberals.  If you ask them, I'm sure they're happy to have Teddy back year after year because he represents them.  My argument is that I shoud not have to agree to vote according to the agenda of GOOOH.  I should be allowed to vote according to whatever the people I represent truly want.  I want to be the statesman you hold in such high esteem.  By voting for what your people want, not for what the special interest group (meaning the extremely far right view of GOOOH wants) you are truly serving the public interest.  Regards, Martha. 

Hi

Christopher,

LOL about the Louisiana politics!  I happen to be a resident of said state, not by birth, but by marriage.  But I know some about the history of the state, and I couldn't agree more about the corruption.  Louisiana is renowned for having the best politicians that money can buy, and it's not a new thing either.  Recall Huey P. Long and his associates.  But I think that given an opportunity to vote for a candidate not promoted by old money, and assuming that candidate was intelligent and informed on the issues, I believe the people of Louisiana would make different choices.  Everyone I talk to says they are ready for a real change, so I think it can happen, in Louisiana and nationwide.  

Martha

I agree that this would cause a conflict of interest, and you would be put into a position which would hurt your chances of being reelected.  I also believe that informed individuals will agree that term limits are needed in order to help prevent corruption.  Before I found GOOOH, I did not see a purpose for term limits.  I still think that being limited to less than 5 terms would probally do more harm than good.  If the people are informed as to the good of term limits, I believe that most people would support them.

There is always the option of making it clear to anyone that votes for you that you will support and vote for term limits.  As long as they know that you will vote for term limits should it come up, they should not have a problem when it does come up for a vote.  It may hurt your chances of being elected, or it could help.  If term limits are brought into focus as an issue during the election, then more people will be informed about the reason for them.

I do not agree that there will be natural turnover without major changes.  Look at Louisiana politics.  I can't get away from the attack ads, and why I should pick one candidate over another.  It is all in an attempt by the politicians to stay in office.  There are countless examples of people who are known to be corrupt, who still get elected and put back into office.  There was even one case in recent years where an elected official(who shall remain nameless) had a lot of money stashed in a freezer.  Almost anyone could see that he likely did not obtain that money legally.  He was reelected.  To be honest, I don't know who was running against him, but I doubt he(or she) was as bad as that guy.

Ok, so the Federal level of government is not as openly corrupt at LA.  That doesn't mean measures should not be put in place to prevent corruption from occurring.

-CB

James,

I see your point about the difference in introducing term limits as opposed to simply voting for them, but I think you miss the real point I'm trying to make.  I don't think that GOOOH should make any candidate commit to voting in any way, for or against, on any subject. 

Let's assume I am a representative who was elected after running in a campaign using the GOOOH system.  Further assume that an amendment to the consitution to limit terms is introduced, and the people in my district (those people who voted for me and whose ideals/desires, wants/needs, I am supposed to be working toward supporting or implementing) don't support term limits.  I would be committed to vote for the term limits because I promised GOOOH that I would in order to be able to even run for office.  Now, I have a true ethical dilemma on my hands.  Do I vote for what the GOOOH organization wants, or do I vote for what the people I represent want?  I would think that it would be my duty to vote according to my best perception of what the people I represent want.  In my mind, that's what the "house of representatives" is all about. 

I may be wrong, but I thought the GOOOH platform was supposed to restore representation to the ordinary people.  This means empowering intelligent and capable ordinary people (those who have no political affiliation to the rich and famous, to the special interest groups of any kind, etc.) so that they can step forward and represent their district without being biased because they owe something to the interest group(s) that financed their election.  If a candidate has to agree to vote according to what GOOOH wants, GOOOH has just become a special interest group, and yet again - the people are screwed out of being truly represented. 

So it doesn't really matter whether GOOOH asks a candidate to initiate legislation or simply vote for a particular bill.  What matters is, in order to be accepted as a GOOOH candidate, a person has to agree to vote according to the GOOOH platform in lieu of representing the people they are asking to elect them.  Keep in mind, the GOOOH candidate will be running for office as an independent, but that certainly doesn't preclude republicans or democrats from voting for them.  And I truly believe that anyone, whether independent, republican, or democrat, would be immediately inclined NOT vote for a candidate who had promised to act according to what a special interest group (GOOOH) wants over what the voter himself wants.

The only way I could be a GOOOH candidate would be to openly state that, as a part of my platform running for office, I am supporting term limits.  This would limit my chances of election because I think a lot of people in the United States do not support term limits for representatives.  Term limits can be a two edged sword.  While they can ensure that if the wrong person gets elected you only have to put up with them for two terms, they can also force a representative who has done an excellent job, and whom everyone would overwhelmingly re-elect, out of office.  I think Tim's underlying desire to have the term limits implemented is because he feels this would be a vehicle to force the old representatives, many who are clearly linked to the special interest groups, out of office.  I think the turnover will occur naturally if people are given better choices in candidates.  

Martha

Correct, you only have to vote for it if it comes to vote. There has been quite a few questions about whether or not we should remove the "Constitutional Amendment" part of this screening criteria, and simply say you must vote for term limits if they come up for vote. The initial thinking was if enough support had been garnered to bring it to a vote, a GOOOH candidate would be obligated to support it.

I beileve this is a great example of here the members of GOOOH need to ultimately decide. I can clearly see both sides of this one.

What would you propose?

-- 1/15/2008 2:49:21 PM.