"They only work towards the next election and dont care about anything past that". The real issues are being left open until one smacks us in the face.

They know they have a base of support and so, they just ride that support and ignore unpopular solutions to long term issues!

The real issues are being left open until one smacks us in the face.

 

This isn't intended as an insult aimed at you, but, I really hope that isn't news to anyone here.

Between the rise of the administrative branch and the rise of special interest groups starting roughly in the 50s, government's long term thinking has been seriously constrained. And really, any long-term thinking can easily be undone by the next interest group infludenced law or administrative rulemaking.

In response to WhatDoYouWantNow's comment:

That's true and exactly why I say we must hold our representatives accountible and NOT just let them sit back and blame the other party!

"We the people" have no power as long as we keep doing this; in fact we are nothing more than sheep being lead to the slaughter of our country.

It's both parties equally that have successfull pitted us against each other!!

Anyone comes in tries to make real change gets slandered, banished and run out of town or they join in with the wolves!

In response to tvoter's comment:

That's true and exactly why I say we must hold our representatives accountible and NOT just let them sit back and blame the other party!

_____________

 

The trouble is how to go about doing that.

2010 was supposedly about holding congress accountable and we certainly saw a number of incumbents get the boot.

But what did we end up with? Hard liners who created this fiscal cliff situation. People who refuse to compromise at all.

So what to do? Sit with our fingers crossed and hope some stoic Bruti (brutus-es) run for congress, even though they hate the idea of being politicians, and miraculously get enough money together to win.

 

(That's another major problem: Wayyyyyy too much money in politics. The only ones who can get elected are people who are willing to shed values for money, which is converted into votes. Then we're suprised when they turn out to be full of sh!t ?!?)

 

 

 

Now it's not just representatives. This is why I bring up administrative agencies. Even when congress does (gasp) pass a law that a strong majority of voters behind, the actual enforcement goes to the President....who cannot possibly "enforce" any one law. So it really just goes to his appointees and many layers of underlings.

But when it comes to the agency actually implementing the law, there's this circuitous rulemaking procedure......  and special interests who don't like what's happening get to rope the courts into it by suing the agency.

So long as they have a viable claim that the rulemaking process is insufficient and harms them unfairly, the court has to deal with the suit even if the suit is just about stopping something the interest group doesn't like.

Because that's our court system: If there's a viable legal basis for the suit, the court is not concerned with asking "why is this suit really being brought?" Or in other words, the trouble with objectivity.

It's a whole 'nother layer of gridlock that the founders apparently did not foresee.

"Factions" was about the TP battling hard core progressives, with centrists on both side left unable to get enough votes for a basic common sense deal. In congress.

 

 

The only way out of the administrative mess is to bite the bullet and remove the many protections for review before rulemaking.

See the whole idea is that they need to force agencies to be as objective and fair and all-considering as possible, so that government doesn't get corrupt and favor specific businesses (procurement, contracting, etc).

It worked. The agencies aren't "corrupt" in that sense. But they're horribly inefficient and all the review creates this arena where selfish special interests can come in and stop an agency from enforcing the law.

At this point, it seems better to risk the corruption, massively shrink the amount of review before rulemaking, and free agencies up to act quickly. Let individuals make decisions and take responsibility. Of course, that "responsibility" bit then puts the ones on the President and his cabinet to be much more aware of agency minituae so they can fire the bad guys.

 

 

 

Finally, the root of it all is voters.

Voters may be stupid. They may be ignorant. They may simply not have time to think about politics let alone get involved.

Knowledge of and involvement in government is no longer seen as a civic virtue. It's seen as a corrosive activity.

 

Add those two sets of concerns together and what you get is a disengaged population, some of whom can't even name our first President. Well how on earth are "we" going to get rid of all the bad apples in government if we can't even motivate voters to learn enough to understand the very basics of the problem?

If they're too busy watching Jersey Shore and Real Housewives. Laughing at lame raunch in Two and A Half Men, or farting into the couch over a season's worth of football matches?

 

 

Government isn't making voters complacent. Voters simply became complacent. And those that aren't too complacent are too busy working their tails off to sit down at night and learn something about what's going on in the country.

 

 

 

As with the overall debt. As with global warming. As with social security. As with food production and overpopulation. As with all this....

 

....I'm starting to think that the only way anyone is going to wake up is by falling right through the bottom of these and all the other bottles.

 

In other words, all these problems will be resolved the same way the human race has always resolved them. Band aids will be stacked on top of eachother, but the host will bleed to death. The wise among the remnants will survey the wreckage, chart a new course, and try for the best.

In a hundred, five hundred, or a thousand years it will all come crashing down again.

 

 

Defeatist, but, that's what I've seen over the last decade plus of reviewing human history. Our lives are too short to motivate us to play the right long game.

In response to WhatDoYouWantNow's comment:

Unfortunately it's a systematic and cultural problem that will take a steadfast and true constituency that pays attention to detail and had each of their own federal, state and local elected officials accountible.

It sounds daunting because it will be but, to say; "this is all we have so, lets just let them control us while trying to get a tweak in here and there is not a solution to me.

 

Bump.

 

These being the real questions.

So can the 2nd term president be counted on to do what is in the best interest of the country?

In any event, TVOTER is wrong, as usual.  How many House democrats lost their seat because they voted for Obamacare?  They knew that voting for the bill would cost them, but they thought Obamacare was in the best interests of the Country and voted accordingly.

In response to DirtyWaterLover's comment:

I haven't heard any serious suggested long term outlays we face: SS, Medicare, Medicaid.

 

Not since Bush (and before him, I believe, Clinton) talked about partial privization of SS. The bottom line is that the demographics crunch and decades of raiding the SS fund have undermined it to a point where people my age simply aren't going to get anything like full benefits. Where's the money to come from?

Meainwhile, health care costs are constantly rising. We're able to treat more and more illnesses, which is a good thing, but with a bad consequence: Absent magical Star Trek machines that heal people with a few beeps and a whirr, our health expenditures are damned to grow indefinitely.

Because when are we going to decide to stop coming up with new treatments?

And of course, there is an ever-increasing proportion of the elderly, though not anywhere near enough jobs for them to be employed (let alone 20 year olds).

 

 

The only respect I think he's wrong here is in his seemingly simplistic view of how "taking congress back" would accomplish something. The question is: HOW would that be possible, given the necessary mechanisms by which congress might be "taken back"?