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7/18/2006 Reform Not on the Table; Politicians Must be Tossed By Jack E. Lohman The column below reflects the views of the author, and these opinions are neither endorsed nor supported by WisOpinion.com. Reform? Of course not. According to the FBI only 1,060 federal, state and local public officials were convicted in 2004 and 2005, and today the FBI task force has only a little more than 2000 active cases going. What with Wisconsin having only a half dozen of our once-finest politicians in various stages of conviction, sentencing or serving time in jail, those who are still free seem content to wait until things get worse before they fix the system. But I'd say it is bad enough already, and the politicians not in jail had best fix things in a hurry, or they may soon find themselves outside of a job. We are seeing what happens to politicians that get caught in a system that they themselves have perpetuated. It's what happens when politicians don't want to face fair competition and potentially lose their jobs. They "fix" the system so others cannot compete. The root cause is the privatization of our public electoral system. Pay-to-play has never been so rampant. Had we had full public funding of campaigns and a strong ethics commission five years ago, we would not even be discussing this issue today. Politicians would not be going to jail and Wisconsin would not be the third-highest taxed state in the nation. Our budgets would be balanced because $4 billion wouldn't be going to the fat cats each year for funding the elections. Get this, guys and gals. There are only two types of money: public and private. The current electoral system demands the use of private money, and those who control that private money demand government favors in return! I've been a CEO; we don't spend money unless we get more in return than we gave. But when I was a CEO, if I had an employee that gave away company assets in return for money on the side, I'd have him jailed. Politicians are very lucky in this regard; we just re-elect them. Of course, the assembly Republicans scuttled all hope for ethics reform when it buried Senate Bill 1. Now they can only dish out the rhetoric preceding the November election. But ask them this: if you "really were" for reform, why did you kill it? Then watch them squirm. And ask Governor Doyle why he refuses to force a vote on it? Is he afraid that it might pass? After SB1 should have been full public funding of campaigns. Spending $5 per taxpayer per year could fund the elections and eliminate the $1300 per taxpayer that goes to the special interests in the form of tax breaks, subsidies and no-bid contracts. That $5 would be a bargain at 200 times the price, but they killed that too. The Republicans and most of the Democrats just don't get it. But that means the voters must now step in. It's called term limits on demand, and only the voters can play that game. There are a handful of good politicians, and you can see how yours is rated on www.ThrowTheRascalsOut.org. If they didn't get three A's, toss them. They are in this only for themselves. Think about it. When the state legislature was cutting local services to balance the budget, they simultaneously increased the road construction budget by $70 million. Follow the money! And they won't implement a good universal health care system because health care interests gave politicians $1.4 million last year to keep things just as they are: profitable and limited. We need a lot of reforms, but our current politicians won't make them happen: · Voter-owned elections · An independent ethics commission · Independent redistricting · Voting by mail with optical card readers · Instant Runoff Voting (preferential voting) · A none-of-the-above option I particularly like the last one. Even if there is no challenger, if none-of-the-above wins, there must be a new election with none of the previous candidates participating. Let them eat cake. Lohman is a retired business owner from Colgate and founder of www.ThrowTheRascalsOut.org. He can be reached at jlohman@execpc.com. |
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