Imagine you could pass any law or regulation in a capitalist society in order to make it more socialist.
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I want to ask a question. If you had a capitalist society, say america, and you had some magic wand to make any law or regulation. What it the fewest laws or easiest to pass laws or most practical laws that would nudge that society towards socialism.
Here's some ideas.
1) law #1: Copyright, trademark and other intellectual property rights can only be held by an individual and are not allowed to be owned by a business. What this means is that if you disover something that a company patents, you own the patent. The company has to pay you or hire you to use your patent. individual people not companies own the means of production.
2) Law #2: Business is not allowed the right and priveledges of people but are treated as dangerous unpredictable animals. So this would invalidate the Limited Liability Corporatioin as a business option and would make company shareholder and managers liable for any damages by the company as a whole.
3) Law #3); People can vote or comment at any time on any topic they want and those votes will become a matter of public record to be considered at the next election. Each candidate would be searchable for the votes and comments related to that candidate and in the week prior to election media and news would get attention by data mining the comments for statistics to support the candidate's bid for re-electioin. An open source block chain type commenting system will be funded and built to support the collection of masive government feedback and comments on practices.
. . .
Any other ideas or contributions. . .
Steve-SanFrancisco-UserExperienceResearchSpecialist wrote:I want to ask a question. If you had a capitalist society, say America, and you had some magic wand to make any law or regulation. What it the fewest laws or easiest to pass laws or most practical laws that would nudge that society towards socialism. Here's some ideas.1) law #1: Copyright, trademark and other intellectual property rights can only be held by an individual and are not allowed to be owned by a business. What this means is that if you discover something that a company patents, you own the patent. The company has to pay you or hire you to use your patent. individual people not companies own the means of production. 2) Law #2: Business is not allowed the right and privileges of people but are treated as dangerous unpredictable animals. So this would invalidate the Limited Liability Corporation as a business option and would make company shareholder and managers liable for any damages by the company as a whole. 3) Law #3); People can vote or comment at any time on any topic they want and those votes will become a matter of public record to be considered at the next election. Each candidate would be searchable for the votes and comments related to that candidate and in the week prior to election media and news would get attention by data mining the comments for statistics to support the candidate's bid for re-election. An open source block chain type commenting system will be funded and built to support the collection of massive government feedback and comments on practices. . . . Any other ideas or contributions. . .Socialism can not be established by legal decree. It has been tried already by many left wingers governments around the globe, the last intent was done in Venezuela, despite the fact that , the United Socialist Party had more than 6 millions members, and many intellectuals with certain knowledge about socialismThe legal system is only the judicial expression of the economical system, and the state is the super-structure of the economical base, it has existed since the time of the Roman Empire, and others class society that has implemented a legal systemReformism has been tried since the early emerge of capitalism and it has never worked. The first ones were the followers of Robert Owen.Whatever measures that you try in order to beatify capitalism will never work for the vast majority of the human beings, the capitalist system did not emerge in our society, distributing flowers, chocolates, and candies, it was thru a violent original accumulation of capitalThe legal constitutions were established in order to protect the interests of the ruling class.A book written by Engels known as "The Origin of the Family, the Private Property and the State" explains that process, and the Chapter of Marx's Capital On the original accumulation, known as the original sin of capitalism. PS On a socialist society we are not going to have Copyright or Trademarks, governments, state , public officials, politicians, or poetical parties
mcolome1 wrote:Steve-SanFrancisco-UserExperienceResearchSpecialist wrote:I want to ask a question. If you had a capitalist society, say America, and you had some magic wand to make any law or regulation. What it the fewest laws or easiest to pass laws or most practical laws that would nudge that society towards socialism. Here's some ideas.1) law #1: Copyright, trademark and other intellectual property rights can only be held by an individual and are not allowed to be owned by a business. What this means is that if you discover something that a company patents, you own the patent. The company has to pay you or hire you to use your patent. individual people not companies own the means of production. 2) Law #2: Business is not allowed the right and privileges of people but are treated as dangerous unpredictable animals. So this would invalidate the Limited Liability Corporation as a business option and would make company shareholder and managers liable for any damages by the company as a whole. 3) Law #3); People can vote or comment at any time on any topic they want and those votes will become a matter of public record to be considered at the next election. Each candidate would be searchable for the votes and comments related to that candidate and in the week prior to election media and news would get attention by data mining the comments for statistics to support the candidate's bid for re-election. An open source block chain type commenting system will be funded and built to support the collection of massive government feedback and comments on practices. . . . Any other ideas or contributions. . .Socialism can not be established by legal decree. It has been tried already by many left wingers governments around the globe, the last intent was done in Venezuela, despite the fact that , the United Socialist Party had more than 6 millions members, and many intellectuals with certain knowledge about socialismThe legal system is only the judicial expression of the economical system, and the state is the super-structure of the economical base, it has existed since the time of the Roman Empire, and others class society that has implemented a legal systemReformism has been tried since the early emerge of capitalism and it has never worked. The first ones were the followers of Robert Owen.Whatever measures that you try in order to beatify capitalism will never work for the vast majority of the human beings, the capitalist system did not emerge in our society, distributing flowers, chocolates, and candies, it was thru a violent original accumulation of capitalThe legal constitutions were established in order to protect the interests of the ruling class.A book written by Engels known as "The Origin of the Family, the Private Property and the State" explains that process, and the Chapter of Marx's Capital On the original accumulation, known as the original sin of capitalism. PS On a socialist society we are not going to have Copyright or Trademarks, governments, state , public officials, politicians, or poetical parties
It sounds like you believe there's no laws under socialism or rules? it sounds like paradise and heaven combined if that were true. But how do you distinguish socialism from anarchy? and it sounds like no laws or rule changes could every beautify capitalism or make it more like socialism? I guess you believe communism will never exist without a violent revolution, the destruction of all money, the abolition of all laws, the death of all leaders, and a world of surplus abundance. And all of those have to happen at the same time and keep happening for comunism to exist?Hey, how does this socialist discussion forum work? is it even socialist? or are we talking about socialism on a capitalist website.
Just to play along: Make it a criminal offence to be an employer (In UK terms: to be the master in a contract of service). That, or make strikes legally enforceable: put police on the picket lines!
To play along too. Declare all stocks and shares, bills and bonds, property titles and incorporations of companies null and void. The state would then no longer uphold the basis of capitalism and productive resources would become the common heritage of all. That would be the end of capitalism and the beginning of socialism. But of course it would require majority understanding and participation to bring about. It couldn't just be imposed by a minority, however well-meaning.
Essentially the same thing: use political power to break a key structure in the system of capitalism, and rely on the expressed will of the vast majority to carry through the changes that result.
ALB wrote:To play along too. Declare all stocks and shares, bills and bonds, property titles and incorporations of companies null and void. The state would then no longer uphold the basis of capitalism and productive resources would become the common heritage of all. That would be the end of capitalism and the beginning of socialism. But of course it would require majority understanding and participation to bring about. It couldn't just be imposed by a minority, however well-meaning.
@Alb, I like your idea. . .Consider if it wouild it be sufficient, or at least an incremental improveemt if the state simply failed to enforce property rights on stocks, shares, bills, bonds, property titles and incorporations of companies? the paper would stil be worth paper and if someone wanted to give you money for the paper bond or paper share or paper property title, than you would be free to accept money for the paper. But if you had the paper no one would would be required by law to honer it. Imagine for example that the courts were so tied up and deadlocked with foolery that they couldn't handle the enforcement efforts. Maybe everyone decides to fight their traffic tickets and at the same time 10% of the population decide to sue their employers, and then a few million student loan and housing owners decided to take advantage in the courts and police being tied up and just decided not to pay their debts unless the police come and force them. And then the police and courts are more overwhelmed so that they could not force someone to give you money for a share of stock or bill or bond or property title until after the backlog of 3+ years was dealt with. the state has largely abandoned prosecuting many laws already such as copyright laws for adult entertainment and and worker protection laws. there's too many laws on the books for even the police and lawyers to know them all. there are precedents for a slow down in property rights enforcements. Can a capitalist society aproach communism more closely if it were somehow to find that the state was very very very slow at upholding the basis of capitalism and completly gave up in some cases? How much of a delay in enforcement would bring us how much closer to communism? or would it work the other way, where delays and complications made society more capitalistic? Maybe it would depend on the type of delay and complications? What about passing a single law that said corporations and business were not people legally (in the USA that means overturning citizens united, AFAIK).and didn't have the rights of people. this is something that might pass in the US, and people keep keep trying). What if somehow that law depriving coporations of their personhood were not only passed, but were extended to mean that corporations couldn't sue or prosecute people for crimes against the corporation. Only individuals within the corporation would be allowed to sue or prosecute people using the law. If corporations became personal property in whole or in part then a corporation could not sue because property can not sue and property has no rights under the law. there would be no way to compel a corporation to pay a bond in that scenario and you could only sue or imprison the person at the company who was holding the bond. How much would that push our society away from capitalism and towards communism? or would it work the other way and push our society towards capitalism and away from socialism?The French already have an individual legal right to strike, it hasn't brought us socialism. Slight joking aside, mine and ALB's suggestions really are backed with the idea that once you have a socialistically determined majority on side, and you can take control of the state, you have the power to abolish capitalism outright. If you can pass a law, you can abolish capitalism, so there's nop point in half measures.
Steve-SanFrancisco-UserExperienceResearchSpecialist wrote:What about passing a single law that said corporations and business were not people legally (in the USA that means overturning citizens united, AFAIK).and didn't have the rights of people. this is something that might pass in the US, and people keep keep trying).This would be tantamount to abolishing limited liability. Capitalism used to exist without this (until the middle of the 19th century), which meant that capitalists were only individual persons or partnerships of persons who were wholly liable for their business's debts. If it went bankrupt they lost everything including their homes, their personal possessions and savings and could end up in a debtors prison. Then capitalists really were risk-takers !Capitalism today could not exist without limited liability companies because of the growth of the amount of capital needed for a capitalist enterprise (as Marx writing at the time saw and saw would continue), which shows that the individual private capitalist has become functionally redundant (as Marx also pointed out).But it also shows that a capitalist company or corporation is a legal construct. Anarchists and other "direct actionists" don't realise this and advocate taking and holding workplaces while these constructs still have the backing of the state. They seem to think that capitalists possess means of production in the same way that they possess their clothes and their tooth brushes and that all that needs to be done is to organise and use brute force to take these off them.Socialists are more realistic (and more direct). We advocate winning control of political power (through elections) and using it to end the legal status of these corporations. Then they no longer have the protection of the state and in fact no longer exist. As YMS points out, then there is no obstacle to the socialist-minded worker majority taking possession of the workplaces that formerly belonged to the corporations.
ALB wrote:Steve-SanFrancisco-UserExperienceResearchSpecialist wrote:What about passing a single law that said corporations and business were not people legally (in the USA that means overturning citizens united, AFAIK).and didn't have the rights of people. this is something that might pass in the US, and people keep keep trying).This would be tantamount to abolishing limited liability. Capitalism used to exist without this (until the middle of the 19th century), which meant that capitalists were only individual persons or partnerships of persons who were wholly liable for their business's debts. If it went bankrupt they lost everything including their homes, their personal possessions and savings and could end up in a debtors prison. Then capitalists really were risk-takers !
Those were the days ha!
Quote:But it also shows that a capitalist company or corporation is a legal construct. Anarchists and other "direct actionists" don't realise this and advocate taking and holding workplaces while these constructs still have the backing of the state. They seem to think that capitalists possess means of production in the same way that they possess their clothes and their tooth brushes and that all that needs to be done is to organise and use brute force to take these off them.Socialists are more realistic (and more direct). We advocate winning control of political power (through elections) and using it to end the legal status of these corporations. Then they no longer have the protection of the state and in fact no longer exist. As YMS points out, then there is no obstacle to the socialist-minded worker majority taking possession of the workplaces that formerly belonged to the corporations.Not a word used these days, but I would say that seizing the workplace not the state, is the delusion of "syndicalists" (deleonists? and autonomists) rather than "anarchists" and "direct actionists".
Steve-SanFrancisco-UserExperienceResearchSpecialist wrote:mcolome1 wrote:Steve-SanFrancisco-UserExperienceResearchSpecialist wrote:I want to ask a question. If you had a capitalist society, say America, and you had some magic wand to make any law or regulation. What it the fewest laws or easiest to pass laws or most practical laws that would nudge that society towards socialism. Here's some ideas.1) law #1: Copyright, trademark and other intellectual property rights can only be held by an individual and are not allowed to be owned by a business. What this means is that if you discover something that a company patents, you own the patent. The company has to pay you or hire you to use your patent. individual people not companies own the means of production. 2) Law #2: Business is not allowed the right and privileges of people but are treated as dangerous unpredictable animals. So this would invalidate the Limited Liability Corporation as a business option and would make company shareholder and managers liable for any damages by the company as a whole. 3) Law #3); People can vote or comment at any time on any topic they want and those votes will become a matter of public record to be considered at the next election. Each candidate would be searchable for the votes and comments related to that candidate and in the week prior to election media and news would get attention by data mining the comments for statistics to support the candidate's bid for re-election. An open source block chain type commenting system will be funded and built to support the collection of massive government feedback and comments on practices. . . . Any other ideas or contributions. . .Socialism can not be established by legal decree. It has been tried already by many left wingers governments around the globe, the last intent was done in Venezuela, despite the fact that , the United Socialist Party had more than 6 millions members, and many intellectuals with certain knowledge about socialismThe legal system is only the judicial expression of the economical system, and the state is the super-structure of the economical base, it has existed since the time of the Roman Empire, and others class society that has implemented a legal systemReformism has been tried since the early emerge of capitalism and it has never worked. The first ones were the followers of Robert Owen.Whatever measures that you try in order to beatify capitalism will never work for the vast majority of the human beings, the capitalist system did not emerge in our society, distributing flowers, chocolates, and candies, it was thru a violent original accumulation of capitalThe legal constitutions were established in order to protect the interests of the ruling class.A book written by Engels known as "The Origin of the Family, the Private Property and the State" explains that process, and the Chapter of Marx's Capital On the original accumulation, known as the original sin of capitalism. PS On a socialist society we are not going to have Copyright or Trademarks, governments, state , public officials, politicians, or poetical parties
It sounds like you believe there's no laws under socialism or rules? it sounds like paradise and heaven combined if that were true. But how do you distinguish socialism from anarchy? and it sounds like no laws or rule changes could every beautify capitalism or make it more like socialism? I guess you believe communism will never exist without a violent revolution, the destruction of all money, the abolition of all laws, the death of all leaders, and a world of surplus abundance. And all of those have to happen at the same time and keep happening for communism to exist?Hey, how does this socialist discussion forum work? is it even socialist? or are we talking about socialism on a capitalist website.
The problem is that you have in your mind all the wrong conceptions spread by the US ruling class against communism and socialism, and you can not leave behind those ideas, it is a heavy backpack that you must throw away. The US ruling has done a tremendous job of distortion in the minds of the USA workers.Anarchism and socialism are both the same, Anarchists are socialists, and socialists are anarchists, and anarchism is not absence of rules, or chaos, it is the absence of state and oppression, and Karl Marx was also an Anarchist. Most peoples and dictionaries have a wrong definition of Anarchismhttps://www.marxists.org/archive/rubel/1973/marx-anarchism.htmWe have given you sufficient ammunition in order to have at least a basic knowledge of what socialism really is, otherwise, you must use our website and start to read our articles, that is what I did when I came for the first time to the forum of the World Socialist Movement, and I think that I have read the whole index of the SP. It opened the doors and windows of my mind despite the fact that I started in this movement when I was 16-18 years old, and I have read Marx and Engels, Mao, Lenin, Stalin, Trotsky, Hoxha, Martov, Plekhanov, Luxembourg, Dunayeskaya, Bakunin, Rocker, and Bakunin, for many yearsYou have to read the pamphlet of the Socialist Party known as; What is wrong with the parliament ? and you have to read what Marx wrote after the Commune of Paris,( it was already discussed in this forum ) we do not support killing, but in some places the ruling class will make resistance and probably workers will be forced to remove them from power, and they are not going to give flowers or chocolates. We can not place the spoon in your mouth. Like Hegel said: We must go through the pain and the suffering to obtain knowledge. You have to do your own homeworkThe killing that you have written about, it is just a propaganda of the capitalist ruling elite, they are the ones who have killed millions of human beings, and have killed their own allied, they have killed leaders, and specially the USA government have won all the Grammy in international killings, it is the terrorist number one around the world, and they have also killed their own presidents placed by them in power. Capitalism was born thru violence, and exist thru violence, and it has been imposed around the world thru violence, they are the real terrorist.The death and killing indicated on the book named: The black book of communism, the writers did not know about the real concept of socialism ( and one of them was an ex-Maoists ) and many statistic are incorrect, and one of them is already in retreat, saying that the data were exaggerated, in reality they were describing State capitalism, instead of communism, and the soviet union always said that they were building a socialist society. Harvard Press also recognized that the book was full of errors http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/socialist-standard/2000s/2001/no-1165-august-2001/did-communism-collapsehttp://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/socialist-standard/2000s/2009/no-1263-november-2009/fall-“communism”-why-so-peacefulSocialism is going to be a society totally different to capitalism, and it can not be combined with capitalism either, those have been the intent of several reformists groups and government. The capitalist laws are for the capitalist society, the concept of law and rules is going to be different under a socialist society, and crimes are going to be treated in a different way. Did the Indians have jails, lawyers, and policeman ? Were they living under a chaotic society ? http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/socialist-standard/1970s/1973/no-832-december-1973/marxs-conception-socialismMoney will not be destroyed, it will vanished because we would not need money, it is only needed on a society based on buying and selling, http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/education/depth-articles/socialism/why-we-dont-need-moneyYou have the same conception of the old right wingers during the cold war, who used to say that in the Soviet Union they were producing communist bicycle, communist car , communist chairs, communist women, and communists guns. The website of the SM or the PG is not a socialist website per se, it is a website run by socialists that motivates workers to be educated on the principles of socialism. We do not believe in paradise or heaven, we are not religious peoples, we think that mankind can obtain their freedom on earth, and that mankind can built a better society on earth. That is another conception spread by the anti-communist right wingers, we have never said that we are going to built a paradise, socialism is going to be a society better than capitalism, but we are going to have our own problems too, it is not going to be a society without problems, we do not the romantic view of Saint Ernesto Che Guevara.If you look at the Curriculum of the School of Law of all the so called socialist country, you will see that they are the same as the curriculum of others capitalist countries, they are run by a bourgeois legal system
Young Master Smeet wrote:Just to play along: Make it a criminal offence to be an employer (In UK terms: to be the master in a contract of service). That, or make strikes legally enforceable: put police on the picket lines!I like this idea. . . Make strikes legally enforceable and put police on the picket lines. . . What if we could approach that goal and make strikes politically and legally unbreakable. Perhaps an iron clad law that says if a person decides to sit down with a sign saying they are protesting in civil disobediance, that it would be a crime to attempt to move them, even for police or law officials or political officials or employers or property owners. Imagine a poorly worded law passed onto the books to protect against police brutality of protestors got enlarged and distorted the way laws usually do so that you could sit at the machine on the factory floor and as long as you were holding a sigh saying "I am protesting peacefully as an act of civil disobedience" then no one could legally touch you without grave criminal and financial penalties. How much closer would that make our society to communism? or would it have the opposite affect of making our society farther away from communism? Hmm. there's another idea I have that might work too. the police (at least in the USA) are under no legal requirement to enforce the law. They can look the other way and ignore wrongdoing if the police or the judge or others choose not too enforce the law for any reason. So the police aren't legally required to enforce the laws against trespassing on a factory, and can ignore those laws with impunity. currently the police legally use this Non-enforcement option when they find it inconvenient to enforce the laws Usally, they don't enforce laws against buisness because business makes their lives awfull when they enforce the laws against business, so they usually target for enforcement poor people who can't hire lawyers to get justice. So legally it's possible to put police on the picket lines in favor of the strikers today. Legally, we have in the USA (and probably Great Britan) everything we need already in place to have the police protect and serve the security and safety of the strikers while ignoring the laws favoring the business and/or property owner such as trespassing or blocking traffic. Police ignore violations of trespassing laws and traffic laws all the time already. So what we need isn't necessarily a law, it could be done with public pressure. BUT, if we wanted to make a law to help us out (that was the game we're playing), what if we made a law saying most or all financial fines and penalties for traffic violations, trespassing, etc be assessed using the day fine system https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Day-fine . So under the day fine system each person pays what they earn in a day as a fine. for a poor person the fine for traffic violations is a mere 1 days income that they would earn based on their yearly income and tax records. For a rich person like the company VP the penalty is the same, a whopping 1 days income that they would earn based on their yearly income and tax records. And for a corporation, which has been granted personhoood and is treated as a person legally the day fine penalty would be a wopping 1 days worth of income or sales that they would earn based on their yearly gross revenue and tax statements. Now with this law in place the financial incentives for law enforcement is to target the rich people. Currently the law enforcement targets poor people who can't afford lawyers, but this laws would reverse that and encourage the cops to ignore poor law breakers who won't be fined much money and instead they'll be looking very closely at rich law breakers who will make the police department a lot more money for each citation or fine they enforce. This is a sort of sneeky law that could be snuck into practice gradually or carefully so that rich people don't notice it will hurt the until too late. And Also we should write it and word it so it's ambiguous enough to apply to a business or corporation or business owners who won't recognize it will hurt them right away. We couild pass it on an expedited fast track like they want to pass the TPP and the president could sign it into law with a very short time between introduction of the law and a vote for approval. So if we rush the political process on grounds it's necessary to appease the black lives movement's concern. And rich people and governors can be panicked with media stories decreeing their will be massive protest and disruption unless we pass the "Day fine" legislation into practice immediately and without delay or further discussion because it's every bit as much of an emergency as the financial collapse from years ago.
Hmm, I would….1) Introduce swiss style referendums where when an issue has collected a certain number of signatures it will be put to a popular vote and become law if people approve it.2) Make elected representatives recallable along with an option to reverse any of their very recent decisions with the process starting the same way as referendums. To prevent abuse allow only one recall per year and two for the entire term.3) Allow the bottom 50% to select any two newspaper, news channel and two news websites to be fully funded by the state for a couple of years. The two most popular choices in each category in the vote being selected for state funding. It can be done region wise then the funding will be for operating in that region only.The funding can be capped at the top expenditure in that category for the previous year. No need for any 'national' government controlled media. This will be a lot of money coming for addressing poor people's concerns focussing on things that can be delivered in a couple of years since then the funding will again be up for grabs. 4) Make all media organizations run by their employees… that is the editors of content will be selected by the employees and not the owners and recallable if the employees dont approve of them anymore. That way all media content will have approval of a majority of their employees and not just their editorial board and owners.
Imagine you could pass any law or regulation in the jungle in order to tame tame lions into behaving like gazelles?Capitalism can not be reformed.
". If money, according to Augier, “comes into the world with a congenital blood-stain on one cheek,” Capital comes dripping from head to foot, from every pore, with blood and dirt."
Subhaditya wrote:Hmm, I would….1) Introduce swiss style referendums where when an issue has collected a certain number of signatures it will be put to a popular vote and become law if people approve it.2) Make elected representatives recallable along with an option to reverse any of their very recent decisions with the process starting the same way as referendums. To prevent abuse allow only one recall per year and two for the entire term.3) Allow the bottom 50% to select any two newspaper, news channel and two news websites to be fully funded by the state for a couple of years. The two most popular choices in each category in the vote being selected for state funding. It can be done region wise then the funding will be for operating in that region only.The funding can be capped at the top expenditure in that category for the previous year. No need for any 'national' government controlled media. This will be a lot of money coming for addressing poor people's concerns focussing on things that can be delivered in a couple of years since then the funding will again be up for grabs. 4) Make all media organizations run by their employees… that is the editors of content will be selected by the employees and not the owners and recallable if the employees dont approve of them anymore. That way all media content will have approval of a majority of their employees and not just their editorial board and owners.I like your ideas. here's some thoughts I've had on accomplishing the same or similar results. . . 1) Some states in the USA, like california where I live, already have a system where anyone can start collecting signatures and if they get enough to put them on the ballot then the people can vote on them. What seemst to happen is that capitalist have paid people to collect signatures so mostly capitalist friendly laws get the required signatures, but it does still help compared to not having this option. Perhaps what we have in the USA can be improved on by the learning from the swiss style referendums? The other problem in america I see is that the paid opposition floods our mailboxes with misleading descriptions of the referendum. We have, for example, local ballot issue that got on the ballot through collecting signatures and the ballot asks for a 1% charge on soft drinks because they're bad for peoples health and the money from the tax is intended to be used for helping low income people and health programs like farmers markets. BUT, my mail box and email and phone gets deluged with propaganda telling me to vote no on the grocerty tax on the poor with stories about how poor people who have trouble buying groceries will have to pay more if the tax passes. We have on the internet something similar and potentially better. MoveOn.org allows anyone at any time to create a petittion and have other people sign them and then you can ask the politicians to look at your pettition and consider making legislation. The enforcement mechanism is obviously lacking from the moveOn.org, but it got me thinking of a way to fix it that might work. What if in addition to signing a petition online, you had a check box that said "send me an text or email or voice call or letter 1 week before the election of the person I can vote for or against who is most responsible for acting on this, or responsible for not acting on this. include in the email a copy of my comment I wrote when I signed the petition, my vote on the petition (for or against) and also the elected official's response and actions. Also send the politician a notice of the petition that reads something like "Dear Ms. Elected official. 11,586 people in your district who wiill have a chance to vote for or against you on December 15, 2017 and have signed a ballot requesting you pass sign into legislation a sugar tax. They have also requested a reminder email be sent to them 1 week before the election with a copy of their request to your with a summary of how you responded. . . so this strategy would work in any nation and with any elected official and the way it works or not works is by nudging or making it easier and less time consuming to vote better. Usually when people fill out petitions nothing happens, so this change is to make sure something happens.2) Perhaps we could, as a society, create a media issue that imposes a litmus test on our poliiticans. When running for office, one of the first questions we ask is if they will agree before the voters decide to elect them or not that they will sign a binding agreement to step down if a petition signed by the majority of the people in the state calls for them to resign? Something similar should be made a campaign issue litmus test that all candidates are compared to see which ones agree with this and which ones don't. 3) I love this idea of yours and it goes along well with the others. You've got a complete set of 4 ideas that could work together to go along ways. I'd like to make a law that all airwaives are public property (already nominally the case) and that business using the airways must pay for their use of the spectrum based on how much of the bandwidth and processing they take up, BUT, the money paid for use of the Electromagnetic frequency spectrum should be payable to the media that use it best and get the most attention. So in affect we want to vary the pricing of the spectrum and the allocation so that public radio or websites are paid based on how many people tune in. I'd like to also do this with regular mail so that every piece of junk mail costs an extra quarter to send, but not if the recipient of the mail decides it's not junk and puts a "I appreciate recieving this" postcard included in the junk mail into the mail box to tell the post office to credit that mailer with doing a public service by sending the mail package. So basically a tax on all communication but with the proceeds of the tax being determined by the people who recieve the communication and possibly given back to the person or group sending the converaation. Something like this was tried in the early days of the internet with Lotus Notes and email software and people loved it, but the lotus notes software company went bankrupt due to competition from microsoft. 4) I like that targeted media companies first. Selective use of what power we have is smart, and starting with media companies is even smarter for practically managing our efforts and resources. I'd recomend media must formally be run by a system of HOLOCRACY which is an OS for business based on free assoication and already used by some major companies such as Zappos shoes and working out well for them with some bugs they're learning to work with too. In conclusion. I think you're suggestions were the most strategically valuable so far and the most implementable. Thanks for letting me know about your support for those good ideas.
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