Capitol Hill Blue Forums Political Issues New Third Party The Common Sense Party

So said Robert Reich and Assembly Speaker John Perez, plus somebody already made a sign. Forbes Magazine thinks this is foolishness.

A Common Sense Party implies that participants would be drawn from folks who practice rational and reasonable dialogue as a means to developing common sense policies.

I feel like this forum is more prone to rational and factual dialogue than many, though it is currently liberal-leaning (in the present meaning of liberal).

Does anyone know of a conservative-leaning forum that is similar?

How about this. What happens if a state passes a law that disallows ANY outside money to be involved in ANY state election. If somebody/something decides to ignore that law then the penalty will be a fine plus 20% for enforcement. That penalty, less the 20%, will be given to the forces which the money was spent to defeat.

My reason for suggesting this is that, if a state did pass such a law, you can be rest assured that the supremes would take it on quickly. I can only imagine what would happen if such a law was declared constitutional. I also believe that it would be simply because I also believe that people have the absolute right to make the decisions which affect them without the input of others, friend or foe alike. If such a law was in effect it would solve many of the problems we have today, I think. I also think that if such were to happen then the common sense party would become as people would, once again, be in charge instead of the big money from, at least in my own case, from the big buck folks from the east.

I have written to my own elected suggesting such a law. So far nobody has bothered to reply <G>

Unfortunately, my friend, the majority of the current Supreme Court would find such a law unconstitutional. Western Tradition Partnership, Inc. v. Montana[/i] They would be wrong, just as they were in [i]Citizens United, but they hold the majority, so they do as they damned well please. Constitution and logic have no sway.

It is just the subtle (actually, NOT so subtle) difference between "corporations are people" and "a corporation is A PERSON".
The former can be held to be true, and it can be proven, and the people IN that corporation do in fact, have the same rights as any natural person.

The LATTER is where we get into trouble.

Thus, corporations ARE people but A corporation is NOT A PERSON.

Again, sounds like a subtle difference, but the truth is, the difference is HUGE.

Their logic, I suspect, would extend to almost any human organization. Therefore, for instance, the KKK could be a person as well as the Elks, Masons, Unions, etc. Pretty interesting.

On the other hand I am not convinced about keeping groups of people from sticking their noses into what is a private thing (voting) would be unconstitutional. People simply do not have a right to stick their noses into other people's business. This is what the NSA thing is currently all about and, evidently, gov agrees (at least mouthwise). In other words I believe that outsiders have no right to know how somebody voted or even the right to tell them how to vote or even suggest same. The only people who should be involved in voting and the people who vote! Those that do not vote, on the other hand, have opted out of the system and have, basically, given up their rights for representation and its that simple. The old saw that goes something like; "We have the right to vote and certainly the right not to vote" is pure crap. Its also important for people who refuse to vote to at least cast a ballot even though no choices were made. That too, incidentally is tracked.

Yet another plank for the party. This one has to do with government being forced to tell the voters what it is doing. To that end I would suggest daily show, on Public TV, produced by gov, and, every day, spend one hour explaining each and every agency the government has. The show would tell us what the agency does, how much money it spends and how many employees it has. There would also be a link (or address) to send/write comments on said agency along with a voting script so everybody can also vote on said agency (for/against). One day a week gov would respond to said thoughts. The responder, for that agency, has to not only answer questions but tell everybody who he/she is and what they do for said agency. This one is not in stone and would probably change over time. It would, however, give everybody a chance to weigh in on what gov is spending our taxes on. Right now that is a pretty much a mystery. Another, I found, is that evidently gov doesn't even know exactly how many agencies it does have or what they actually do (http://dailycaller.com/2013/05/03/the-government-has-no-idea-how-many-agencies-it-has/) I find this a bit offensive (sorry, couldn't resist).

I am suggesting this one because I think its really important that gov start telling people what is going on and what they are doing. Right now its a mystery and, I believe, tends to just make folks more disgusted.

I would also suggest that the Common Sense Party would not be a party of change so much as a party of fix. Until Our existing gov starts fixing itself (right down to the point of actually knowing, exactly, what its actually doing)I suspect that the current party system of one side expanding, and another shrinking gov, without first understanding what its actually doing, is a waste of time and incredibly silly. In that regard I would also support a new Hoover type commission (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hoover_Commission) If Harry Truman (a Democrat) created such, and put the last Republican president in charge of it I think it can be done again?

So, the first is for gov to tell folks what it thinks its doing, and giving folks the ability to weight in. The second thing is to establish just what the Common Sense Party is there for (to fix) and suggest a commission to help in that process.

i am confused .... a corporation is a legal construct which enjoys some attributes of personhood but remains a lifeless piece of paper. The embodiment of the piece of paper would be the owners.

How is each individual entitled to additional "rights" as a result of ownership?

That would be very disruptive, economically: If your income-generating business takes $150000 of expenses to generate $50000 in net profit, but you got taxed on the $200000 income you would go bankrupt. Deductions are there for a reason besides "social goods". Most of the very complex deductions are there to make particular income-generating activity fairly taxed. If you disallow all of those deductions then all sorts of income-generating activities no longer generate income.

Of course a few or those are just stupid tricks that take advantage of some tax loophole and do nothing useful, but the vast majority are not. Don't throw the baby out with the bathwater! Fix the loopholes, don't destroy all the tax rules that work.

If you have a tax code, and that tax code can be easily 'adjusted' by the elected then you no longer have a real tax code, designed to pay the bills only. Instead you open the gates to what we have right now a 70,000 page system which is more arcane than any religious document. Right now our tax system rules how the accounting works instead of the accounting doing what it is originally designed to do - help the company/person understand and manage the business. In our system Profit is the money left over after all costs and expenses have been taken out. There are other tax systems, such as the flat tax and the fair tax which works differently. Basically x amount is charged anytime money changes hands. In both cases the elected love to mess with it. I tend to like the flat/fair tax because everybody pays something and its usually based on some kind of sales tax (there are several avenues for this one). If, for instance, something is paid, everytime money changes hands then the question becomes whether just the end users pay or gov gets paid EVERY time money changes hands. The goal, however, is to keep it simple and clean and so I prefer the EVERYTIME approach. I also think that such a system would go a long ways in cutting fat from the system by reducing the number steps between production and use to reduce taxes which is a lot better than what we are doing now. A good example of just how bad our current system is, is when a given company can pay no taxes yet get a tax refund (several of these have been reported this year)

Again, if somebody wants to do good works then they should go ahead and do them but not by using our tax system. Its to pay the bills and NOT for good works, helping friends, punishing others, etc. If we do overhaul the tax system it should be to pay taxes and NOTHING else! I firmly believe that anytime a tax system is adjusted for reasons, other than paying the bills, the result is what we have now. Its a slippery slope that has proven its disastrous consequences.