It is well to remember that as the Sun begins the march toward spring and eventual summer, Humanity is turning a corner as well. We have had long dark nights in which we were told that the wealthy were in their station for any number of reasons. We have had a variety of excuses made for the uberwealthy. Like the emperor who wears no clothes, the rich liked anyone who could validate their station, and their defenders and supporters still trump up excuses for them. The rationale for the rich has ranged from claiming lineage from Gods, to being "chosen" by them to rule. Later, when those excuses were discovered to be the furthest things from truth. The 99% were told that these wealthy families had our best interests in mind, that they were smarter or deserved more wealth simply for being "good". They were told that the best and brightest had to be Ivy League or perhaps elevated by genetic aptitude.
This link has been created everyculture to educate and inform.
The link is to a site that describes the Iroquoix Confederacy. They had found a way to be led by a representative democracy. In fact the United States of America based their government design, at least in part on the native, "tribal" form of governance.
One crucial part that was involved in governing the Iroquoix nations was that the Grandmothers were the ones who voted, when the whites stole the idea, they let white, male, mostly wealthy landowners do the voting. Those interests are very different than those of the Grandmothers. Whereas, grandmothers would be best able to identify the hot heads and more sensitive leaders, they are the ones uniquely situated to know the bullies and their victims, who need protection and what investments have the greatest benefit over time. Businessmen on the other hand, can only be interested in their particular portfolio, the value of their holdings, next quarter earnings etc. Grandmothers take a longer view. Seven generations is a thing, not just a saying.
I, for one, am ready to go back to the true American Experiment and I intend to outline it somewhat in this post. We are nearly a generation into this Century, and have hardly been inspired in our treatment of it. I think that it is plain to see, we need a new way of looking at the government and the social, economic, environmental and political landscape we all share. I have a plan to greatly scale down the Federal government and simultaneously restore much more autonomy, character and wealth to states, rather than continuing to encourage money to influence politics, as we do today. This would be accomplished by dividing the U.S. of A. into thirteen bioregions. These would function much like the original thirteen colonies. Congress would be severely reduced in size, but would benefit from the cuts. To make sure that no undue pressure was placed upon these federal representatives, they would not be allowed to entertain the overtures of any paid lobbyists. Instead of fundraising half their time, they would be liberated to interact with constituents, not lobbyists. This way the Federal government could concern itself more with ecological and water conservation, air quality and soil fertility in ways that are important to the stability of the planet, the ability to enhance abundance in each bioregionally distinct area. The way arbitrary lines have been drawn across the nation, there are many places where people have no say over how their water has been treated before it gets to them. By dividing the nation this way, the Senate would be reduced to 26 representatives, two each from the thirteen biregional "colonies", much like the framers wanted. This appeals to the smaller government crowd and changes the dynamic from huge masses of rich white males to a more representative democracy.
The most vast by land area would be the Mississippi/Missouri/Arkansas basin. The Great Lakes Basin, although it covers parts of eight states, and the entire Great Lakes Watershed is not much bigger than the lakes themselves, (making air quality paramount for that region) would be another of the thirteen. Appalachia/Allegheny mountains a third. Colorado River drainage would be another, The Desert Southwest, The Pacific Northwest, the Intermontane region, the drainage basin of the Great Salt Lake, would constitute four more, bringing us more than halfway with seven bioregionally defined "colonies". Hawaii, with the massive areas of Pacific Ocean would be a state that is also a bioregion, unique in virtually every way, Alaska, the same. Eastern Gulf states would be a bioregion, including westward draining Florida, bringing the total to ten, The eastern seaboard would be split into two zones, bisected between North and South, again based on watersheds, combined with latitude, roughly splitting in half, near Virginia Beach and the area defined by the Rio Grande drainage including the western Gulf of Mexico, would round out the thirteen.
In this re-envisioning, the The U.S. House of Representatives would be, similarly, representatives of more discreet watersheds within the greater whole, primarily as they can be referenced to population as well. Some territories or districts would be large in area, but slight in population but others would have large populations, but still be based on a relatively small watershed. We have seen some of the difficulties that can happen along borders, indeed, tragically they are the invention of humans. Perhaps if we started acting like thirteen colonies again, things would get better.
State boundaries alone currently represent 25,802.4 miles of territory. Even though bioregion boundaries by nature meander more, less than half as many boundary miles would be required to delineate thirteen eco-colonies. The emphasis on bioregions would make explicit the need to reform our geologic, energy, environmental, cultural similarities and to capitalize in regional similarities rather than focusing on being so many, often divisive "states". Of course, we could retain much higher quality representatives if we had to pay far fewer of them! Again, the goal of limiting our nation to thirteen units of federal governance, which the "conservatives" say that they desire, yet it would emphasize ecology and sustainability as many "liberals" would like. Paring down the numbers of representatives to about half, would yield several benefits. This would greatly reduce or eliminate the need for large subcommittees, The full body would not be nearly as unwieldy as the current one. Instead of having 535 Congressional members, 435 Representatives and 100 senators, the Senators would be reduced to twenty six and the representatives would be capped at 100, allotted based on population of each bioregion.
No bioregion would be allowed fewer than two Representatives. Because of the small numbers of representatives, every effort would be made to insulate them from lobbyists. Because there would be far fewer individuals in Congress, their finances would be far easier to inspect/audit. There is absolutely no reason but for greed and deceit, that someone making a couple hundred thousand dollars per year on a government salary should be becoming a multi millionaire on side deals and golden parachutes from industry. We are even seeing pre-employment pay-outs for services to be rendered in the future, this is not the American Way. I have spoken with thousands of individuals who agree, the system as it is formulated today is severely broken and these changes address many of the concerns people have about how far awry our government has drifted. Not only would there be a stipulation preventing those who had served in government from taking positions in the very industries they had formerly regulated, but there would be limitations on corporate executives being s"elected" to serve in government. There need to be, with this new approach, strong campaign finance regulations helping to keep the corporate beggars away from our representatives. Many have proposed these sorts of things in the past, but we need to assure that our elected representatives are free of corporate allegiance and needless interference from the influence of lobbyists.
This link has been created everyculture to educate and inform.
The link is to a site that describes the Iroquoix Confederacy. They had found a way to be led by a representative democracy. In fact the United States of America based their government design, at least in part on the native, "tribal" form of governance.
One crucial part that was involved in governing the Iroquoix nations was that the Grandmothers were the ones who voted, when the whites stole the idea, they let white, male, mostly wealthy landowners do the voting. Those interests are very different than those of the Grandmothers. Whereas, grandmothers would be best able to identify the hot heads and more sensitive leaders, they are the ones uniquely situated to know the bullies and their victims, who need protection and what investments have the greatest benefit over time. Businessmen on the other hand, can only be interested in their particular portfolio, the value of their holdings, next quarter earnings etc. Grandmothers take a longer view. Seven generations is a thing, not just a saying.
I, for one, am ready to go back to the true American Experiment and I intend to outline it somewhat in this post. We are nearly a generation into this Century, and have hardly been inspired in our treatment of it. I think that it is plain to see, we need a new way of looking at the government and the social, economic, environmental and political landscape we all share. I have a plan to greatly scale down the Federal government and simultaneously restore much more autonomy, character and wealth to states, rather than continuing to encourage money to influence politics, as we do today. This would be accomplished by dividing the U.S. of A. into thirteen bioregions. These would function much like the original thirteen colonies. Congress would be severely reduced in size, but would benefit from the cuts. To make sure that no undue pressure was placed upon these federal representatives, they would not be allowed to entertain the overtures of any paid lobbyists. Instead of fundraising half their time, they would be liberated to interact with constituents, not lobbyists. This way the Federal government could concern itself more with ecological and water conservation, air quality and soil fertility in ways that are important to the stability of the planet, the ability to enhance abundance in each bioregionally distinct area. The way arbitrary lines have been drawn across the nation, there are many places where people have no say over how their water has been treated before it gets to them. By dividing the nation this way, the Senate would be reduced to 26 representatives, two each from the thirteen biregional "colonies", much like the framers wanted. This appeals to the smaller government crowd and changes the dynamic from huge masses of rich white males to a more representative democracy.
The most vast by land area would be the Mississippi/Missouri/Arkansas basin. The Great Lakes Basin, although it covers parts of eight states, and the entire Great Lakes Watershed is not much bigger than the lakes themselves, (making air quality paramount for that region) would be another of the thirteen. Appalachia/Allegheny mountains a third. Colorado River drainage would be another, The Desert Southwest, The Pacific Northwest, the Intermontane region, the drainage basin of the Great Salt Lake, would constitute four more, bringing us more than halfway with seven bioregionally defined "colonies". Hawaii, with the massive areas of Pacific Ocean would be a state that is also a bioregion, unique in virtually every way, Alaska, the same. Eastern Gulf states would be a bioregion, including westward draining Florida, bringing the total to ten, The eastern seaboard would be split into two zones, bisected between North and South, again based on watersheds, combined with latitude, roughly splitting in half, near Virginia Beach and the area defined by the Rio Grande drainage including the western Gulf of Mexico, would round out the thirteen.
In this re-envisioning, the The U.S. House of Representatives would be, similarly, representatives of more discreet watersheds within the greater whole, primarily as they can be referenced to population as well. Some territories or districts would be large in area, but slight in population but others would have large populations, but still be based on a relatively small watershed. We have seen some of the difficulties that can happen along borders, indeed, tragically they are the invention of humans. Perhaps if we started acting like thirteen colonies again, things would get better.
State boundaries alone currently represent 25,802.4 miles of territory. Even though bioregion boundaries by nature meander more, less than half as many boundary miles would be required to delineate thirteen eco-colonies. The emphasis on bioregions would make explicit the need to reform our geologic, energy, environmental, cultural similarities and to capitalize in regional similarities rather than focusing on being so many, often divisive "states". Of course, we could retain much higher quality representatives if we had to pay far fewer of them! Again, the goal of limiting our nation to thirteen units of federal governance, which the "conservatives" say that they desire, yet it would emphasize ecology and sustainability as many "liberals" would like. Paring down the numbers of representatives to about half, would yield several benefits. This would greatly reduce or eliminate the need for large subcommittees, The full body would not be nearly as unwieldy as the current one. Instead of having 535 Congressional members, 435 Representatives and 100 senators, the Senators would be reduced to twenty six and the representatives would be capped at 100, allotted based on population of each bioregion.
No bioregion would be allowed fewer than two Representatives. Because of the small numbers of representatives, every effort would be made to insulate them from lobbyists. Because there would be far fewer individuals in Congress, their finances would be far easier to inspect/audit. There is absolutely no reason but for greed and deceit, that someone making a couple hundred thousand dollars per year on a government salary should be becoming a multi millionaire on side deals and golden parachutes from industry. We are even seeing pre-employment pay-outs for services to be rendered in the future, this is not the American Way. I have spoken with thousands of individuals who agree, the system as it is formulated today is severely broken and these changes address many of the concerns people have about how far awry our government has drifted. Not only would there be a stipulation preventing those who had served in government from taking positions in the very industries they had formerly regulated, but there would be limitations on corporate executives being s"elected" to serve in government. There need to be, with this new approach, strong campaign finance regulations helping to keep the corporate beggars away from our representatives. Many have proposed these sorts of things in the past, but we need to assure that our elected representatives are free of corporate allegiance and needless interference from the influence of lobbyists.
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