Friday, August 12, 2011

Anyone else willing?




In a recent NY Times column, Joe Nocera wanted to know why people who are willing to pay higher taxes don’t stand up and say so.

Ok, I’m both able and willing, and I’ll bet there are lots of others like myself who are equally willing.   Any sensible person can look at recent events in London and see what lies ahead for the United States if we don’t bring an end to the era of constantly increasing income inequality and lost hope.  When people lose hope – as they will unless we invest what’s needed to fix our ever worsening educational system, repair our infrastructure, eliminate the complexity and unfairness of our ridiculous tax code, and encourage innovation --- they think they have little to lose by destroying the sense of security and social comity which from their perspective  benefits everyone but themselves.

So let’s get real. If we want to fix the country’s problem – instead of just talking about doing so – we need to roll taxes back to where they were before the Bush tax cuts, means test the big entitlement programs and get our absurdly high defense spending under control --- because those are the big ticket revenue and spending items that are driving the budget deficits.  At the same time, we need to do winnow out the countless governmental programs that represent unnecessary intrusions into everyday life and insist that essential government programs  operate  efficiently and honestly.  We need to give government the resources needed for its appropriate functions while eliminating functions and activities the government cannot and should not be doing. We can do so only by holding those we elect to a much higher standard of performance.

To meet that goal, we need to fix our political process by eliminating the gerrymandering which enshrines radicalism in most congressional districts as well as the Electoral College, which neutralizes the votes of millions of Americans in every national election. These archaic structures make it impossible to elect people willing to find middle ground rather than cling to ideological extremes.

Since all this will take time – and since we need change now – let’s begin by adopting all of the Simpson-Bowles Commission’s recommendations.  Doing so, now, will be a great down payment on the broader changes needed, and will give an immense and immediate boost to public confidence.

8 comments:

  1. Good article. Also possibly consider a primary process based not on the parties but which , instead, has all comers in a single primary with the top two competing in the general election, so that the radical ends of the two political parties are disenfranchised and only centrists and pragmatists are competitive.

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  2. Agreed. Thomas Friedman of the New York Times wrote a column a few weeks back about a new organization called AmericansElect.org that sounds like it is trying to achieve a similar outcome - better representation of the silent majority in the electoral process - by leveraging the power of the internet. If you go to the website it looks like they are still getting organized but you can get a sense of where it is going. A little ray of hope for voices of moderation and pragmatism in our broken political system....

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  3. A very good article with common sense ideas.

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  4. Remember all of the walkouts of meetings during the recent budget debate. Similar to a filibuster, those that engage in grand-standing are wasting our time and budget. Has anyone put a $ to the cost of those attending and then walking out to simply make a point and capture the camera.
    I appreciate Bob's leadership and hope more business leaders step forward. We are at a tipping point as a country.

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  5. Good to hear your voice again. Sure do miss seeing you on Christmas morning on the ramp at DFW. was always nice to see leadership caring about us. Looking forward to more blog posts!

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  6. Bob, please create a Twitter handle so that we can spread this on a larger platform?

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  7. Jim Washington said GREAT article Bob......nuff said

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  8. Bob could you please post some commentary on American Airlines? Can your baby be saved and how? We're desperate for leadership by the last of the great airline builders. The employees, Wall St. and stockholders will line up to pressure the Board to restore you as CEO & President. No illusions held by anyone...in the thick of battle you were an SOB...but we knew you were always our (respected) SOB. We need you back.

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