So I’ve been batting this one around in my head for a while, and then I read this article (very, very hyperbolic and one sided, but still fairly informative none the less), which set me off a bit to finally write this up. The idea (really sort of 2 ideas together) still definitely has issues, but it’s at least something to think about. This one’s admittedly equal parts idea and rant, and parts are half joking, though also half not.
Now, in an ideal world, politicians would actually care about representing the views of the people who they are supposed to represent. No US Senator from Minnesota would vote for a bill unless he thought that the people of Minnesota would support it. No Minnesota State Congressman would vote for a piece of legislation unless he thought that the people in his specific district would support it. They would do frequent opinion polls among the people they represent (not national polls) on relevant issues.
However, I think we all know that not how things work. If a drug company promises some money to a campaign in exchange for slightly stricter intellectual property laws, it will probably go through. If the head of the TSA has a side business that has clients that sell body scanners, we’re told we need body scanners in every airport to stay safe. If the steel industry wants higher tariffs to make higher profits to have more money to donate to politicians, the circle of political life goes on.
While there are many, many groups I can give money to as an individual in order to try to elect a given politician, there’s not much I can do to influence him/her after the election until they start making campaign promises the next time around. In short, while companies and interest groups can influence politicians while in office, the average citizen only really comes into discussion around election time.
So, here’s my idea – political bounties (for clarity, so I don’t have the FBI knocking at my door, I’m referring to bounties on laws getting passed/repealed, not on politicians’ heads). Now you may be saying, wait, you want to just buy laws? Well, yes. It basically works that way now for companies, I just want to be more blunt about the government representing the money rather than representing the people. Aside from that, as it stands, companies don’t just have the same rights as individuals, they have more rights. While an actual person can only donate up to a specific amount of money, corporations basically can spend whatever they want. I’m just proposing equal rights here. However, the real key to this idea is that the bounties are only awarded to a politician (or more specifically their reelection fund) AFTER they accomplish what the bounty is for, and that they will be for very, very specific changes.
For instance, I think it’s stupid that I can’t buy beer on Sunday in Minnesota, and I’d like to see that changed. I don’t care which politician introduces the legislation, or what party they’re from. I just want to be able to go grab a bottle of wine for diner on Sunday. So, if this were all set up, I would start a political bounty for legalizing the sale of alcohol on Sunday in Minnesota, and I would contribute a few dollars. And anyone else who thought it was a good idea could also contribute a few bucks. The key here is that the bounty continues to sit and grow until someone introduces a piece of legislation that passes to change the law. No one gets the money until the law is changed. Basically, we shift the focus for individual campaign contributions from campaign promises to realized results. This would also work for non-incumbents, they could take out loans to campaign on, and pay them back when they got some results and got bounties (or not get elected and go bankrupt I suppose).
Another sort of complimentary idea for this would be that we shut down all direct campaign contributions. Instead, each citizen is allocated $100 (arbitrary number, adjust as you see fit). The $100 comes from tax money, so actually the rich are contributing way more, and the poor way less, but they all get equal say, thus leveling the field some across economic groups that way. Also, I say allocated rather than given because you don’t actually get this money, this money is held by the government and you instruct them (probably via a form on some website) on which campaign to contribute it to and how. This could have a short list of options, such as making the contribution conditional on specific campaign promise being fulfilled. For instance, $50 to Person X unconditionally, and $50 split equally among all politicians who vote to repeal the Patriot Act, if the repeal succeeds. You could also contribute it an interest group, who could then use it to advertise about a specific issue rather than for a specific politician. The key here is that this would be the only money they would be allowed to use. This would help to make it so the government represent (or at least plays to) the people instead of corporations, and it would give all citizen equal say in their government (or again, equal influence over the election). Politicians would be strictly banned from using any other funds in their campaigns.
The obvious problem with this part, is that you basically have to limit free speech in order to keep companies and rich people from buying their own advertising. And it sort of presupposes that elections are decided by how much advertising you can do, rather than what people actually think, which gets a bit to the heart of the issue that most people know almost nothing about politics, but are still responsible for choosing politicians. In order to make it manageable, you would also have to limit the list of conditions that you could apply to your contribution. Maybe you could make it so the $100 can be payed out at your will throughout the elected politician’s term?
There’s also the elephant in the room that any change like this would have to be put in place by, you guessed it, politician. And we’ve already covered where they currently get incentives from.
Ugh. Politics makes my head hurt, and make me nauseous. This is why I haven’t had much on here about it for a while, and will probably continue that way for a while.
So, I’m fond of Free Idea Friday… and read this one… and here’s my question. Ok- I give my bounty or $100 or whatnot to some legislation that, oh, I don’t know… requires everyone to wear no underwear on Friday (okay- only good looking people). It doesn’t pass. What happens to the $$? How long does a politician get to make the thing happen before that money is just gone? and where did it go?
So, the idea would be that it would just stay there waiting, basically forever, until someone makes a law to claim it. So after it didn’t pass the first time, it would just sit and wait, until maybe 10 years from now when there’s a more underwear-free friendly climate in politics, and someone else introduces a law to pass it, and so on, and that way, if other people also thought no underwear Friday was a good idea, they could put their $100 in over the years too, or you could add $100 each year, so maybe in 10 years, the bounty would be up to $2,000 or something. And don’t forget the dirtiness of politics that if it doesn’t pass the first time, someone could still sneak it into some unrelated “must pass” piece of legislation so it would pass with that. I think a “it’s stuck forever” clause would also help (at least a little) to keep people from putting it towards goofy / dumb things just to see if it would pass – like a “put Steven Colbert on Mt Rushmore” bounty. Though I suppose that could also backfire with it building over time.
On the other hand, I suppose you could attach expiration dates to them, so they would have to do it within a year, and then maybe you could pick some other bounty to put it towards. Or they expire each election cycle (6 years for US Senate, 2 for US Reps, etc) though that gets messy too if you don’t care if it gets introduced in the House or the Senate.
I’m kind of open to either. This one’s admittedly not all that definite.