The 110th Congress has been elected. Whether it's the crowd you voted for or not, there's quite a lot of talk now about a new direction, a new civility, possibly even a new pony (but I might not have heard that last part right).
So, given that the Congresspersons will be looking for our votes again in another two years (along with a third of the Senators), this seems like a good time for the people (i.e., you all) to put together an agenda for these elected representatives of ours. To streamline things a bit, and in keeping with the overarching themes of this weblog, let's restrict the wish-list, at least for the moment, to issues to do with science, education, and matters of ethics -- broadly construed. It would be good if you could provide a brief description of why your agenda item should be a priority, and whose needs or wants it will serve. If you've got a clever plan for funding it, so much the better.
If we can hammer out some good science/education/ethics goals for the legislative branch, I'm prepared to launch a letter-writing campaign to communicate them to the legislators, and a Congress-watch to keep track of how well they do at achieving these goals.
Seems to me that they ought to care what we want even after they've gotten our votes. Let's make sure they know what that is -- and that we'll be watching!
a new civility,
Every single election is followed by reconciliatory talk about bipartisanship, etc. etc. etc. I seem to remember Bush talking about that back in 2000.
I don't believe it for an instant.
I have become very sad once I realized, from boingboing, that Berman is the new chair of the IP committee. That is very sad.
As for the rest : I'm hoping to see, for the first time, a modicum of long-term thinking. There's this whole climate change thing; there's the fact that the Great Baby Boomer Retirement is coming in a few years, promising potential economic disaster; there's the fact that the US standing in the world is in the toilet, plus our economy has been mortgagbed beyond belief, both thanks to the Iraq war; and there's the crucial fact that there isn't enough astronomy NSF funding to follow the big-project mandates that must be done while also maintaining a modicum of a diverse scientific program.
Well, OK, that last bit is more provincial. But we have a lot of huge stormclouds hanging over us, which will not (if we're lucky) start to rain in the next two years. I'd really love it if we had the ability to look past the next election and realize that we need to start thinking about the unpleasant things that will happen in several years if we don't plan ahead.
-Rob
Ethics: Election integrity (i.e. put Diebold et al on the trashheap), public campaign finance, and reversing the GOP gerrymandering. That's probably in order of practicality.
Science: bring back the Office of Technology Assessment. If Bush doesn't want them, let them report to Congress. Give the Patent Office a major program to catalogue prior art, and trash the BS patents that have flooded the system. Provide a pool of publicly funded experts to testify in patent and medical-malpractice cases.
Education: Leave NCLB behind. Feed the money to Head Start, LD-support and public literacy/numeracy programs.
Transportation: Rebuild the AMTRAK system and public transit in general. National emissions standards for private and commercial cars and trucks.
Ethics:
1. No more Diebold machines. Federal funding support for those precincts that need to replace the wretched things.
2. Campaign finance reform: Public funding only, level playing field, or in other words, no more buying elections.
3. Initiation of impeachment of Bush and Cheney, conviction to be followed by binding them over to a UN committee to be tried for war crimes under the Geneva convention. Rumsfeld to be bound over for trial for war crimes within the first 100 days.
Anything. Just accomplish something that moves us forward. We've spent 6 years getting nothing accomplished in the congress.
But please, PLEASE leave the attacks on our inept pres alone. All that does is guarantee Republican victory in '08.
More citizens who figure out that you have to participate if you want a ribbon.
"But please, PLEASE leave the attacks on our inept pres alone. All that does is guarantee Republican victory in '08."
Wrong. The GOP spent a couple of decades screaming about the 'liberal media', and they've benefited immensely.
If the 'referees' allow themselves to be worked by one side, they have no right to expect the other side not to work them.