Presidential Debates -- These were not!

Did any of you watch this year's Presidential Debates?  Pretty exciting huh? 

Honestly, I am not sure what kind of idiot you would have to be to NOT have made up your mind prior to this debate.  But nevertheless I think the debates could have merit and that we should continue this tradition but we have to fix the format.

 

As always, let's start the discussion with a little history lesson.  The first "televised" Presidental Debates occured in 1960 and were sponsored by the television networks themselves.  The 1960 Debate was between Richard Nixon and John Kenneday and was watched by 61% of the potential voters or 66.4 million viewers (the third debate in 2012 was watched by 24.6% of the potential voters or 59.2 million views .. but it was up against Monday Night Football Source, Source). 

 

In 1976, the Debate was sponsored by the independent League of Women Voters (Gerald Ford versus Jimmy Carter).  In 1980, we see the appearance of the first Independance particpant in the Debate, John Anderson a former congressman from Illinois.  It was their (LWV) practice to include ALL candidates who had the credentials to be on the ballot. 

 

However by 1988, politics had intervened and the independent and non-partisan League of Women Voters refused to bend to Democratic and Republican pressures to draw up a contract prior to the 1988 presidential debates.  The "Partys" wanted to limit particiaption to their candidates or someone who had equal stature (which meant nobody else since there was no such group).  When asked why they (LWV) withdrew from participation, their President Nancy Neuman said of the situation:

The League of Women Voters is withdrawing its sponsorship of the presidential debate scheduled for mid-October because the demands of the two campaign organizations would perpetrate a fraud on the American voter. (Source)

Since 1988, the Commission on Presidential Debates, a nonprofit corporation became responsible for the Presidential and Vice Presidential Debates.  (non-profit does not mean pure)  According to their new rules, all third-party candidates must have at least 15 percent support in at least five national polls to participate in the Debate.   While 15% does not sound like a lot at first, remember that the winner will likely have 55% of the vote POST debate and election.  It is almost impossible for a third party candidate to poll at 15% PRIOR to the Debate since most folks have not heard of them. 

In the 2008 election, 77 individuals filed "Presidential Exploratory Papers" and while the Commission allowed the voters to hear from Rudy Guliana and Fred Thompson (who did not have the required pole numbers) they were "out of chairs" for Dr. Ron Paul a 30 year representative from Texas who did pole at the required level.  Party Politics owns the debates.

We have to change ownership of the debates back to the independent League of Women Voters or some other similar independent organization.  We need to allow all real candidates to be heard and hopefully a real leader will emerge.

As a patriotic precaution, I am grooming my son Griffin to be this leader guy if someone else does not jump in there prior.  I do not want that responsibility for him since he is just a happy normal kid.  But without leaders, his future and his children's future will be in trouble too.  God bless the Schofields and America.

Glad my car uses gas not water...

On the news we continue to hear how upset people are that oil is over $100 per barrel.  Some of the Sunday morning pundits were even saying oil could be headed to $200 in the future and to prepare for $4+ for a gallon of gas. 

This significant price increase seems so ominous. Add to that all the political uncertainties playing out across the Middle East right now and it makes for a seeming obvious consequence if oil is something you use. And if you are normal like me, and likely you then oil is something you consume (although hopefully whatever you drive gets better mileage that what I drive). 

Now the price of oil/gas/energy is upsetting.. UNTIL you calculate what Americans are now willing to pay for water. That’s right, gas is cheap when you buy water by the pint/liter at the same convenience store. And we live in a society on a planet that is 80% water. 

When the cost of water is more than oil (or certainly when it is 5X) we need to solve the problem or at least be aware of why we cannot solve it. My little goal is just to make folks aware of it. At the local convenience store at the end of my street, water is sold in 1 pint containers (.5 of a liter). According to my grade school math, there are 8 pints in a gallon. Thus, if water is $1 a pint, it would cost $8 a gallon. And if there are 55 gallons in a barrel, then a barrel of water costs almost 4 times as much as a barrel of oil. What, 4 times? 

That seems absurd when water comes out of the faucet for free (sort of, but paid for already for sure). We as a society need to make more much informed choices if we want to control our destiny. Stop paying for plasticized water would be a good first step. 

 God bless us all and Citizen Bill and his family. And check out the original digital art.

Announcing - Presidential Idol!

I have done it again.  I came up with this a while back and posted elsewhere but it continues to evolve like all good ideas should.  Wait till you think about and digest this one.  Too bad nobody really reads this stuff but I am solving big problems with a little blog.

In my estimation, our entire republic/democracy has been subverted by the “Party System”.  While ancient history is kind on the reasons for the formation of the Partys (winner writes history remember), it is History and we need to just observe the lessons of the present to see that times have changed.  Worse yet, as it evolved we lazily created just two choices in the “Party”.  We spend Bizzillions polarizing people into “one “Party” or another and we look funny at anyone who would belong to “Different Party”.  But no way is it that easy or simple to define or cajole human behavior.  

Is every Republican conservative and every Democrat liberal just by definition?  While we know the obviously right answer (of course not), we act very much to support the system.   In Texas, there is still a way to vote ALL Republican or ALL Democrat.  It is surprising how many “straight party ballots” are cast (could not find actual statistical reference to support this but I have read it before and will find it).   The heads of the Commissions on Presidential Debates are the Democratic and Republican “Party Leaders” who do not encourage or really allow anyone but candidates from these “accepted parties”.  The Green Party, the Libertarians, those terrorists the Tea Party (not) and many other “non mainstream parties” are marginalized and cut out.  Some of them have way good people with way good ideas and we should be talking about those, not insulting the witness.   But again, I digress..

Folks, I would like to propose we modify our presidential election practices to follow a Presidential Idol format (we can call it Presidential Pick in case Simon or the other Simon sues for copyright).  Now certainly CongressClowns are a bigger problem than the President, but we have to start somewhere.  So here is how it works.

Step 1.
Schedule a “Casting Call” in 50 major North American cities (maybe use the "capitals" where we have paid for government space).  Criteria for selection to next level will include US citizenship (we will verify), and academic questions on history, economic, politics, philosophy and current affairs.  All questions will be submitted by the audience NOT press or other handlers.  

The ideal candidate will be super smart, multi-lingual with a significant knowledge of all human history and politics, a known leader and motivator and a decent hard working American with no allegiance other than to the dream we were raised on.  The ideal candidate will be physically fit and have a significant understanding of the physical sciences and accounting systems.  Any candidate that can juggle or do magic on top of this likely has an advantage (Americans love Entertainers).  We will pick two candidates from each city but we will interview all candidates who apply.  It costs $10 to apply. (you will see the beauty of this later).  All of this is televised raw (no time or money to waste on fancy editing or post) and will be shown repeatedly on PBS and all others who want the feed.

Step 2.
Now we have 100 candidates.    We schedule 10 “pay per view” episodes where we whittle them down to the top 10 (cost to watch $0 but cost $1 per vote and you can vote up to 10 times per episode (we will cut a billing deal with phone/internet company to make this painless, totally secure by IP address).  100 million people voted for American Idol so I am expecting at least that many votes also.  I think most “Americans” will pay less than $100 to meet “and select” their next president (the current system costs us way more than that now with federal “contributions” to the presidential election system, we get to keep all that now).  This process will take one television season (as opposed to the months/ we have now).  There will be “hometown clips”, “interviews with current and ex spouses” as well as “feats of skill”.    Our “new” production company will contract this out through the present network/studio system or maybe contract it all through PBS/NPR and the Post Office.  Then we have final vote night with one “free (not pay per view)” vote per social security number allowed (we do this by telephone, internet or visit to Post Office. No need to inconvenience the viewer/voter with more silly inefficient systems.   Eventually we sell video of all the candidates that we put together.

Step 3.
Then, Congratulations Mr. President.  And so as to provide a “non disincentive” for your service, we have taken the average income reported by you for the last 3 years (remember we know all about you and we have your tax returns) and we will pay you this amount for the next 4 years (with a minimum of $400,000 a year as under the current system).  When your term is over, we will pay you this amount for 10 more years and then nothing further except security if needed.  This should “keep you whole” while you take the time required to serve as President.  Our present system “penalizes” the real entrepreneur or family man.

Step 4.
Lastly, we calculate the proceeds collected from pay per view, voting and broadcasting rights, pay my production fee and transfer the balance to the Treasury.  My election MAKES money and will produce as qualified a candidate as we have ever seen.  Hopefully, we don’t get that guy who “won Jeopardy”, he is kind of creepy.  But that is the risk.  The last two presidents have also “scared” me and 2012 is not going to be better so I am willing to take the chance.  

God bless Citizen Bill and his family and friends.