REAL DEMOCRACY in America -

The Future is NOW. All the Presidential Candidates in this year's election, both Democrats and Republicans, are claiming to be the best AGENT of CHANGE in America because they know that we are all simply fed up with the way things are in this political system today. President George W. Bush has the lowest approval rating in history and what's even more embarrassing is that Congress has an EVEN LOWER approval rating. No one in Government is doing their jobs. The reasons why they can't do their jobs any more, I will cover in future blogs, but we all know that the lobbyists are now writing most of the laws in this country and our elected Representatives are only representing themselves, their friends, their own retirement.

So, it's OBVIOUS that there has to be a MAJOR CHANGE in the way we do our political business in the United States of America, STILL the best country in the world, but sliding fast into oblivion due to the neglect, corruption and incompetence of our leaders.

But REAL CHANGE is NOT going to come from any of our candidates, I'm sorry to say. Oh yes, they will talk up a great story and some of them will bring tears to your eyes. No individual person can bring about any major changes, however, due to the massive bureaucracy and embedded special interests that have taken over their little fiefdoms in the country.

WE'RE ON OUR OWN. So, what does this mean? It means quite simply that We The People need now more than ever to band together to create REAL CHANGE BY OURSELVES.

And when we band together we need to have ONE PURPOSE, ONE FOCUS in mind to UNITE the ELECTORATE.

AND, the MAJOR ISSUE is that we must NOW VOTE in National Ballot Measures to NEUTRALIZE the impact of the Lobbyists and Special Interests and corrupt politicians.

BY PLACING NATIONAL INITIATIVES on the FEDERAL BALLOT, we can make REAL CHANGE in America and not have to rely on sneaky politicians who are very adept at telling us what we want to hear.

Now, when Benjamin Franklin was trying to make a major decision, he made up TWO COLUMNS on a piece of paper and wrote down as many of the BENEFITS that he could think of and then on the other column make a list of the Problems or REASONS not to do something. In that way, he would know if that if the benefits outweighed the problems, he could easily make his decision, knowing that in the main, he would be further ahead and he would know what to look for in the way of setbacks as well and handle them.

BENEFITS Vs.

So, I decided to list all of the Benefits in this article and then follow up immediately with all of the security issues, because this seems to be the Government's only objection to allowing a Real Democracy for the American voter today. So here goes.

Benefits of Voting Over the Internet:

1. Increased voter participation. Right now, it's an incredibly pathetic 25% or less of all qualified voters actually take the time to get dressed, get in their cars, look for the school or government building that is serving as the polling place. Waiting in line, and then finally punching the chads in the paper ballots before returning home.

2. More and better candidates. Once we get this thing rolling, we'll figure out where we can have communities like HubPages to attract candidates from all walks of life and all ranges of experiences instead of the same old stuffed suits from some Law or Divinity School somewhere who get their dance card stamped by the Republican or Democratic brand of organized gang.

3. Far more thorough debate on the issues. Over the Internet, we can read about opinions from hundreds of perspectives, not just a few like we get now. For example, at the moment we either support the troops getting shot at in Iraq or we want them home which is supposed to not support the troops. Why bringing the troops home to their families is not supporting them, I don't know. I'm positive that's where most of them would prefer to be. How about just moving them closer to the actual enemy, Osama Bin Laden, some five thousand miles away in Pakistan? Wouldn't that be a more economical expenditure of the billions we're spending now to fight Al Quaeda? Common sense opinions like these need to be focused during an election so that we have real choices, not just the rhetoric of the two-parties who are more and more alike every day.

4. National Ballot Measures. Why not put the issues that the Politicians discuss on the Ballot? Why should they get all the power to decide these issues? For example, the politicians of both parties have been talking about taking us off the Oil Addiction this country is on ever since I can remember. There were actual gasoline shortages in the early 70's. So, shouldn't we have solved this by now?

If we put it on the ballot, we would probably have hundreds of better policies to vote on directly, like a 10% gasoline tax, the money to be used to subsidize hydrogen, solar and electric powered vehicles. Even though our gasoline prices would rise a little bit, at least someday, we would have an industry that could compete with gasoline and then prices would have to go down. This and hundreds of common sense ideas for our future should be placed on the Ballot so that the Oil Companies can't bribe a few key committee chairmen to prevent good, thoughtful effective to be passed.

I could go on and on about this benefit. We could have a National Proposition to guarantee a balanced Federal Budget every year. In years in which the budget isn't in perfect balance, no Congressional salary can be paid. That would keep them working until they had a balanced budget and it would immediately cut all the pork from their 100,000 page budgets with something for everyone in them. We should have a National Ballot Measure to provide a National Health Care subsidy to families that cannot afford their Health Care. Do we really want to live in a country that puts people out in the street because one or two of the breadwinners contracted a life-threatening disease? That seems to me to be like Caveman days. We should have a ballot measure to fix the Social Security System. It's easy. The politicians just don't want to tell you the solution is simple because the solution requires us to tax the wealthiest part of our society the same as the lowest economic rungs in the ladder and their biggest contributors are wealthy people and corporations. Like I said, I could go on and on about this benefit. It's MAJOR.

5. Reduced Government interference in our lives because Voting on the Internet would allow us a check and balance against the tendency to bring this country down. We can't have invasion of privacy and the government spying and torturing our citizens. It's the slippery slope into oblivion and dictatorship.

6. Less taxation for stupid things. Why is it we are sending over 11 Billion dollars to Pakistan? Pakistan is where Osama Bin Laden is hiding with the aid and support of the Pakistani government. I'm not saying we should invade Pakistan. But, maybe we don't want to give our hard earned tax dollars to the enemy? Just a thought?

7. The ability to compete in a global economy. In Europe and most of Asia, people are now zipping around the countryside in Bullet Trains, very modern trains that travel at 300 Miles Per Hour. They never have a fatality. In some parts of Europe they've begun moving people around using MAGNETIC LEVITATION, something right out of Star Wars. Yet, in this country, we can't get our passenger trains to run at all. When they do, they can't make it over 50 Miles per hour and they cause about 3,000 deaths per year from derailing and crashing into each other. This is a disgrace for the greatest country in the world to be so far behind other industrialized nations.

8. We could stop the exportation of the best jobs from this country to India and China by using our technology to solve our problems. Al Gore is right. Global Warming is a problem that our government wants to sweep under the rug, but the rug is now under water. Yet, if we used our technical know how to build better cars, trains, airplanes, roads, navigation systems, etc. we would once again have the greatest economy with plenty of Clean Jobs for everyone. We just have to have the leadership and the will to do it. We certainly have the know-how.

9. We would save billions upon billions of dollars because the voters would have more control over their pocket book issues. The schools would be improved by reducing the bureaucracy and returning common sense to the laws of the land. The roads would be free of potholes. We could fight the fires we have every year instead of ignoring them and allowing all the forests to burn. We could prevent diseases by voting to support Science instead of squelching it. I could go on and on about the uses of voting on the Internet.

10. I'm sure you, the reader, can think of dozens more benefits of Voting On the Internet, given some of the examples above.

NOW, let's look at the downside, the risks of Voting on the Internet:

1. There might be a security problem if we just rush into this without the proper safeguards.

2. The Two-Party System might go the way of the Dinosaur. Good ole boys might go without a job.

3. The President and Congress might have to listen to the people they represents for a change. Right now, they can simply ignore us, get rich and retire as billionaires. This might put a crimp in their style.

4. Bureaucracy might have to go. No more waiting in lines with your tax returns in your hands hoping you don't get a penalty. That could hurt the bureaucrats who don't know any other way of life. They might have to look for real work for a change. Their headaches could be horrible. and we might have to listen to them whining all day long.

5. Congress might have to shut down half the year with nothing to do. That would be annoying - for them.

So, those are the Pro's and the Con's of voting on the Internet. If you followed along here, you should be asking yourself now, why don't we do this and give it a try?

Well, that's a question that I have been asking myself for decades and the only conclusion I can make is that there really hasn't been a concerted and unified effort to get this to the American people AND in fact, the media of this country have been withholding this information from us. I tried to get the politicians to talk about this idea all my adult life and they simply refuse, usually telling me that they like the system the way it is. I've tried to get the TV News to talk about it. I've sent hundreds of letters to the editors of nearly all the newspapers. None of them want to GIVE UP this information because it rocks the boat. The media is run by the major corporations and they like to control our laws by bribing a few of their favorite politicians to get the laws the way they want them written. The Drug Industry for example just wrote our Prescription drug laws about a year ago and all the Congressmen who allowed them to write our laws were rewarded with Jobs in the Industry that pays them over ONE MILLION DOLLARS per year salary to do, guess what, Lobby the next batch of scoundrels that we send to Washington to make sure they get good high-paying jobs when do the right thing for Industry in their own terms.

Will Rogers once said that "We have the best Congress that money can buy." and he was exactly right. And he said it back in the day when only a few of our Congress people were bought and paid for by lobbyists. Today, it's nearly ALL of them in the employ of the Industry Lobbyists who have more offices in Washington now than our politicians and all their supporting staff. We're outnumbered by the enemies of democracy and we're losing our country, slowly but steadily, more and more every day.

Well, I started out explaining all about Voting On The Internet because I finally figured out how to Educate the American People and get them interested in the idea. We are so addicted to television, movies, video games, etc. that we don't want to learn anything new in regard to how this country is governed. The founding fathers would be appalled at the kind of apathetic citizens we've become, but it's the government itself that hopes to keep us dumb and getting dumber, because their own jobs are more secure that way.

So, in order to make the process of Voting On The Internet a more enjoyable and natural process, I've devised a game. It's a voting game and it's modeled after the two most entertaining traditions that we have, YouTube and the TV Show, "Survivor". Thus, it's called, "Survivor YouTube". It's a way for people to vote on the Internet for the current batch of scoundrels. The one you like the most, or hate the least should get your support and your vote. That's the American way. After we're all nice and cozy and warm and fuzzy with the idea of Voting on the Internet for these clowns, then, we'll actually start to show you how we can vote for REAL SOLUTIONS. Federal Ballot Measures, National Propositions like some that I mentioned above as worthy examples of how to use our technology to advance our common economy.

And so, when you hear all the negative criticisms of Voting On The Internet from the nay-sayers and oh, yes, there will be a few, just think about the inventor of the wheel. When our ancestors saw the first wheel, they must have laughed like hyenas because they had never used this new fangled technology and look at all the problems associated with the wheel. You can get things moving too fast. You don't have to use as many laborers to move those heavy boulders in constructing buildings. The wheel would certainly cause an economic recession. Jobs lost, things moving too fast.

Well, that's really where we are today. We could start Voting on the Internet today, but we have to solve some minor problems like the security issue. (I have that one solved, trust me.) But, there will be many people who think we'll be moving too fast and too many jobs will be lost. The way we do things will certainly be different than the way we do things now.

But, do we really need to spend hundreds of billions of dollars to elect Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama or Mike Huckabee or Ron Paul? Would these clowns really be any better for the vast majority of us than the present clown living in the White House?

We can't know for certain, can we? But one thing I can say for certain is that if the majority of us get to vote on the Solutions to problems as presented by the best and the brightest of us, we'd only have ourselves to blame if things went wrong, wouldn't we?

Get in the Game. Vote Now and Vote often at: http://www.survivoryoutube.com

It's just common sense