If you could make ONE SINGLE political reform...?

If you want people to see it, why are you putting it on CSPAN?

Because some Pol-Sci geeks will be watching, and will proceed to cut the juicy bits and upload'em on Youtube for the world to see?

I had a thought about the United States:

I would change the elections to the House of Representatives occurs every four years in between the Presidential elections rather than the every two years they occur at the moment.

The prime motivation for the thought is the question of money in politics and really that's the question of how one gets elected. If you have fewer elections then over a decade less money will be needed to be raised, representatives will have to spend less time actually campaigning as a proportion of their time and they have to spend less time thinking about campaigning. The flip side of the coin is that the more time a representative spends being your representative gives you more time to judge them on and define their worth.

The issues that the federal government deal with don't only have effects that last two years, sometimes they can't even be implemented in two years. It also splits the chamber between two types of politician- the guy who can get elected every time no problem and can be there for years and the guy who is completely unable to challenge his authority because the turnover is a blink in the eye.

Note that I specifically detailed that the elections would happen inbetween the presidential ones. First, I would just say that doing it at the same time would effect the separation of powers thing the constitution writers were going for. Second, having them never coincide would change the perception of the game a lot. Often people remark that the President of the United States doesn't really have the power that people imagine him to have. Yet when you have congressional and presidential elections on the same year, it all becomes about the president. When they are inbetween it even remains a commentary on the president as it is at the moment. I believe that if they only happened in between, people would just focus more on their congressman, especially since they have a longer record to be judged on because that person is staying around, even if the President goes in the next election.

It would effect lots of people in different ways. For you third party supporters, you would have congressional elections less effected by the two horse races forcing features of the Presidential election. Sure, you've still got first past the post, you're not getting a revolution but you might find a handful more independents or third party candidates.

The Speaker of the House would probably become more prominent and more prime ministerial as they become the leader of a more independent house. I say that's a good thing since you can keep track of them better.

The political class would shrink. You have 435 representatives so each election has 870 candidate and candidate teams. Over ten years, you'd have 2610 less election campaigns and so the people who are hired for those campaigns are finding jobs drying up. The political class would shrink, it wouldn't be a class, you might actually get real human beings.

I'd end censorship, no more bleeps, edited versions or Real-Time with Pause EVER.

Why would the House become independent in that case? How would the Speaker grow in power as well?

Actually, I'd probably try to reduce the focus on the beneficiary principle and permit trusts for non-charitable purposes, provided the settlor is required to appoint an enforcer to ensure that the terms of the trust are carried out.

They do something somewhat like that on the Channel Islands, I think. It's just something I've been wondering about lately, while I was reading some articles about equity.

I would (assuming this is the US) get rid of elections and have the President randomly chosen from the population. Anyone who actually wants the job is automatically disqualified.

I'd go for having Commons elected by most open list proportional representation, and having the Lords being filled with specialists (kind of like now, but more so) so that they can more effectively provide checks and balances on laws. And sure, you might end up with the odd BNP MP, but I'm one of those stupid people who thinks that, if you're going to have a democracy you have to actually be democratic, even if you personally absolutely detest the people who eventually get elected.

Freedom of Information.

No classified data. No covert redaction. No security clearance needed.

Fallout is likely to be massive, but from that mess, a populace with knowledge of ALL of a government's actions can potentnially deal with it without acting like ignorant morons.

• Though admitedly I'd worry about nuclear launch codes being common knowledge.

edited 29th Jan '12 7:54:23 PM by Natasel

Require every bill in the US congress to read aloud before any voting can take place.

Little Sister Act.

Rationale: Since being watched by Big Brother seems to be a big part of Orwelian dystopia, reversing the trend where everyone watches the leaders seems like good change.

Every mayor, senator, congress man, every elected offical up to President, gets more and more scrutiny until the highest office in the land is a figurative glass box where not a even single moment is potentially unwatched.

edited 10th Feb '12 5:04:05 AM by Natasel

The European Union will form a tighter fiscal and political union, hereby forming a Federal Union of the Community of European States, and of course, will include Britain.

That sounds like it could get reaaaaally creepy. I mean, would they like, watch the president peeing?

edited 10th Feb '12 10:39:45 AM by ThatHuman

Hmm...for the USA, repealment of the 2nd Amendment would be tempting, but universal health care would have to be the winner. An NHS-like system.

For the UK, drug legalisation (full, heavily regulated) is my tempting loser, with proportional representation winning out. We need it, we really do.

This is kind of easy for me, as someone is actually trying to do it: http://www.sanders.senate.gov/petition/?uid=f1c2660f-54b9-4193-86a4-ec2c39342c6c

Not a fix-all, obviously, but seriously a VERY important first step in fixing this mess.

That's not a reform so much as an objective, and it's still one of the European Union's long-term goals. I think Delors wanted to have achieved it by 1992, but the EU is a dynamic institution; you can set all the goals you'd like for it, and while you may meet them there's no guarantee that they'll fall into a tidy schedule.

Watching a President Pee?

Why not?

As the old joke would say:

"In Soviet Russia, President Watch YOU Pee!"

• A dystopian Orwelian state needs secrecy in order to function more effectively. If they were on the wrong side of the Information War, their lifespan would likely be measured in how long it would take to organize and Angry Mob with AK-47s.

• Of course, just because nothing is secret does not ensure Utopia. Paparazzi, loss of privacy, the utter inability to carry out covert goals and the like will be a problem, with more likely to pop up. Its main advantage is that if problems do start, everyone will see it coming and it will not grow in secret.

Unless one has a urination fetish and has a thing for the President, then no.

edited 10th Feb '12 9:11:02 PM by ThatHuman

If the first thing that comes to mind for this prompt is "take away the guns!", you really don't understand what problems the US has...

Two massive, false assumptions. The 2nd Amendment is simply my pet peeve law, and we all have those. I wasn't aware that the thread was "pick the single most practical reform the country most desperately needs". It also wasn't the first thing that came to mind by any means.

@ Gloomer. I suppose so.

In that case, I would devolve more powers from Westminister to local councils in England. For too long, the League Of Nations has seemed to have more power than a city council.

Either that; or we set up regional assemblies across England.

Classify excessive campaign financing and lobbying as bribery. Giving a few hundred dollars in donations to a candidate you like is fine. Dumping millions in the coffers of elected representatives undermines everything democracy is supposed to stand for and gives a handful of individuals way too much power.

Runner up would be having American electoral boundaries drawn/elections run by non-partisan organizations; not having state governments help rig elections. Ideally do it like we do in Canada, where the one running the election actually gives up their right to vote in that cycle to ensure impartiality.

Fair enough.

Have all Colleges offer free, open-to-the-public, basic pol sci and econ classes, that can be taken any number of times, and are pre-requisites to obtaining a voting license.

Rational: can you think of a good reason why people shouldn't know what the hell they're doing before stepping into the box?

Interesting, logical, and will likely need to be protected from partisan professors who will fail you if you show views against ther own.

Then there's the tenure issue....

Could work. Or could turn voting into an exercise in Stepford Smiling until you can get the poll booth to vote your own opinion.

Wild Guess: Either way, politicians will show a lot of interest in education all of the sudden.

edited 13th Feb '12 11:56:55 PM by Natasel