Tuesday, March 19, 2024

Simple solutions: New laws require a new Congress

Posted

I don’t have all the answers, but no one human does. So here’s the plan: Allow unlimited immigration to the United States with the caveat that all males and females immediately enlist in the military, branch of their choice, as a price for admission. Once they serve a four year contract, which automatically includes overseas deployment, they get their citizenship.
This plan also ensures that they learn a skill and English in the military, if necessary, as well as learn to save and invest money so that when they leave the military they do not immediately go on welfare.
Of course they have the option of reenlisting.
That’s it. Simple, but there are these inherent problems: 1) The modern military does not want high school drop outs. 2) Today’s military does not take drug addicts or alcoholics. 3) The military has height, weight and other physical requirements that many immigrants cannot meet. 4) No criminals allowed. So how many of these immigrants will have a clean background check? 5) Age limits. I think 29-years-old is the maximum and I believe 17-years-old with parental permission is the minimum. So even more immigrants will be eliminated.
Basically all the above issues make my simple answer untenable. Alas, simplicity is the boilerplate of most plans. They just don’t see the forest for the trees. Simple answers just aren’t answers at all, but a way to justify naive  actions. At least that’s how it may appear.
Political action by sound bites or bumper stickers, tweets, Facebook or other quick solutions are not solutions at all. So what do they represent? In my simple mind, simple answers represent more of a general philosophy than an actual game plan with step-by-step actions taken to achieve a specific goal.
Donald Trump won the presidency because he made many vague promises similar to my immigration/military plan above. The difference is he now has to make things happens and keep at least some of his promises.
I honestly believe more and more Democrats and Republicans ought to resign their party positions and run as independents for the U.S. Senate and for Congress.
The reason is simple, just like Trump’s campaign promises. America needs dedicated independent thinkers and doers, not the same old, same old political hacks that have infested Washington, D.C., for the last 50 years.
We need new thinkers with new plans and bold ideas. If a man or woman tries to run as a Dem or GOP then they are dooming themselves to becoming slavishly fettered to whatever status quo platform the party apparatus has been adhering to for generations and that hasn’t worked out too well.
Americans chose Trump as a means to an end - the changing of the status quo, not the continuation of it. Steve Bannon, Trumps “Rasputin,” stated he wanted to destroy the government as we know it. We may not be ready for this extreme plan, but at least we should be ready to elect a few more brave souls with enough fight within them to effect real change.
Some argue, as I have done myself, that the only way to change a political party is to become a member of it and change it from within. This logic also assumes the element of change gets to vote for a fellow change agent during the primaries.
We, as an electorate, must therefore encourage persons with this “change element” mentality to run in primaries in order for the theory to hold water, but how many party bosses will even allow holders of  “radical” ideas to be allowed on the ballot?
Another negative factor about simply quitting the party you now belong to is that candidates running as independents rarely get elected. Third party candidates get votes, but they are almost a waste of time except for the “protest” value inherent in the act of voting against the status quo.
I am in favor of term limits and, barring that, I’m in favor of more and more so-called third party candidates at least giving the election process the “old college try.”
Men, woman - agents of change - your nation needs you. A change maker like Trump will never succeed unless Congress has a working majority of newly elected change agents to make sure his agenda realizes fruition.
Yes, it is that simple. Stop voting the party line and give some new blood a try.
If it doesn’t work out, then it will be just like it is now, so what have we got to lose?

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