The "Build a Better Democracy" Thread

[GreenLantern2814]

Some of these will be extreme, and I hope we can all moderate each others ideas in the pursuit of finding common ground.

If you want to run for office, there's a section at the bottom for your donor list as of the moment you enter the race and your tax returns. Failing to provide these means you do not appear on the ballot, and all write-in ballots will be disqualified.

My personal pipe dream would be to ban all political advertising period outside of signs and fliers. I don't wanna see you on the side of CP in a banner ad, I don't want you playing before a Youtube clip - if you have a message, go talk to your constituents. Gain momentum. Stand for something. Don't just get a bunch of money behind you and run attack ads.

Failing an outright ban, some form of limitation on number or frequency of political ads.

I would extend this to government advertisments to the extent that paid messages from the government of Canada must be as apolitcal as possible - they are not allowed to tout the government's achievements or put lipstick on a pig.

I'd like to see minors allowed to challenge for the right to vote. Say at age 14 or 16, whenever you get your learner's permit, you can also take a test that features ten or twenty questions that proves you pay attention and care, and if you pass you get to vote. The more people you have voting, the better; it doesn't matter who they vote for, what matters is that they do.

I'd cap taxes at 50% across all levels of government - if the total amount of tax you pay exceeds half of your gross annual earnings, you should be made whole. I don't care how rich you are, I don't think it's fair for anyone to spend more than half their year working for money that they never see.

We should also invest in an electronic voting system. Something with nuke proof encryption. Register with your SIN number and address - again, the more voters the merrier.

Renegotiate NAFTA so that we have proper control over our water resources.

Establish a deadline for when we will no longer allow the sale of internal combustion cars - England has set 2040. China and India will do this soon if they haven't already, and then what are the world's automakers going to do? Build one set of cars for America and another for the rest of the world? No, they'll go full electric. So get out in front this.

Invest more in space exploration. Like, a lot more. I'd go so far as to say try and put a Canadian on the moon.

What else you got?

[SebC]

Originally Posted by GreenLantern2814

I'd cap taxes at 50% across all levels of government - if the total amount of tax you pay exceeds half of your gross annual earnings, you should be made whole. I don't care how rich you are, I don't think it's fair for anyone to spend more than half their year working for money that they never see.

Nope. This is just human bias for round numbers. Fundamentally there is very little difference between 49.9% and 50.1%. As I mentioned in another thread, as production gets more and more capital heavy, taxes will need to get more and more progressive to maintain an equitable society.

Originally Posted by GreenLantern2814

Renegotiate NAFTA so that we have proper control over our water resources.

Maybe. Negotiate means we'd have to give something up, and we can't commit to this without knowing what the cost will be. On the whole, NAFTA has been great for Canada.

Originally Posted by GreenLantern2814

Establish a deadline for when we will no longer allow the sale of internal combustion cars - England has set 2040.

Again, nope. Set a price on carbon that pays for its effects, then let the market figure it out.

[KTrain]

I think all political signs should be banned from public property, roadsides, etc. If you want to put up a sign for your political campaign, you have to convince property owners to allow you to. Every election our city looks like trash during a time when it should be most beautiful (Autumn).

I think less physical advertising the better. It's such a waste.

Revealing donor lists should be mandatory, prior to advance voting and again before election day.

We should be using electronic ballots.

EDIT: We should be using ballots that can be electronically tabulated. Scan-trons? Something to get results more quickly.

[Slava]

Originally Posted by GreenLantern2814

Some of these will be extreme, and I hope we can all moderate each others ideas in the pursuit of finding common ground.

If you want to run for office, there's a section at the bottom for your donor list as of the moment you enter the race and your tax returns. Failing to provide these means you do not appear on the ballot, and all write-in ballots will be disqualified.

My personal pipe dream would be to ban all political advertising period outside of signs and fliers. I don't wanna see you on the side of CP in a banner ad, I don't want you playing before a Youtube clip - if you have a message, go talk to your constituents. Gain momentum. Stand for something. Don't just get a bunch of money behind you and run attack ads.

Failing an outright ban, some form of limitation on number or frequency of political ads.

I would extend this to government advertisments to the extent that paid messages from the government of Canada must be as apolitcal as possible - they are not allowed to tout the government's achievements or put lipstick on a pig.

I'd like to see minors allowed to challenge for the right to vote. Say at age 14 or 16, whenever you get your learner's permit, you can also take a test that features ten or twenty questions that proves you pay attention and care, and if you pass you get to vote. The more people you have voting, the better; it doesn't matter who they vote for, what matters is that they do.

I'd cap taxes at 50% across all levels of government - if the total amount of tax you pay exceeds half of your gross annual earnings, you should be made whole. I don't care how rich you are, I don't think it's fair for anyone to spend more than half their year working for money that they never see.

We should also invest in an electronic voting system. Something with nuke proof encryption. Register with your SIN number and address - again, the more voters the merrier.

Renegotiate NAFTA so that we have proper control over our water resources.

Establish a deadline for when we will no longer allow the sale of internal combustion cars - England has set 2040. China and India will do this soon if they haven't already, and then what are the world's automakers going to do? Build one set of cars for America and another for the rest of the world? No, they'll go full electric. So get out in front this.

Invest more in space exploration. Like, a lot more. I'd go so far as to say try and put a Canadian on the moon.

What else you got?

I hate to be pedantic, but those last few have nothing to do with a better democracy and are just policies you like. You could have a democracy that's just as good and not implement those things...

[Fuzz]

No longer is your vote worth one! You can vote at 16, but it is worth 0.1. It ramps up to 1 at age 25, and stays there until you are 70. Then it decreases in value unit you hit 90 and it is 0.1. Because really, should someone with less than 10 years in them have the same control over our future as us young whipper snappers? And young people get to vote early to get them into it, but since they think they are smarter than they are, they only get a full vote at 25. So no big risk of even 10 of those know-it-all 16 year olds getting together to sway one vote. This is the perfect system.

[You Need a Thneed]

Ban political parties and block voting at all levels of government.

[SebC]

With regards to actual democratic reform, the first thing on the list should be scrapping first-past-the-post and moving to a system that maintains proportionality.

[bizaro86]

What does banning fossil fuel engines have to do with better democracy?

[Sr. Mints]

Originally Posted by bizaro86

What does banning fossil fuel engines have to do with better democracy?

Yeah, everybody knows the most effective way to rationally discuss multi-faceted civic issues is to burn cars.

[Tron_fdc]

Hopefully blockchain technology replaces the current paper ballot system. The infrastructure is there, it just needs someone to adopt it. That right there would eliminate almost all voter fraud.

[GGG]

1) We need a Facts council. The major political parties each nominate a person to a fact council. They adjudicate things like the 55% increase and force you to say

City council revenue from taxes before inflation and not considering population growth increased 55%. Taxes accounting for population growth and inflation increase 23%

They would approve all ads of any kind that addressed elections including PAC like entities. To get a seat on the fact council you would need to get say 10% of the national vote.

I'm not sure if this actually works but something needs to be done so we all are making decisions on the same base set of facts. Facts are not partisan.


2 - public funding of all elections. Yes this is going to cost us more however getting corporations out of democracy is a good thing. I liked the X dollars per vote model. Would need to evaluate how to fund municipal and fringe candidates. At a minimum only individuals should be able to donate and the cap should be $100 per year. No unions, no businesses, no money worth currying favour for.

3 - Each individual when discussing politics should frame all criticism at specific policies and not parties.

4 - Jounalists need to do their jobs and call out bull####. Anytime someone lies in an interview it should cut away stating what is actually true. In any article written with a quote in should be parsed with what is actually true.

Bill smith said " Nenshi raised taxes 55% (this is not factually true as after inflation and population growth taxes increased by 23% and the is one vote on council in our weak mayor system therefore the tax increases are the decision of all coucilours who voted for the budget)"

5 - Social media sites would include fact based information in all advertising.
6 - Jornalists and social media sites should create a politic act type entity on all major claims.
7- All platforms should be subject to economic review by government economists so standardized assumptions are used
8- Forcasts for commodity prices should never be greater than current strip pricing for all promises and budgets.
9- Idividuals need to stop sharing crappy team sports political articles and get over the Harper bad Trudeau good.
10- Idividuals need to quit using sarcasm as a form of humour and discourse in regards to politics

In other words quit ####ing lying to me and deal with the ####ing issues

[PepsiFree]

Have 100 candidates. No funding allowed. Maximum 1000 spent on campaign. Have the people vote. Declare the winner god’s choice. Instate them as a monarch and switch to a totalitarian monarchy. The end.

[GGG]

Originally Posted by KTrain

We should be using electronic ballots.

I don't think you ever want to go away from paper ballots. The paper trail with supervision is very difficult to defeat and is very good at being trusted by the public.

What we need is a faster counting system. Scantron multiple choice sheats are very simple and already used in schools and would satisfy the counting problem and the paper trail problem.

[Coach]

Lately I've been contemplating the idea of minimum wage as a function of a company's profits (ie, each company would have it's own minimum wage). As corporations grow larger and buy each other, they congregate the wealth into smaller and smaller pockets. There really needs to be a way to redistribute this in a relatively quick manner IMO so more people can participate in larger economies outside of buying the essentials from walmart.

There are obvious questions/flaws with it. What about small businesses? Will the market created by larger corporations drag the natural minimum wage of smaller businesses to a livable wage?

I often think about ways to do away with money all together but that's more for fiction than anything.


The electronic voting thing intrigues me. I agree that I don't think I could ever trust the security. But having a voting app would instantly revolutionize voter "turnout".

[DoubleK]

Originally Posted by MattyC

Lately I've been contemplating the idea of minimum wage as a function of a company's profits (ie, each company would have it's own minimum wage). As corporations grow larger and buy each other, they congregate the wealth into smaller and smaller pockets. There really needs to be a way to redistribute this in a relatively quick manner IMO so more people can participate in larger economies outside of buying the essentials from Walmart.

Comrade, is that you?

[Coach]

Originally Posted by DoubleK

Comrade, is that you?

Mom never taught you to share?

What would be wrong with all of a company's employees' gaining something from the progress of the company? In fact, economic models are built on finding equilibrium between revenue and cost to maximize production, not to maximize profit. That cost includes cost of labour rising along with everything else. And hiding that in bonuses for people at the top is not helping the problem.

[pylon]

Originally Posted by GreenLantern2814

I'd like to see minors allowed to challenge for the right to vote. Say at age 14 or 16, whenever you get your learner's permit, you can also take a test that features ten or twenty questions that proves you pay attention and care, and if you pass you get to vote. The more people you have voting, the better; it doesn't matter who they vote for, what matters is that they do.

I'd like to do the reverse of this. If you are paying property tax, you're vote counts 2-1. If you pay income tax 1-1. If you are under 30, of sound mind and body, and you haven't contributed income tax or had a job for a minimum of 6 months, or continuous employment in the previous 6 months, you can't vote, because you simply aren't contributing to the system, and shouldn't have a say in how taxes are spent. Post secondary students to be excluded, they can vote.

There is literally zero excuse as a Canadian citizen to be unemployed if you are able bodied. We are shipping in people from all over the world to take jobs that rich white entitled kids are too 'proud' to take. And the immigrants take those jobs with pride. Maybe give the votes to those people, they are more productive than some entitled tw@t of a kid death matching on COD all day in mommy's basement.

You said some of your ideas may be extreme, well these are my extreme ideas.

[pylon]

Originally Posted by MattyC

Mom never taught you to share?

What would be wrong with all of a company's employees' gaining something from the progress of the company? In fact, economic models are built on finding equilibrium between revenue and cost to maximize production, not to maximize profit. That cost includes cost of labour rising along with everything else. And hiding that in bonuses for people at the top is not helping the problem.

If I'm fronting millions of dollars and taking all the personal risk in a business? I don't think so man, that's almost a laughable scenario. If I want a sweat equity partner it should be up to me to decide who that is, and who's qualified to have equity, not some government spreadsheet.

Everyone in this country has the opportunity to be an entrepreneur, the BDC is ridiculously generous as long as you keep your credit clean and have a business plan that is even remotely viable. If you are disqualified because you have terrible credit, which is literally the only thing that will get in the way, you don't deserve a business loan.

[Coach]

Originally Posted by pylon

If I'm fronting millions of dollars and taking all the personal risk in a business? I don't think so man, that's almost a laughable scenario. If I want a sweat equity partner it should be up to me to decide who that is, and who's qualified to have equity, not some government spreadsheet.

Everyone in this country has the opportunity to be an entrepreneur, the BDC is ridiculously generous as long as you keep your credit clean and have a business plan that is even remotely viable. If you are disqualified because you have terrible credit, which is literally the only thing that will get in the way, you don't deserve a business loan.

I don't disagree necessarily, as I mentioned, a small business provision would have to be in place somehow. But wouldn't you also agree that corporate executives pocketing millions per/year while their lowest level employees need to hold multiple jobs to sustain families and provide liquidity to the economy is out of whack and something that needs adjustment? You do get to choose who's qualified to have equity by choosing who you hire, no? It's not like profit sharing is some crazy idea. I don't see this arbitrary line where some positions deserve it over others (obviously on a scale).

[topfiverecords]

Originally Posted by GGG

1) We need a Facts council. The major political parties each nominate a person to a fact council. They adjudicate things like the 55% increase and force you to say

City council revenue from taxes before inflation and not considering population growth increased 55%. Taxes accounting for population growth and inflation increase 23%

They would approve all ads of any kind that addressed elections including PAC like entities. To get a seat on the fact council you would need to get say 10% of the national vote.

I'm not sure if this actually works but something needs to be done so we all are making decisions on the same base set of facts. Facts are not partisan.


2 - public funding of all elections. Yes this is going to cost us more however getting corporations out of democracy is a good thing. I liked the X dollars per vote model. Would need to evaluate how to fund municipal and fringe candidates. At a minimum only individuals should be able to donate and the cap should be $100 per year. No unions, no businesses, no money worth currying favour for.

3 - Each individual when discussing politics should frame all criticism at specific policies and not parties.

4 - Jounalists need to do their jobs and call out bull####. Anytime someone lies in an interview it should cut away stating what is actually true. In any article written with a quote in should be parsed with what is actually true.

Bill smith said " Nenshi raised taxes 55% (this is not factually true as after inflation and population growth taxes increased by 23% and the is one vote on council in our weak mayor system therefore the tax increases are the decision of all coucilours who voted for the budget)"

5 - Social media sites would include fact based information in all advertising.
6 - Jornalists and social media sites should create a politic act type entity on all major claims.
7- All platforms should be subject to economic review by government economists so standardized assumptions are used
8- Forcasts for commodity prices should never be greater than current strip pricing for all promises and budgets.
9- Idividuals need to stop sharing crappy team sports political articles and get over the Harper bad Trudeau good.
10- Idividuals need to quit using sarcasm as a form of humour and discourse in regards to politics

In other words quit ####ing lying to me and deal with the ####ing issues

Facts Council: It was actually 51%.