One of Mark Steyn’s readers points out that:
Congress passed the onerous Sarbanes-Oxley* on the premise there needed to be a new law requiring CEOs to read their financial statements and personally face legal penalties in case there are errors. Maybe Congress would be a bit more cautious if they faced jail time when their 10-year budgets didn’t pan out.
Of course, Congress is notorious for passing bills that hold others to higher standards than themselves, and that don’t apply to themselves (as the “health-care” atrocity surely won’t — they’ll continue to get their own gold-plated plan). In a sane world, SOX would be repealed (that would have a bigger stimulus effect than anything that the people in Washington have done to date), but the larger point is that this practice of holding themselves above the laws that they pass themselves was one of the things that drove the 1994 Republican revolution. In fact, fixing that was one of the ten points of the Contract With America. Time to start drafting up a new one, I think.
SOX vs. Congress is apples vs. oranges. SOX requires that PAST results be reported accurately. It also doesn’t require that the CEO hit their budget – merely that the CEO has reported what in fact happened.
Sarbox imposes a draconian level of accountability on executives of public companies, whereas members of Congress consistently refuse to accept any accountability under the laws that they pass. I don’t see why this isn’t a relevant comparison.
What’s a cheap way to accomplish what SOX intends to accomplish?
Congress loves to exempt itself from the laws everyone else has to obey. For example, is there anyone so naive as to believe members of Congress, their families, and political cronies will fall under ObamaCare?
Likewise, if any corporation ran their accounting as bad as the US government, it would be shut down and the executives perp-walked for the cameras in very short order. The accounting tricks Congress regularly pulls make Hollywood look like a bastion of propriety by comparison.
Chris completely misses (or avoids) the point of the post. Congress makes other do what they are not willing to do; be accountable for their actions.
Hey Rand, last year I came up with a contract with America. I call it “The New Contract with America”. Here is what I wrote.
The New Contract With America
1. Abolish the income tax, the payroll tax, and replace it with a national sales tax, called the Fairtax.
2. To control spending, create a 10th Amendment Commission, would be a commission made up of a few politicians (national, state-level, and municipal) and Constitutional experts that would go through the current federal laws, statutes, regulations, bureaucracy, departments, budgets, etc.Everything that doesn’t meet the governmental restrictions found in the Constitution would be highlighted and reported to the President for his weekly television address (Tuesday nights on your local network affiliates). In these weekly addresses, the President will show the American people how their government is acting outside of the Supreme Law of the Land and he will demand that Congress to immediately cancel/slash/zero-out/get rid of/nuke these items.
3. Immigration. Enforce the laws that are on the books, and fine those that knowing hire illegal immigrants. However since there maybe some jobs that Americans won’t do, then you should
create an agency, that will have offices in northern Mexico. The employer will pay the agency, the agency will pay the migrant worker. When the employer stops paying the agency, unless another employer pays the agency for labor, the agency will stop paying the worker, and the worker will have to go home. Part of the employees wages will be withheld for healthcare. The migrant worker will be given a card, however this will not lead to citizenship. The card is used for healthcare, ID for employment, and for going to bars, and adult business.
4. We don’t need caps on lawsuits, instead we need loser pays. A lawyer should not be able to file a lawsuit, for over 60 million dollars, because his pants got missing at the dry cleaners. In certain cases, we do need very large lawsuit claims, like if a doctor doing circumcision, makes a mistake. So yes to loser pays, no to caps on lawsuits.
5. We need to get tough on countries that have very bad human rights records. China is persecuting Christians, Falun Gong, bloggers, and journalist. We should tell China, that it has 2 years to make changes, or they will face sanctions, or Tarriffs.
6. We need to lower gas prices. To lower gas prices, we need to build more refineries, and we need to stop making ethanol. If we have to, I suggest building fuel refineries on military bases. The fuel companies will pay the Government with a certain amount of fuel they produce. The reason to build fuel refineries on military bases, is because of NIMBYism,
7.Repeal the internet gambling ban. What a person does in their own home, with their own money, should not be the government’s business. Also most states have a lottery, and you can find casinos on Indian reservations, so the Federal Government is showing favoritism, toward states that have a lottery, and toward Indian reservations. After repealing the internet gambling ban, the Federal Government should welcome the owners of the gambling website’s, and allow them to set up their website’s in the U.S.
8. End all farm subsidies, but at the same time, the Federal Government should get off the farmers back. The government should not tell a farmer he can’t plow his field, or fill in a hole, because some endangered plant, or animal lives there. Most of the farmers that get subsidies, live in large cities, and do not get most of their income from farming. Also the U.S. should import its sugar, from South, and Central America. Europe should import its sugar from Africa.
9. Replace foreign aid, with trade. Instead of sending sacks of grain, we should instead develop trade relations with third world countries. Also, we should develop, what I would call an Economic Corps. The Economic Corps, will be made up of people that have owned, or operated a business. They will show them how to make their country prosperous, and attracted to business. The old way of, offering aid to third world countries only makes it worse, and makes the leaders of these countries wealthy.
10.Reform NASA. We first need to quit thinking of space, as just for science, or exploration, but instead, as a place that can be exploited for the benefit of the Earth. If NASA wants to send astronauts, to Earth orbit, or to the Moon, NASA should purchase launch flights to the Moon. Not only will this save NASA money, but it would also establish an Earth to Moon launch industry. Congress should also pass a bill, that would have the U.S. recognize lunar land claims by private industry. The business would have to build a base or settlement, and have it occupied for 1 year or more. While the U.S. would recognize, the claim, U.S. sovereignty would not extend to the Moon.
This is impossible with the current crop of political harlots in Congress, but I believe that a list of pros and cons, or a listing of who will be helped and how and who will be hurt and how, should be required to be a part of each bill voted on by the House and Senate that involves any tax changes, any appropriations over $10 B dollars, or changes to criminal or civil laws that can affect any person’s life, liberty, or property.
You probably need to file an Environmental Impacts Statement nowadays just to dig for worms to go fishing on most Federal lands, so why shouldn’t our elected representatives be required to clearly define and go on the record on the expected impacts of the bills they vote on? Maybe that’s one way to get them to read and understand the things.
Another tactic I recommend, for the media, is: At press conferences and all other opportunities, always ask the President, his Cabinet officers, and all Congresspersons and Senators to explain how bills if signed into law will affect themselves, their immediate families, and their closest friends. They will try to dodge, but over time the dodging will become a running embarrassment and eventually some honest and no-doubt revealing statements will come out.
gtex
Contract with America 2 (shorter version).
1. Read the Bill!
Pass, as soon as possible, a brevity amendment requiring all bills to be read aloud in Congress, in final form prior to passage.
2. Stop Growing the Fourth Branch of Government!
Restore the Constitutional role of the executive by allowing the President or his appointees to fire up to 6.5% of the Federal workforce per year, at will. (so after 8 years, the president could have fired no more than 42% of those who were in govt “service” at the beginning of his term. Surely meets the concern of limiting term-to-term turnover, but gives the president some actual power to run the executive branch.)
3. Restore the Constitution’s intent on titles of nobility and hereditary advantage!
Explicitly outlaw all forms of public affirmative action. Pass law ensuring that copyright terms end at the end of the original artists life or 40 years after creation, whichever is longer. (Why should I still owe Disney money for Sleeping Beauty when everyone who worked on it is dead for 30 years?)
4. Allow immigration while mandating assimilation!
Pass an amendment that all legislation, voting materials, ballots, and official government business (except education) shall be presented in common English.
Regarding space, I would like to see someone build a small O’Neill cylinder that would serve as habitation for interplanetary manned missions.
I would like to see the Constitution amended such that no law or regulation can take effect unless it has been read aloud in it’s entirety and with a quorum present throughout and voted on by each chamber of Congress. This both would ensure that Congress knows what it’s passing and would eliminate the practice of lawmaking by bureaucratic fiat.
Congress makes other do what they are not willing to do; be accountable for their actions.
They are accountable to the voters. If you’d like to make them more accountable, support:
* Public campaign financing, so they aren’t chasing contributions
* A larger House of Representatives, with multi-member districts and instant runoff voting, so that minority views are also represented
* Abolish the Senate, which is the least accountable and least representative body next to the Supreme Court
You can read Jim, and wonder what he narcotic he just took. Or you can just note that nothing he said holds elected representatives to the same laws they write, and thus acknowledging that Jim is just rambling off nonsense as usual.
How about more citizens doing their duty to be part of the government and vote. There is no need to change the Constitution.
nothing he said holds elected representatives to the same laws they write
They write the laws, according to the Constitution they can make those laws do whatever they want (within the Constitution). The thing that holds them accountable is our power to replace them.
Jim, you wrote:
* Public campaign financing, so they aren’t chasing contributions
* A larger House of Representatives, with multi-member districts and instant runoff voting, so that minority views are also represented
* Abolish the Senate, which is the least accountable and least representative body next to the Supreme Court
Only one that is interesting is point number 2. The other two are anathema to the US as it is constituted. I’d rather have well-audited private contributions. For example, as I recall half of Obama’s campaign contributions come from small (and hence unknown) contributors including significant amounts from overseas. Rather than put in public money, I’d rather know where that money really came from.
Another detail is who gets funding? Currently, it’s any major party that got significant votes in the last election. The problem here is that you risk setting up a dynamic where only the groups who qualified for public funding in the last election get public funding in the next election and raising a large barrier to entry for new parties (not that’s much different from today’s barriers to entry).
And for point 3, I believe the Senate is performing as desired in the Constitution. That seems far more than necessary a reason to retain the Senate as it is currently constituted. Jim, why aren’t you suggesting abolishing the Supreme Court?
The only one I’d be interested in is a multi-member districts for representatives. The only problem is that these would only be implementable for states that have more than one member in the House (a multi-member district that spans two or more states is anathema to the federal system we have).