Useful guidance for cleaning up our local districts. Good ‘boot camp’ in preparation for the national scene next.
If NY City can flush the corrupt Tammany Hall from their environs, certainly it can be accomplished throughout our land, piece by piece, a leg and an arm one by one. Don’t keep getting your “ethical frauds” from the same barrels. You don’t need a new party. Parties will form by themselves if needed. You need people with morality, and the commitment to honor his oath, people, and their rule of law. Sanction none with a safe harbor of exclusion. Start off with a coffee clutch with kindred spirits, maybe? Do it once and you’ll be on a roll. Others will follow.
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Submitted by Free Oregon:
You cannot reform a system if the reformers are dishonest with themselves and with others. It seems even those with the best of intentions ultimately succumb.
As a society we also are locked into an "enforcement" mindset, i.e., force and violence. In truth force and violence lead to more force and violence - everything from banditry to war. They are the least effective ways to change behavior and achieve a peaceful, productive society.
What's needed short term:
1. No one who has been a prosecutor can become a judge. No one who has been a prosecutor can hold public office. The mindset is authoritarian. The expectation is you can achieve anything by passing a law and applying force and violence to achieve your purpose.
2. Laymen qualify to be judges. This used to be the system. It did not achieve greater honesty, but it did achieve greater common sense and created the potential for a more adversarial system in which the judges were under scrutiny. In New Jersey the "reforms" of 1948 did away with lay judges and left the corruption to the lawyers. The Bar Associations are supposed to discipline the lawyers but of course the most corrupt, hypocritical lawyers and politicians run the bar associations.
3. No career politicians. I'd advocate short terms of office but probably that would lead to corrupt people figuring they only have a year to grease their palms and get theirs. Am I cynical?
FreeOregon
