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NeoNote — Campaign finance reform redux

My idea for campaign finance reform.

You can't contribute to a campaign unless you reside in the area affected by the campaign. No one from Phoenix could contribute to a city council election in Tucson, no one from California could contribute to a proposition in Nevada, and so on.

No anonymous contributions. A current public list of all contributions must be maintained.

Any unused funds must be returned proportionally to all contributors or to a specified charity. If someone contributed .01% of the campaign's funding, then they would receive .01% of any monies left over.

Violating any of these rules would render a candidate legally unable to serve in any public office until the end of term for the office they ran for. If they ran for Senate, violation would make them ineligible for six years. In the case of a ballot proposition, the election would be voided and must be held again.



Money is not speech. No matter what the USSC says.

If they want to spend money, they can do so in their own home. If they want to speak against someone, they can do that where ever and when ever. But someone in Idaho doesn't have to live with the aftermath of an election in Illinois.



It's part of my SUPER SECRET PLAN TO DESTROY THE POLITICAL PARTIES.

Don't tell anyone.



People forget that the party system wasn't created by the Constitution. Yet they essentially control the nomination process. Take the cash flow and war chests and political action groups away and the parties collapse.

All without arguing over if cash is free speech.

Oh, and banning corporate campaign contributions. And union contributions. And political "matching funds."

*grins*



Money isn't speech any more than money is press. Money is a tool, a way of keeping score, and power, but it is not speech.

If money was really speech, there would be no legal limit to campaign donations.

If someone has more money, does that mean they have a bigger right of free speech or a bigger right of the press? If that is the case, we might as well do away with elections and just hold auctions.

It's telling that prior to campaign finance "reform," no one thought otherwise. It's also telling that the CFR was used to restrict speech.

Just because the law says something doesn't mean it's so. I'm still convinced that anyone born with a penis is a male.

Under my proposal, there are two restrictions on donating money. You have to be a voter and you have to reside in the area affected by the election. These are the two restrictions that every other proposed form of campaign finance reform tries to do away with.
NeoNotes are the selected comments that I made on other boards, in email, or in response to articles where I could not respond directly.

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Friday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Charity instead of trash

“Instead of Trashing Groceries During Cooler Malfunction, Store Donates 35,000 Pounds of Food”

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Thursday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Tuesday roundup

Israel to formally announce intent to leave UNESCO

Although I am not a blind supporter of Israel, there is no other nation that has been vilified for so little reason.

University of Minnesota Retracts Restrictions on Christmas Decorations

“In a memo sent by the University of Minnesota earlier this month, staff was told that Santa and Christmas tree decorations were “not appropriate” for campus buildings.”

Santa Calls It Quits

Parody

Cities, volunteers clash over feeding homeless in public

It's not charity unless it's Officially Approved

How Opaque Healthcare Pricing Mechanisms Rip Off Consumers

Or How Government Conspires to Keep Medical Costs High

Wrong-footing the NYPD

Going through the motions without fixing the problems

Christmas 2017: Why I'm Hopeful



Who Regulates Bitcoin Trading? No U.S. Agency Has Jurisdiction

No regulation is not necessarily a bad thing

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Tuesday roundup

The Big Con: The Truth Behind Net Neutrality and Why the Sky Is Not Falling

“Net neutrality was the government’s response to an actual problem. As usual, their response ignored the problem completely.”

The Modern Art Of Pervs

Changing mores and the sexualization of children

The secret backstory of how Obama let Hezbollah off the hook

“How Hezbollah turned to trafficking cocaine and laundering money through used cars to finance its expansion.” So Obama let them break the law. I don't agree with the War on Drugs, but the President should uphold the law.

CDC director says there are ‘no banned words’ at the agency

Well, I fell for this one too. I should know by now that the really bad stuff about Trump seldom turns out true. Also No, the CDC did not ban a list of words

Since Feeding the Homeless is Now Illegal, A Group Carried AR15s to Give Out Food—It Worked

Unsanctioned, unofficial charity.

The Other Tech Bubble

The ugliness behind the startup culture.

In Legalizing Marijuana, Uruguay Trips over the Dollar, US Laws, and Global Banks

or “Why Drug Lords Love the Patriot Act.”

3 Reasons Millennials Should Consider Ditching Karl Marx for Ayn Rand

“Karl Marx doesn’t align with what’s important to Millennials.”

Jedi Mind Trick: The Disturbing, Destabilizing Abnormal Is Now Normal

Change means disrupting the system. And there's plenty of disruption.

Is Your Cell Phone Protected by the Constitution?

The Supreme Court will decide, and it doesn't look good.

‘We Made This (Harassment) Law Up From The Beginning And Now We’ve Won’

Deliberately screwing up society.

Comey Should Be Indicted

It was obvious months ago, but now it's a given. It won't happen though. Indicting Comey is one step closer to HRC. And indicting HRC is one step closer to Barack Obama.

Right Wing Extremism vs. Islamic Extremism in the United States: A Look at the Numbers

Debunking the claim that most terrorism in the US is carried out by the right wing.

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Charity vending machines

“LDS Church unveils charity vending machines on Temple Square”

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Charity

If I choose to give, that is charity and can be celebrated. If I am manipulated or threatened into giving, that is extortion. I don't care how good the cause is, if I am required to give without my consent, that threatens my freedom. I shouldn't be tricked into it “for my own good” or “for the greater good.” I want to know WHY, and I want an honest answer. I demand the choice to walk away.
     — NeoWayland
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Unity liberty charity

Unity in things Necessary, Liberty in things Unnecessary, and Charity in all.
     — Richard Baxter
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Fix health care

Taxing Hospitals Is a Lousy Way to Fix Health Care

But if that’s the case, then the best solution is probably to stop subsidizing it, not to make the subsidy more complex. A lot of the current mess in the American health-care system can be traced back to the thicket of hidden subsidies and fiddling regulations we’ve enacted over the years, trying to fine-tune the system into some platonic ideal where nothing ever goes wrong and no one ever makes an unseemly amount of money. But fine tuning has not delivered us the platonic ideal of anything, except perhaps the word “dysfunction.” It might be time to step back and rethink our approach.

We might start by asking ourselves, “Why are hospitals tax exempt in the first place?” When the income tax was first levied, giving hospitals nonprofit status made sense, because these organizations did largely act as charities. Over the succeeding decades, however, the government decided that it didn’t want to rely on charities for charity care, and enacted a series of programs that financed such care with government dollars.

In an ideal world, perhaps hospitals would have gratefully accepted those dollars, and redirected the money they’d been spending on treating patients to cover gaps in the system, like dental care (woefully underprovided either by charity or government fiat). But we do not live in the ideal world. The difference between a charity hospital and its for-profit brethren has shrunk smaller and smaller, and by now, seems too small to justify treating them as charities.
     — Megan McArdle

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NeoNotes — The screws

Almost nobody bothers to ask if the screws should exist in the first place.

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“Not Yours to Give”

If it’s true, it could destroy the government.

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☆ The special asterisk is a multiplier

Keep law simple and absolute.

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Who decides?

"Lessons" I don't agree with from a progressive list

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FAQ-KYFHO: Keep Your Freakin' Hands OFF!

Guess which word the popular version uses. It is not Freakin'

A work in progress. Comments and suggestions are welcome.

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