If I was President for a Day…

If I was President for a Day…

(I started this in another thread with lots of awesome ideas, but I thought I would start a new thread so you could beat this up more directly :-) )

Here are the issues I would address, goals, and expected outcomes:

The two largest challenges to world civilization are climate change and income inequality. Left unchecked these two threats amplify each other to bring civil unrest that will lead to civilization collapse, let alone the dire ecological damage.

With the bulk of the world’s weapons, largest market, greatest wealth, GDP and carbon emissions, what the USA does controls the world.

Thus, to fix the world’s problems, fix the USA first.

All laws expire in 25 years, unless by super majority calls for their early expiration along the lines of an Amendment

#1 Issue - Return the USA to a Representative Republic - Eliminate the Oligarchy Control

Expected Outcome – preserve the balance between a Democracy and the dangers of Majority Rules and go back to what our Founders had designed. Corporations are eliminated from political society and focus on just maximizing profits from their goods and services. Corruption is reduced by strict controls on campaign finance, and raising the pay of politicians to the point that corruption does not pay.

Laws to Address -

Eliminate all corporate spending on political speech. Corporations are denied the 1st Amendment to express political views.

Eliminate PACs and Super PACs. Only individuals can donate to politicians directly. Individuals are limited to $2,000 a year for all political contributions.

All political donations are transparent and open to any citizen for search and review.

Corporations that violate the law, lose their corporate charter - assets are distributed to debt holders and shareholders with an immediate 50% one-time tax penalty

Individuals that violate the donation laws get 5 years

Gerrymandering is eliminated - use an algorithmic approach to voting districts

All national voting days are national holidays

Vote in a national election - get paid $200

Standardized voting machines nation-wide

Equal pay amendment

Eliminate Voter ID laws designed to disenfranchise women and minorities

Allow Puerto Rico to become a State, they pay taxes, the bleed in our wars, they are citizens

Any immigrant who has worked and paid taxes for 10 years is granted citizenship as long as they are free from a felon record

All national voting is open for 30 days, and online voting is mandatory

Exit polls are used to audit the polls - deviations cause investigations - tampering with the voting process carries 20 years

Churches that perform political speech lose their designation as a Church and are considered a Corporation that violated campaign finance laws

Supreme Court justices limited to 20 years

Increase political pay to match market rate in order to minimize attraction of corruption:

* Barred from serving in private industry in any capacity that has impact on public policy during pension term

* House of Representative - $1m a year salary, 10 years pension

* Senate - $10m a year salary, 20 years pension

* Cabinet Secretary - $25m a year salary, 2- years pension

* President of the United States - $100m a year salary, life pension

* Penalty is forfeiture of pension, and 10 years in prison

#2 - Maximize Economic Opportunity and Reduce Income Inequality

Close all tax loopholes that allow corporations and ultra wealthy to keep profits offshore and untaxed. This will deliver $300million+ of additional revenues.

No income tax on income < $100k – most efficient promotion of economic expansion

No payroll taxes on income < $100k – most efficient promotion of economic expansion

Eliminate High-Frequency trading – all stocks must be held for at least 10 seconds before changing hands

Carried Interest is taxed at the highest income tax rate – not long term capital gains

Founding entrepreneurs that create companies may sell their first $5M of stock at 0% tax rate to reward creating companies and jobs. Amounts above $5M are taxed at 20%.

Long-term capital gains are taxed at 0% for incomes < $300k this is to reward saving

Long-term capital gains above $300k follow the same schedule as earned income rates

Short-term capital gains are taxed at 60% this is to reward longer term investment

Estate tax is 50% on estates > $5M. Address all loopholes with lifetime giving

All cash transactions > $1k carry a 0.25% tax

Eliminate too big to fail. Separate Retail Banking, Commercial Banking and Investment banking again. No government bailouts for investment banks, hedge funds or any other exotic financial entity. FDIC insurance for retail banking.

Like a house property tax, all wealth > $5m whether liquid or not is taxed at 2% annually. For illiquid assets payment in cash is delayed until liquidity, but interest at the Prime rate accrues.

Tax rates on income > $100k are increased to be revenue neutral after all of the above tax policies net out. With the 2% tax on wealth, the top marginal rates would only need to be about 25% a huge savings for all honest tax payers that have strong earnings

All companies with annual revenues > $10m a year that import more than 20% of their products or materials must show that their imports meet US labor codes – burden of proof is on the company. Companies that use all USA or 80% USA are exempt from this requirement

#3 – Change the Charter of the Department of Defense – Real Defense

DOD now is charged with space colonization, climate change and nation building. The DoD used to have a budget of $200m a year. Now it is $800m a year. Take that increase of $600m and direct it into long term infrastructure that addresses climate change, space colonization and nation building – all of these will ensure that the USA is safe for generations – AND it has enough money being spent so as to not existentially threaten the powerful lobbies centered on the defense industry. Actual war-fighting becomes a minority function.

Space Colonization – go for a matching funds model – increase spending to $50B a year, where every dollar must be matched by private industry.

Climate Change – War on Carbon – $500B a year. Nationalize the Coal and Oil Power plants and buy them from current shareholders and retire them over 10 years. Make this a War Effort on the order of WW2, and build new Solar, Wind, Geothermal, Hydro, Wave, and any other green renewable to replace carbon power plants in 10 years. Direct the bulk of this manufacturing to occur in the states that are major producers of coal and states with devastated manufacturing economies and repair unemployment. Draft Elon Musk to be direct this $500B a year spend for 8 year term. This should be an exciting ball of money for companies to compete for. Lockheed, Boeing and all the usual defense contractors are perfectly setup to create these products just as much as weapon systems.

Gasoline and Diesel have a $0.25 per gallon tax increase every quarter until phased out naturally from economic forces. Revenue to the DoD for Climate Change expenditures.

Plant trees as a jobs program/carbon sink two-for-one: find the best tree planter to partner with a strong public policy designer and plant the first trees in 90 days.

Nation Building - $50B a year. Draft Bill Gates to direct this spend for an 8 year term. Address civil unrest from climate change on the global scale.

#4 – Life, Liberty and Pursuit of Happiness

Nationalize healthcare - pattern off of European and East Asian models - luxury medicine is handled by private industry - frees businesses and individuals up from existential worry. No more medical debt for non-luxury medical spends. Boots the economy by 10% by freeing up companies to focus on products and services and eliminates 10% of GDP waste from the insurance industry

Raise the national minimum wage to $1 per quarter until the minimum wage is equal to what it should have been if indexed to inflation and corporate profitability since 1970. E.g. $11 in 2015, $15 in 2016, $19 in 2016, $23 in 2017, and $27 in 2018 would have it caught up. This eliminates public subsidies for industries that pay below living wages and push the burden to other tax payers to fund this gap.

Maximum Interest rates - 20% over the Fed prime Rate - any interest rates that exceed this rate are usury and punished as a felony. Corporate liability protection does not apply and all officers and shareholders over 5% are directly liable. Eliminate predatory pay-day lenders that are reducing economic growth.

Student loan interest rates are caped at the Prime Rate

Student loan debt returns to being discharge in a bankruptcy

Any student that completes a 4-year accredited university receives a payment of $5k a year for 4 years, for a 2 year degree, $5k for 2 years. But only on graduation. The private market can create loans and attach liens on these payments. But if the student does not graduate, the lender has no recourse.

Privately owned and operate for profit prisons are eliminate. Current shareholders are compensated at a fixed price like eminent domain applied to real estate.

Drug possession is decriminalized and all currently serving prisons are released and paid minimum wage for time served

Marijuana as a recreational drug is re-classified with the same regulations as alcohol. Same commercial opportunities and responsibilities.

Handguns and assault rifles require private insurance with minimum liability of $1m per injury and $10m per death. Hunting rifles and shotguns are exempt from private insurance requirements. No private gun sales, all sales must pass background and mental health checks. Failure to obtain insurance and legal transfer is 20 years in prison, and $10k bounty for tipsters. Michael J Steele is drafted to recommend the remaining gun handling laws.

4 years after the passage of the Gun Reforms, the police must demilitarize and meet European and Asian standards.

No GMO patents. No software patents. No business method patents. Eliminates the evil business practices of Monsonto while preserving the benefits that GMOs can bring. Eliminates patent trolls that are stifling innovation rather than promoting it – which is what patents were designed to deliver.

Marriage only requires the consent of the adults getting married. All benefits and obligations are recognized nationwide – not variance by state.

Disallow the creating of industrial farming greater than $20M a year in annual sales. Impose taxes on large scale monoculture over 100 acres. Draft the country’s best Permaculture agriculture specialist to refine, Gordon Walton to recommend.

Originally posted on Facebook on June 03, 2014.