A Sensible Plan to Reform Congress Now

Pick a poll, any poll.
Odds are the majority will complain the United States is “going down the wrong path.”
And complaining about the messed up politicians is like complaining about the weather.  “You can’t do anything about it!”
Or can you?
Charles R. Hooper thinks you can do something about it.  Not the weather, but the messed up state of affairs in the United States.
His book “The Next American Revolution: How to Demand Congressional Reform Now” outlines a sensible plan to reform an out of control government that could doom the republic to failure.
Hooper points out Congress seems to listen to itself first.  Not the people.
It also listens to money.  The money thrown at it by self  interests who have placed themselves above the common good.
He calls for restoring the representational aspects of government.  A good start, Hooper argues, is to limit the terms of service in Congress.  Let people serve a few years in government, and then go back among the public to live under the laws and regulations enacted by government.
We now have a Congress that passed the Affordable Care Act - but exempted itself from the act.  It passed and oversees Social Security - but awards itself lavish pensions and benefits instead of applying Social Security to itself after leaving government.  This reviewer adds Congress is so corrupt it even exempts itself from insider trading enforcement.
Hooper also believes the contentious two-party monopoly that again people complain about can be fixed with a simple solution.  He suggests reducing the number of Congressional districts within states and then allowing people to stand election for the same overall number of House seats.  The difference is that the winners would be determined by cumulative voting.  In other words, if 26 people sought to win say 12 seats within just three districts within a state, the winners would be the top four vote getters in each district.  Much less gerrymandering to preserve seats for one party or the other.  It also allows parties with alternative views a chance to have more say in government.
These are just some of the gems of thought in Hooper’s 84-page book (plus a brief  epilogue, the U S Constitution and an index.
But then Hooper becomes “controversial” because of how he suggests reform should come about.   Hooper says an amendment convention to consider these reforms should be held.
Researching history, Hooper points out all 50 states at one time or another in the past two centuries have called for an amendment convention as outlined in Article V of the Constitution.
But The Congress, Hooper argues, has acted unconstitutionally by failing to respond to these calls for reform amendments.
Many of us have already heard the reasons against common people convening to suggest reforms (which Congress would have to vote on to approve).
Fear mongers say an Article V convention would spin out of control and destroy everything.
How?
Hooper points out an Article V convention would simply suggest reforms to make government more workable and honest and representative.
The real threat here is not to the republic, if terms were limited and voting became more representatives and if the polarizing two party monopoly was weakened.
The real threat is to Congressional representatives who think their government job should be for life (presumably because they have the experience to understand things better.  But that is not working out, the reviewer notes.)
Term limits and cumulative voting also threatens lobbyists and arm twisters who get paid a lot of money to make Congress do its will and not that of the people.
Another crucial piece of reform is to greatly restrict if not eliminate campaign contributions.
And this sends up a howl from the television industry, which gorges on attack ads every two years.
And it threatens the concept that faceless corporations are like people.
Except that while corporations and foreign lobbies can use their money to get the U S into a war, the corporations and foreign interests do not die on the battlefields.  American citizens do.
Time to make our foreign affairs truly accountable.
It is now a good idea to blow away the smoke and shatter the mirrors.  And take a real good look at how bad American government now is.  How far off course it has gone since the 1960s.
Charles R. Hooper is not just complaining about it. He has outlined some common sense ways to fix it.
His book is a constitutional way to fix the problem.  Don’t wait until the people in charge resort to more unconstitutional behavior.