Fix Our Broken System
Our political system features numerous anti-democratic policies that are specifically designed to prevent the most oppressed sectors of our society from participating in the electoral process. Students and young people, African-Americans, poor people, and the elderly all face tremendous barriers, such as voter ID laws, disenfranchisement of ex-offenders, and restrictive residency requirements, among others. All Americans are affected to some degree by these policies, and our entire society suffers as a result. WE MUST FIX OUR BROKEN SYSTEM!
Ballot Access Reform
Ballots exist so that voters can choose who they want. But our ballot access laws actually TAKE AWAY voters’ choices The U.S. has made some progress over the years in enfranchising citizens who had been denied the right to vote, such as women, blacks, and poor people. However, we have been going backward when it comes to ensuring that, once someone has a ballot in hand, they are able to use that right to vote for someone they actually support. There are a number of reasons for that. However, the most basic reason, and probably the one people are least aware of, is our ballot access laws.
In the 1896 general election, every single congressional district in the nation had at least two candidates on the ballot. The average district had 3.1 candidates on the ballot. Today many Congressional incumbents and candidates have no opposition at all, as do many down-ballot candidates. The modern-day voter’s choice is even more limited in state legislative races. In 2012, about one-third of all state House and Senate candidates ran unopposed.
Our ballot access laws are so bad that even Democrats and Republicans can’t field candidates in quite a few races. However, these laws generally place far more restrictions on third parties.
Very few people are aware of the ballot access problem in the United States. Each state writes its own ballot access laws, even for federal office. Since there is no single standard for the whole nation, the public and even the media are ignorant about ballot access laws. By contrast, the campaign spending laws (for federal office) are uniform for the entire nation, leading to campaign spending laws for federal office being familiar to the press and most political activists.
Unfortunately, the US Supreme Court has a rather erratic record when it comes to decisions regarding the constitutionality of ballot-access laws. While the court has, on occasion, upheld challenges to restrictive requirements, it has at other times ignored these same decisions.
Open Political Debates
Voters learn about candidates through various sources: advertising, editorial coverage in the media, endorsements and personal contact. Debates are considered an extremely important part of this mix. Debates are often the only chance voters have to compare candidates side by side, and see them respond to questions in real time. Popular incumbents try to avoid them. Challengers push for them. Voters generally want to see more of them, and want more candidates to be included.
For third party candidates, who typically don’t get much media coverage and can’t compete with the major parties’ ad budgets, debates are everything.
But the two major parties generally control debates. Not only do they do everything in their power to keep meaningful issues from being addressed, they try mightily, and usually succeed, in keeping third party candidates out. SIGN OUR PETITION NOW to open the debate.
Money In Politics: the sad state of affairs
Today, new forms of big money undermine American democracy. Citizens United and other court rulings obliterated a century of campaign finance laws. Now a handful of special interests threaten to dominate political funding, often through Super PACs and shadowy nonprofits. Public trust in government has plummeted.
The drive to allow ever-larger campaign contributions rolls on to what seems like new heights of absurdity, everywhere you look. The “Cromnibus” must-pass spending bill that went to Congress in December 2014 included (on page 1,599 of 1,603, and never mentioned in public before) a ten-fold increase in the amount of money people can give to party committees.
The legislation allows a single individual to contribute to each national party’s three committees a total of $777,600 per year or $1,555,200 per two-year election cycle. It allows a couple to contribute to these committees a total of $1,555,200 per year or $3,110,400 per two-year cycle.
One-tenth of one percent of all tax returns in 2011 showed income of a million dollars or more (about 235,000 people). So there are very few people who could possibly hit these new campaign contribution limits. Only two-tenths of one percent of all Americans donate to Federal campaigns at all.
Americans want campaign finance reform
Seventy-five percent of Americans feel there is too much money in politics, and only 25 percent feel there is an intrinsic right to unfettered election spending, an argument commonly used by opponents of controls on campaign finance. Almost the same proportion – 76 percent – feel that the amount of money in elections has given rich people more influence than other Americans, a 2012 Reuters survey found. Republicans were somewhat less likely to hold these beliefs than Democrats or independents, but a strong majority of Republicans nonetheless agreed.
The Best Alternative; Instant Runoff Voting (IRV)
IRV is a “fair voting” option for single-seat races. IRV allows all voters to vote for their favorite candidate, while avoiding the fear of helping elect their least favorite candidate. IRV allows “third parties” to compete in elections without losing potential supporters to the fear of “spoiling.” It could demonstrate the TRUE level of support for the Green Party and our issues, helping us build power to enact our political agenda.
Compared to traditional runoff elections, IRV saves tax dollars spent on unnecessary elections, ensures winners have broader support than plurality elections, and elects winners when turnout is highest, rather than in separate run-off elections where turnout is typically extremely low.
IRV is used in local elections in Cambridge (MA) and some local offices in Minneapolis (MN), among other spots in the US.
IRV allows voters to rank candidates in order of preference (i.e. first, second, third, fourth and so on). Voters have the option to rank as many or as few candidates as they wish. If no candidate gets a majority on the first round, a series of “runoffs” are simulated, using voters’ preferences as indicated on their ballots. After the vote, first choices are tabulated. The candidate who receives the fewest first choice rankings is eliminated.
All ballots are then re-tabulated, with each ballot that ranked the now-eliminated candidate first, now counting as a vote for that voter’s SECOND choice.
The weakest candidates are successively eliminated, and their voters’ ballots are added to the totals of their next choices. Once the field is reduced to two, the candidate with the majority of votes wins.
Check out this YouTube video by MPR on IRV.
From: http://www.gp.org/fix_our_broken_system
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