1) The tax code. We need a far more equitable tax code where those who get the most benefit out of the American economy also pay the largest amount of the tax burden. ‘To whom more is given, more is required.’
2) Elimination of Super Pacs and an absolute limit on the amount of money that could be spent on an election. In order to accomplish this we also need a shorter campaigning season, say, no more than 6 months for a national office and no more than 3 months for state or local office.
3) Term limits for Senators and Congressmen, but longer terms for Congressmen, say four years.
4) No pork barrel addendums to otherwise good bills allowed in Congressional legislation.
5) Actual reporting of news, both nationally and locally. We are all beyond tired of the insanity of simply reporting car accidents, robberies, fashion trends and other trivial matters, while little or absolutely nothing is said about world news and how it impacts America. This is remarkably shortsighted considering we do indeed live in a global economy and a global village these days and what happens in Greece affects us all. One of the worst offenders at reporting non-news as news is CNN. Instead they report conjecture, possibilities, opinions rather than facts. Of course Fox news is just as bad from another angle, deliberately reporting everything from a very conservative slant. So much for unbiased or relevant reporting in both cases.
6) A complete revamp of the fast food industry. In an age where almost 40% of all Americans are clinically obese, and about half of those are morbidly obese it is time for the fast food industry to take responsibility for the punking or should I say porking of America. I suggest the hospital and pill bills be sent to them to pay. Watch the documentary ‘Super Size Me’.
7) A complete banning of the use of hand held phones and texting by drivers of automobiles with stiff penalties for violations. This is insanity on wheels.
8) We have a legal drinking age, apparently we need also a legal gaming age, say 21 for some of the obscenely violent video games turning the minds of our teens and twenty-somethings to mush.
9) More bipartisan efforts to rebuild the infra-structure of America. Our roads, and bridges and tunnels, etc. are desperately in need of repair, and since we are so dependent on trucks and cars, and since most forms of mass transit never get outside of towns, we must do something and soon. This ought to be something everyone in Congress could agree on.
10) Apparently we need far more regulations on banks and on Wall Street who seem regularly to be able to throw away billions, and pass the bill on to ordinary customers. We need to look at some of the way fiscally much more conservative countries deal with such matters.
11) Far less money spent on the military industrial complex and its industries and far more on education and normal job creation.
12) More reliance on NATO and other such organizations instead of America trying to be the world’s policemen all by ourselves.
13) The banning of completely false advertising, such as all the nonsense on TV these days about clean coal. There is no such product. There are no factories in America that produce such a product. We need to get entirely AWAY from fossil fuels which ruin our environment and while we are at it away from nuclear energy since we have no answer to the danger questions or to what to do with nuclear waste. Instead, we need massive investment in alternative clean energy sources such as solar and wind and hydro-electric. It is time for us to stop being so short-sighted. Even at best fossil fuels will not solve our long term energy problems.
14) The revamping of the whole way we handle the illegal immigrant issue. On the one hand it’s obvious that we continue to need blue collar workers and so it should be possible for Hispanics and others willing to do such work, to work their way to citizenship in a reasonable amount of time. On the other hand, it is absolutely necessary that we have enforceable laws when it comes to entering this country legally. A person should not be able to break in line in front of those who have followed the legal procedures for entering the country and becoming citizens, simply because they have been working here for a considerable period of time.
15) As Jesus once said, ‘what good is it if you gain the whole world and lose your soul’. Applied to education, it will do us no good to be much better at math and science, if we are totally ignorant of great literature, can’t write a decent term paper, and have no interest in becoming an articulate and thoughtful and literate human being. In short, we need more emphasis on the humanities and not just on the sciences and math. We need as many people who know Greek as those who know geek.
16) Enough with the stupid Viagra etc. ads. This amounts to pouring gasoline on an already towering inferno of lust among sex crazed males in a sex obsessed culture. You are not helping the situation drug companies!! A sin tax should be imposed on all such drugs, like the sin tax on cigarettes.
17) Enough with the ‘newest is the truest and the latest is the greatest attitude’. This just fuels obsessive buying of stuff we don’t really need.
18) There should be penalties for advertizing products that are hazardous to human health and well being, for example, for advertising pornography and prostitution. Major TV networks (are you listening ESPN) who advertise such things under cover of late hours darkness should be fined for every ad shown.
19) Enough with major sports unions ruining college sports. For example, the NBA player’s union has refused to agree to a rule that would keep athletes who enroll in college there for at least two years (see the NFL agreement by comparison). We don’t need any more rent-a-players in college basketball who don’t even pretend like they are student-athletes. They do not represent the college they play for. They are simply show-casing themselves for professional scouts (are you listen U.K. and coach Calipari?).
20) We could do with a lot fewer ‘personal injury’ ambulance chasing lawyers who give good lawyers a bad name. And America needs to take some reality pills in regard to its ‘entitlement’ mentality, a mentality that just fuels frivolous litigation.
I could easily come up with another top twenty, but let’s fix these things first. I’m thinking we should be able to get all this done in time for Christmas (and yes, I do believe in Santa Claus :).
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