General Elections: Reform

So we talked about reforming primaries and caucuses yesterday, but what about the general election.  If you read yesterday's issue "Primary and Caucus: Reform" you would probably think that that is a great idea for general election reform too (assuming you read it and that you liked it).  But alas, that is not optimal for a general election.  Yes, voting via the internet would work, but unlike the aforementioned proposal where the site allowed you to change your vote all the way up and to the day before a cutoff date for a particular candidate, the reform I propose here would not have such a luxury.  So what would this reform entail?

For one, Election Day would be moved to Saturday to ensure that people who have to vote by the traditional ballot system would have greater access to the polls.  With respect to voting via the internet, if the States allow it (States make the rules on how votes are to be cast or counted, while the Federal government looks to prevent corruption) it too will be limited to a single day.  In both instances the day can be first Saturday of November which will also double as a holiday that mandates all businesses and government offices save those implementing the election will be off from work.  So while this reform will not completely eliminate the need for absentee ballots or even early voting it will help with the eventual removal of these potential sources of corruption (sometimes these ballots are mysteriously found when an election is too close to call).  If using an online voting system, your driver's license number, or your social security number which aids in showing where you live and thus your eligibility to vote will be required to log in along with a series of challenge questions to insure that you are in fact who you say you are.  The Federal, State and local governments will all conduct their elections on this same day to ensure maximum turnout.  Also, special elections (where people retire before their terms are up, or otherwise removed from office) would be eliminated wherever possible so as to not disrupt this system.  An example would be having a one of two U.S. Senators leave office, thus rather than one being appointed by the governor of their State as a temporary replacement the other sitting Senator would get two votes instead of one.  Another possible example to be rid of special elections is if a local legislator is arrested and forcibly removed, if there is no votes scheduled between the legislators removal and the election, then no special election will be allowed to take place.  These are obviously two hypotheticals, but the idea is to keep the choices of who gets elected in the hands of the people and prevents as much influence by the parties and the governments in that special election as possible.

Another potential reform is a runoff election.  Say there is more than two candidates who are eligible to run after July 31st.  As such a series of runoff elections would take place on the first Saturday of September and October where candidates with less than 10% of the vote will be dropped after the first round of voting, then only the top two candidates with the two highest percentages of votes will be allowed to stay in the race after the second round of voting if there is still more than two candidates left by this point in time.  These runoffs will be based on total number of votes received, while the final vote will use the traditional Electoral College system.  Thus we almost completely eliminate the chances of a third group running in the General election and thus siphoning off votes from a potentially better candidate.  

You may be wondering why I do not remove the Electoral College.  Simple, the Electoral College acts as a filter in my opinion to prevent tyranny of the majority.  While it is fine to have a majority vote in a runoff election, we as people are prone to rash actions and judgments.  As such, the Electoral College helps to filter that out as each State has its own population sizes and cultures.  So you could say that it prevents a tyranny of the majority by the voters of New York, California and other coastal States which host a majority of the population of the United States as compared to the smaller States which even together may not even have a population size coming anywhere close to that of New York's and California's combined.  Basically, if we did our election system by majority rule the Candidates would visit exclusively New York, Texas, California, and Florida (and maybe a few others) thus winning because of the vast population sizes of these States.  In short, you would disenfranchise every voter in Alaska, North Dakota and more.  Therefore it acts as a balancer even if the winner does not achieve a victory in the popular vote.

Conclusion:  These are some basic reforms, but of course some will need a Constitutional change, and others like internet voting and making Election Day a national holiday take simple but only semi hard to achieve votes in Congress, and the State and local governments.  So about half the reforms here are feasible as is.  Any case, hope you like the reforms and personally I am in favor of internet cast ballots that you can cast anywhere in the world that there is an internet connection.  Some States have already begun to move in that direction and I look forward to seeing how far they will take it.

Primaries and Caucus: Reform

If you watched the news or participated in a political primary or caucus, you would know that it is filled with long lines and depending on your State can be annoying or difficult to vote in.  So what are some reforms that can take place to make this process less painful?  

The reform I can think of primarily revolves around the amount of time it takes to pick a candidate.  Now, I am not going to say have all the States vote all in one day.  The reason being is that the process being so lengthy is beneficial so as to prevent rash decision making.  You see, if it were not for the amount of time it takes to choose a candidate in this election year, we would have a battle against Hillary and Trump as opposed to a possible battle with Sanders and Cruz for the nomination.  So we need it to take a while to finalize who will be the candidates in both political parties.  Also, part of this little issue of time is that in some States candidates are still on the ballots even after they have pulled out of the race, in part, due to the fact that they paid for their names to be there.  As such the internet can provide us with a wonderful solution.  

With the internet we can set up an online voting system for nominating people for political races.  What it would entail is a system that allows people to vote from January 1st of an election year to July 31st. In this time people can vote or even change their votes for candidates as they see fit all the way up until the July 31st deadline thus combining an element of caucuses into the system.  This insures that a person's vote is not locked into a candidate who may turn out later to be a big jerk (Trump and Hillary), or if their candidate dropped out of the race (Rubio and Carson), they can then throw support behind their second choice or even third choice.  Additionally, this ends the need for early and absentee voting with respect to primaries and caucuses especially as absentee and early voting can be used as part of manipulating the vote in favor of one candidate or another. Basically, it reduces the amount of possible corruption involved.  To top it off, it even allows new candidates to enter the race during the election season, but a cut off would have to be implemented where no new candidates may enter past say May 1st as we will need time to get to know the candidates so as to prevent nominating people on emotion rather than logic and reason.  But how would this system work and where would the delegates who have the final say on who runs in each party come in?

So we will not eliminate the State by State system at all (so you are still voting as a member of your party, but also as a citizen of the State in which you live).  In fact we will keep it where you win a number of delegates per State, but they are awarded at the July 31st voting cut off all at once.  The role of delegates would change though as they would act as a tiebreaker if no one candidate achieves a 50% plus one majority by the end of voting  In other words, there will be one or more delegate per State and U.S. territory.  Whoever wins more than half of those is declared the winner and thus has the nomination and the parties support.  However, as stated, some or all the candidates may not achieve that majority, thus delegates vote in a convention held at the very end of the nomination cycle to confirm the best out of the top two or three candidates who achieved the most wins (three if the next best two are tied or are so close in the number of wins per State that they can be considered tied, otherwise all other candidates are dropped from being considered).  Now how do we prevent people from screwing around with this system?

For one, each person will receive a national membership code from the political parties, and should even be able to change party affiliation at any time, but if they have voted as a Republican and switched to being a Democrat for example, then their vote for that Republican candidate will be nullified unless they switch back, but at that point their voting for the other candidate on the Democratic side will be nullified.  This switching back and forth will stop being allowed during the May 1st through July 31st dates so as to provide stability to the voting process as no new candidates are allowed at this point. It provides stability by preventing ideologues from manipulating the vote in favor of their candidate by switching parties to vote for the weaker candidates of the opposing party.  Anyhow, back to that membership code.  The code itself will indicate first and foremost which State you are currently living in, your age, sex, gender, and race.  The reason for this is partly to allow the parties to analyze your demographic, but also makes it harder for a person to pretend to be you as a series of challenge questions may ask these things and more to confirm if you are in fact you.  This helps to prevent voter fraud at least with respect to someone pretending to be you if they for whatever reason get your code (the code can also be your social security number or driver's license number depending on what is easier).  The political parties will have to work together to pull this off and other political parties like the Tea Party, Green party and others must be allowed to host their primaries here too, but follow along with the same rules.  The site will also have to be protected from hackers, which means a combination of government agencies and private firms hired by the parties will be needed to prevent any form of manipulation electronically as well.

This site in addition to voting in a primary (based on the changes here), and being able to change your party affiliation (or even be able to be part of multiple political parties if the parties allow it) will enable people to see all the candidates who are running and will have links to all of their campaign websites.  This ensures voters can make an informed decision (candidates can opt to not have their websites linked to this one if they choose and any new candidate who announces must have their name and website up on the site within 24 hours of their announcing so as to ensure their voters do not miss their chance to vote for their preferred candidate).  It would also be useful to allow people to be able to donate to their candidates through this site directly, via the political parties, or to the political parties themselves.  Additionally, you can change your address here as well if you move which will allow you to keep the government and the parties up to date on where you are legally allowed to vote.  The idea here is to insure that the site is useful outside of Presidential elections and even Senatorial, and Congressional elections as well with respect to the national nomination process.  Eventually it can even be used to handle State and local election nominations as well and could even put out a newsletter via text, email or other to keep people up to date on whether there is an election they can vote in or not.

Conclusion:  This site will be partly supported by the parties, but money will come proportionally based on the number of members of each party has.  The rest of the money will come from the States and or Federal government via the federal election commission and State equivalents as they have a vested interest in free and fair elections even during the nomination processes.  This insures fairness with respect to keeping this site up to date.  Of course this site would require States to harmonize their election laws to fit the new structure and for the political parties to agree to participate as well.  Needless to say it will take some effort to implement this system.  The older voting system will not completely go away however as areas with shoddy or no internet access will still need the traditional paper ballot (or similar), which will have to be tallied before delegates are distributed. Overall, this is an outline of a potentially cheaper (as taxpayers are helping to pay for a website as opposed to voting booths), more effective voting system that helps to reduce voter fraud and gives people more access to vote for candidates of their choosing.

Donald Trump's Healthcare plan

Trump has a decent health plan.  His Of course completely repeals Obama Care so that people will no longer be forced to buy insurance unless they want to.  He will do basically what Ted Cruz advocated at this point allowing people to buy and sell health insurance across State lines, but so long as they meet State health insurance requirements such as catastrophic care or covering specified conditions by State law.  So it is not complete freedom to buy and sell, but it comes very close.  People under Trumps plan will be able to deduct their health insurance premiums from their taxes.  So if your premium is $4,000 a year or a million a year, the full thing is tax deductible.  He also advocates tax free contributions and inheritable health savings accounts (HSA's).  Trump wants these accounts to accumulate (presumably including gaining interest) and that when they are inherited that no death taxes will be applied to them.  At the same time, the HSA account can be used to pay for any member of the family without penalty.  Now with Dr. Ben Carson's endorsement of Donald Trump, these plans may change slightly to reflect some of Carson's ideas, but this remains to be seen as the overall plan is really just an outline at this point.  

Other changes that Trump wants to do are just as helpful to health care as Dr. Carson's, Senator Cruz's and Governor Kasich's ideas.  Trump wants to implement a true price transparency law that would require health professionals, Doctors, and health organizations like clinics and Doctors to publish their prices for their services.  The goal is to allow consumers to pick and choose the places with the cheapest health prices for the same quality services.  Donald Trump also will block grant funding for Medicaid.  What this means is that the Federal Government that provides financial support for Medicaid will give States a specified amount of money per year for States to spend as they wish on Medicaid patients.  Mr. Trump’s logic is that States know more about the needs of their residents and that States will do a superior job of combating waste, fraud and abuse while providing healthcare to the needy (this idea is shared between all the Republican candidates).  The final part of his plan will open the market to drug providers that "offer safer, cheaper and reliable" drugs.  Basically, this means Drug companies from overseas will be able to compete against domestic drug companies and potentially laws governing generic drugs and patent rights may be adjusted to increase competition.

Final Thought:  Trumps outline of a plan is very solid and does what most of the other candidates want to do and possibly even a little more in areas that the other candidates did not think of trying such as opening the market to overseas drug companies.  I am not a fan of Donald Trump, and I end up about every three weeks saying I would never vote for him.  But then he has stuff like this which can do wonders to help people, and it forces me to reconsider him again and again.  I am still a Cruz guy, but hey if you like Trump for his mind rather than his mouth (and potentially loose morals), then it is possible you will not go wrong voting for this guy.

Donald Trump's Tax plan

The Trump plan for taxes is good.  It is not a flat tax, but instead like Rubio and Kasich works with the existing code, but is adjusted to accommodate personal and business income growth.  What it would do is create four categories of people with respect to how much they will be taxed.  For individuals making $25,000 and under, they will not pay any taxes, neither will Married filers making $50,000 and under, and heads of the household making $37,000 and under. Those taxed at a 10% rate will be individuals making $25,001 to $50,000, married couples making $50,001 to $100,000 and heads of households making $37,001 to $75,000.  Both these initial two groupings will not be taxed by the capital gains taxes (money earned through things like investments as opposed to work).  Individuals making $50,001 to $150,000, married couples making $100,001 to $300,000 and heads of households making $75,001 to $225,000 will be taxed at a 20% tax rate and a capital gains tax rate of 15%.  All money beyond these amounts listed will be taxed at a 25% tax rate and a capital gains tax rate of 20%.  Interestingly, Trumps plan has three groups who are taxable and does not combine capital gains taxes with regular income like other plans such as Cruz's and Rubio's.  Of note, Trumps plan makes deductions progressive like the income tax itself.  As such those in the 10% tax category will keep all or most of their deductions, the people in the 20% category will keep a little over half their deductions and those in the 25% category will keep some of their deductions according to his website.  Charitable giving and Mortgage deductions will remain the same as they are now under Trumps plan.  Also, Trumps plan also makes health care premiums completely tax deductible.  Trump aims to eliminate as many special interest deductions as possible, and phase out others that would not work with his tax plan.  For businesses, as Trump recognizes that startups and other small and growing businesses pay their taxes via income taxes as opposed to business taxes.  So Trump will create a 15% business tax which based on his wording will allow these small business owners to choose which tax to pay, while big businesses will pay the 15% rate only.  With all the deductions reduced for the rich, and the new tax code, apparently no small businesses or middle class and lower people will be harmed by the new plan.  As such, Trump is touting that the rich will pay more.  For businesses who keep money abroad and sell outside our borders, the tax deferral on income earned abroad will disappear but the foreign tax credit will remain.  Trump also has a onetime repatriation fee of 10% for money held abroad by corporations, which Trump hopes to encourage businesses to bring home with his new tax code (according to Trump's site, $2.5 trillion is held overseas). Trump will also phase in a tax cap on the deductibility of interest expenses.  Lastly, the death tax will be eliminated.

Final Thought: Donald Trump's plan is basically Kasich's and Rubio's plan, but goes further than Kasich and has better rates than Rubio's.  It is not the flat tax that libertarians and conservatives hope for, but it is an improvement.  I think Trump helps the poor and attacks the rich all in the same tax code to show off his progressive credentials and cares about people's perceptions of fairness which he may possibly share based on what I have read in his tax and health plans.   I personally do not like the three separate rates, but his business tax rate on its own is the best compared to Cruz's 16% rate (though it taxes total income and not exclusively profit based on how it is worded).  But Trumps keeping of various tax loopholes and deductions outside of mortgage, charity and his newly added health care premium deduction could hurt him as people may say he did not go far enough, or rich people may still try to leave the country as they could still end up paying more.  I do not think he will satisfy everyone, but hey, he is still an option.

Hillary's Health care plan

Hillary's plan to take on health care builds upon the Affordable Care act, better known as Obama Care.  Her end goal is universal coverage, but it does not seem to work in the same way as Senator Sander's plan.  Her plan would attempt to make it easier and cheaper for people to purchase health care via the exchanges created by Obama Care.  To do this, she will provide a $5,000 tax credit to families to offset out of pocket premium expenses that are 5% above their income.  She will also enhance other tax credits and make it so that no family pays more than 8.5% of their income on health care for people who buy through the exchanges.  Also, she intends to fix the "family glitch" which would allow families to purchase health care on the exchanges if their employer's plan is too expensive.  Hillary will also look to expand Medicaid further to grant further access to health care for poorer Americans.  She intends to advertise to people to help them enroll more into the Medicaid and Obama care systems already in place to achieve "universal coverage".  She also believes that access to Medicaid should be granted to illegal residents and non-citizens alike.  Additionally, she wants to work with State governors to create a public option where people's health will be taken care of via a single payer system, but on a State by State basis.  Her other goals are to lower deductibles, health insurance premiums and drug costs, but she does not give any details on these subjects.

Final Thought:  It seems Hillary has not given up on the single payer idea, but does not want to lose the advantages of the health insurance industry.  So she seems to want to create a hybrid system.  The single payer systems will be implemented per State, while insurance companies will provide the backbone along with Medicaid to the exchanges.  She may be hoping that this hybrid system will counter the high costs and rationing of the European model that Sanders wants to follow for health care.  I personally do not think this system will work and will end up turning the health insurers into public utilities to implement a version of single payer health care.  But, this is Hillary's plan based on what she has stated in her campaign site.  So take it as you will.

Hillary Clinton and Taxes

Hillary's tax plan is non-specific to a degree at this point in time.  So I will present some of the details here that I have garnered from her campaign site.  For one, she intends to reform the tax code by ending the carried interest loophole and implementing the "Buffett Rule".   What this means is that Capital Gains (money derived from sources other than labor) taxes will be integrated into our regular income taxes, thus eliminating two different taxes and merge them into one.  This allows the "Buffet Rule" to be put in place which taxes the total income a person makes, from whatever source derived, thereby taxing people on wall street more "effectively".  Key note is that Republican Candidates like Senator Marco Rubio and Senator Ted Cruz will do something similar with their plans.  

Hillary does want to cut taxes in other areas though, such as keeping the $2,500 tax deduction on students, and an additional 15% tax credit on businesses that share profits with their workers on top of wages and wage increases.  She also intends to remove loopholes in corporate taxes that have encouraged businesses to send their money overseas, and provide tax relief to small businesses.  How all this is to be done though is not clear with respect to what constitutes profit sharing and other small details which would shine light on how these ideas would work.

Final Thought:  So, much of what Hillary wants to do is what the Republicans want to do as well, but in different ways.  Republicans like Cruz will create a flat tax, while Republicans like Rubio will adjust the current income tax.  However, the key difference is that Hillary's plan targets people who make more than people who are considered middle class.  Ultimately though, her plan will complicate the tax code more and encourage businesses to find other loopholes or to lobby for new ones.  So the net result is the same problems with the current tax code, but with an us versus them mentality against the more successful in America further integrated into it.

Ted Cruz on Health Care

Ted Cruz's website lacks any info on his ideas for health reform so I had to look it up somewhere else.  As such according to http://www.ontheissues.org/2016/Ted_Cruz_Health_Care.htm, Cruz intends to raise the minimum age requirement to receive Medicare which Cruz does not specify, though I would assume is age 70.  Additionally he advocates turning it into a premium support system, basically what Carson's plan does, by helping people afford private insurance companies with the government giving our seniors money to do so.  Likewise, Cruz would repeal Obama Care and allow health insurance companies to sell health insurance across State lines without limit so as to improve competition and thus lower costs according to: http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2016/01/28/ted_cruz_s_horrifying_idea_of_health_reform.html, which is a web article that is critical of Cruz as his ideas do not address pre-existing conditions.  The article sites Cruz directly in the debates and shows that he intends to expand Health Savings Accounts as well.  In an interview on August 3, 2015: Interview with Jack Heath on Voters First Forum, Cruz was asked his views on health reform (source:  http://2016.presidential-candidates.org/Cruz/?on=health-care) where his answers from the debate did not differ in the slightest.  Basically, Cruz is probably aiming for what Carson was going to do, but is keeping silent on the details.

Final Thought:  I am saddened to see that Cruz does not have any official details on his health reform ideas which makes Carson's ideas superior here due to details of how it would work and the fact that Carson has greater knowledge of the health care system America currently has.  It would not be surprising for Cruz to mimic Carson's idea is some way to achieve the goals he set out to do which is to make healthcare personal again with respect to patients and doctors while also reforming Medicare and Medicaid.