Is individual political participation even effective anymore?

Question

The First Amendment grants rights, among others, to petition the government with a list grievances and to peaceably assemble (i.e. protest) .

However, there is nothing that says the government has to listen or take any action. Because of special interest groups and corporate-sponsored corruption in both parties, writing your congressmen and donating money to any party could be mostly ineffective. I would go so far to argue that most younger voters are apathetic because they feel that their voice is useless. As we see with elections coming up, Congressmen only now care about the voters and seems short-term.

I am just wondering if I am just cynical or if grass roots and individual participation can continue to be effective or if there are any alternatives that may work better than the traditional forms of participation.

My personal feelings are that people today "vote with their wallet", and by excercising their purchasing power, they in fact vote for different political factions.

I'm not talking about whether you should vote or how you should vote. Of course, you should vote and be well-informed when doing so.

I just wonder if it even makes a difference.

Answer 1

We need a new political party! We need a party that works for the regular Americans like customer service in a department store, for the little guys like you and me. Our government treats us worse than they treat third world refugees, look at the Tsunami and New Orleans after the hurricane.

We had people on the ground 18 hrs after the storm, on the other side of the world! New Orleans, it took 36hrs for help to get started! FEMA held the Navy off, with the Navy being ready and on the backside of the storm. While FEMA's head man is asking " Do these clothes make me look fat?". Our political system is a disgrace, not one man, ALL of them.

We now work our brains out at low level jobs because the flim flam men politicians have rewritten the laws and sent our good jobs abroad. They gave away our tax money to foreigners that built their factories with our tax money. This has to stop, it doesn’t work for America, it robs us and our children of our future.

The National Income Party :

America could conquer the world. Not with warring, but with such overwhelming wealth that the whole world would lick our boots to get our help for themselves. I can make a provable, tangible, graphable outline for doing this.

First someone like me would have to the President. I say that because I'm the kind of man that can't be knuckled under, I don't take you can't do that and just quit, and no matter how hard the job is I never stop short. I’m a working class man, I came up doing body work, so I know how to fix the tangled mess others have made.

As President, this being THE most powerful position in the world, I would go completely around the flim flam men in the Senate and the House. I would use the Executive Order and write the checks to get what needs to be done to happen ASAP! The treasury is in the executive branch and Lincoln wrote checks to get things done, so I would do the same.

By Executive Order, I would start with fixing the governments money problems and getting the citizens tax problems solved. Then I would stop the foreign companies that cheat the US out their share of taxes, and make a loophole free way to collect every penny they owe.

Next would come the illegals, I'd get them all registered, employed, and put them on the tax roles not us. We need the illegals paying taxes because there's just not enough Gen Xer's to pay the SS for the Boomers and Gen Xer's.

I'd make millions of high wage jobs with renewable power plant construction, renewable power would be a priority. I'd build so much clean power we would have power in overabundance, and we could supply the whole world with clean US made power. 1/3 of the money from the foreign power bills would be put into a fund and every head of household would get a paycheck and NO tax bill!

To continue doing this would make a book so I'm going to outline what’s to be:

1st90 days by ExOrder
Establish Earth Rights for all of America like in Alaska
End income taxes;fund the Gov the right way, not on our backs
End tax paper work for the citizens, not business
End all welfare programs, save the money
Balance the budget, officials are not paid till it’s done
Regular people for elected officials, no lawyers or rich
End lobbyists, take the money out of politics
Make graft illegal, have mandatory jail time
Close the DOE, save the money
Take the Gov out of the schools, PTA run save money
Set Iraq’s oil to pay for the war, make an exit plan with the military
Prisoners work for jail costs, not us, save the money
Make foreign tax cheats pay, tariff goods @retail every container
Register the illegals, put them to work and on the tax roles not us
Private SS accounts, makes us millionaires, no gov access to money
After90 days by ExOrder
Build renewable power, make millions of high wage jobs
Build a fund from foreign power bills like Alaska uses to PAY us
End Nuclear power
Build electric powered roads, make more millions of high wage jobs
Thousands of jobs building electric cars&trucks
End our dependence on foreign oil
Clean the polluted water with clean electric power
Return America to 50% of world’s economy


The Alaska state constitution claims common heritage rights of ownership of oil and other minerals for the people of the state as a whole. Citizen dividend checks are distributed every year in Alaska out of the interest payments to an oil royalties deposit account called the Alaska Permanent Fund (APF) created in 1976 after oil was discovered on the North Slope. The APF is a public trust fund - a diversified stock, bond and real estate portfolio - into which are deposited the oil royalties received from the corporations which extract the oil from the lands of Alaska. The first citizen dividend check from the interest of the APF was issued in 1982 and was for $1000 per every person for everyone in Alaska who had resided in the state for at least one year. Annual citizen dividends have been issued every year since then, for a total of more than $23,000 per person.

In 2003, each of the nearly 600,000 Alaska US citizens (residents of Alaska for at least one year) received a check for $1,107 from the APF. The total amount dispersed was $663.2 million. The $25 billion investment fund's core experienced stock market losses which led to the dividend's decline this past year compared to the several previous years. The amount was $433 less, a 28 percent drop from the 2002 pay out of $1,540, and a 44 percent decrease from the all-time high of $1,964 in year 2000. The amount changes based on a five-year average of APF investment income derived from the bonds, stock dividends, real estate and other investments.

Alaska relies on oil for about 80 percent of its revenue and has no sales or income tax. Alaska state government is mandated to invest 25% of its oil revenue into the APF while the other 75% of oil royalty revenue is dispersed to other government funds to finance education, infrastructure and social services. If 100% of Alaska's oil royalties had been deposited into the APF, it is conceivable that the CD this year could have been about $4,400 or $17,600 for a family of four. But then there would have been no funds for roads, education and other public services and no funds available to run the state legislature - a libertarian dream fulfillment or a social and economic disaster, which one we will never know. If state services were to have been maintained while 100% of oil royalties were deposited in the APF, there would of course have been the need for income, sales and other taxes on wages and production.

Alaska uses Earth Rights to pay about $1000 p/yr and not tax their residents. With all 50 states my fed government could pay $50,000 p/yr, NO TAXES, and fund the government!

The foreign tariff money, the illegals taxes, and earth rights money pays all the government expenses, funds the military better than now, and pays down the national debt with NO deficit.

The Renewable power fund would pay what I call a National Income Program, and when the fund matures in about 30 years, would pay about another $50,000 p/yr.

So $50,000 p/yr from the Earth Rights and NO taxes. Millions of high wage power plant construction jobs, we would need to build 5000 power plants just to start, and build for many years to come.

Then make millions more high wage jobs to build new electric powered roads to use the clean power. Make thousands of jobs to build electric cars and trucks that use power from the new electric powered roads.

Foreign oil dependence would end! The Arabs could drink their oil, we don’t need it any more. The oil money that funds the terrorists would dry up, and terrorism would strangle, then die. Domestic oil production would supply all our needs.

Then comes the $50,000 p/yr from the National Income Program, with the Earth Rights money my government could then pay every household $100,000p/yr, all with no taxes.

Then the private SS accounts would have about a $1,000,000 in them for your retirement. The rich make fortunes by building money in funds just this same way, so what works for the rich, will work for the nation.

This builds America to be 300,000,000 millionaires. The money would be passed to your Aires and NO TAXES. Each new generation would be richer than their forebears. Soon newborns would be born millionaires, and the system would continue to multiply their wealth for each next generation.

America would be so wealthy that soon we would be the envy of the world, and people from around the world would lick our boots for us to help them get where we would be. America rules the world with wealth, not war.

With stable third world power comes jobs, with jobs comes prosperity. Prosperity makes life comfortable, with comfort comes contentment. Contentment would bring peace, and war would be a thing of the past. If someone for some strange reason wanted start a war we could just stop beaming them power.

I take it you know electric power can be beamed on a microwave inside a laser beam to a satellite and put anywhere it's needed on the earth! So cut the beam and no power. It's hard to ,fight a war with no lights or power. America controls the power!

The renewable power is fuel-less so it's cheap clean power! It’s without the inflation of fuel costs, so the price would remain stable.

I grew up loving to watch Super Man as a kid, he made a lasting impression on me. I’ve lived my life by his motto “ Truth, Justice, and the American Way!”, it still rings in my ears today as it did when I was a child. I want to bring this to America’s government, and drive out the flim flam men! I want America to BE the shining example all the world wishes to emulate.

The Flim Flam Men:

They make speeches about they must have taxes, and every politician knows what is being done in Alaska. Alaska PAYS all their residents with earth rights and doesn’t tax their residents. This makes the politicians liars!

They make speeches to get elected and make promises about what they will do for us. They say nothing about getting every dime of lobby money to do what big biz wants that’s opposite what they promised you. That makes them cheats!

They stole your grandmother’s retirement money from SS. Now you face getting nothing for your SS payments. That makes them thieves!

They tax us, but they know the foreign companies pay no taxes on the goods they sell here. The goods are sold then bought on paper in a foreign port to skate the tax laws. Thus eliminating their profit on paper to cheat the US out of the taxes they owe. This makes them backstabbers!

They take lobby money to put earmarks and pork in every law that passes their desk. Then they do photo ops, a news clips to promote themselves as doing something good for us and America. So they corkscrew us!

They make back room deals and give our tax money to foreigners who build factories with our money. Then they write laws that send our jobs overseas. This makes them dirty dealers!

So lets total all this up. They lie, cheat, steal, backstab, corkscrew, and dirty deal. HELL their Flim Flam Men! Just like in the George C. Scott movie “ The Flim Flam Man”! They are called the “ Honorable” Senator or Representative. Hell Flim Flam Men have NO honor what so ever! They’re crooks, criminals for God’s sake!

The BBC has film of ALL of them going in and out of Abramoff’s restaurant. That was THE place in DC to get loaded with lobby money. The BBC has been running this story, and trying to get the US media to run it too. The US media refuses to run the story.

We are all slaves, we own nothing! Even if you paid off the bank, try not paying the extortion tax, and the government takes your house. Try not paying the income extortion tax, and you go to jail. You can’t even run away like the slaves of old. The government will hunt you down, and you got to jail.

What’s the difference? You pay with your work, or you work to pay. We are slaves, the smoke and mirrors BS hides the truth from us. Da masser geds his’uns pound a flesh. Sucks! Doesn’t it?

It’s time to take America back! Get registered! VOTE! Vote for anyone that’s not a Democrat or a Republican. They have ALL the power and ALL the control. They must bear ALL the responsibility for their gross mismanagement and abysmally poor judgment! It’s time to put THEM in the unemployment line!


If a politician found he had cannibals among his constituents, he would promise them missionaries for dinner.
Henry Louis Mencken (1880-1956)

CAPITAL, n. The seat of misgovernment. That which provides the fire, the pot, the dinner, the table and the knife and fork for the anarchist; the part of the repast that himself supplies is the disgrace before meat.
Ambrose Bierce (1842-1914)


Political language is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind.
George Orwell

To compel a man to subsidize with his taxes the propagation of ideas which he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical.
Thomas Jefferson

A man's country is not a certain area of land, of mountains, rivers, and woods, but it is a principle; and patriotism is loyalty to that principle.
George William Curtis

America is much more than a geographical fact. It is a political and moral fact - the first community in which men set out in principle to institutionalize freedom, responsible government, and human equality.
Adlai Stevenson

Freedom has its life in the hearts, the actions, the spirit of men and so it must be daily earned and refreshed - else like a flower cut from its life-giving roots, it will wither and die.
Dwight D. Eisenhower

The universe grows smaller every day. The treat to security by any group, anywhere can no longer be tolerated. There must be security for all, or none are secure! This requires giving up no freedoms, except the freedom to act irresponsibly!
Klaatu

He loves his country best who strives to make it best.
Robert Green Ingersoll

Those who deny freedom to others deserve it not for themselves.
Abraham Lincoln

A man's feet must be planted in his country, but his eyes should survey the world.
George Santayana


Some men see things as they are and say, "Why?" I dream of things that never were and say, "Why not?"
George Bernard Shaw

I like to see a man proud of the place in which he lives. I like to see a man live so that his place will be proud of him.
Abraham Lincoln

A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government.
Edward Abbey

The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.
Edmund Burke 1729-1797

This country will not be a good place for any of us to live in unless we make it a good place for all of us to live in
Theodore Roosevelt


I believe in America because we have great dreams - and because we have the opportunity to make those dreams come true
Wendell L. Wilkie


If our forefathers were alive today they would lay siege to DC. They would tar and feather all the politicians and then hang them right on the steps of the capitol buildings. They would leave them there for all to see what happens to those flim flam man politicians that corkscrew Americans.

It’s time to put all of America to work for all Americans. When America leads the way to such overwhelming wealth the world will follow. Prosperity here will breed more prosperity world wide as stable clean cheap power becomes available to all the world. This brings jobs and stability to the third world. The jobs and stability will bring peace, and then we have a fighting chance for “ Peace on Earth”!

Join me in the one real true fight for all mankind, a stable world with “ Peace on Earth”!

Would you vote for me to be the President? I’ve made a very strong case for being able to do what I’ve said needs to be done. I think our founding fathers would be proud of these things being done for America. I believe I’m the man who can do just that, because I believe in doing them 100%, without any doubt!

Answer 2

Money in politics is the root of all evil. But there are huge problems with our electoral process that have to be resolved or political participation will be utterly pointless. Computer voting machines that are hackable, stored in insecure locations, and that don't produce paper print outs that confirm that the vote was counted accurately are big problem that can be fixed. Also voting has to be removed from the control of politically motivated individuals who have vested interests in outcomes. In addition a national voter registration system's time has come. Modern technologies contribute to the ease of voter fraud. It's a start.

Answer 3

To me, if you don't know where you stand on the issues, then you shouldn't be voting. It's completely pointless to just flip a lever or punch a card not knowing what you want. You should know the philosophy behind being Liberal or Conservative. You should know whether you want to think on your own (small government, you keep your money, limited social programs), or have the government do the thinking for you (big government, high taxes, lots of social programs. Know what communism is. Know what freedom is. Which party pushes toward which basic philosophy? What does each type of philosophy result in? Wealth? Repression of citizens? Think carefully, vote wisely.

Answer 4

i don't believe of there is this kind of element as a potential 0.33 party. it is sadly, yet maximum go in and pull a lever and little or no concept is going into it. at the same time as on the floor it may appear like a sturdy element, it may basically reason more effective complications then it ought to sparkling up. For one element if no party had a majority in congress it ought to set off off higher payoffs to the swing votes to get law by. it ought to also complicate and water down the vote so as that perchance a more effective constructive candidate couldn't get elected because it ought to cut up the vote 3 innovations rather of two. So in my view no u.s. isn't waiting to have a nil.33 party.

Answer 5

I agree with Crys. Whether or not my vote is actually used, I am going to place it anyway because I have hope that those big guys in power would at least look at me as a number in favor of or not in favor of them. Meanwhile, I join large groups that speak my general opinion also, so that I can add one more number to the member list of Greenpeace, for instance, because they are headed in the direction that I approve of.

Answer 6

I see where you're coming from. But I think that if you don't exercise your right to vote, then you don't have the right to complain about the way things work out.

Answer 7

There are days that I really wonder if I am "outbought" at the ballot box