Since joining this community I have been thinking a lot about our “One Job” and how that can be accomplished, and I think we need to pursue two tracks. Obviously, recruiting and electing committed constitutionalists to state legislatures is vital. But there are some states where electing enough legislators to make a difference is nearly impossible.
There is another path, though: citizen initiatives. California just proved that citizens acting against the wishes of the legislature could establish a statewide policy (race/gender/status-blind employment and college admissions) AND defend it against the efforts of the political class to get rid of it. SO … in addition to electing citizen-leadership, I believe we should set ourselves the goal of using petitions to get an election integrity initiative on the 2022 ballot in every single state.
The petitions should incorporate the 14 principles from https://www.kootenaigop.org/blog/2021/1/8/minimum-standard-for-fair-and-honest-elections that Bill presented in the MB2A “One Job” livestream (8 Jan). And it should probably be written by a lawyer. I think election law expert Robert Barnes from https://vivabarneslaw.locals.com/ would be willing to help draft a legally-sound template if contacted by the election integrity committee. (I’m imagining that the committee intends to publish a model/uniform election code that can be incorporated by reference.)
I pledge my “spare time” to signature collection once the petition language has been drafted.
8 replies on “Taking the Initiative”
Well, California looks one of the places most suppressed under tyranny. Yet the people could not do as much as sign the petition to send the king packing in the required number. (I think it got halfway to the original deadline and got extension.)
To me this implies the people there just like it that way. And we better not force our system on the unwilling population. Let’s first concentrate on places that still believe in the old values and need help to get them back.
There is a current petition that had over a million signatures as of the end of 2020. The deadline is in March. So if you live in CA, go to https://recallgavin2020.com/faq/ and download a copy of the form.
Yeah, that’s what I was referring to.
I also like this idea. We should be using every tool we can, especial the ones the lefties love. I’m also tempted by what I’m calling Guerilla Legislation; where a Legislator inserts language that subverts a bill, or gets something else big passed in one of these huge omnibus bills. Where that might be “The federal IRS is abolished, the tax rate is set at a fixed 10%, no exemptions, all other articles of the bill are considered null and void” or something equally amusing, and ultimately helpful if passed. It is legislative trolling, but making them read the bills as a result wouldn’t hurt. I would love to see the lawsuits over some of them, too.
I absolutely love this idea. Unfortunately, getting an amendment to or a rider attached to a bill requires an open vote at some point, so there’s no sneaking it in unless it’s part of the initial bill as written, in a bill too long to read before its vote. But in those cases, absolutely I want to see trolling like that!
That UFO requirement made it in not via the normal amendment process, so, maybe that would work. Also, I wouldn’t mind a clerk or staffer adding it either, especially if it was hard to track who. While that sounds like I’m subverting the legal process, I’m not convinced it can be considered proper legislation if the legislators haven’t read it, and then expect us to obey it. They need to read these things. Also, some of the amendment processes can be pretty perfunctory; e.g. “vote to include this amendments(document in hand). Those in favor? etc” sort of thing.
OK. So who do we pay off to do this for us? 😉
I think this is an excellent idea!