On Thu, 04 Feb 2010 20:44:13 -0700, Patrick Elliott wrote:

> You, you make them poor, it leads to corruption, not away from it. 

You remove the incentive for them to make a career out of it, and get the 
people who *want* to do a real *public service*.  If there's no money in 
it, you keep the money out of it (you have to monitor contributions, 
bribes, and the like - but you take the money that's being paid to the 
congresscritters right now and hire people to monitor that - you'd still 
end up with leftovers).

You're assuming that if you remove the money from it, the same people 
would participate.  I don't think they would because those people are 
largely driven by a profit motive.

> The
> #1 thing causing problems right now is that companies and private
> groups, and sometimes people, funnel large amounts into electing
> someone, then expect them to do what they want, usually by bribing them
> with more money to help with X pet project, or the next re-election.

Yeah, so you watch for that activity like a hawk, and if someone is 
receiving bribes, you prosecute them and throw their asses in jail - both 
the person bribing the official and the official who accepted the bribe.

> Needless to say, a recent supreme court decision is just going to make
> this stupid idiocy worse. 

I agree with this.  One of the worst supreme court decisions in all time.

> The last thing you need is to make it a field
> that only crazies and the corrupt want to even try to get into, because
> it pays shit to work at it.

Only crazies and the corrupt want to get into it now, for the most part.  
Look at Michelle Bachmann or watch *any* of the house or senate debates 
on TV where they pull out a stupid chart on an easel.  You have to be 
crazy to say some of the things that are said on the house floor.

Jim

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