June 07, 2004
Open Question
If you had the power to enact one law in this country, to be implemented immediately, and beyond repeal by Congress or the Supreme Court, what would it be? (I'll give my answer after a few have come in.)
Posted by michaelf at June 7, 2004 12:15 AM | TrackBackComments
Constitutional Amendment – A National Living Wage
A national living wage, what’s rate is established and maintained by a non-partisan commission and commensurate with inflation and cost of living adjustments and shall not be lowered, shall be established and enforced for all citizens to be paid by their employer or contractor, who hires one or more personel for purposes of expanding or servicing said business operation services.
Posted by: James Mason at June 7, 2004 08:55 AM
i second that one.
Posted by: jessanne at June 7, 2004 09:31 AM
Ban on governmentally enforced or allowed murder, which would include wiping out both the death penalty and abortion rights. There would have to be some stipulation written in for allowing a handful of mercy-kills as might be necessary (even if the criteria for those would cause a firestorm)
Posted by: Andy at June 7, 2004 09:48 AM
What law could be worthy of being enacted that needs to circumvent passage by Congress or the review of the Supreme Court?
Posted by: Pete at June 7, 2004 12:22 PM
Pete: Just for the sake of your personal convenience, perhaps?
I would like to see some sort of exam/license for people who want to have/are having children.
(Of course it's entirely impractical.)
Posted by: Sooz at June 7, 2004 02:16 PM
Expand the weekend to three days without increasing the 8 hour workday. Now that's a law I could get behind. (Living it already, almost.)
Posted by: Hilary at June 7, 2004 09:00 PM
affirmative action! affirmative action! affirmative action!
how can the gov't., with their bogus 1963 civil rights act, tell a citizen it cannot use race to decide who they will or won't rent their private home to but that colleges, police dept. etc. have to use race when handing out jobs, accepting people to schools etc.?
(great question, mike)
Posted by: edved at June 7, 2004 10:01 PM
Anyone convicted of killing a person while driving drunk, without a valid license, after having had their license suspended previously for drunk driving, is sentenced immediately to prison for life, with pictures of the people that he/she killed flashed on their cell walls multiple times each day.
Posted by: Vin at June 8, 2004 08:30 AM
I'd raise the sales tax to 6.5%. That money will help the Commonwealth out of some pretty enormous holes it's in right now.
I'd ban cigarettes.
I'd (wait, are we talking local, state, or federal law here?) I'd make the Somerville library open on Sundays, and make the West Branch open daily as well. Right now it's open about four days a week.
I'd have the commuter rail electrified, and I'd appropriate the $5 billion or so needed to go retrofit the Big Dig to connect the north and south commuter rail systems. I'd double-track where necessary and run smaller more frequent consists, creating more than an in-in-the-morning, out-at-night system, something more like the RER in Paris.
I'd officially name the Big Dig I-93 tunnels for Tip O'Neill, not simply to praise him, but to be sure its legacy -- good or bad -- is tied to the man responsible for it.
I'd completely scrap the Boston Redevelopment Authority and cobble together something with a little more review process built in.
I'd make summer camp mandatory.
I'd re-enact the Clean Elections Law, perhaps the most important and most callously discarded piece of legislation in the Commonwealth in a quarter century. The blame for its failure rests not only on easy target Tom Finneran and his cronies, but on the likes of the Boston Globe whose dismissive coverage treated the whole concept like a child's figment. Indeed, cutting politicians off from the corporate teat does seem ludicrous.
I'd see that both the Globe and Finneran get theirs. I'd have the Globe put back in local hands, and I'd have the investigation into Finneran's redistricting improprieties suddenly see an unexpected infusion of cash.
I'd ignore questions of morality on which the country is sharply divided. This power is poorly suited to them. Except the cigarettes part, because come on, who are we kidding.
Posted by: Pete at June 8, 2004 10:55 AM
And I'd do this all in one bill that would technically make it one law, the "Giving Massachusetts a Piece of My Mind Omnibus Tinkering Act of 2004."
Posted by: Pete at June 8, 2004 11:16 AM
I'd go for tougher environmental standards, beyond the Kyoto protocal, a crack down on companies that pollute and alloting more money into the alternative energy industry, research for solar, wind, or even newer forms of energy that don't damage the environment so there'd be no more drilling for oil or dependancy on nucleur energy, which would also fix the electrical grid so that there's no repeat of last year's extensive blackouts and Cali's rolling ones. Also, when a portion of wilderness is declared a sanctuary, it's irrevocable so that certain industries can't grease the palms of the government and open them up to drilling/logging/development when they think nobody's looking. And nobody can "own" all the water. Programs for water conservation and more ways of filtering should be put into effect. I mean, we don't want the world to turn into Soilent Green.
Posted by: V-bunny at June 8, 2004 11:58 AM
I agree with the living wage thing. I think that would help out a lot of people in this country.
Posted by: megan at June 10, 2004 03:01 PM
I support the Giving Massachusetts a Piece of Pete's Mind Act, and I support half of Andy's No Killing Act. Most of all I support my spouse's Three-Day Weekend Act, because that would go a long way towards making America a better place to live. But, in the final analysis, I think it would have to be The Secret Agent Cathy Free Health Care for All Act.
Posted by: Secret Agent Cathy at June 13, 2004 04:41 PM
OK, I promised I'd chime in after a few. Good answers all, by the way -- I even agree with most of them.
Here were a few finalists: universal health care, of course.
Something that would codify and clarify the separation of church and state.
A "Truth In Legislation" Law that would keep politicians from semantic games like calling an inheritance tax a "death tax" (I mean, who could be for that?!?) when it could just as easily be called a "spoiled brats of billionaires" tax.
Some form of Clean Elections, possibly including declaring Election Day a total nationwide holiday, where nobody has to work, so no one has an excuse (yes, of course provisions must be made for doctors and ambulance drivers and firefighters - I'm in big-picture mode).
But I think what I'd eventually settle on is this: not a living wage, exactly, but a decree that executives of a company can't make more than X times the average wage of their employees. Look at what the gap has become; in 1980, CEOs made 42x the pay of the average factory worker. In 1999, the lastest year that this article cites, it was 475x as much.
With the fortunes of the execs and the workers tied together, there's a real incentive for everyone to work together. If a company's profits fall, the bigwigs can't bail out with golden parachutes and leave the peons to suffer. If a company does well enough that the execs deserve to take a big raise, well - everyone else gets one too.
So go ahead, you freemarketeers, tell me why this is awful. But please, first tell me exactly what a CEO does all day that's worth 475 times more than Larry the mailroom guy.
Posted by: Michael at June 13, 2004 11:47 PM
I'm working at Harvard for the summer, and from what I've seen there's a lot of deference shown to the professors--basically, they all have to be treated like mini-CEOs (each one gets 25% of a secretary) and not bothered with little details. That's hard to take. I'm worth ten of them--well, at least one of them. Every person has the same worth as every other and I'd love to see a company operate on that principle. Every now and then you hear of companies that purport to, but I don't know how successful they are (or how genuine).
Posted by: Secret Agent Cathy at June 15, 2004 07:16 PM
Is that even possible?
Posted by: Pete at June 16, 2004 10:17 AM
