Politicians as a class are disreputable--HL Mencken
A revolution every once in a while is a good idea--Thomas Jefferson
Our government does not represent the people. It represents special interest lobbies, such as AIPAC, big oil, drug companies, etc. The depressing facts are well known:
--TheDemocrats won a mandate to stop an illegal war, but they let the war be widened; and they are about to consent to another war, before they ask for another mandate.
--Americans don't want torture, black holes, rendition, suspension of habeas corpus, eavesdropping. The Democrats don't stop it.
--Americans don't want to take sides in the Israel-Palestinian conflict, but the administration and both parties backs Israel indiscriminantly.
It's time to control the politicians who work for lobbies and turn them into accountable civil servants: employees of the people, not statesman. The Internet can provide direct plebicitatory democracy. A fourth branch of government created by a Constitutional amendment can provide the necessary oversight on politicians whose agendas are not in synch with ordinary Americans.
That the system is rigged, that the US government has been taken over by lobbyists is now common knowledge. Most politicians are ruined, craven people who work for these lobbies. Efforts to clean up the system, e.g. McCain-Feingold have failed. The answer is to make the politicians in the congressional and executive branches accountable to we the people. That means we must limit the scope of their decision making authority. To do this a fourth branch of government, the people's plebiscite, would be added to the other three branches via a constitutional amendment. A means would be devised so that any major issue or policy could be voted on by the people over the Internet. The decision of the people would be binding on the politicians.
If we had such a people's branch of government operating today, we could have votes on major questions such as whether to fund the war; whether to bomb Iran; whether to torture; whether to aid Israel; etc.
There should be a requirement that every vote the people make should have a funding requirement attached to it. So if the people decide to bomb Iran back to the stone age, they would also be required to fund that action, that is, impose a surtax to pay for the bombs, airplanes, body bags, blackwater, fuel, junkets by congresspeople, etc.
It's time that politicians were turned into the people's employees. This needs to happen because they have for too long violated our trust and despoiled our nation.