1 Goal: $$$ out of politics

[skeptical]

Money is what stops our government from working for the 99%

The only way to get it out of politics is to severely limit campaign donations.

The only way to do that now, after the recent supreme court ruling, is a constitutional amendment.

That should be our ONLY goal. All these other "demands" just water down our message, and alienate other 99%-ers.

Please remember what we're fighting for. If we can focus on this one goal, then all of your other goals can be possible, because government will be working for us again, and not the 1%.

Keep it simple.

[BenBurton]

Strategic planning:

 

Objective -> Goals -> Strategy -> Tactics

 

Or something like that.  If the objective is a constitutional amendment to get corporate funding out of campaign finance, there are a multitude of goals leading up to it.

[skeptical]

Fair enough.

The problem is that we're getting bogged down into trying to decide what unattainable perfect world we all want to live in instead of focusing on a single goal/objective/whatever--what brought us all together in the first place.

Getmoneyout.com

[cordy]

I totally agree. You can't create utopia overnight and will get way more supporters if you narrow the scope and eliminate the drivel.

[DavidMichael]

This is the ultimate goal...everyone just hasn't figured that out yet, but they will.

 

Getmoneyout.com

[mcfuzz]

I completely agree with the goal get money out of politics. That is the core point of all of this. It's the reason for the ows protests, and the reason those protests and ours are at financial institutions rather than government ones.

I think it can be accomplished through dramatic reforms in campaign finance, lobbying, and revolving door policies.

[marymcmahon@clear.net]

YES, the root of all that ails us

[sheryl]

Agree.

Getmoneyout.com is a good place to start.

[marymcmahon@clear.net]

Look at the history of the Equal Rights Amendment. This is why a constitutional amendment is a non-starter.

This is the entire text of the ammendment:

	Section 1. Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex.
	Section 2. The Congress shall have the power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.
	Section 3. This amendment shall take effect two years after the date of ratification.

 

This is the timeline:

 

TheEqual Rights Amendment, first proposed in 1923 to affirm that women and men have equal rights under the law, is still not part of the U.S. Constitution.The ERA was passed out of Congress in 1972 and has been ratified by 35 of the necessary 38 states.  When three more states vote yes, it is possible that the ERA could become the 28th Amendment. The ERA could also be ratified by restarting the traditional process of passage by a two-thirds majority in the Senate and the House of Representatives, followed by ratification by legislatures in three-quarters (38) of the 50 states.*

*http://equalrightsamendment.org/

[lastpolarbear]

We can call it a non-starter, but it's essential to try for it. Unless we have major changes to the Supreme Court, there is no other way to deal with this problem. And none of our other grievances will be addressed until money is out of politics.

We need to follow the strategy of the Civil Rights movement. Absolute non-violence. Hypercivility and composed appearance, with clear, very reasonable demands. When that is what the other side is fighting against, it outs them as unreasonable.

But what will KILL a constitutional amendment effort is if all the support is coming from Democratic legislators. We've seen how the Republicans in Congress address anything the Democrats bring up - block it at all costs, because even if it's good, they'll get credit for it instead of you, and stagnance makes them look bad instead of you.

We have to do more outreach to conservative voters - I've talked to a lot of them, and they ALL want money out of politics (although they also think it is a fantasy). But we need to rally that base and get them to demand that the Republicans take up this issue, too.