Interesting, A Virtual Congress?

Interesting. From blogsite Sons of Liberty Thursday, March 15, 2012 A Virtual Congress Voters commonly feel that our elected representatives are out of touch and isolated from them and their concerns. Constituents rightly believe that special interests and lobbyists have full time access to our representatives with little input from voters. Many bills passed by congress significantly influence small businesses, jobs, veterans and healthcare, which directly affects all of us. Citizens want more access to their elected representatives. The best way to address these concerns is to move Congress closer to their constituents. A Virtual Congress would have representatives live and work in the communities they represent and use modern telecommunications to perform their duties and make them more accountable to their constituents. In effect, kick Congress out of Washington D.C. Modern telecommunications is a well developed technology. Cheap, secure, video and data transmission lines can be combined with retina scans or thumbprint scans to conduct the day to day business of committee meetings, constituent meetings, floor debates and votes. Many of these meetings could be opened to the public at large via the internet. I would have a hard time telling anyone how many meetings I have attended over the last couple of years from the comfort of my easy chair with my laptop via live streaming. Having a Virtual Congress would remove our representatives from the undue influence of special interests and lobbyists who have constant access to them. Instead our representatives would live in the districts they are supposed to represent, and we the people would have nearly round the clock access to our representatives. Politicians would be surrounded by skeptical constituents instead of obsequious supplicants. This could eliminate such embarrassments as Nancy Pelosi’s “vote for it to find out what is in it” or Ben Nelson’s “cornhusker kickbacks”. Small businesses, hometown newspapers, and bloggers will be better able to look over the shoulders of our representatives to achieve a greater transparency of what is happening at the federal level. Instead of the expensive professional staff that lives full time in Washington D.C. who does most of the work (including writing policy and legislation) for our representatives, everyday citizens could be hired as staff. As has been noted by some commentators on the political process, “staff is policy”. Hiring local staff with ties to the community would eliminate the insider’s culture that currently exists in Washington D.C. and replace it with the attitudes and beliefs of the local constituents that the politician represents. By having our Congressman live and work in communities they represent, it would shift the balance of power back to the voters. When our representatives the leave their home or office, voters could visit with them as they go to restaurants, theatres, church or even the grocery store. Ordinary citizens may elect to run for office if they don’t have to uproot their families and children, and reduce the number of people that make a career out of politics. This idea has been placed before congress by New Mexico Congressman Steve Pearce and is available as a downloadable PDF file on the internet. I believe this proposal is worthy of discussion and debate among the voters.