I'm curious as to what your answer is.......

Thanks for the interest. I will give you the short answer. I must warn, however, that the short answer may seem puzzling as the solution is wholly unique. That is, this concept and the assumptions it requires have never been proposed before and, at first glance, defies all we have been taught.

In the matter of oppression, those seeking relief should look for the mechanism of oppression and neutralize the weapon used. In our present day, the Republic is harmed by the unauthorized course the Congress has assumed. This much is widely accepted: Congress uses the money (it is mandated to spend) to barter with special interests to secure re-election and other forms of wealth. So, simply, the key to their corruption of power is their control of the funds in the Treasury… the weapon the people need to disarm. These monies, entrusted to them by the Constitution, have become the de facto private property of Congress--as measured by the nine points of possession to determine ownership. We flounder as a nation because the nation's wealth has become the private property of Congress, the same as when the nation's wealth was the private property of the King. We've closed a circle. Without realizing their brush with truth, the tea baggers sense it is time for a new tea party.

To disarm this unintended ownership, financial ownership of the nation's wealth needs to be lawfully passed to the broad democratic base, namely the taxpayers who paid into the system. Here you need to step out of the familiar since we (incorrectly) do not believe government to be a business and we stumble over the notion of private ownership of government. The transfer of ownership can be achieved by issuing Stock Certificates to individual taxpayers so that their Share is pro-rated to the total taxes paid from such sources. [All necessary information is already tracked by IRS]. The teeth to the ownership would be the right to redeem one's Shares any time there is a surplus (as in 2001) in the Treasury, giving the taxpayer/voters a financial stake in how the Congress spends their money. It would make the discovery of gold on Mars more interesting as well.

At this point the idea lacks all sex appeal. It is another scheme that 'will never work'. Warren Buffett suggests that any time there is a deficient , etc., etc. then all Congressional seats go up for re-election--one of a million schemes that will lead no where. Everyone has such a notion or another. But please persevere a little further.

Benefits of this scheme:
1) Clarifies the role of Congress as managers of the nation's wealth, not its owners. And establishes that someone must have financial ownership in deed as well as lip service ("the people's roads, etc.&quot .
2) Gives the voters an annual report regarding the value of their holdings. They will have an objective accounting of how well government is performing.
3) Introduces another player at the table when Congress sits down with the special interests to spend the money. Since the only way for Stock value to increase in value is through efficient government that solves long-term problems, all taxpayers share the same investment interests and will have the same expectations. The combined weight of this 800 pound gorilla will overshadow the largest corporations. Congress must once again satisfy the voters as well as the deep pockets and confront a competing, countervailing power.
4) Since the mechanism operates within a political system that is a capital market (always has been), it will self-correct to its greatest gain, namely good government. The longer it is in place, the greater the drift toward owner satisfaction. The 'invisible hand' is brought into play to judo capitalism against its abuses.

To understand why taxpayer ownership of the Treasury's surpluses could actually solve the problem, it would be necessary to look at the LONG answer that examines why our country was founded, how its political system was intended to operate, how the system became corrupted by advances in corporate law, and then come to the realization that there is no other way out of our quandary except to work through our historical heritage.

I could go into each of these separate points, but Peggy 'O I have already grown long of words. With numerous posts yourself, you, no doubt, are familiar with words. Yet I do not want to force too much. If you would like to consider these various aspects, I would be glad to offer my thoughts. If you would like to ask questions or point out why it would not work, etc., then the same ground would most likely be covered, but with your having a hand on the wheel. And if it is all much more than you care for, that will be alright too.

btw, a hobby is 'reading' heart shapes found in nature (stones, etc). Your heart logo has an interesting twist in its flow of energy.

Welcome to DU!

Our nation got off track when we decided to preserve slavery and to not act honorably toward the various Native American tribes.

You may enjoy The Invisible Line by Daniel Sharfstein. He maintains that all races mixed freely for 250 years over here without racial prejudice and hatred. That is, the inhumanity of slavery and the conquest of native land were facts, but among free people, there were no barriers as to color. Children born of free mothers were free without prejudice. And there were many freed slaves from the very beginning. They intermarried and became leaders in their communities and all people defended them and their offspring as free since their kind were an integral part of most communities. Like Colbert says, those people did not see color. Slave status, yes.
The pie hit the fan after the Civil War and the eventual reaction by the South to the Radical Reconstruction. Like the Germans who went into Hitler's arm after the war-guilt and reparations of WWI, the Southerns reversed the historical traditions and defined race as a 'single drop of blood'. Suddenly mixed people were forced to move to new areas and hide their ancestry. Soon the knowledge of one's past became lost (except those with native blood who kept that knowledge alive with pride). Even Obama's mother, it turns out, may have had black blood in her past. Chances are we may all. In other words, the horrors of racial hatred that mark the last 150 years are an aberration from our longer past. We could have been a racially open society along the lines of a Portugal. Damn Booth's bullet.