Go to www.change.gov and write President-Elect Obama with your ideas and vision for the America we all voted to change.

This is how a government by The People and for The People takes its first steps in the right direction.

This is the first open ears in which The People can expect to speak.

These are firsts of many, many yet to come.

 

Here is what I wrote:

 Congratulations, President-Elect! This website and input-forum is a monumental step in the right direction.

I am a native Washingtonian that recently moved to Alpena, Michigan to restart my education at Alpena Community College.  Having grown up in DC, and seeing how it works from the inside and then moving to rural, rust-belt Michigan and seeing how the changes in manufacturing industry and long economic downturns shape people's lives directly, I have a few suggestions that I believe can help a wide cross-section of America, help our global standing in the world and return us to the land of opportunity and liberty that we once were.

Starting with the government, we need a 100% transparent government using open source database management software and communications technologies.  Constituents should be able to go to a central website and see what legislation is on the books, what is being voted on, whom is voting - and how they vote - and be able to directly contact their representative and senators through a single user interface.  Security considerations are obvious, and all necessary steps should be taken to protect what is sensitive and vital to our national interests. However, the rest of it - from bridges to somewhere to parks to environmental regulation to education mandates to gun control should all be available and readily viewable online. 

This 21st century platform should be mandated for every state and major city municipality.  It does not have to change what their priorities are - as each locality will have agendas that will obviously differ from each other - but simply HOW they function.  One of the major disenchantment I have observed both in my urban Washington, as well as here, is the daunting inaccessibility of government by the people. They don't know what their government is doing, where there tax dollars are being spent, or even how to begin finding that out.

The Economy:

Our tax system is antiquated, lop-sided, overly-complicated and too easy to skirt around.  I agree that paying taxes is patriotic. It is what The People give back beyond their blood, sweat and tears.  There needs to be a fair, open and simple tax structure for everyone - perhaps eliminating income taxes all together, and instituting a federal sales tax.  Criminals, illegal immigrants and super-rich tax evaders all purchase goods and services. Everyone can contribute to a federal sales tax that way, regardless of how they earned the money they are spending.   Our banking system needs to be well-regulated and transparent.  We need a major re-investment in American jobs showcasing American technology, talent, and industry.

Civil Liberties and Civil Rights:

Our government has committed War Crimes in the name of expanding Liberty, Freedom and fighting an ambiguous enemy we call 'terrorism'.  Federal tax dollars have gone to support torture, kidnapping, illegal detention, and war profiteering. If it were any other country, we can - and do- decry their behavior as criminal and against all that we hold dear. Why then, are we participating in that ourselves?  We need to close down Guantanamo Bay prison immediately. We need to hold those that have tortured responsible for the crimes they committed.  We need to look at all the Mandates, Executive Orders, and expansion of Executive powers that have skirted or outright ignored the Constitution -which I have sworn to 'support and defend from all enemies, foreign and domestic', as you will too.  Our Constitution needs to be treated as the sacred beacon of governance that we all idealize it to be. Federal and State amendments should not be passed to prevent two consenting adults from getting married, adopting children or conducting family business because of their gender, nor criminalize dissenting behavior when The People have a grievance with the government.

The Environment, Energy and Industry: 

Undoubtedly, global warming and climate change are issues we face. We have observed conclusively the changes taking place. We have and continue to develop technologies to adapt to those changes, and lessen the impact of the developing world. Our environmental  problems are China's problems are Greenland's problems are South Africa's problems are India's problems and on and on. We need to join the international community in dealing with climate change by adopting real game-changing standards in what we put into our waters, ground and sky.

All of these problems are inter-related. Call it a New New Deal, New Deal 2.0, or simply - as my parents have taught me - Doing What's Right.  Massive investment in updating our entire educational system to deal with a 21st century world, massive power and transportation system investment to upgrade and maintain our infrastructure in environmentally sound ways, massive re-tooling of manufacturing (especially in hard-hit areas like my new home of Alpena, Michigan) to produce world-enviable green technologies like wind and wave turbines, photovoltaic cells and Hydrogen vehicles will produce jobs on an equally massive scale. Rosie the Riveter was right: We can do it!

Healthcare and the Medical Industry:

For too long has Big Pharmacy called the shots in modern medicine. 300 percent more people die from prescribed legal drugs than illegal drugs that are destroying families and criminalizing whole generations of people.  People are being denied medicine for profit, as it makes more money in treating a disease than in curing it.  Like the 21st Century Government's necessarily open-platform of the latest communications and data storage technologies, the medical industry needs to have a similar high-tech universal infrastructure put in place.  Doctors and experts in one part of the country should be able to look at and recommend procedures for people on the other. Any doctor anywhere should be able to log into a National Medical Database and get a patient's records wherever they go.  This system needs to be independent of Insurance and Pharmacological control and influence as well as independent of the criminal justice system.  The Hippocratic Oath is one of simply helping people - not profiting from them or criminalizing them. Anyone, anywhere within the United States - especially her citizenry - should be able to seek the best and brightest medical help without fear of crippling costs or civil or criminal repercussions.

My vision for America is lofty, but I feel not out of reach.  The large-scale changes I ask for will need to put every man, woman and child to work toward a greater good.  People will need to be trained on new technologies, and factories re-tooled to produce new goods in an environmentally friendly way. Our children will need the best and brightest teachers, and a high-tech support staff to give them a learning field unprecedented in human civilization. We will need to dig deep and look to help - and look for help - within every brother and sister across the country and even the world we share. The vision for America I see is not one overshadowed by Big Government. Rather quite the opposite: envision an efficient government that is abreast of the latest and most efficient practices and technology instead of fighting to adopt them. Our country can be repaired and rebuilt BY the People, and FOR the People, and held accountable TO the People.  That is not socialism, communism or any other -ism that some may use to scare the masses.  That is Lady Liberty learning how to better serve her people, the people that hold Her up as a shining example to the huddled masses, yearning to be free.

Gods Bless you, Mr. Obama.
As a journalistic writer and editor, I have an ever-vigilant eye on you. As an American, I am with you 100 percent, and want to help you - and the country we both love and share - every step of the way.

Good morning, Fellow Americans.  It is the dawn of a new day.

Right now, in Alpena County, Michigan, and all over the country, our government's ears have opened, and into that yawning abyss we call bureaucracy, must we collectively shout our desire to change the future of that nation.

We must Vote.

This day, unlike other elections in civil society, provides the opportunity to affect the lives of everyone around you - possibly around the world.

Your vote in county, state, and federal elections - not just President - affect the policies that are set, and direct who's in charge of where your tax dollars go. Those policies are the vanguards of our American dream. The people who enact those policies are heroes for our cause.

Your vote matters. It has always mattered. Our government is run at the People's consent. It's a job we hire them to do. For whatever reason, if they don't do it, they're subject to replacement. It's that simple.

We have all seen our government go awry - here is our opportunity to do something about it.

Your decision may affect whether someone goes off to war. Whether someone gets to eat that day. Whether your tax dollars go into researching new ways to save a life - or new ways to take it away. Whether someone can get married, or someone else can adopt. Whether another species go extinct. Whether or not we're that species.

Imagine the change.

Vote.