Employee Handbook for Members of Congress

About

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America
We the People
Broken Gov
The Game
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Our Mission
Control Gov
Education
Action
Mass Projects
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Team

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Click to the Idea Center to help shape the policies and procedures that will make up the Handbook, but first read this entire page to fully understand the purpose of the Handbook. Once at the Idea Center, read the list of ideas for policies and procedures to include, “Vote Up” each idea you like, and “Vote Down” each one you don’t. If you have an idea that’s not listed, click on “new idea” to add it to the list.

THE PURPOSE OF THE HANDBOOK:
To make Members of Congress accountable to us, and nobody else, in order to force a return to accountability and common sense in all of government.

It’s as simple as this: We the People already hire our government’s law-making and oversight team (Members of Congress) with our votes. And we pay their salaries with our hard-earned money.

They’re our employees, and we hire and pay them to serve us and our families, to protect our basic rights so each of us has the freedom and opportunity we need to have a clear shot at succeeding and living the good life, and at providing an even better life for our children. The only reason we established and consent to government is to protect us and our property from harm, to keep oppression off our backs. We don’t hire and pay them to serve political parties, special interests, financial elites and central bankers. We don’t hire them to pick winners and losers and dole out benefits and privileges to a select few at our expense.

But once we hire these employees, we don’t tell them what we expect of them. What kind of employers have we been? How can we hold them accountable when we don’t even tell them how we want them to represent and serve us, and by what criteria we will judge their job performance each year? We don’t even tell them we want them to stick to the basic principles articulated in the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution of the United States and the Bill of Rights. So they’ve obviously operated under the assumption they’re free to do whatever they please once elected. And we’ve let them do this, haven’t we?

No more. It’s time to put some new policies and procedures in place to take the power and control back. We the People are Sovereigns, not subjects, and each individual American must assume the role of a Director. Together we make up the Board of Directors over government.

This Handbook will contain a complete list of the basic principles, policies and procedures that We the People expect — even demand — our Senators and Representatives to live and operate by. We entrust them with the powers of our government, but it is vital that we, as Sovereigns, retain sufficient control over them while they hold these powers. The Handbook is the first step in the exercise of our control. It will give our employees (Members of Congress and their staffs) clear guidance on how to do their jobs and keep us happy.

The principles section should include such common sense principles as:

• Basic American principles articulated in the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution of the United States and the Bill of Rights. In fact, all three of these founding documents will be included in the Handbook.

The policies section should include such common sense policies as:

• You need to read every bill you will vote on. Further, you need to understand what the bill is designed to do, and how it will actually affect individual Americans, before you cast your vote in favor. If you have not read a bill, or if you don’t understand what the consequences will be, vote no, or abstain from voting.
• No pork-barrel spending, which means no more earmarks.
• No wasteful spending, which means no more spending on policies and programs that don’t work and/or programs that aren’t needed to solve problems that affect the entire country. Programs must get stellar results or they don’t get our money.
• No deficit spending, which means don’t ever spend more than the government receives in any given year.
• No carrying of national debt, which means stop borrowing and spending money we don’t have, stop the Federal Reserve from printing money out of thin air, and start paying down the national debt every year.
• Represent, serve and work for the American people and nobody else. Hold yourself accountable to the people who hire you and pay your salary with their hard-earned money — individual Americans. View us as your Board of Directors and take your strategic guidance from us and nobody else.
• Do not represent, serve and work for political parties, special interests, financial elites and central bankers. Do not take your strategic guidance from them, and do not allow yourself to be unduly influenced by them or their registered lobbyists.
• You can still take inputs from special interests and groups, but share them with us and seek our guidance and comments on whether or not to accept or reject them.
• Respect individual Americans enough to listen to and learn from us.
• Respect individual Americans enough to tell us the truth and be honest and genuine in carrying out your duties and responsibilities. No more political spin. Say what you mean, and mean what you say.
• Respect individual Americans enough to involve us in the legislative, appropriations, oversight and reform processes. Seek and consider our input before you take action on our behalf.
• Respect our right to make decisions about our own lives — don’t do anything to limit our freedom of choice under threat of fines, jail time, etc.
• Respect our right to choose what’s best for our children, including their health and education — don’t tell us how to raise our kids, and don’t do anything to force our hand under threat of fines, jail time, etc.
• Respect individual Americans enough to justify to us every action you take — explain why you took the action you did.
• Don’t just tell us what you’ve done while in office, but tell us what have been the results of your actions in office. We care about results, results, results. We expect you to be effective and get good results.

The procedures section should include such common sense procedures as:

• With every vote of “yea,” you must sign a formal acknowledgement that you have read and understand the bill you just voted for.
• Pass and stick to a balanced budget every year.
• Before spending a dollar of our money on any policy or program, require and share with us the outcome studies that were done that prove the policy or program gets good results and is effective.
• Before implementing a new policy or program nationally, require and share with us the results of a pilot program that proves the new policy or program gets good results and is effective.
• Spend 10% of our annual goverment tax revenues on paying down the national debt each year.
• Do not take campaign contributions from registered lobbyists.
• Do not allow registered lobbyists to raise or bundle campaign money for you.
• Do not take campaign contributions from political action committees.
• Post on your website all legislative proposals you receive and are lobbied to introduce and support, and let individual Americans know who brought it to you and lobbied you. And provide us with the ability to provide guidance and comments.
• Provide a 30-day public comment period for every bill that is scheduled to be marked up and amended in committee or subcommittee. At the conclusion of this period, fully explain what you did with our inputs — whether you accepted or rejected it, and why.
• For every bill that has been marked up and amended, provide a 7-day public comment period on the revised bill before it takes its next step in the legislative process — before it gets marked up and amended in full committee and/or before it is scheduled for a final vote on the House or Senate floor. At the conclusion of this period, fully explain what you did with our inputs, and why.
• Keep a running list that not only tells us what you’ve done but gives us the results of every official action you have taken while in office.

Once individual Americans have had a chance to shape the content, we will publish the Handbook and distribute it to every Senator and Representative on Capitol Hill. Individual Americans can participate by traveling to Washington to help us deliver them to every office on Capitol Hill, and by downloading and printing a copy of the Handbook and then hand-delivering it to their Senators and Representatives back home.

Together, We the People will then ask every Senator and Representative to sign a formal acknowledgement that he or she has read and fully understands everything in it. Only then we will have a mechanism to hold them accountable to us, and nobody else.

Everyone needs to participate in government this way. Again, influence over government must be shared among all the people.

Click to the Idea Center to help shape the policies and procedures that will make up the Handbook. Once at the Idea Center, read the list of ideas for policies and procedures to include, “Vote Up” each idea you like, and “Vote Down” each one you don’t. If you have an idea that’s not listed, click on “new idea” to add it to the list.

*NOTE: Please limit your ideas to principles, policies and procedures that focus on how they should approach their jobs and conduct themselves in office — the principles, policies and procedures that must guide their behavior. Let’s stay away from asking them to take specific positions on issues until we have completed research and data analyses.

This is a time for bold action.

We the People are Sovereigns, not subjects. Let’s start acting like it.

WHAT YOU CAN DO AS A SOVEREIGN

1. Click to the Education Center and get informed.
2. Click to the Action Center and participate.

JOIN US. CONTROL GOVERNMENT. BE FREE AND INDEPENDENT.