Wikipedia Founder Facilitating Net-based Political Reform
Wikipedia founder Jimmy “Jimbo” Wales has launched an initiative to “ramp up the intelligence of poltics.”
In his open letter to the political blogosphere, published yesterday, he writes:
I am launching today a new Wikia website aimed at being a central meeting ground for people on all sides of the political spectrum who think that it is time for politics to become more participatory, and more intelligent.
This website, Campaigns Wikia, has the goal of bringing together people from diverse political perspectives who may not share much else, but who share the idea that they would rather see democratic politics be about engaging with the serious ideas of intelligent opponents, about activating and motivating ordinary people to get involved and really care about politics beyond the television soundbites.
Together, we will start to work on educating and engaging the political campaigns about how to stop being broadcast politicians, and how to start being community and participatory politicians.
How will we do that? Is it possible? Jimbo, are you crazy?
Ok, I might be crazy. I founded Wikipedia, which is of course about as crazy an idea as anyone might imagine. And you know what? I was not and I still am not smart enough to figure out how to make Wikipedia work. The Wikipedians figured that out, my role has only been to listen and watch, and to guide us forward in a spirit of sincerity and love to do something useful.
So, I will frankly admit right up front: I don’t know how to make politics healthier. But, I believe that you do. I believe that together we can work, this very election season, to force campaigns to use wikis and blogs to organize, discuss, manage, lead and be led by their volunteers.
We can turn this into the first beginnings of what is to come. This can be the start of the era of net-driven participatory politics. And it does not matter if you are on the right, on the left, moderate or extreme, socialist or libertarian. Whoever you are, and whatever you believe, you can share with me my sincere desire that the process start to be about substance and thought, rather than style and image.
Keep reading to learn more... (Thanks to Andrew Schwartz for the tip.)
I am all for a fair and open democratic debate on the issues, so I applaud those comments. And to be fair I should add some comments to the Fair Tax issue. While it appears on its face to be a good alternative to our weirdly complex current system it has many flaws. The most glaring is that it will hurt the poor and middle class and benefit the wealthy. This certainly explains why it is supported by such wonderful leaders as President Bush and Tom Delay.
Does anyone really think that changing the method of collecting taxes will keep the Federal Government from sucking dollars from the citizens to keep itself going? As I have said the main change here would be in who pays the most, and in an era where the rich are consistently getting richer and the poor poorer, then supporters of this measure are being played the fool.
John,
You write: “The most glaring is that it will hurt the poor and middle class and benefit the wealthy.”
The wealthy spend far more on taxable products and services than the poor and middle class — both of whom will benefit from a prebate that eradicates all taxes up to the poverty level.
Until you provide some evidence for your assertion, I can only conclude that you are misinformed and making wildly inaccurate speculations about the potential impact of the FairTax.
Joshua
Joshua,
Thanks for the opportunity to explain myself. The current tax system already precludes those who live below the poverty level [or some preset level] from paying taxes. As far as products and services, while its true that wealthier people will spend more on luxury items, all people have to spend a certain amount on basics such as gasoline, food, clothing, shelter, vehicles, health care, electricity etc. I fail to see how a wealthy person, who suddenly has no income tax, no capital gains tax etc, will be paying an equal amount solely on purchases. If the fair tax truly ends the cycle of the rich getting richer and the poor poorer then I am all for it, but I sincerely doubt it.
John,
Your belief that the current tax system “already precludes those who live below the poverty level [or some preset level] from paying taxes” suggests that you haven’t read much about the FairTax.
If you read The FairTax Book, for example, you will learn that everyone (poor, middle-class, wealthy) already pays an embedded tax to the tune of around 22% (depending on the particular industry in question) on everything we buy today.
Many of these embedded taxes will be repealed along with the passage of the FairTax. See The FairTax Book for more information about this.
Joshua
Joshua, Thanks for the input. I will give it a closer look.