We can fix American Democracy now. But the window is beginning to close.
If you’ve been reading this blog, you know that the problem with American democracy is that Congress is not accountable to citizens. In brief, accountability happens in a relationship. Relationship requires communication. This requires ways to communicate. At the tail end of an accountability relationship is firing someone- and we have a bit of that in elections. Almost all of the accountability relationship is just missing.
When accountability is missing, government doesn’t work. Instead, you get corruption, fighting, and other forms of dysfunction. Just like America has now.
The most heroically accountable representative is not accountable
Some members of Congress try very hard to be accountable. My rep, Anna Eshoo, reads and responds to, about 100,000 letters, emails and phone calls every year. 300 per day! She keeps her own database of what people call about so when she has news, she can update the right people. That’s amazing! And it means she’s more accountable than almost all other reps. I’ve heard maybe one other is that good.
Some people contact her office a few times per year, some just once. And most contacts are about one topic. This adds up to maybe 40,000 people, about 1/10th of her constituents, contacting her about a couple of their concerns. This means 90% of voters don’t communicate with her about over 90% of their concerns. So she has little absolute accountability, despite heroic effort to be the most accountable representative!
Accountability is possible
Efficient accountability is possible. 4 years ago I struggled for 8 months to form a team, launch a prototype and do some marketing experiments. I launched a partial prototype, but was unable to form a team. I never got to the point where marketing experiments were possible. Money ran out so I went back to work.
18 months ago I tried again. Twice I almost formed teams offering the promise of stock, but they fell apart before they started. (And I wasted lots of time interviewing people who were eager and able, but couldn’t actually work without a salary.)
I then engaged off-shore teams to build it, but they mostly failed. So I worked on it myself and am very close to being able to demo it. With a decent person or two (a bit of angular front end, and some angular/node back-end), we could launch in a month. But that would take money for salaries, which I don’t have.
Why are we wasting our money?
We Americans spent something like $2 BILLION on the past election and are very unhappy with the results. With $300,000, I could hire people and get PeopleCount up and running. With $2 million, I am certain we’ll succeed.
But I simply don’t have the contacts. I keep trying to reach people, and keep trying to finish the demo (and write a book, and pay bills…), but I have failed, so far. Now, money is once more running out, so I’m applying for jobs again…
Unlike other attempts in this “space”, such as Represent.me. Brigade.com, and Simpolfy.com, PeopleCount.org has a great plan for growing, becoming financially stable and delivering results. (No offense to the other sites, and I love you, but I don’t understand how your solution can make a real difference. I’ve talked with the principles of Represent.me and Simpolfy.com. Brigade won’t talk with me. Nor, for that matter, will Change.org…)
Please, help me help you. Add your email address to our announcement list and make a donation. (Currently, about 30 people have added their addresses, and total contributions are about $200…)