I’m always looking for new ideas for improving elections. The Founding Fathers did a pretty good job with their Constitution, but one day we’ll probably have to start over and do another and hopefully we’ve learned a few things to add some new stuff to improve things.
So here’s my idea: Every election year, we spin a big wheel, kind like the Wheel of Fortune wheel. And one of the spaces is labeled “Super Crazy Fun Election Time”. If that space is landed on, every elected official loses his job and has to be replaced with someone else. It’ll be wacky crazy fun!
There can be other spaces on the wheel to like “Veterans Get Two Votes”, “No Women Suffrage Bonus Round”, and “Election Winners to Be Picked Randomly from Phone Book”. It’ll make election year exciting!
What would you want on the Election Year Wheel of Chance?
1. Election results will be determined at random by trained seals.
2. Only citizens who’s Social Security number ends in an odd number can vote.
3. Everyone up for reelection via jungle primary.
how about a “Bring Out Your Dead” space
when landed on, all elected officials must be dead, dug up and dusted off – and put in office
Steel Cage Match.
“Good enough for us, good enough for you.”
If the wheel stops here, then for a passed law, every politician that voted for it must live under the provisions of that law for 366 days before it will apply to the electorate.
Yeah – a THUNDERDOME space
2 politicians enter, 1 politician leaves
I like it
“Pay to Play”
Politician’s pay based on the GDP, deficit, and unemployment rates. In addition, they will only be able to take standard dependent deductions on their 1040 and must pay full property taxes for all owned real estate.
“EVERY REPRESENTATIVE WILL BE A RON PAUL CLONE RON PAUL”
We are already playing with an extra-large “Bankrupt” space.
“Permanent Vacation” – when landed on, all politicians on more than their second term get a permanent vacation to Mexico.
How about a “No Lawyers” slot. Any one who has attended law school (how ever briefly) will be forbidden from holding public office for the next decade.
Or maybe a “No Pay Raise Ever” space. Pretty much self explanatory!
I like your idea, Frank, especially the every elected official loses their job part. I would make that the only choice on the wheel. And I would add that after losing their job, we get to tar and feather the whole lot of them and ransack their homes and take all their stuff away.
Every other space on the wheel should be “Chuck Norris….Ass Kicker in Chief”
It would be crazy no to.
My picks for the wheel:
* Election Canceled. Congress is closed for 2 years. Go home.
* Zero pay for Congress, next six years!! Run for office now! Civil service makes you happy.
* Only laws that repeal laws may be passed in the next two years. Violators will be shot.
I’d like to have an election where only citizens get to vote and they only get to vote once.
“Monkey Shines” where a Monkey, or maybe a Gorilla, is elected for the next year.
Definitely need “Underworld” and “Aunty’s Choice” slots too!
This reminds me of my ‘Wheel O’ Punishment’ idea for disciplining my kids. The wheel would have one slot that says ‘Grace’, but it’d be a tiny one.
You might want to get working on that for the nipper, Frank. “Frank Jr., Mom always said, don’t play ball in the house… now go spin the wheel.”
While some of the ideas have merit, I must object to “Election Winners to Be Picked Randomly from Phone Book”. This is terribly elitist. I would submit, in it’s stead, a procedure whereby each State is obligated to send a percentage of their homeless populatiion to Washington DC. This would help the unemployment rate, get the homeless into warm places already heated by taxpayer dollars and the decisions could not be any worse than the ones already being foisted upon us.
No Women’s Suffrage Bonus Round?
That’s thin ice right there, Frank.
And SpaceMonkey – just stop with the crazy talk. We need to at least keep these ideas within the realm of possibility.
The only fair way to decide who should hold an office: Yahtzee.
dogs get the vote. Both candidates call a dog which ever one he goes to is the winner.
Other spaces
*if you vote then you can’t leave the country until the next election
*All bills passed during this election term will be repealed with the possibility for reapplication next election cycle.
I’d say two wheels… one concerning the bills to be passed and one concerning the elections.
What if we just put the politician that sponsored the bill on the wheel and net tax payers get to throw one knife for every dollar it cost. The more it cost the lower their chances.
All representatives must be from Muskogee, Oklahoma, USA. That place always sounded nice.
* Politicians must follow the law required of us, or be shot
* No bills longer than 5 pages this session
* Candidates named Pelosi, Reid or Obama may not run this turn
* Ultimate Challenge: Congress is given 24 hours to crank out a new federal budget for next year. If they pass a budget that is half the size of the average of the last five years, the election this year is suspended and all incumbents get a free bonus term, on the condition that the budget remains frozen for the next 4 years.
* Switcheroo: Every candidate for President switches places with their VP nominee. Every candidate for the Senate switches places with one of their state’s candidates for the House.
* Super Switcheroo: Like Switcheroo, but every candidate for President switches places with the VP nominee of another party.
* Super Duper Ultra Mega Mega Crazy Fun Election Time: All incumbents are automatically disqualified as in regular Super Crazy Fun Election Time, and then permanently banned from ever holding public office again.
Find the last person who understands the words integrity, service and sacred honor and make him or her the president. They have to have demonstrated those ideals throughout their lives so far. Draft dodgers, drug takers, lobbiests and Hollywood elitists need not apply
* All voters given a list of ten sentences. Five are from the constitution, five are bogus statements, like a right for health care, separation of church and state… To vote, you must be able to tell which five are from the constitution, and which five do not appear in the constitution.
* To run for office you have to take a similar test first, but it has a hundred questions.
* If you have a stupid sounding name, you have to change it to something common, before running for office.
Opposite of Europe…we let Europeans do our voting for us and then go with whoever they support the least.
We could do the same thing with foreign policy by having the arabs decide.
Put all the candidate names on a bunch of rubber balls, throw them into a huge pool of water and let a school of manatees push the winners into a basket.
Have a second congress in the District of Columbus which is in the desert on the California-Nevada border, with no buildings, just old musty tents. The second congress is the only one that can vote for taxes. The original congress can vote for all the spending they want, but only until they run out of money.
The second congress will all be people who ran on slogans like “No taxes! Donations only!” and then they will say to the original congress “here is your dollar”.
Have No Democrats Allowed on the wheel and the rig the sh!t out of the whole thing!
Some Ideas for the spaces on the election “wheel of fun”
1. Mall Santa Switchero- Make all senators switch jobs with mall santas for a year. (I’m not sure we could get the mall santas to go along with this)
2. Haitian Vacation- When this is landed on all illegal aliens get a free one way trip to Haiti. (It could be a real boost to the Haitian economy)
3. Bear Fight – The president would have to wrestle a bear. (A good president IE Teddy Roosevelt wouldn’t have a problem with this)
4. Spending Slash – Any member of congress that proposes any sort of spending bill must first win a knife fight with the speaker of the house.
5. Budget balance – Members of congess would have to stand on a plank together over a shark tank until they agree on a balanced budget. ( This one might get the creulty to sharks people after us)
More Wheel of election fun Ideas:
6. Trump the court- Land on this space and we fire the entire supreme court. ( We hire Donald Trump to do the firing)
7. Golden Gunplay- Land on this space and we shoot one random member of congress. (This should work better than term limits)
8. Vote like your life depends on it – If the wheel stops on this space we shoot one random voter. ( this would hurt voter turnout but those that do show up and vote are going to be motivated and informed)
9. Second amendment- Land on this one and we release armed bears into Washington DC. (We will have to keep them off the bridges as the right to arm bears shall not be abridged.)
I don’t know, Frank. When the wheel landed on “Inexperienced Socialist” in 2008, look what happened. That trial run alone makes me wary of continuing the wheel experiment/
What?
Obama wasn’t a random spin of the wheel?
We’re doomed.