« Business/Politics LOL break | Main | MOTTO "6" - Poltical tit for tat »

Weekend Coffee

weekend coffee.jpgFollowing this years initiative fiasco, the Missoulian suggests making the process easier.   Wonderful, lets reward those who deliberately set out to connive, cheat, and cloud important issues by making it easier.  Why don't we also shorten the Tour De France not to tempt cheaters to cheat. Lets remove the mountain passes along with banning doping.

To be fair, they also suggest barring paid signature gathering, which MOTTO supports (MOTTO also strongly advocates for stringent financial reporting).   The problem with the Missoulian editorial, however, is how quickly they seem to point to the courts as the culprit in these issues rather than those who deliberately hijacked our initiative system. 

 But direct democracy doesn't exactly work if it's left to the courts to decide what people can vote for and what they cannot. We need an initiative process that limits the potential for control by the courts.

The courts did not decide what people could vote for, but rather upheld the integrity of the system.   Common sense changes regarding gathering and financial transparency will provide a level of integrity, particularly for those who are ethically challenged.  The courts will always be (and should remain) a line of defense for those who continue to attempt to circumvent our precious system.

Posted on Saturday, October 7, 2006 at 07:03AM by Registered CommenterJeff Mangan in | Comments2 Comments

PrintView Printer Friendly Version

EmailEmail Article to Friend

Reader Comments (2)

You're absolutely right, the problem with the initiatives was not a judicial one. The problem was that an outsider with a lot of money thought he could use his $$$ to turn Montana into his libertarian shangri-la. But he knew he couldn't do it without breaking the rules, so he shelled out the money and his friends broke the law.

The judge did Montana a favor. Now if only Orego could have the same kind of luck. I dare Rich to come back in '08 and try this crap again.
October 9, 2006 | Unregistered CommenterAbra
The initiative process scares the hell out of me. How many times have we heard that a particular vote is "the will of the People!" This familure cry is used to justify too many initiatives that are either a really bad idea or just outright against the law. History is full of examples of the popular vote being used to abuse a minority.
Thank God the courts and the legislature can still correct "the will of the People."
October 15, 2006 | Unregistered CommenterWorried

PostPost a New Comment

Enter your information below to add a new comment.

My response is on my own website »
Author Email (optional):
Author URL (optional):
Post:
 
All HTML will be escaped. Hyperlinks will be created for URLs automatically.