Reform!

Its the new Win! Democrats have finally embraced reform in their rhetoric, now it is time to see if their DNC chair and platform will match it.

The DLC's Ed Kilgore has some starters that Democrats from all sides can agree on (and so should Republicans like McCain, Lugar, etc.) He names Election Reform (a real Help American Vote Act), Redistricting Reform (no more protectionism), and Ethics and Lobbying Reform (deep six the K Street project).

Now I agree with all of those but I think we need to go further on Election reform: Federalize the elections. No more 2 million different ways to vote with incompetent volunteers, etc. American politicans talk a good game when it comes to how much they value democracy, but we spend money on it like it is an unwanted, illegitimate child who just showed up from Vietnam (appologies to David Sedaris). There should be one system, controlled by a FEC with teeth and real administrators (not party hacks). Recounts should not be county by county, state by state, but federally done (via one recount and contest law for all federal elections). I don't care if these poll workers are unionized, but it might help in terms of their competence.

While we are at it, let's have real Intelligence Reform, Procurement reform(Why don't we have enough flack jackets? But plenty of B1 bombers), Government Accounting and Spending reform (Missle Defense and the Army Corps of Engineers, GAO, etc.), Tax reform (make it more progressive and simplier) We should be getting good ideas from the states and building them into our platform.

Think of how well McCain and Perot did, there is a huge "The government needs reform" constituency out there. Let's have at it.