Dealing in Fear, Dealing in Hope

Fear is a powerful emotion. It can drive people to do many things, and the ability to instill fear into people's hearts is one of the more effective paths to power over those people. It's the calling card of many a movie or comic book villain, from Emperor Palpatine to Sinestro.

Sadly, fear isn't exclusive to the realms of fiction. Fear is a powerful force right now, in this year's presidential election. It's a tool being used by both sides of the conflict, to varying degrees of success.

Trans-Pacific Partnership Part 1: Preamble

PREAMBLE

The Trans-Pacific Partnership is a proposed agreement between 12 countries along the Pacific rim: The United States, Japan, Canada, Mexico, Chile, Vietnam, Australia, Peru, New Zealand, Malaysia, Brunei, and Singapore.

The preamble of the TPP lays outs the goals of the deal between those countries, which is mostly reflected by the pro-TPP statements on the front page of the United States Trade Representative's TPP website. The preamble doesn't really get into the details of the deal, so there isn't a lot to unpack.

Trans-Pacific Partnership Part 0: Public Perception

The Trans-Pacific Partnership is a hot-button issue right now. Our current sitting president, Barack Obama, supports the deal, while both of our presidential candidates, Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump, oppose it. Clinton in particular has waffled on the deal, finally turning against it in part due to Bernie Sanders' influence on the Democratic platform, as he was particularly opposed to the deal. The final decision on the deal rests with Congress, but while it's not clear where Congress is leaning on it, it is clear that our next president will influence the deal's fate.

I'm intensely curious as to how a deal like this can be equally abhorrent to the thoroughly capitalist Donald Trump and the socialist Bernie Sanders. So, to cut through the rhetoric, I've decided to actually read the deal. Let's try to understand what, exactly, this deal is about.

Today I'll start by exploring the rhetoric surrounding the deal; arguments for and against the deal. Then, I'll start exploring the text itself.

Revised Amendment XXVIII

After discussing it with a friend, it became obvious that there was a problem with the run-off method in my proposed amendment: basically, that getting people to go out and vote a second time in the case of a run-off would be difficult for many people. So, instead, there needed to be some way to have that run-off election without having an entire second Election Day.

I've edited the amendment to reflect a better system:

Why I'm Running for President

I don't want to run for President. I don't want to be President.

Yet, strangely, these are the thoughts that made me decide to run for President. These are the thoughts that have been driving me toward my 2020 run for the past 12 years.

AMENDMENT XXVIII

I would like to propose an amendment to the United States Constitution:

The President shall, together with the Vice President, chosen for the same term, be elected, as follows:

All eligible voters within the Unites States, its Territories, and all its Possessions, may vote by ballot. They shall name in their ballots the person they select for President and who they select for Vice President, and the choice for President and Vice President shall be distinct. The Person with the greatest number of votes for President, shall be President, if such number be a majority of the whole number of votes counted; And, if no person has such a majority, then another election shall take place within 30 days, this election featuring only the two People with the highest number of votes for President from the initial election; and the Person with the most votes for President from this second election shall become President. The Person with the greatest number of votes for Vice President, shall be Vice President, if such number be a majority of the whole number of votes counted; And, if no person has such a majority, then another election shall take place within 30 days, this election featuring only the two People with the highest number of votes for Vice President from the initial election; and the Person with the most votes for Vice President from this second election shall become Vice President. If both the President and Vice President require a second election, the second election for the Vice President shall be held on the same day as the second election for the President.

Please allow me to explain what this amendment would do and why it's important:

The Politician Stigma

Recently I read a sentence that said, "you've probably dreamed of becoming a model, athlete, or worst of all, a politician."

This got me thinking about how we perceive politicians. By no means is the author alone in their disgust with that particular profession. Few professions are more reviled, whether for being corrupt, inept, unbending, and/or oblivious. These things are all bad on their own, but these faults (real or imagined) are magnified by the fact that these are the people in power in this country.

However, I have a theory that this revulsion toward politics as a profession may be a part of the problem; that the politicians we have are a product of the reputation we lay upon them.