Do you REALLY want a fair election?

 There are two challenges that predominate today that make a "fair" election possible.  For the purposes of this discussion, define "fair" as

1. Truthful campaigning with the guaranteed right of an opponent to reply on the merits of a claim or accusation; and
2. the guarantee of honest and truthful preparation, submission, and counting of votes.

Not sure how number two can be accomplished with the current judicial climate.  One would be to go back to everyone voting on election day unless the individual would be out of his or her home town or out of the country and applied for an absentee ballot.  If applied to everyone, that would seem to be not only fair, but Constitutional.

Campaigning is a different matter, and that arguably could be solved quickly if the American people wanted to do exactly that.  Everyone is looking for an edge. Human nature doesn't ever reward or strive for "fairness," so acting as if it is, is duplicitous. Not sure if this would help the voter searching for truth, but how about:

• requiring every campaign advertisement to require also providing the opponent's answer or explanation. In print it would be on the same page as the original claim or accusation. In broadcast, it would follow immediately and be clearly labeled as the "official" reply.

• Have an independent research panel, subject to charges of perjury charges for errors, empowered to fact check each and every campaign ad, statement and reply for truthful accuracy, including a duplicitous parsing of sentences to appear to say one thing but not technically saying anything of the sort (a common practice in politics today). THAT sort of thing is lying by inviting assumptions on the part of the reader, listener, viewer. And make prosecution mandatory, not at the discretion of any prosecutor or Judge; an accusation leads to a trial, no excuses or way(s) out.

I suspect that would stop the "October Surprises" as well as the "Russian dossier" type fabrications. It would also cut the profits of news publications, stations and print shops, although each "job" would require double the space of the initial claim or accusation, so maybe it would even out.

Violations could escalate to make the rules effective: first violation would deserve a monetary fine, a second... elimination from a debate... a third, removal from the subject ballot.  

Re-establishing a Meritocracy will restore equality in America!

 One of the biggest negative factors in America in 2023 is the perception(s) of racial inequality.  Arguably overblown by politicians and media, there is nonetheless an ongoing existence, and it is worth considering the likely causes of the survival of that inequality.

Over just the last century, trillions of dollars have been spent, advertised and publicized as dedicated to erasing that inequality.  A close examination of those expenditures strongly suggests that those funds were not only not effective in the asserted goal(s) but in fact exacerbated the inequality.  Why?  Consider:

• The government funded those not working with no requirement to do any work or train for future employment, thus sending the unstated message that not working was not only acceptable, but that to expect the poor to actually train for employment was beyond their ability.
• Poor women who had out of wedlock children actually were given more publicly funded money the more out of wedlock children they birthed, abandoning any effort to identify and hold the men fathering those children responsible for supporting their families.
• Funding of education became oriented to meeting the demands and aligning with teachers' union's definition of education as well as their focus on teachers' salary increases independent of schoolchildren's level of achievement, leading to "social" advancement from grade to grade without requiring minimal student accomplishment of learning goals, thus granting High School diplomas to children not educated to a level that enabled them to hold meaningful employment.

For many poor and virtually all minorities, these steps all served to artificially handicap and often block advancement in the business world and resulted in valid resentment on the part of those subjected to this disparate treatment.

Not being able to deny the factual basis of the resentment, government has for years tried to illegally and imperfectly make up for these underlying and causative errors by granting employment and admissions not earned to those who did not receive the promised or implied level of education needed, and this was done in a manner that left the unstated and unadmitted impression that those in charge of these programs were doing so because the recipients were not capable of success

on their own initiative.  This was and remains absolutely untrue and serves to insult and disrespect the abilities and potentials of the poor, whether of minority status or not.

But once identified, what can and must be done to provide true equality to all?

No one can perfectly and completely identify and promise results... but there are a number of steps that may be worth considering:

1. Stop rewarding failure.  Make unemployment and any grants dependent on some public work effort and/or job training.  Doing so provides the recipient not only with the potential of future employment but the working and study supports his or her own sense of self-worth.
2. Stop financially rewarding out of wedlock births, instead increase the public effort to identify and hold the father(s) of such children financially responsible.
3. Stop social promotion in schools.  There was a time when if a child didn't pass the tests (and tests ARE needed) they were held back.  That has to be restored as the norm.
4. If children in a class are not learning, the teacher has to be held responsible.  It is time for them to be accountable for results.  If a person cannot effectively teach, they should not be being paid for or holding the position of "teacher."  That insults the children, their parents, and the school district and school in which that person is employed... as well as pulls down the respect other effective teachers deserve to receive.
5. If a school or school district will not serve the children first, parents must be able to transfer their child to a school where their child's learning and accomplishment is paramount.  That means educational tax money moving with the children, not based on residence address.
6. No child cannot learn, and any argument to the contrary must never be accepted.  If a child is recalcitrant and refuses to learn, at a certain age they should be made to enroll in the military where many youth used to be saved by the installation of discipline absent acceptable excuses.  It did work.  It will work again.

There are certainly more possibilities and readers may want to add those for consideration.  This is not a "save all" or "perfect" list.  It is but a starting point for a discussion... a realistic one... about recognizing what is, what is wrong with what is, and some of the ways worth considering if America wants to get back to valuing what it used to and what its success is based and dependent upon... Meritocracy.

We claim to guarantee a chance, not a result, ... but we do need to re-establish access to that chance instead of implying that some are not able and thus preventing a mental attitude dedicated to achievement and self-worth.  It isn't money.  It is respect, with the concomitant responsibility, that must be taught, expected and honored.