governance

May I see Your ID Please. AT the top,l et me say I pride myself as being what I call a common sense Centrist, I think good governance is good governance simple as that.  I think Its Good for Gvt to defend our country, pave our roads, help people recover from disaster, provide Limited help to people who need ot be lifted out of poverty. You get the picture.  NOT good for GVT; tell me what books I can read, installing religious beliefs in schools,  basically stay out of my Beliefs.   

Hopefully that qualifies me as a reasonable common sense human.  

Having said that, Lets try this. 

Some form of Identification requirement for Voting is not such a horribe Idea.  

Some support for my Argument.

If I want to FLY, I must provide a Gvt issued ID

If I want to Operate a Motor Vehicle- I MUST have the GVT Issued License.

If I want to go to the library I need a "card" to do So. 

If I buy Tickets for a Show and go to Willcall to get the tix. I need to Provide ID.

The Left says that VOTER ID would discourage Some from Voting.  The Rght says that attitude Proves that the Democrat leaders encourage Voter Fraud AND those fraudulent voters ALWAYS vote Democratic.  There is NO evidence tthat actually Happens in any organized way.  And, Who are these people that want to Vote Illegally, How many of them are out there.  Enough to change the outcome of elections?  Im a cynic on that Idea.

Im Saying it's time to Put this debate to bed.  Provide a State Issued Voter ID.  

In NJ The Motor Vehicle Comission Issues the "REAL ID". It has deep proof of who I am.  If the GVT trusts that and will let me get on a Plane, It seems to me that should Qualify as a way to verify I have a verified way to Vote.   

Incorruptible Organizations AMA with Eric Ries. Wednesday 2/4 at 3:00 PM CT

Lean Startup author who now focuses on legal structures to protect mission-driven organizations from corruption. incorruptible.co

Free book giveaway! Register here.

Do what Olympians Do. As an Olympian I know that mindset is key to which awesome athlete wins. Im concerned that most people are stuck in fear and anxiety about our collective future. We need to know and address the challenges, but keep focused on our collective desire for peace. What systems to change and who is doing what in the system you care most about? 

🔮 Join for A Future You Love, Aug 28-29. We're hosting another online forum! This time two days of imagining a better future. Be a featured writer by signing up here. Or just show up- add the event to your calendar so you remember to hop on. More about the event- Imagine being 10, 20, 50 years into the future. It's awesome- better than you expected. What went right?

Check out more details on the site- www.uptrusthq.com/future. 

It would be awesome have everyone that regularly posts claim a writing spot- 

What would you want to see preserved or enhanced in the future?

For this event, a Future Claim comes from your personal imagination of a future world you love being a part of. What’s it like? Whether or not you feel the world is headed that way or if it could given our current course.

This can be far future or in a couple of years. It can be a bold idea, a quiet hope, a fear, or something you think more people should talk about.

You don’t need to be an expert. You don’t need to be a sci-fi writer. You can come with an unfinished idea or something you’re pondering.

Some examples:

• “I love how everyone speaks openly about their mystical experiences of oneness with God, and we help each other integrate these awakenings with our unresolved psychological problems.”

• “Jobs, family, and status don’t define us in the future I love. Instead, we’re defined by our character transformations.”

• “We will treat grief as a kind of activism. Crying in public is revered again, like when you read about women beating their breasts in ancient societies.”

• “I’ll see dozens of micro-homeschool pods as I walk around my neighborhood. Each running different experiments with different models of education.”

Not sure where to start? Try imagining yourself 5, 10, 20 or 50+ years from now, and finish one of these sentences:

• “I’m so happy because ___.”

• “Wow, I can’t believe [this incredible thing actually happened]”

• “It’s so amazing that [x problem was solved by y]

• “It’s so amazing that everyone now has [z thing that belonged to only the super lucky (rich, or dedicated)]”

   

Future thing not working for you? Try these:

• “I hope someday we stop pretending that ___.”

• “If we keep going this way, ___ will happen.”

• “I believe we could build a future where ___.”

Then ask yourself: Why do I believe that? What’s at the heart of it?

That’s your Future Take.

Do what Olympians Do. As an Olympian I know that mindset is key to which awesome athlete wins. Im concerned that most people are stuck in fear and anxiety about our collective future. We need to know and address the challenges, but keep focused on our collective desire for peace. What systems to change and who is doing what in the system you care most about? 

Leave the country or stay? There was a time period where my friends and I were getting invited to these new exciting community projects in the Central America and Asia and Europe. Crypto millionaires and retired billionaires trying to bootstrap whole new civilizations and villages and large retreat centers.

Yet, all of us felt a certain affinity and even responsibility to stay in the States.

Which is a little strange considering probably all of our families also have immigrated here at some point.

How does one assess whether to establish a new home abroad and call it quits on the homeland? Or stick it out and try to make it work?

It reminds me of the dilemma that's often posed around do you try to reform an institute as a player within or do you go off and establish a brand new thing? Does staying in the current system doomed to be corrupted and compromised? Or is going off naive and doomed to failure as a retreat from life?

As I'm writing this, I could see the same dilemma in deciding whether to stay working for a corp or start your own business. Or stay in a currently challenging relationship or call it quits to find a new partner. Or even try to be a lay person in the world or go off to be a monk in the mountains.

I suppose the answer is ultimately context is what matters most.

And I've yet to see a really compelling abroad experiment that seemed actually integrated or likely to deliver on the promises.

I, myself, have been increasingly interested in building out more of the physical and social infrastructure locally to create the new type of village community in AVL. But, those billionaire communities or even rural Portugal tiny communities do tempt me at times.

Teal Version of US Democracy. I asked ChatGpt what changes could be made to US democracy to make it teal. I really dig these concepts. I hadn’t ever heard of Liquid Voting before, and it sounds cool as heck.

1. Ranked-Choice Voting (RCV) on a National Scale
   Description: Ranked-choice voting allows voters to rank candidates in order of preference rather than voting for just one candidate. If no candidate wins a majority of first-choice votes, the candidate with the fewest votes is eliminated, and their votes are redistributed based on voters’ next preferences. This process continues until a candidate wins a majority.
   Teal Impact: RCV encourages more nuanced, cooperative, and less divisive campaigns, as candidates are incentivized to appeal to a broader range of voters, not just their base. It reduces the polarization inherent in two-party systems and promotes coalition-building, which aligns with teal values of inclusivity, complexity thinking, and the integration of diverse perspectives.

2. Deliberative Voting Structures
   Description: Deliberative democracy involves structured, informed, and inclusive discussions among citizens prior to voting. Participants engage in dialogue to explore different viewpoints and potential solutions before casting their vote.
   Teal Impact: This would encourage citizens to move beyond partisan talking points and engage in deep, meaningful discussions about policy and candidates. It fosters greater empathy, collaboration, and systems thinking—key elements of teal governance—by helping voters understand the interconnectedness of issues and the long-term consequences of their choices.

3. Proportional Representation
   Description: In a proportional representation system, legislative seats are allocated based on the percentage of votes each party receives. For example, if a party receives 30% of the vote, they would hold 30% of the seats in the legislature.
   Teal Impact: Proportional representation encourages a more inclusive and diverse political landscape by allowing multiple parties and viewpoints to be represented. This system discourages binary winner-take-all thinking and creates space for collaboration and compromise. In a teal system, this would better reflect the complex spectrum of human development and values, leading to a more integrated and balanced government.

4. Liquid Democracy
   Description: Liquid democracy allows voters to either cast their own vote on issues or delegate their vote to a trusted representative or expert. Unlike traditional representative systems, delegations can be revoked or reassigned at any time, allowing for a dynamic and responsive voting structure.
   Teal Impact: Liquid democracy would enable a more fluid and flexible form of representation, where citizens could actively participate in areas where they feel knowledgeable and delegate in areas where they do not. This approach mirrors teal values by empowering individuals to engage in governance based on their unique strengths and knowledge, while also fostering collective intelligence by delegating decisions to trusted experts when needed.

5. Holacratic Voting
   Description: Holacratic governance is a decentralized system where power is distributed among roles or circles rather than individuals. In a holacratic voting structure, small, autonomous groups (circles) would vote on issues related to their specific roles and areas of expertise.
   Teal Impact: A holacratic system of voting would distribute decision-making power more evenly across the population, reflecting the teal emphasis on self-organization and decentralization. Citizens would have more direct influence on issues relevant to their communities and professions, creating a more organic and adaptable system of governance that empowers people at all levels.

6. Consensus-Based Voting for Key Decisions
   Description: Instead of simple majority rule, consensus-based voting requires that decisions achieve broad agreement among participants, often with mechanisms to ensure minority voices are heard. Modifications to proposals can be made to accommodate different viewpoints.
   Teal Impact: Consensus-based voting aligns with teal’s focus on inclusivity, cooperation, and holistic solutions. It prevents majoritarian dominance and encourages decision-making processes that take into account the needs and concerns of all stakeholders. This approach fosters a deeper sense of community and shared responsibility, which is essential in a teal democracy.

7. Policy Feedback Loops and Systems Thinking in Voting
   Description: In a teal democracy, voting structures could be designed to include mechanisms for ongoing policy feedback loops. Citizens would have the ability to vote on policies or amendments, but also provide real-time feedback on how policies are working through ongoing participatory platforms.
   Teal Impact: This system would help voters think in complex, systems-based terms, encouraging them to consider the long-term and interconnected effects of policies. By integrating feedback loops into the voting structure, it would create a more adaptive and responsive governance system that evolves based on the changing needs and conditions of society, aligning with teal’s focus on evolutionary development.

8. Blockchain-Based Voting for Transparency and Trust
   Description: Blockchain technology can be used to create a secure, transparent voting system that allows for tamper-proof voting records. Voters can cast their votes digitally, and the system ensures that each vote is counted accurately while preserving voter anonymity.
   Teal Impact: Blockchain voting would enhance trust in the electoral process by providing complete transparency and accountability. This technology could reduce concerns about fraud or manipulation and make elections more accessible, particularly for marginalized communities. Teal democracy values transparency, trust, and fairness, and blockchain would support these principles.

9. Participatory Budgeting at National and Local Levels
   Description: Participatory budgeting allows citizens to directly decide how to allocate a portion of the public budget. It has been used successfully in cities around the world to give citizens a direct say in how funds are spent on community projects.
   Teal Impact: By scaling participatory budgeting to both local and national levels, a teal voting structure would empower citizens to engage in collaborative decision-making about public resources. This process would deepen civic engagement, promote collective responsibility, and ensure that public spending aligns more closely with the needs and priorities of the people.

10. Multi-Level and Issue-Specific Voting
    Description: In a teal democracy, voters could have the opportunity to vote on different levels of governance (local, state, national) and on specific issues, such as environmental policy, healthcare, or education, through issue-based elections. This could allow citizens to participate more actively in areas they are passionate or knowledgeable about.
    Teal Impact: Issue-specific voting reflects teal values by encouraging deeper engagement in governance. Citizens can focus their energy on specific issues where they have expertise or passion, allowing for more nuanced and informed decisions. It would also decentralize power and ensure that specific areas of governance are shaped by those most interested and knowledgeable about them.

American aristocracy could learn some things from the old world. A big American founding myth is that we eliminated the aristocracy from our government, but the real American innovation is making it much easier to join the aristocracy starting as an outsider. 

Sure, great. A little closer to meritocracy, one hopes. 

But governance is complex enough that you’d ideally want to be trained from birth to do it. Programs of similar intensity to olympic training, for example. 

That was a potential upside of the previous method. You had a limited set of preselected kids who were almost certainly going to rule one day, so you could put them through the training to do so. It often worked pretty well.

Now anyone who is good at twitter can ostensibly rule without knowing anything about how to do it. 

Remember Boaty McBoatface? Our current timeline is the spiritual equivalent of running an internet poll to determine who is in charge of a nuclear reactor. Except orders of magnitudes more reckless and dangerous than that. 

 We need a better synthesis. 

#DeepTakes

‘Gangs’ are not bad per se. Gangs are neutral-there are good and bad versions. A healthy society will have gangs of people that take charge of their shared public space and take care of the community, even if they have to employ the threat of violence. 

#deeptake

American aristocracy could learn some things from the old world. A big American founding myth is that we eliminated the aristocracy from our government, but the real American innovation is making it much easier to join the aristocracy starting as an outsider. 

Sure, great. A little closer to meritocracy, one hopes. 

But governance is complex enough that you’d ideally want to be trained from birth to do it. Programs of similar intensity to olympic training, for example. 

That was a potential upside of the previous method. You had a limited set of preselected kids who were almost certainly going to rule one day, so you could put them through the training to do so. It often worked pretty well.

Now anyone who is good at twitter can ostensibly rule without knowing anything about how to do it. 

Remember Boaty McBoatface? Our current timeline is the spiritual equivalent of running an internet poll to determine who is in charge of a nuclear reactor. Except orders of magnitudes more reckless and dangerous than that. 

 We need a better synthesis. 

#DeepTakes

The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, probably via use of the word "optics" ;) . I've been reading the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (abridged*, of course, at least to start with!). New to the topic, and I’ve never identified as a history buff, but I’m really loving it. I wanted to write a short post about it, but couldn’t quickly figure out how to say what I wanted briefly, so here’s a long one!

It feels like a bird's-eye view of modern politics, in many ways, but especially regarding "The American Experiment." I'm sure this comparison isn't new--it's probably a huge part of what makes Decline and Fall popular today, despite being published in 1776. Since there's a whole trope about Rome buffs, I imagine many of you have hashed over all this a ton previously.

The early part of Decline and Fall starts with how amazing Rome was. Of course, it built on other civilizations and governments that came before it, but I think we these days have a hard time imagining just how surprisingly modern it would seem to us, if we were transplanted to the Roman Empire in its heyday. Of course we have tons of hard tech they didn't. But on the social level, I think a lot of it would feel spookily familiar. (I’m sure the author and I are both missing or leaving out huge ways it’s different. But I think there’s still a lot we can learn from it.)

Widespread assumption of and dedication to: rule of law, trial by peers, market-based economy. And somehow the start of the Roman Empire manifested a deep dedication among citizens and leaders to a Republic as the form of government. No nepotism, no monarchy, no might makes right. Government of the people, by the people, for the people, at least in spirit--my sense is people and government and military were all aligned in their dedication to that spirit. 

And peace! Peace, for centuries, throughout a huge swath of the known world, where that hadn’t happened before. There was a kind of national religion they inherited from the Greeks, but they seem to have been even more dedicated to religious tolerance than to their religion (prior to Constantine and the Christians taking over). Sure, there was kind of constant fighting on the edges of the empire, including always against the pesky Gauls and German barbarians, who really hated the idea of being part of the big empire. But mostly, and especially compared to times before in much of Europe, you could live safe in your home with your family, for generations even, protected by law-abiding and law-enforcing local authorities, backed up by the Roman army when needed, truly answerable to the people through the representation of the Senate, such as it was, and it was pretty great as far as I can tell. 

Now, the bird's-eye view of the modern USA comes in when, generation after generation, leader after leader, eventually monarch after monarch, the common-knowledge shared dedication to being a Republic and to all the ideas above, faded over time. First, one or two leaders came along who had enough sway over the army and enough popularity with the people that they were able to, against the grain of all Republic dedication, declare themselves effective leaders of the empire. First humbly, as first-among-many. Then with time, openly and pompously. Then with more time, it became obvious to everyone that the Republic was only a Republic in name, that it was just obviously "the way things worked" that the army effectively got to decide who became emperor, and that as soon as the army switched loyalties, you'd better be ready for a change, including probably a bunch of people getting killed for being on the wrong side. 

The thing about Decline and Fall, wrt this kind of degradation, is you get to read real human stories of this happening, again, and again, and again, and again. The same patterns, the different humans with unique circumstances playing them out. 

Why did the dedication to the original ideals degrade with time? I think the same natural processes, and lack of opposing processes, have led the US and myriad other democracies down similar paths over time. People and groups learn to subvert the system to get more of what they want in the short term, sacrificing the common-knowledge dedications and ideals that support the good things they have in the world. They pay less attention to the whole than is needed to maintain it. 

I'll name what I see today as one instance of roughly this kind of degradation, and I hope it's a little spicy. I have been part of many, many conversations in organizations where, when discussing some strategic question for the organization, the word "optics" comes up. For the uninitiated, the word "optics" in this context means: people could see what we're doing and have interpretations of it. We don't want those interpretations to have bad consequences for us. So let's be sure to include in our strategizing some component of consideration for trying to get people's impressions (the public, journalists, stakeholders, or etc) to be at least neutral. I can understand that. But I want to live in a world where we're creating the whole we want, not mostly attempting to persuade or convince or if nothing else not be noticed by parts of society that IMO we ought to relate to as peers. If we all practice distrusting our peers' sense-making processes in this way of strategizing about "optics", we'll all end up with a society with worse and less sense-making. So what do I want instead? I want us to take actions with integrity. Yes to being aware of our reputation (individually, organizationally, etc) and acting with integrity.

(*The abridged version I landed on, after some back and forth about versions with Claude, is the Womersly version. I love it. You get 100-200 pages of the above, which was just right for this first-timer.)

#DeepTakes

Who am I to decide? California General Election is here and once again I’m asked to decide the fate of a few propositions which I believe I’m in no position to make decisions on.

For example, Prop 2 an 4 are asking for $10B of debt each to fund various important things. Who am I to decide whether that’s a good idea or not? I have barely a clue about the inflationary monetary system we live in and no idea where its limits are. What percentage of state budget does debt interest constitute? Is that too much or on par with the state economy?

Then there’s rent control, minimum wage increase, and a few other, highly debatable props, which I’d guess even the experts would be lost trying to predict the effects of.

Do I assume the government has done their due diligence and my vote is simply a measure of trust?

I feel overwhelmed by the lack of data, expert guidance, anything of real value to me, the voter. I’m only given a few cursory meaningless numbers and a bunch of emotional arguments in the official voter guide.

How do you decide on things like that? Do you do your own research? Do you look at endorsements? Do you use your intuition?

My beautiful children. . Saying beautiful children over and over is feeling like a bit much, haha. But talking about mother’s having a choice about wanting to work or not is speaking to my heart.