If I was president, this is how I'd fix america?

[Mitch]

Here would be my plan to "fix" the United States if I was president between the years 2016-2024. It's not all perfect, and please note that I'm a highschooler so go easy on me. But tell me what you think.

I've dubbed this the "Mitch Plan." My first act as president, if I'm even allowed to interfere with this, would be to establish open primaries so that independents that lean right or left are allowed to participate in choosing the presidential candidates. To also help boost voting participation, I'd start "Mail Votes" and "Online Primaries" in which you can vote for candidates online, which would include a video of their debates, and summaries of what they support, (same for the mail, excluding the video) and people who were apart of the part of that party or independent could vote via mail or online. I'd also set up a third party organization that does is not an elected position or appointed by the government to determine voting districts fairly. The goal is to create a less radically divided government, that can compromise.

The second part would be to attack the budget issues. I'd close all but a very few key military bases overseas, and decrease the active military further. Then, for an entire year, if this is possible, I'd stop all government spending, social programs, infrastructure improvements, scientific management except for government workers like teachers and the military, and utilities. Instead, I'd make it up to the states to decide if they are going to have welfare or infrastructure improvements for that year, and that it would in no way come from the federal government. So it'd be up for the people of the state to decide those issues. With this decreased spending would come a decreased need for taxes, and so I'd lower taxes hopefully promoting consumer purchases and companies to start employing again. After that, whatever money the government did earn would go to paying off our debt, if it would help at all. You would still receive these improvements, but it would be up to the states, not the federal government, to pay, if the states and people want these improvements anyway. To fix healthcare, I'd simply make health insurers compete in the market like homeowners or auto insurance. I'd also go back to the gold standard.

Finally, I would try to make america, if only temporarily, like it was in the 1800's industrial revolution by promoting american factory system again, only with minimum wage set and safe conditions and stuff. I would try to promote american industries creating the things Americans buy, by setting a high tariff on many imports that would compete with these new factory productions. I would also set a "Overseas Penalty", if this doesn't already exist, that would tax companies per worker for each person they hire who is not an american citizen. This would count for illegal immigrants and overseas workers. I'd also say that after certain date, to be considered an american citizen, you have to be born in a U.S. territory and be born to at least one legal U.S. citizen. I'd also make it where to apply for welfare, you must prove you are a citizen of the U.S., and if you are caught illegal in the country more than 3 times, you are no longer eligible for U.S. citizenship ever. This only applies to people born in the U.S, and not those coming here legally.

I know there are more issues but this would be the start. What do you think?

[GIO C]

another "IF" question that leads to a non historical and purely fictional.

[325]

You seem to have little to no idea how government operates.

Most likely this means you're right wing.

[Steven]

Sorry but the Mitch plan has more than a few problems:

1) The primaries and how voting occurs is handled by the States not the Federal Government. Although many of the ideas presented are good.

2) Closing some overseas military bases makes sense (e.g. those in Europe, left in place after WWII), but most serve important functions, such as predeployment of troops and arms which help keep China in check.

If you stopped government spending on social programs and infrastructure you would put us back in recession. All that money gets spent in local economies and creates jobs there. The states do not collect taxes to cover those items, so they wouldn't be able to spend money on them.

Going back to the gold standard would also cause a recession, because the economy could only expand as fast as new gold could be produced. Additionally, in a technologically advanced society, there are other minerals which are much more important than gold. Gold is not a Strategic Mineral http://topics.info.com/What-is-meant-by-...erals_2854

3) There is a mistaken notion that the US doesn't have much factory production. This isn't true, we just don't use much manpower to run our factories as other countries such as China. http://www.cbsnews.com/news/us-factories...ing-china/

[Sub Ponte]

It'll be interesting to compare this to the plan that you come up with when the weed wears off.

[caspian88]

Open primaries, mail-in voting, and independent redistricting commissions are all good ideas.

Closing all but "key" overseas military bases would depend on what you consider "key."

Ending all government spending for a year, particularly on social programs, will kill several million Americans - you're ending Medicare and Medicaid, Social Security, food stamps, and so on for an entire year. You will also start a massive, massive recession that will cost millions of jobs and probably actually increase the government deficit because of how much tax revenue you'd lose. Consumers aren't going to be buying anything - they'll be hoarding all the money they can get so that they'll be able to buy food or pay for a doctor.

There is a much simpler way to fix the health insurance market - make all Americans eligible for Medicare, regardless of age. Much cheaper and more effective.

The gold standard is dead for a very good reason - it causes deflation and currency crises. It has no benefit in the modern world.

A high tariff would simply cost consumers money. You've also basically wiped out the economy, so you're hurting consumers even more with tariffs, and you're not going to have any money out there for investment to build factories anyway. Far better would be something akin to a "dirigisme" program of national industrial goals, with government and industry cooperating to accomplish those goals.

Your immigration and citizenship rules are basically no different than they already are, except that you ban social programs for permanent residents.

[Cabal]

You could get your president elected by the people instead of by surrogates.

As for the rest, you are describing a nightmare.
Lack of infrastructure maintenance will mean more money needed later to repair the damages
Closing down all scientific research will make the US loose all the big brains as they leave for better shores in other countries. The US will also loose its proeminence in research, forever as the big brains won't want to come back, not knowing if you won't do it again.
Millions of people dying of hunger and of lack of medication.
Riots everywhere as desperate people try to find food or help, so you will need all the money you saved by closing down the bases to hire a bigger army to keep people quiet.
Tarif war with the rest of the world. American goods will be taxed to a fair thee well in other countries in retaliation.
Punish companies for hiring overseas foreigners? You will have companies changing their nationality, or splitting their foreign branches and making them in charge so they can claim their revenues abroad.
You will also get every single American company to loose the goodwill and help of the countries they have developped in, will get them in trouble with local laws, and will help destroy them.
Banks crashing as lenders take their money out of the American economy and people take their money out of the banks (you did study the bank run of the Black Friday, didn't you?).
There's not enough gold to cover the worth of all the US Dollars, printed money and stock exchange worth, so huge inflation as it will take $500 or $1000 to buy a gram of gold instead of $40.
If foreigners (legal ones) have no right to ask for welfare then it should be right that they don't pay taxes either, don't you think so?