The other day I was sitting on a bus with time to let my mind wander. I was thinking about our presidential campaign season and the ideas being promoted by our current candidates – including our current president – when I found myself considering what kind of a president I think our nation needs – specifically I began to formulate what ideas he would offer in seeking the presidency. I decided to write up the platform ideas that came to mind. I’d love to hear what others think of this. I have written this in the first person not because I claim to be this candidate but because I would expect a candidate to articulate the platform from a first-person perspective.
- Any budget proposal that I submit will not exceed actual tax revenues for the previous year. Any budget bill that I sign will be paid for, either because Congress has passed a budget that does not exceed the tax revenues for the previous year or because they have clearly raised the necessary taxes as part of the bill to pay for any spending over the amount of taxes collected in the preceding fiscal year.
- I will not attempt to expand the powers of the presidency. I will stick to my constitutional duties. I will refrain from using the extra-constitutional powers that have previously been granted to the president, such as the ability to indefinitely detain American citizens without trial, and request that Congress officially revoke those powers from me and future presidents.
- I will insist that Congress fulfill their constitutional duties. One major part of Congress fulfilling their duties is that I will order all regulatory agencies to enforce only those things that Congress has passed into law and not to enforce regulations created by regulatory agencies based laws passed by congress where those regulations were not specified in the bill. I will not sign bills in which Congress leaves the authority to specify particular regulations to other bodies such as regulatory agencies.
- I will not sign any bill into law, nor allow any bill to become law without my signature, unless it has been made available for public review and comment for a total of no less than seven days prior to becoming law. The seven days counts only the time after the final version of the bill is made available. That time may include any combination of time before the bill is passed by Congress and time after the bill has been passed by Congress. In other words, Congress may choose to pass bills without allowing seven days for public input but the only way I would act on a bill without seven days of public input would be to veto the bill. I will also not sign any bill into law unless I have had time to read the bill in full.
- As commander-in-chief of our military I will seek to maximize our national defense. The emphasis there is on the words “national” and “defense” – all military spending and activity will be focused on defending our nation in the most effective ways possible. We will seek to improve our defensive abilities wherever possible. If the use of military force ever becomes necessary under my watch I will act decisively with the intent to end the conflict as quickly and effectively as possible.
- I will not run a campaign for a second term. I will simply do my job as President. My campaigning will not exceed participation in scheduled debates and defending myself against any false accusations that are made by those who hope to replace me. If that is not enough to win me a second term then I do not deserve a second term.
As I considered the ideas that I wrote I asked myself whether any of the current candidates would ever articulate a platform like this. My conclusion was that none of them would. I suspect that some Ron Paul supporters would argue that Dr. Paul runs a platform not unlike this. I’ll admit that he comes the closest but I am still not sure that what he would do fully correlates to what I think we need in a president – which may indicate that I have not fully fleshed it out above. Either way – I’d love to hear thoughts on the platform I have outlined.
