Let’s face it, the world isn’t being taken care of. The leaders of the free (and not so free) world have pretty much chewed up the planet (and it’s population) and pooped it out into a steaming pile of “I don’t care”. Logic has pretty much left the building with Elvis and compassion was voted off the island along with intelligence.
This wouldn’t all be happening if I ran the world. How can I say that? The world is a tough place to run. It’s angry, confusing, and just generally in a constant state of PMS. But the leaders have pretty much run it so far into the ground that anyone with half a brain (and conscience) could do a better job. With that in mind, I thought I’d list out what I would do if the world was run by Jack.
Hold people accountable: Too many people get away with too many bad things. From speeding to genocide — people need to be held accountable for what they do. The US court of justice is so flawed that murderers and rapists get off on technicalities or because the wrong words were used in the Miranda rights. This needs to be fixed!
Limit gun purchases: Why do you need a stock pile of weapons? You don’t. Although I am a firm believe that gun ownership should be limited to law enforcement and military, that will never happen. Instead, I would allow only one gun per person. Period. And I would require gun owners to do the following:
- Take a safety class and pass a test before the weapon can be purchased
- Retake that test yearly
- Pay a heavy tax on both weapons and ammunition
Limit alcohol and tobacco sales: Alcohol and tobacco sales would be limited to a certain number of purchases per consumer, per year. Yes, this is harsh — but there are too many alcoholics and deaths by tobacco. The average person just doesn’t have the intelligence necessary to understand the risks involved with consuming too much of both.
Parental rights: I would require all adults to take a test prior to conception of a child, to make sure they are intelligent enough to actually have the child. Anyone having a child without passing said test would face a significant fine.
Healthcare: I would completely do away with health insurance and completely restructure the cost of healthcare so anyone can afford care. This would also include restructuring malpractice insurance for doctors. To help that issue I would make sure malpractice law suits were tightly controlled and limited (and rarely won).
Transportation: I would focus all new transportation efforts on encouraging people to rely more on bicycles for transportation within a certain range.
DUI: If you are arrested for a DUI, you lose your license for a year. If you injure or kill someone due to that DUI, you lose your license permanently.
Reality TV: Would be done away with — unless it could prove an educational value to the viewer.
Marriage Equality: Same sex marriage would not only be legal, it would come with all of the benefits that varied-sex marriage has. Not only that, but to get married, all couples would have to first go through free public classes in order to marry.
Income: This will sound incredibly radical to most readers, but I would instate an income floor and ceiling. In other words, no one could make more than X and less than Y. These numbers would be based on a calculation that conforms to the idea that the highest paid employee (including CEO) cannot make X times the amount of the lowest employee. In other words, if the lowest employee makes 50,000 per year, and the calculation states that the highest paid employee cannot make more than 10 times that of the lowest paid — the highest paid employee would not be able to make more than 500,000 per year. Other incentives (vacation, company car, etc) could be used. This would be standard — and the floor and ceiling applied to all industries. Once the floor and ceiling were set, they would not change.
Education: Teachers would be the highest paid and highest regarded in the work force. Not only that, but education (on all levels) would be available to all. Add to that — dropping out of high school is no longer an option and all graduating high school students would be required to at least attend one year of college.
Bullying: Zero tolerance — in schools, workplace, public locations. Period. Anyone found guilty of this will serve community service detail.
Lawsuits: This would radically change under my rule. No more would the law hold court for vanity and frivolity. You want to sue someone, you better have a damned good reason for it. You trip and fall, it’s your DAMN fault. You pour hot coffee in your lap, it’s because you were doing something STUPID!
The little man wins: The economic and financial systems would be set up to not only encourage but benefit the small companies. No more would the huge corporate chains have a strangle hold on the world. And Wall Street? That corrupt ring of legalized corporate gambling would be completely flushed down the toilet.
Work Week: The universal work week would be thirty hours. Those thirty hours could be spread out in whatever way the employee prefers. If you want to work three, ten hour days — good for you. If you want to work five, six hour days — awesome! Two, fifteen hour days — if you can handle it, I’m okay with that.
Animal cruelty: You hurt an animal, you go to jail. Period. Period. Period.
Okay, I know some of my ideas are crazy, but you see where I’m going with this. It’s time to level the playing field and bring a sense of compassion and logic back to the planet. The human race has been swirling in a very dark toilet for too long. It’s time we pull ourselves out, shake ourselves off, and shower in the waters of equality.