To Form A Mo' Better Union

“We the People” established the Constitution in order to form a more perfect union. President Obama speaks confidently and often of perfecting our union. As for me, I don’t think the language needs to be lofty or the concept complex: “We the People” need to get to work on an individual basis and take greater responsibility for ourselves, our fellow citizens, and our government and it’s accountability. I call this forming a “mo’ better union."

The difference?

A More Perfect Union: Asking not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country.
A Mo’ Better Union: Don’t ask and don’t wait to be asked. Serve at the micro-level – your family, your friends, your community. Need is all around, and your service need not be grand. Thanking a military person for his or her service to our country, no matter how you feel about the war, is a start.

A More Perfect Union: Making our government make decisions we can justify to our grandchildren.
A Mo’ Better Union: Making our government make decisions that, seven generations from now, insure that there actually are seven generations from now.

A More Perfect Union: Giving equal say and weight to all constituencies, no matter how self-interested they are.
A Mo’ Better Union: Taking into account the self-interest and long-term detriment to the good will of all of anything proposed by any constituency, especially corporations and businesses, and calling them on their self-interest and detrimental proposals.

A More Perfect Union: Defending our way of life.
A Mo’ Better Union: Examining our way of life to see if it is worthy of defending. If not, changing it.

A More Perfect Union: Expecting government to step in and set the market straight when it spins out of control.
A Mo’ Better Union: Educating citizens to sound the alarm and become politically activated when the market is spinning out of control.

A More Perfect Union: Creating more educational and job opportunities for all.
A Mo’ Better Union: Preparing the underserved to take advantage of the increased educational and job opportunities for all.

A More Perfect Union: Not asking whether government is too big or too small, but whether it works.
A Mo’ Better Union: Being in the position that you don’t have to care whether the government is too big, too small, or works, because your financial well-being isn’t dependent on the government at all.

A More Perfect Union: Foreign policy based on self-interest and alliances.
A Mo’ Better Union: Foreign policy that is based on morality and international law and is defensible in the international arena.

A More Perfect Union: Assuming that we have overcome because we have an African-American president.
A Mo’ Better Union: Hoping we can overcome because we have an African-American president.

A More Perfect Union: “Greening” the United States as part of a movement.
A Mo’ Better Union: The terms “green” and “eco-friendly” disappear because they become inculcated in how we live instead of being part of a celebrity fad.

A More Perfect Union: Tolerance of diametrically opposed political views.
A Mo’ Better Union: Engaging those who hold diametrically opposed political views to see where you can find common ground or if you can even converse civilly. Civil discourse is a worthy goal in and of itself.

A More Perfect Union: Defending a woman’s right to choose.
A Mo’ Better Union: Making sure that women can truly utilize all available options so they don’t have to be in the position of making that choice.

A More Perfect Union: Spending our way out of a recession.
A Mo’ Better Union: Saving and investing our way out of a recession.

A More Perfect Union: A color-blind society.
A Mo’ Better Union: A color-celebrating and inclusive society.

A More Perfect Union: The War on Terror.
A Mo’ Better Union: Not elevating the fight against terrorism in the minds of our enemies by calling it a war. Wars are fought between nations. The organizations that are menacing us are no better than gangs and exist for all the same reasons – poverty, ignorance, lack of opportunity and freedom. Think Bloods and Crips with better weapons.

A More Perfect Union: A line-by-line review of the federal budget to cut out the fat.
A Mo’ Better Union: Putting the entire federal budget, line-by-line, on the internet, Wikipedia-style, with links from expenditures to which member of Congress proposed them and who donated to those members’ campaigns. Similarly, all government contracts would be posted online and government expenditures posted in real time – that means you, Blackwater. The power of the ENGAGED masses to keep the federal bureaucracy accountable is greater than that of any watchdog group.

You get my drift. What’s your “Mo’ Better Union”?