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THE REAL PROBLEM
By T Blogger | September 10, 2009
I have a recurring dream. In this dream huge crowds of people flood into the two houses of Congress and say to the senators and representatives, “OK, ladies and gents, pack up your stuff and go home and get a real job. We’re going to start all over.” It is, unfortunately, the Impossible Dream.
When the Founders of this country set up our system of government, I don’t believe they imagined they were setting up an enterprise that would produce an entirely new profession — politician. I believe they expected that elected federal offices would be held by citizen/statesmen who would take time out from their various private sector pursuits to temporarily bring their skills to bear in keeping the federal government on track. If you told John Adams or even old Tom Jefferson that in the future people would actually tailor their education and aspirations to pursue a “career” as an elected official they would have laughed at you.
Washington, D.C. is not a fetid swamp crawling with professional politicians. The professional politicians are the “swamp”. Our legislators are a bunch of people whose “success” depends not on their insight, or their problem-solving talents, but on their ability to get elected and, more importantly to them, reelected. Their lives are a constant cycle of begging money, making deals, and campaigning. With a two year term, a member of the U.S. House of Representatives starts campaigning for his next term the instant he or she is elected. This system cries out for term limits.
Of course the professional politicians are not going to impose term limits on themselves. We the people have to do that. It takes a member of the House about two terms to be Washingtonized. So, no matter how much you like old Joe congressman, you need to think really hard about electing him to a third term. No matter how conscientious he might have been when he got to D.C., after two terms he has already been to too many cocktail parties, bought too many fancy suits, ridden in too many limos and cut way too many back room deals to be trusted. He needs to go back home (if he even has a home anymore). Furthermore, if old Joe is a lawyer, one term is quite enough for him, because he’s already entirely too good at making –and breaking– deals.
It takes a person elected to the Senate about thirty seconds after being sworn in to become an insufferable elitist bloviator. One term is quite enough for them. It boggles the mind that some people have actually spent four and five decades in the Senate. Any incumbent senator needs to be voted out of office — period. No exceptions!
That, my fellow Americans, is change I can believe in.
©2009, Tom Weeks
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