Fifteen or twenty years ago we passed some term limit laws here in Kalifornia to keep the bloodsuckers in Sacramento from being addicted to the tit of public service. Well low and behold they just went from one branch of Government to another.
State Senators who were "termed out" suddenly began running for State Assembly and other postitions. They're like roaches and you can't get rid of them.
The amazing thing is WE THE PEOPLE keep re-electing the same people over and over. The Kennedys in Ma. will always have fine jobs "in service to the people". Can you think of a more disfunctional family in the U.S.A.?
Here in Los Angeles we have the Hahn family. Kenneth, James, and now Janice, who just happens to represent the fifteenth district where I live. Even though she lives here in San Pedro she represents the City Of Los Angeles and very often at our expense.
I think part of it is the incumbency factor and part of it is just pure laziness on the American electorate. The last two generations of voters have also been indoctrinated by a very liberal school system which leads right up to the University level. With this stacked against Republicans it's amazing they can ever get anyone elected.
I don't know about the Constitutionality of it but maybe it's time for term-limits at the Federal level. If the voters won't get rid of corrupt multi-term Politicians maybe maybe Congress will.
Oooops... I guess that idea is out the door since it would be Congress voting against itself. I guess we're doomed. This forty plus years in office (Byrd, Kennedy, Thurmond) is NOT what the Founding Father's had in mind.
Just as in all other endeavors in life, everybody goes after #1. Of course most sane, rational people look at what it is that makes a team or individual #1 and tries to emulate it. Unfortunately politicians are neither sane nor rational. I think the definition of insanity is doing something the same way every time and expecting a different result.
I posted on this yesterday ... it's a Democratic Congress, but lack of confidence could hurt the presidential party this fall, especially in congressional races (strange, isn't it?)
If you want to see the quality of our representatives to Congress, check out this video:http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives2/2008/
06/020791.php
Yes, let's give this Congress control of our medical records, healthcare, and oil companies....uh, I don't think so.
If they socialized oil companies like they want to, we'd be paying $8.50 a gallon of gas just like in Europe.
it's not a good thing for a country, that the Military has so much more respect than has the civilian Congress.
I think that one answer should be term limits. In Canada, after 50 years in power, the Liberal Party was rotten to the core. People are the same everywhere, and a stable, wealthy organization like the Dem or the Repub parties will attract corrupt people like Pelosi and Chretien.
Heather, I think the Military in the USA deserves all the respect we can give it. I think you may have meant power as opposed to respect.
No military needs great power. The genious of our system of government is the checks and balances that keep one branch from dominating another. The same checks also contribute to much of the political gridlock we have here now. I can't say (being a typical ignorant American) how things work in Canada.
I will forever be greatful for our Armed Services. If not for them I would be saying the pledge of allegiance to Adolph Hitler and Hirohito as opposed to the United States Of America. The world has such a short memory.
Thrice Caesar refused the crown as Shakespeare writes. Thanks to the all our politicians and judges, we will demand Caesar not resist him. Our anger won't be that he takes it, but because he refuses it. Let's just hope there is far more Washington in ours than was in theirs when the time comes. Remember these are the leaders who built the democracies of modern German, Japan, and, as it looks now, Iraq.
You know, maybe, like any other 'business' if you actually paid a salary for the qualifications you want you might be competent people. You want them to run a multi trillion dollar international economy, operate an international security system costing hundreds of billions, oversee the operation of a legion of regulatory agencies that stretch through our daily lives, and you pay relatively peanuts to them predicated upon some arcane notion of citizen representatives from the agrarian past. When there is a scheduled pay raise, all we get is the mob whining about the bums not deserving it and insuring that those competent people don't even consider putting up with the hassle. For the price of some earmarks, we can easily afford to pay every member of Congress a cool mil a year, throw in the Prez and Vice Prez, and SCOTUS and in one or two election cycles we'd get some real choices on candidates for the office. Oh, if you insist, you can even kill their pension program off if they're going to take in that sort of money above the board. If they can't invest a mil adequately for the future, they shouldn't even apply.
rich b and don
"respect" has not as yet morphed into "power" but there is no reason why it shouldn't. Check the Iraqi War: the US Armed Forces have done a spectacular job, not only as a military force, but also (and here is the issue) as a reconstruction/peacekeeping force. As one fella said, the US is not at war, the Military is at war. And... the MILITARY has proven itself to be more competent and more realistic and just plain more capable than any other branch of government. State has been cowardly; the CIA incompetent; the Congress, both House and Senate, have been unhelpful (aside from a few stalwarts like Lieberman and McCain). The President has not understood the role of Communicator in today's world.
Now. WHEN there is a crisis (and there will be, because we live in the world), who do you suppose will do the heavy lifting - again - and ultimately, demand commensurate power.
Truly, term limits is not just a means of getting rid of time-servers. It would also ensure a reasonably competent Civilian Congress.
If it were possible I would recommend a program to reward the members with a commission on actual savings. The country could easily afford to split several bilion among the members at, say 1% for lower budgets and money saving initiatives. With each ten billion saving, the result would be $1,666,666 for both house and senate members
One wonders if their personal greed would be exceeded by their lust for power and control.
Oh, I forgot, it's only private enterprise that has the wit to install such programs.
Maybe I am too cynical, but given that military approval has always been high over the last 30 years, and approval of Congress has always been low, why is this only now a problem? More to the point, why should WE worry about it? Even more to the point, why isn't Congress worried about it?
Once in a while, we actually do throw the bastards out, as we did in 1994, but unfortunately we don't seem to do it often enough. I suspect the Republicans are being smart (more or less) by encouraging their weaker members to retire -- at least that way they'll have a shot, if there really is a bloodbath this year.
heather:
The US military is comprised of American citizen soldiers. It's not a different or separate social class or caste.
I can tell you, from personal experience of having been one of those citizen soldiers...
From the top down and from the bottom up. From the officer corps down to the rank and file, the US military would not permit a military coupe in the US. Matter of fact, the only guarantee of no military coupe in the US is the US military.
What you could expect to see from our military if the national political situation goes much worse is an abandonment of the military system by the citizen soldiers. Then as private citizens, the options of what's permitted and/or demanded by an individuals conscious may change in a big way.
of course, I meant coup as in bloody takeover, not coupe as in car.
Grimmy,
Yes it is different. It is hardly composed of the Ivy League or Blue Country population whose public disdain, which vacillates between the lowest bigotry to fained cared for those 'poor victims', is well documented. It is a different culture from those who believe they're entitled to rule. It is a culture predicated upon service, one that can ask for that 'last full measure of devotion' not to self, not to group, but to each other. However, there won't be a coup. As I noted, they will be asked, they will be put upon, it will be demanded they take the power.
I believe that our founding fathers did not envision Career polititions, but rather someone that is/was engaged in another enterprise and served the country as a civic duty. I don't believe that our founding fathers envisioned the polititions salary would put them in the top 8% of all wage earners. But we got what we got, and the fat cats will not give up their gravey with out a fight(unfortunately they make the rules).
I would like to see such a change that '94 looks meek. Term limits and nobody allowed to get into politics until they have demonstrated competence in the real world. Now this is the kind of hope and change I can believe in.
Don:
Of course, we won't know until the story is done and put to print, but, I seriously disagree with your assertion that the US military will ever end up in control of this nation.
The underpinning of my belief in this is exactly your description of who populates our military.
These are people, either born American or foreign, that do hold strongly to the American Ideal. Heck, some of the strongest believers and supporters of the American Ideal are among our foreign born service members.
But, by and large, these are all people who are devoted to the ideal and serve as our first, middle and last line of defense against military rule of America.
I do, also, believe that if things get much worse than what is currently in progress on our domestic political front, many, if not most, of the stalwarts that populate our military will leave the uniformed service. Then, as private citizens, do whatever it is they believe must be done to salvage the ideal.
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