I just got an email from someone I very much respect, and while I understand the sentiment of the message, I very much disagree with it. In part it says,
"In November of 2010 the entire House of Representatives will stand for re-election; all 435 of them. One third of the Senate, a total of 33 of them, will also stand for re-election. Vote every incumbent out. And I mean every one of them. No matter their Party affiliation. ... Two years later, in 2012, vote the next third of the incumbents in the Senate out. We can do the same thing in 2014 ...I am also suggesting term limits ..."
Well.
You can check back through my previous two plus years of posts to see how rarely I've ever cursed, do that, in order to get a gauge how emphatic I am being in the following message to the Term Limit and 'Vote them Out' 'Reboot Congress' movements... with one slight qualifier, that many of those who favor these actions, I deeply care for and respect, in person and online.
Ahem - warning blue language below...
Ok, here we go....
Take fucking responsibility for your own god damned civil and moral responsibility as Free men and women, as citizens of America, to know who your candidates are, what their positions and records are, and then VOTE! Learn for yourself whether a candidate is worth a god damn or not! If he is, strengthen him! If Not, WORK to vote him the hell out!
THE ONLY THING THAT VOTING OUT EVERYONE WILL ACCOMPLISH, WITH NO DIRECTING INTELLIGENCE OF CHOICE ON YOUR PART, IS WHAT ANY ACTION WITHOUT INTELLIGENCE BEHIND IT CAN ACCOMPLISH! FUCKING STUPIDITY AND MAYHEM!!!
Do you know who will benefit? Do you know who will be in power when all the 'don't know jack shit' new politico's come to town?
THOSE WHO WERE THERE BEFORE THOSE YOU REPLACED CAME TO TOWN, AND WHO WILL BE THERE WHEN THE NEW FACES LEAVE - THE FUCKING GOD DAMN BUREAUCRATS, INTERNS AND AIDES WHO KNOW HOW THE SYSTEM AND REGULATIONS WORK!!! VOTING THEM ALL OUT WILL MEAN PUTTING THE UNELECTED AND UNSEEN PEOPLE IN TOTAL CONTROL AND POWER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
TERM LIMITS?! TAKE MY PREVIOUS RANT AND AMP IT UP BY TEN POWERS OF TEN!!!!!!!!!!
IF YOU WANT TO BE AN AMERICAN, TAKE THE GOD DAMN TIME AND ENERGY IT TAKES TO GOOGLE UP THE RECORDS OF YOUR REPRESENTATIVES, AND ACT ACCORDINGLY!!!
EMPHASIS ON ACT!!!
Here's an idea - INSTEAD OF WATCHING AMERICAN IDOL, READ THE CONSTITUTION! LEARN WHAT IT MEANS!!! LEARN WHAT IT MEANS TO BE AN AMERICAN!!!
TALK TO YOUR NEIGHBORS WHO KNOW EVEN LESS THAN YOU DO! SPEAK UP AT HOME, AT CHURCH, AT BAR-B-Q'S AND GET TOGETHER'S!!!
DO SOMETHING TO SAVE YOUR NATION!!!
STOP TAKING THE GOD DAMN COWARDS WAY OUT, OF TRYING TO PASS LEGISLATION THAT WHAT WILL SUBSTITUTE FOR YOUR UNWILLINGNESS TO THINK AND ACT ON YOUR OWN!!!
HOW IN THE GOD DAMNED HELL DO YOU THINK WE GOT IN THIS SITUATION IN THE FIRST PLACE!!!
YOU FUCKING DEBASED POSTERITY BUNCH OF GOD DAMNED SELF WILLED MORONS!
Ok, done. Sorry. Unfair in the extreme, I know, but... a man's got to rant what a man's got to rant.
I wholeheartedly agree with your rant. Whenever you are really pissed off and about to act on your impulses, stop. Cool off, think hard, and then act. Voting everyone out is an act of passion and, just as you say, mindlessness. Term limits will remove those politicians who wish to be removed, just as disarmament worked well to disarm those nations who wished for it in the 1930's.
ReplyDeleteWhat, you want people to actually think about who they're voting for? Do research? Oh, heaven forfend!
ReplyDeleteActually, I agree wholeheartedly. The problem is, most people (left and right) just want the easy answer when it comes to voting, as though they should just pick the candidate with the correct initial after their name then get a cute little sticker and everything will be just fine. Most people have only a passing relationship with the world outside their primary concerns, which is simple human nature. Trouble is, part of the privilege of being a citizen of this republic relies on a specific type of responsibility, and they don't teach that much in school any more. Haven't for quite some time, now.
God save us from the government we deserve. Lord knows, as a nation we've done nothing to earn anything better.
Thanks guys, glad I'm not alone on this. I felt... rude when I hit post, and surprising as it may seem to a few trolls, that is something I dislike... but this 'pass a law to solve our problems' mindset must be denounced - it IS Exactly what got us into the mess we are in now.
ReplyDeleteJulie said "God save us from the government we deserve."
You said it... I hope it's a common prayer.
We're in the middle of a so-called "Fourth Turning". This is to be expected.
ReplyDeleteNow comes the period of Crisis.
While we're not on the subject, do you have any more amusing stories about Vegas?
Amen
ReplyDeleteVan
ReplyDeletewill you stop sugar coating your opinions please.
One of the unintended consequences/blessings of the lockdown over at one cosmos is the fact that I get to spend time reading your posts and the posts of other regulars of OC.
I like your style and appreciate your willingness to share it with us all.
Regards,
Sean
But the pleasure of it, Van.
ReplyDelete:-)
Not a fan of the "stay at home protest vote" either. I believe that either serves no purpose or worse.
ReplyDeleteThe message, taken literally, is no more than another uninvited chain-email threatening us not to be the one breaking the thread. But since you otherwise respect your friend, perhaps the sentiment of the message is the message, even as that message only hints at the solution.
ReplyDeleteIt seems you wish the electorate to be practical and committed. But that may be equally missing the point. We have seen an evolution in American government for eigthy years--give or take as you please--that is relentless. Burke decribed it already established in Britian over two hundred years ago: The parties are gamesters; but government keeps the table, and is sure to be the winner in the end.
That is permanent government.
Chesterton updated him: The whole modern world has divided itself into Conservatives and Progressives. The business of Progressives is to go on making mistakes. The business of Conservatives is to prevent mistakes from being corrected. Even when the revolutionist might himself repent of his revolution, the traditionalist is defending it as part of his tradition. When a politician is in opposition he is an expert on the means to some end; and when he is in office he is an expert on the obstacles to it.
Reagan did not escape this fate. Practical and decent men refloated this progressive scow, which only advanced itself once again. What more proof is needed other than where we are?
So the real question is, do we accept our role as making the liberal state work in the interest of living another day--a very worthy and challenging cause--or do we wish to see farther and risk closing the State down? Citzens cannot be "responsible" in affecting a government designed to be immune to them, they can only suffer Tocqueville's description of our fate--we will derive consolation from being supervised by thinking that we have chosen our supervisors.
The State has this game established to where it does not even need to think or plan. An energetic citizenry cannot accomplish anything without a plan for the return of Constitutional government, and no politician I am aware of would risk standing for the principles both understood and respected by the last constitutionally minded President, Calvin Coolidge.
It may be very necessary for us all to keep illusions in a broad range of things, but that is not for those who wish to truly change this monster. Even an educated and energetic minority cannot make change without first understanding what that is, and such understandings are only made by individuals and then confirmed by groups.
Xlbrl said "But since you otherwise respect your friend, perhaps the sentiment of the message is the message, even as that message only hints at the solution."
ReplyDeleteI think that is the case, the sentiment of his message was the full depth of the issue that was grasped.
I've had this argument before with him, but the 'subtleties' of political philosophy, and philosophy in general, are new issues to him, having had a 'normal public school education', and college degrees, he was taught nothing about political philosophy, let alone the ideas behind our founding, or the constitution itself. Not having had any interest in such subjects until this last year when he, and so many others, finally began to realize that things aren't right, he, and many, many others, have a kind of "Politicians are bad, get rid of all politicians" outlook, a sentimental grasp of the issue.
But he is very intelligent, he's not someone who takes things lying down, not even the ALS (Lou Gehrig's diseas) which he has... he's a fighter, and despite his email, he's also fighting against his own errors, knocking them down as best he can, and moving on. It takes time.
"It seems you wish the electorate to be practical and committed. But that may be equally missing the point."
As with most things, that depends on the context. I do think that everyone who thinks of themselves as citizens, and intends to vote, should have a grasp of the fundamentals of our govt, and why it was structured the way it is. Beyond that... 'practical and committed' depends upon the context of the issues involved, and their interest and/or concerns in them.
In 'Normal' political times, for the typical person who has no real interest in politics themselves, it shouldn't require much more of a voter than that they are satisfied that they're candidate has a solid grasp of our govt, the regional issues relevant to the office being sought, and confidence in the persons knowledge and character.
When abnormal times come around, as now, that casual voter, has the responsibility to bone up on the important issues and political infrastructure involved, and perhaps contribute more of their time and energy than they have before. Not a huge problem for someone with a decent liberal (in it's original, classical, meaning) education.
However such times leave the 'casual voter' who doesn't even have the understanding I mentioned above, who has in fact been not 'casual' but negligently lax for far too long, now that they suddenly realize that all they've taken for granted is in jeopardy, they have a responsibility to cram, at the very least they have a responsibility to see that the actions they are taking 'first, do no harm' - but they have a lot of ground to make up.
Which leaves it up to those who have bothered to learn more than the fundamentals to inform those who are stoked up on sentiment, that they are missing essential substance.
And that is not always easily accomplished... hence this post's rant!
"We have seen an evolution in American government for eigthy years--give or take as you please--that is relentless."
I'd about double the years of that give or take... I date the first structural erosion to the Civil War, but not the the typical rants against Lincoln, but to Morrill Act in 1862 (I've given more details in this post), which though seemingly small, first broke the Federal Powers out of it's proper restraints, involving it in the field of education, that quickly grew into the cancerous rot that has nearly wrecked us.
(annoying blogger 4k comment break)
"Burke decribed it already established in Britian over two hundred years ago: The parties are gamesters; but government keeps the table, and is sure to be the winner in the end.
ReplyDeleteThat is permanent government."
Yes, but though the British think of themselves as having a constitution, they don't have a written one, which I think gives us an edge... if we can just get people to read it... and govt to follow it... tricky business I'm afraid. Burke is one of my favorites, btw, and not just for his shredding of Rousseauian idiocies, but his earlier philosophic writing as well.
"The business of Progressives is to go on making mistakes. The business of Conservatives is to prevent mistakes from being corrected"
And Our business, is not to fall into that trap, to identify ourselves as 'conservatives' in a light context, and anything deeper, we must differentiate ourselves as Classical Liberals, rather than Traditionalists - it is vitally important that we don't fall into a "WWTFD" (what would the Founders do) sort of parroting of our Founding Fathers era, but that we do our best to understand the principles which they did, in order to conceptually apply the Constitution to our business of our govt.
"Reagan did not escape this fate. Practical and decent men refloated this progressive scow, which only advanced itself once again. What more proof is needed other than where we are?"
Yep. And no, Reagan didn't escape it, as he himself once identified himself as an FDR Democrat, fond as I am of him in many ways, he had a deep progressive streak in him as well.
"So the real question is, do we accept our role as making the liberal state work in the interest of living another day--a very worthy and challenging cause--or do we wish to see farther and risk closing the State down?"
I'm not so sure that names the question well, or the risk. In "do we accept our role as making the liberal state work...", the word "Work" is quite loaded, and able to blast out in any direction. Yes, we should accept our role as responsible for seeing that out constitutional republic remains bound to our constitution. However, "...work in the interest of living another day", is also ripe with potential equivocations... living another day... in what way? Is living, in and of itself, a worthy goal, regardless of how you are living? I don't think so, not while you have at least the potential power to prevent you, or your children, from being forced to live in a manner unfit for Americans, then if we must "risk closing the State down", if that is the only option (and I Do NOT believe it is), we should risk such a thing, and every measure short of that while it is still possible.
We, MUST, take an active, long range hand, in affecting our government, and even more importantly, we must take an active hand in taking our educational system out of the hands of the proregressives who hold it. THAT is the only change that can have any hope of causing real change worthy of being believed in. All else, all merely political actions, are mere stop gap measures built with sand under the feet.
(annoying blogger 4k comment break)
"Citzens cannot be "responsible" in affecting a government designed to be immune to them, they can only suffer Tocqueville's description of our fate--we will derive consolation from being supervised by thinking that we have chosen our supervisors."
ReplyDeleteOur govt is not designed to be immune to us, quite the opposite, but our non-representing-representatives have saddled it with so much accretions of proregressive agencies and regulations and general spin-flam representations about how it runs, that our task is formidable. One of the greatest steps we could take, would be to teach the Federalist and Anti-Federalist papers AND Tocqueville's Democracy in America - those two together, if thoroughly discussed, would amount to a not so mini course in Classical Liberalism all themselves - not to mention an aversion to easy answer sentiments such as 'reboot congress' and term limits.
One of the things I've been most heartened by in the last year, is the number of people starting to actually read them... that would go a long way towards to reigniting our original American Revolution.
"The State has this game established to where it does not even need to think or plan. An energetic citizenry cannot accomplish anything without a plan for the return of Constitutional government, and no politician I am aware of would risk standing for the principles both understood and respected by the last constitutionally minded President, Calvin Coolidge."
Coolidge, was the ONLY constitutionally minded President, and the ONLY one I can see that Understood the Constitution's concepts and principles, from the 20th century forward. Not only can't I see any politician risk standing for those principles he did, I can't even see any making this speech, The Inspiration of The Declaration of Independence, which he did.
We've come a long way... and we've got a long way to go back, before we even find the right road to be on. But many strange and never before seen things are afoot today. If we can keep govt from neutralizing the internet, we might still have a chance to right ourselves.
I spent part of today campaigning for a local candidate a thousand miles away.... I don't think the Nat'l Political Parties have grasped yet, that their sealed operations are quickly becoming a thing of the past. They were created by the structures of available 19th and 20th century technology, which are no longer justified, or able to withstand a populace in which any significant portion grasps its role and responsibilities and means to act on them.
NY23 vs the GOP is a small powderkeg of a case in point.
We shall see what We The People may yet see.
"… Even an educated and energetic minority cannot make change without first understanding what that is, and such understandings are only made by individuals and then confirmed by groups."
I Fully agree with that, and sites such as I linked to in the post, The Founders Constitution offer a way for normal Americans to not only read the Constitution, but read it section by section along with the ideas which the Founders had in mind when not only writing that section, but debating for and against it, and later in arguing what it meant in the Supreme Court. If you haven't seen it before, just take a look at the page (and links below) for the Preamble, and you'll see what I mean.
We don't need to wait for our 'schools' to be reformed, in order to get an education, in fact I'm pretty sure that we're going to have to become an Educated people again FIRST, before we can make any lasting changes to our schools, or our govt... and for the very, very first time in all of history, a people has free access to the ideas which their debased leaders which to spin aside.
Interesting times lay ahead.
Sean said "will you stop sugar coating your opinions please"
ReplyDeleteLol... hopefully being so close to Halloween, you were able to avoid the sugar coma!
Xlbrl, btw, I'm also an ex-musician from Las Vegas... go figure.
ReplyDeleteJust noticed your motto, Exploit the Earth or Die. Excellent. Can we get that on the currency?
ReplyDeleteThe public--and worse, the children--have been lobotomized to liberty, and it is for that reason that I find short and sweet to be of the greatest value, cherry bombs to break up the hympnotic slumber of commonly held opinions. I collect them.
The Meadows, eh? What is your instrument?
I shook Harry Reids's hand thirty-five years ago and am still not right, I admit that.
Xlbrl said "The Meadows"
ReplyDeleteSuch an odd name for the place, I vividly remember the first time I saw it, about noon, 115 degrees, coming over the hill from L.A. when I was about 12... what I saw was dirt... a few buildings... and dirt... with mountains ringing in the dirt.
Mt. Charleston was my meadows, every chance I could get - when I couldn't get that far away, we'd 'party' outside of town, taking the dirt roads of Sahara to Jones (!) then a little 4 wheeling in my solid steel '66 Ford Galaxy, swoosh the dirt to a stop and enjoy the distant lights and a very long Beer' O'clock.
I spent the 80's playing Bass in a band... The Moby Grape became our home turf... Captain America's & The Troubadour too... fun memories... from a distance... like twinkling lights.
Really? The whole entire House? Somebody wasn't thinking way back when. Has it ever happened before?
ReplyDeleteBy all means, vote. If you're able, campaign for the new guy (just make sure he's not a sheep in wolf's clothing).
Better do it now - by 2012 it will be too late. The doom-sayers will have been right - 2012 is the End of the World. The End of the Free World; the end of the Great Experiment begun in 1776.
There's one big problem: look at how many people voted for Obama, how many voted for Reid, for Pelosi, for the whole Socialist Wing. They're going to vote again (and again, if Soros and Acorn have their way), and they're going to try their darndest to keep the Socialists in power.
We have to do better than just hope for change. We've go to pretend that this election will be the turning point in modern history.
Because it will be. If we lose this one, we might as well give it all up.
If we lose this one, we won't have to give it up - they'll take the rest of it from us - and we won't be able to stop it.
And it's not just House and Senate, it's local elections all the way down to city council.
It's going to be an uphill fight. Those who feed from the government trough outnumber the rest of us - who are the ones who stock it.
Van makes a great point:
"We don't need to wait for our 'schools' to be reformed, in order to get an education, in fact I'm pretty sure that we're going to have to become an Educated people again FIRST, before we can make any lasting changes to our schools, or our govt... and for the very, very first time in all of history, a people has free access to the ideas which their debased leaders which to spin aside."
Now here's the problem: the "educators" we've seen fit to run the asylums we call schools have been, since the time of John Dewey, been tinkering with the education system, making sure it got worse and worse (see Left Back: A Century of Battles over School Reform , making most of our children culturally and politically illiterate (not to mention scientifically and literally).
xlbrl notices that, too.
It's not going to be enough for you and me to vote, we somehow have to convince the wide-eyed optimists, the Obama-infatuated crowd that the "hope and change" he promised was not the hope or change we wanted.
ZZMike said "Now here's the problem: the "educators" we've seen fit to run the asylums we call schools have been, since the time of John Dewey, been tinkering with the education system, making sure it got worse and worse (see Left Back: A Century of Battles over School Reform , making most of our children culturally and politically illiterate (not to mention scientifically and literally)."
ReplyDeleteYes, we can not count on our schools, no matter what new 'reforms' they promise, they are fundamentally opposed to Education, they will not provide it. Period. We must do it ourselves.
No other option.
Modern education found it's anti-conceptual black heart and soul, in the writings of Rousseau, it acquired it's 'intellectual' foundations in Kant, Hegel & Fichte, it found it's progressivist pseudo-intellectual snob appeal and theoretical basis in Dewey.
It made inroads in fits and starts in private 'progressive' schools, and occasional local schools... usually followed with huge setbacks when it's practice proved it's failure to be able to - Teach - apparently parents felt that was a deal breaker.
But the center of Intellectual circles had shifted to Germany, Americans seeking a prestige education went to Germany or France for one of the newly invented sparkly "PHD"'s... and they began returning to America and getting prominent positions in society and at universities. The 'educator' who unmade Harvard, Charles Elliot, brought back the euro ideas and implemented the first 'elective' courses, and was a professor (though they disliked each other) to the central founder of Pragmatism, Charles Peirce, who was a huge influence on Dewey.
Once proregressive republican Morrill conned Lincoln into signing Morrill's pet education bill, which had been vetoed by Buchanon who saw it for the dangerous breach of the constitution that it was, as a war measure ("to educate the rebels out of existence"), over the objections of most College Presidents who foresaw that it would unmake classical education, that form of education which produced the Founders generation, we were hosed.
(break)
(cont)
ReplyDeleteAnyone who has followed how a seemingly small govt measures metastasize into all consuming cancers, would recognize how the Morrill Act, which established Land Grant colleges to teach agricultural methods, would not be surprised at how soon govt demanded that they have more control over curriculums that Fed money was going to, then the 'need' to ensure that those teaching what they were paying for were 'qualified' in modern educational methods, and led to the first Teachers colleges and soon mounting requirements that ALL teachers be certified, and then by the opening of the 20th century, that new industrial style schools be created "High Schools", and soon every state in the union had mandatory public education.
At that point, we became screwed. It didn't matter whether you went to a private or public school, you got some form of a progressive education, a reverence for pragmatism and it's virulent assaults on anything to do with Principle, a view that is thoroughly incompatible with America, a nation founded upon Principles of liberty and individual rights.
Woodrow Wilson summed it up in his comments on what he expected of education, and what he thought of America's founding principles; when as president of Princeton, he made a speech to the Federation of High School Teachers: "We want one class of persons to have a liberal education and we want another class of persons, a very much larger class of necessity in every society, to forgo the privilege of a liberal education and fit themselves to perform specific difficult manual tasks.", and his denigration of "Newtonian ideas" of the Founders, "The trouble with the theory is that government is not a machine, but a living thing. It falls, not under the theory of the universe, but under the theory of organic life. It is accountable to Darwin, not to Newton. It is modified by its environment, necessitated by its tasks, shaped to its functions by the sheer pressure of life. No living thing can have its organs offset against each other, as checks, and live.", IOW, there are no principles, everything must be decided 'pragmatically' on the basis of the moment, take action to 'make things work'... it is the abolishment of 2,000 of philosophic conceptual development, which the Founder's era was the pinacle. Wilson's The Author and Signers of the Declaration- by Woodrow Wilson is another which sets the 'modern' up as no longer having need of outdated notions of principles.
The proregressive is fundamentally anti-American. Neither their political leaders or educational leaders will willingly teach what they oppose.
ZZMike "Really? The whole entire House? Somebody wasn't thinking way back when. Has it ever happened before?"
ReplyDeleteHmmm... in case that was serious, yes, it has happened before... about one hundred and eleven times... and not just by extraordinary coincidence,
;-)
... but by design. The Senate is staggered in elections, but except for special elections, the entire house is up for election every two years.
One problem is having far too many fools and me people voting on single issues and for the pols who promises them the most.
ReplyDeleteMaybe voting them all out won't work and most likely will hurt but you haven't convinced me that term limits are a bad thing. The pipe dream of people learning about positions of pols and how it effects the country and voting responsibly, while being something I would dearly love to see, is just that, a dream.
Mxdg said "Maybe voting them all out won't work and most likely will hurt but you haven't convinced me that term limits are a bad thing."
ReplyDeleteGuess who is the minority representation in the legislative process right now... our elected representatives.
With the reams of existing regulations, regulatory agencies, laws and byzantine committees, sub committees and ad hoc committees... which are in place before a rep arrives in D.C., continue on during and after their term, and the gazillion measures and bills striving for their attention, and the importance of knowing which influential person favors which, the 'legislator' relies on their aides who make up the bureaucracy, to tell the new member what he is for and against.
It is only with experience, favors, connections, gained over time, that a legislator can hope to get to the point that they can begin to steer the course of their office and votes.
The value of a (alas perhaps mythical) honest, principled legislator who becomes an independent (relatively speaking, D.C. ya know) voice, is immeasurable. With every term won, that persons power increases geometrically.
If we pass a law to substitute for our vote, for the ability to make an intelligent choice, not only do we enshrine stupidity into the electoral process (not only will good and bad be both turned out, but even the possibility to make an intelligent decision will be ruled out), but the powerless will be replaced by more powerless, and those who 'aide' the process will become even more needed than they now are, and so the real power, and the elected representative a mere figurehead, having not even the possible threat of ever attaining actual power over the process.
In short, if you think it's bad now, while legislators and their aides actually care about the result of elections, imagine what it will be like when those who have the actual power will be permanently entrenched, and they don't give a rats ass who wins.
The problem is NOT in the terms of our elected representatives, it is in the existing regulations, regulatory agencies, laws and byzantine committees, sub committees and ad hoc committees we have allowed to entrench itself in Washington D.C., and what allowed them to take root, what waters and fertilizes them and cross pollinates them, is the fact that we allowed govt to interfere in the free enterprise system. Teddy Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson, even more than FDR, with the complicit and instigating aid of proregressive legal minds such as Oliver Wendel Holmes, established a disregard for property rights, and a reverence and trust for x-spurts to regulate and supervise the market.
The people who sought no contact or help from D.C., did nothing. Those who knew that they could push for regulatory requirements that would favor themselves, and discourage new or rival competitors if they just 'helped' legislators in proposing and writing those agencies and regulations, did, and those legislators who knew they could wangle money, favors or both from those newly empowered bid'nessmen (who now had real, actual, political power of law through their influence), did as well.
That is the corruption we face. None of the corruption will be in any significant way reduced or checked, while the core of the system is in place. Until property rights and contract are again sacrosanct, free from govt intrusion (alphabet agencies, min wage laws, union's backed by govt, etc), we will not reduce the corruption. Until the people themselves come to understand their constitution and why it was written as it was, no progress will be made.
Not a rosy scenario, but it's a better one than blind stupidity and baseless hope of voting without thought or preventing thoughtful voting through term limits.
The argument against term limits is that it takes a few years to "learn the ropes" and get really good at being a Congressman. So by the time you know which way is up, you're out.
ReplyDeleteThe arguments for term limits are Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, Ted Kennedy, maybe even Richard C. Byrd, and any number of people who've been there forever.
As I remember, one of the reasons the Founding Geezers had Senators sit for longer terms than Representatives is so they wouldn't have to be so dependent on drumming up the vote.
They also figured that someone would run for Congress, take time off from the family business (usually a farm), do his bit for a couple of years, then go back home and let somebody else have a shot at it.
That still sounds like a good plan.
You've convinced me to take some time and rethink my position.
ReplyDeleteThose are some damn good points to ponder.
Part of the problem is the corruption and the blatant disregard of the people as displayed by many pols recently.
Their attitude that they know what's best for us has many people angry and rightfully so.
Back in the day they may have been ridden out of town on a rail after an application of tar and feathers but unfortunately that is no longer possible. Maybe it should be. There needs to be a way to hold these clowns accountable and if they ignore our phone calls and e-mails what do we have left?
ZZMike and Mxdg, instead of another extended reply, I made it into a new post here.
ReplyDeleteMxdg said "Back in the day they may have been ridden out of town on a rail after an application of tar and feathers but unfortunately that is no longer possible"
ReplyDeleteA warm thought
;-)
"There needs to be a way to hold these clowns accountable and if they ignore our phone calls and e-mails what do we have left?"
I think precisely what happened to the GOP in NY23. That we will very publicly expose their idiocy, and that we would rather have a principled candidate, win or lose, than an unprincipled RINO.
That WAS what happened, and MUST continue to happen. I'm going to do a post on this in the near future... not quite ready to right now.