Congressional Insanity

Although the article I link here is about…Uhhh…Gorbal warming, I am actually going to rant about something that struck me right in the face when I read the piece.

 

"I'm trying to have everybody understand that this is going to cost and that it's going to have a measure of pain that you're not going to like," Rep. John Dingell, who is marking his 52nd year in Congress, said Wednesday in an interview with The Associated Press."

 

It is the red stuff that should make our blood boil. 52 years in Congress? What the heck is that all about? How can the people elect someone 26 times? Do people not understand that things change, that people change, and that having the same representative for 52 years is not a good thing? Sheesh..if you were 18 when you first voted for this guy you are now 70. You worked your whole life and he liveed off of your taxes, and now he wants to kill your grandkids with even more taxes.

 

Okay, term limits would require a constitutional amendment, right? NO, they require an informed electorate. We are a representative democracy, we choose who goes to Washington, they do not get the job for life, as this guy has. We CAN change the election laws so they do not favor incumbents, we can make it illegal for incumbents to do anything campaign related when on the clock. That's right, NO campaigning when Congress is in session, no speeches, no appearances, nothing. Incumbents get the press, incumbents have the name recognition, and, if the incumbent is doing a good job, they will be reelected, period. Secondly, NO money should be allowed to be spent on an election that does not come directly from the constituency that the candidate would represent, simple as that. No move-on money, no Soros money, no ACT money, no union money, and no 'big-oil' money would flow to a congress-person, or a candidate for congress. Any money spent would have to be raised locally.

 

Grrr..this one burns me up.

 

"It is not by the consolidation, or concentration of powers, but by their distribution, that good government is effected." --Thomas Jefferson: Autobiography, 1821. ME 1:122