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CONTROVERSIAL PREDICTION

Here is a controversial prediction. It can be verified or disproved by midnight, Tuesday, November 2.

THE PREDICTION: 50% of those who were members of Congress when President Obamawas inaugurated will not be members of the new Congress when it convenes in 2011.

SECOND PREDICTION---and this is more important to democracy than the first prediction: I predict that the talking heads, the editorial writers and pundits will spend all their efforts trying to divine the political reasons for the voter rejection of so many incumbents.

BUT, one reason for the inability to devine the cause of the “incumbents rejections” is it effects both major parties proportionately. And while the pundits will be spending their analytical talents trying to devine what each losing candidate did wrong, the real answer will be that the angry American voters took their anger out on whoever (incumbents) was associated with the current unplesantness regardless of party or political conviction.

The real lesson to be learned particularly by career politicians is if things aren’t going well, the politicians in power will be kicked out of office even if the problems weren’t their fault.

That will be a very important lesson for career politicians and, if learned, a very important step for the growth of the basic democratic idea. The lesson, hopefully to be demonstrated, is that a politican’s job security and the longevity of his party’s dominance depends on whether a majority of the voter’s believe “that the country is heading in the right direction”. (The most recent polls show that somewhere between 60—80% of the poll respondents said they thought the country was heading in the “wrong direction”.)

Finally, the election hopefully will prove that voters are more sophisticated than politicians typically believe them to be. It really doesn’t matter to the voters that the Democrats made housing so easy to buy that people vastly overextended their credit or that the repeal of the Glass=Stegall Act in 1999 gave the banks the new authority to speculate with people’s savings in new ways. The facts are, that both parties may have been trying to do right, but Congress did not react fast enough when it first became obvious that greed and excess were way too rampant.

TO REPEAT: The fact that the Congress didn’t quickly correct their mistakes is what has created the voter discontent predicted to be shown in the November 2 election.

NOW, if this lesson can be learned, the chances of repeating the mistakes will be somewhat reduced and the case for democracy will be advanced to a new level because elected officials everywhere will conclude that their job security depends almost solely on whether the voters think the country or the state or the county is heading in the right direction with a minimum of graft, corruption and greed. What’s more, the voters don’t care who caused the problem.

I can hope only that this lesson will be learned in an indelible way.

Is the Problem Career Politicians?

Honestly, have you ever seen so much grass roots discontent with our career politicians? Especially with the Congress…

Second question: Would it be better for the nation (and the basic democratic ideal) if we had term limits for all of congress…Senators and Representatives. It could be just like the constitutional prohibition of no more than two terms for the president?

Question three: Would the change to term limits noticeably upgrade the quality of legislation coming out of Washington? Would term limits increase the statesmanship of the whole congress (and through them the whole federal government) by changing the motivation for holding an elective office?

If you answered “NO” to any of the three questions, you probably should skip the rest of this dissertation. Sorry and goodbye.

I answered “YES” to all three questions and here are my reasons, right or wrong:

Reason One: The current system almost forces someone who wants to serve the nation to become a “career politician.” Realistically, how else would a politician get nominated, elected and accepted in the Washington political scene? Second Reason: We force the poor congressmen to start running for another term the morning after he wins each election And where does he turn for the necessary money he must have to get re-elected? The answer is: to people/organizations that want “ear time”, people with an ax to grind and it may not always be in the national interest. In short, by providing the wrong motivation, we have created a legalized and highly-sophisticated system of graft/corruption that is robbing our country of its full potential.

O.K. “ Mr.-Know It-All” you might well say, “ be fair and tell us the negatives.” Well, one is that you won’t always attract the best talent because being a statesman ( vs a career politician) shouldn’t provide any real wealth, just salary. My answer is, I would rather have properly motivated people than the most talented. Our prisons are full of brilliant people who were wrongly motivated. Think—Madoff.

Second negative: Placing term limits and adjusting the length of the term is an extremely complicated constitutional procedure. I agree. …Asking the congress to instigate such a change would be like asking the fox to voluntarily leave the hen house.

But it is not all frustration. I have had many suggestions.

One suggestion was for voters to agree not to support any candidate running for a third term. The disadvantage would be that it would be hard to organize and publicize. And you may penalize the very party you want to help.

A second suggestion was to write in a name like “ Two Terms” instead of voting for any candidate in the next election. Again the problem is organization but also you likewise might hurt a canidate you would like to support.

But the best suggestion has been to exercise the democratic principle of “the right to petition”. Suppose thousands and thousands of people each got 10 signatures with addresses on a genuine flood of grass roots petitions urging a constitutional amendmentlimiting congressional terms to no more than two. (This could be achieved if every signer would agree to get 10 other signatures on a separate petition)

A suggestion is the petitions be sent to The Heritage Foundation,

214 Massachusetts Ave. N.E., Washington, D.C. 20002, fax it to them at (202) 879-6333 or through the internet (www.myheritage.org). If you want to call them their phone number is # 800-546-2843

The Heritage Foundation is very moxie about how to get things done politically in Washington and they may find ways, if so motivated, to make sure the petitioners are heard.

But to help the Heritage people along, have copies of the petitions sent or e-mailed to the local newspapers plus, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post and The New York Times.

If there is an honest groundswell out there in the grassroots, this whole idea should catch fire and spread on its own with such speed that “even the foxes in the hen houses” will have to pay attention. That would be a giant step for all of mankind and additional proof that the basic idea of a democracy is alive and well, because it can update itself to meet the ever-changing challenges of our society.

If you want wording for your petition it can be as simple as

We the undersigned, think that the problem with our country is Congress, and support career limits on Congressmen.