There is a simple way to throw out all of the corrupt bastards: TERM LIMITS.

[Leftist Agitator]

Limit individuals to no more than three terms in the House and two in the Senate.

Do it at the state level, i.e. have states pass a law that says that any citizen thereof is thereby limited to represent that state a limited number of times.

If necessary, lobby state legislatures to call for a Constitutional Convention and amend the U.S. Constitution to limit Congressional terms.

Discuss.

[Obamanaut]

1. We have a means to limit terms now. Stop voting for "the name you know."

Incumbents are reelected at a rate greater than 90%, with the others being mostly the ones who are retiring, dying, or dead.

[Bitwit1234]

16. Vote em out...that's never going to work because

once these crooks get in office, who but a billionaire has the means to go up against them. And even then most billionaires' won't spend their fortunes to run for office. the incumbent has so much money accumulated from the lobbyist they can outspend any normal person wanting the job. So vote em out AIN'T GONNA WORK.

[Obamanaut]

28. I have never ever seen a ballot in a primary or a general election

where every single name was an incumbent - there are always some challengers on the page someplace.

Vote for one of them. When the choice is between an incumbent or a challenger, pick the challenger. It no longer matters the party affiliation, because if they are not already weasels, they have a propensity for weaselry and will become one soon after taking office.

If a weasel has not lined his pockets sufficiently during one term, bad luck got 'im. Let a neophyte weasel nose up to the trough for awhile.

[Yupster]

23. With gerrymandered districts

80 % of congressmen have their races over before they start.

I'm with the original poster in calling for term limits.

Robert Byrd and Strom Thurmond are evidence enough for me.

[dysfunctional press]

2. congress would have to do it to themselves- FAT FUCKING CHANCE.

it will NEVER happen, so forget about it.

it was even a plank in newt's 'contract on america' and it went NOWHERE, even though the repukes ran on it.

[Leftist Agitator]

8. Congress wouldn't have to do it themselves...

State legislatures could do it just fine.

Now the question is, "Would they?"

I'm sure that many state legislators, if not the vast majority of them, harbor ambitions to get elected to Congress and stay there for life.

You would need a very large populist movement that jeopardized the re-election prospects of any state legislator who opposed term limits for Congress, but it could be done over time.

[dysfunctional press]

13. keep dreaming.

it just isn't going to happen.

besides- term limits already exist- elections.

"You would need a very large populist movement that jeopardized the re-election prospects of any state legislator who opposed term limits for Congress..."

with a populist movement of that size- it should be just as easy to vote the bad u.s. congressional reps out of office directly. :shrug:

[Yupster]

25. The Republicans term limited their committee chairpeople

which came back to bite them because once the chairmen were term limited they retired instead of going back to being a back-bencher and their Democratic opponents won many of those seats.

Same for the guys who ran on term limiting themselves. The ones who kept their promise are gone. The ones who broke their promise are promise - breakers. The guys who left often also lost that seas for the Republicans.

[valerief]

3. There's an old fashioned way to enforce term limits, too. nt

[Echo In Light]

4. G.Carlin - "Term limits ain't going to do any good; you're just going to end up with a brand new....

... bunch of selfish, ignorant Americans."

[BlueIdaho]

24. I love G.Carlin - nt.

[earthside]

5. Sadly agree.

I'm philosophically against term limits.

But practically, since we're never going to get public financing of Congressional elections, then term limits may be the way to go.

Too many of these guys (and they are mostly guys) just don't know when to leave and give a fresher approach a chance: Specter, Dodd, and Reid come to mind. Why are they running for reelection again? They are so much a part of the Washington culture that they don't know how to think outside of the box anymore. It is because of them that we are still stuck with this anti-democratic filibuster rule in the Senate.

[CreekDog]

6. What so they can become lobbyists faster?

That's what term limits did in CA. And: bonus! Now legislative staff is more powerful and knowledgable than elected officials.

[Earth_First]

12. +1

[G_j]

7. needed: real campain finance reform

money will still be the determining factor

[laughingliberal]

9. We have term limits. They're called elections. The real problem is campaign finance nt

[GoCubsGo]

27. Exactly.

Thank you.

[comrade snarky]

10. Constitutional convention?

Yeah, good idea.

You have fun with that. I'm sure only your good liberal ideas will be written into the new constitution and none of them nasty conservative ones will make it in.

That's much better than voting them out. :eyes:

[cali]

11. no, no and fuck no. why do people post this stupid suggestion day

in and day out?

[NeedleCast]

14. We have term limits now, people just wont exercise them

[wryter2000]

15. No, thanks

I'm not giving up Barbara Boxer and Barbara Lee.

[cali]

17. btw, there's NOTHING simple about amending the Constitution. Really.

[Laelth]

33. Agreed. n/t

:dem:

-Laelth

[Lydia Leftcoast]

18. Oregon has term limits, and they have a very harmful side effect:

The legislature loses its institutional memory.

I knew someone who was an administrator at the Oregon state capitol, and she said that with term limits, 1/3 of the legislature arrived completely clueless about everything. They waste about two weeks every session because the newbies are dithering around figuring out how the system works.

Furthermore, not all long-serving legislators are bad apples, and most of them develop expertise in at least one area of government concerns. You lose that with term limits.

The solution is voter education, learning to recognize the bad apples and not voting strictly on name recognition.

[jwirr]

19. And we throw out the good ones (Bernie & Dennis to start with) right

along with them.

[onenote]

20. of the four different people who would have occupied teddy's seat

if instead of being elected nine times, he only could've been elected two times --

how many do you think would have been as good as or better than teddy?

[11 Bravo]

21. Teddy came to mind the instant I read the OP.

Great minds ...

[Yupster]

26. But how much good could Teddy have done if he

also was a CEO of a company, and Governor, and maybe cabinet member, or head of a NPO.

He could have done a lot of good a lot of places. Not just in the senate.

[Spike89]

22. Counter productive idea

The logic escapes me...term limits mean that having a great reputation and doing a great job mean nothing and that every race is going to be a PR blitz as the candidates will need to get their names known. PR blitzes are expensive, and thus term limits will only give even more power to lobby interests who will finance one shill after another. At least with the current system, an incumbent doesn't need to accept money to get their name out as much (but most do it anyway).

Without very strong campaign finance reform, term limits would be the best thing special interests could ever hope for. With campaign reform, we don't need term limits. This is a simple-minded republican-style "easy" solution to frustration that not only wouldn't work, but would do the opposite.

[tritsofme]

29. See U.S. Term Limits, Inc. v. Thornton

The issue is settled.

States cannot impose additional requirements on federal officeholders, absent what is already in the Constitution.

With term limits, lobbyists become the only professional legislators in Washington, we would be denied the voice of the veteran lawmakers like Ted Kennedy.

[FiveGoodMen]

30. The real power behind DC isn't in Congress, it rests with the people who tell Congress how to vote

You can put term limits on the legislators, but how do you put them on the power brokers?

Term limits just mean that if you get a Kennedy or a Wellstone, you have to kick them out again.

Idea sounds good; I'm pretty sure it wouldn't help at all.

[shadowknows69]

31. I've always been for Congressional term limits.

[Laelth]

32. They'll just be puppets of the executive branch that way.

Freshman legislators have little power and are very susceptible to "persuasion" from the executive branch.

As Lynn Woolsey suggested here: http://blog.peaceactionwest.org/2009/06/12/pelosi-white-house-twisting-arms-to-gain-votes-for-war-funding-supplemental/

Term limits would turn the President into a true dictator.

:dem:

-Laelth