Finishing Term Limits In Congress

Continuing with the explication of my list of 10 flaws in the US Constitution, as enumerated in this post back in June, today's post deals with Congressional term limits.

My second point involved term limits for the judiciary.

We also need to include Congress, so that all three branches of the federal government have term limits to prevent a professional political class from taking root any further than it already has.

In my opinion, the 22nd amendment to the US Constitution, limiting presidents to no more than two full elected terms, represents unfinished business. As this webpage suggests, even that amendment hasn't been entirely safe from repeal, either. I was rather disturbed to see that Barney Frank and Harry Reid have attempted to repeal this important amendment.

The general issue is one of US citizens allowing the formation of a professional, career class of federal politicians who enact laws and accrue power to themselves. I'm currently reading Glenn Beck's "Common Sense," and find his observations and evidence to reinforce my own.

For example, just to put everyone on the same page, members of Congress vest in their own pension scheme far faster than most private workers. Further, that pension plan, and their health care system, are exclusively for Congress, and have better terms than the average voter's plans.

When, exactly, did we allow Congress to create for themselves a lush, fully-funded career, complete with better health care options than the voters for whom they work?

There are so many reasons why permitting professional, career federal office-holders is a bad idea that it's probably easier to deal with the two major arguments for long Congressional service.

The first is the oldest one I can recall hearing. This argument contends that the people of a Congressional District or state deserve the right to choose their own representative, and nobody should be able to deny them that representative. Perhaps nobody else in the district is as competent at representing them as their current, or favored representative.

To that, I would counter that the immense damage to the US economy and individual liberty by permitting a professional Congressional class far outweighs any presumed "right" of any group to have a long-sitting federal legislator. Unlike our founding fathers, or, really, any group prior to the middle of the 20th century, today's American citizens can see how a federal 'ruling class' have simply shredded the Constitution and gathered powers previously unimagined to themselves. Seniority and mutual back-scratching has resulted in ever-higher taxes and federal spending, even in peacetime.

If Congress were not seen as a career option, few would care to use it to line their own and their friends' pockets.

Further, if an entire district of over half a million citizens ( i.e., 300MM Americans divided into 435 equally-populated districts) can't manage to find more than one qualified representative, or an entire state can't find more than two qualified senators, their problems run much deeper than term limits. It simply can't be good for a Republic to be run by essentially the same people for decades at a time.

We've seen, since the 1930s, an inexorable tendency for members of Congress to "do something," in order to have evidence for voters that they "accomplished" things. The idea that preserving domestic policy and program arrangements and merely handling necessary, recurring appropriations and/or foreign policy matters is long gone as a measure of a successful Congressional term.

Now, if the federal budget hasn't grown and new pork hasn't been delivered to constituents, well, your Senator or Congressman has been deficient and must be removed via the next election.

The other argument I can imagine against term limits is one of experience. On this line of reasoning, we are asked to believe that only experienced members of Congress who "know the ropes," "how to get things done in Washington," etc., are truly effective. Oh, and let's not forget seniority.

I think this is actually the more baseless, intellectually dishonest, but convincing argument. For example, it's why no state will ever enact federal office term limits. In a Congress run by seniority, who wants to deliberately put themselves 50th among states seeking aid and advantage?

Your local Representative or state's Senators will try to convince you that their chairmanship of this or that committee or subcommittee, their ties to other 'respected' legislators, and solid core of staffers, allow them to be maximally effective for you, the voter.

Do you really want to throw away all that hard-won, seniority-based advantage for your District or state just by throwing the bum out?

The truth is, the House and Senate have become cozy clubs that answer to themselves and party leaders more than to their voters. The long-serving members have rigged the game so that the new arrivals are disadvantaged if they don't play ball. By going along, new members are tossed attractive bones, i.e., choice committee assignments, some favors for the folks back home, etc. Cross your party's leader or whip at your peril.

Of course, if there were federal office term limits, this would all change immediately.

My own preference is to limit Congressional service to three two-year terms in the House and two six-year terms in the Senate. That means in total, not consecutive. None of this husband-wife alternating terms. Serve eighteen years total among the two chambers and you are finished.

Without cushy pension plans and time to make lucrative connections which allow Congressmen to become wealthy off of unspent campaign funds, various vendor and lobbyist relationships, etc., it's unlikely that so many will eye federal office so fondly.

Besides, if you could gain election to Congress, and, thus have a chance to make a lifelong career of gathering more power to yourself and your colleagues, controlling your own pay and perks, why would you not stay? Why not simply grow insensitive to the voters, as you busy yourself with becoming well-entrenched, more powerful and untouchable?

Why do people like Charlie Rangel get away with tax evasion? Because even the IRS won't take on someone who looks like he'll die in office before he ever loses his power.

This is fairness? We want servants in Washington, not capricious masters.

Hopefullly, with term limits, we'll get truly civic-minded candidates motivated with one or two good ideas to implement within a few terms. People who have a passion to enact a specific change, then move along in life.

With our federal spending and invasion of liberties so engorged beyond anything imagined by our Constitution's Framers, it's time to attack the problem at its root by limited Congressional terms, and, thus, as Glenn Beck notes, the motivation of our Congressional members to vote for what enriches and empowers them in a career in Congress, rather than what is best in the long term for our country and its citizens.

Peggy Noonan On Obama-Care

Peggy Noona wrote a so-so piece in the weekend Wall Street Journal hypothetically returning FDR and Nixon to life to counsel their respective parties. Interesting, entertaining, but not really very practical.

The prior weekend's column, however, had some interesting aspects to it. Written for the 25-26 July edition of the Journal, Noonan began by roundly criticizing Wonderboy's dreadful healthcare press conference earlier that week.

In the second half of the piece, Noonan provided her personal belief as to why she thinks massive government-run healthcare will fail. The first two included reasons not everyone might immediately notice: current freedom of doctors to selectively discount fees, and the aversion by the majority of Americans to paying for abortions with federal healthcare dollars.

But her last contention was, for me, by far the most interesting and, frankly, typically wacked out Noonanspeak.

The former Reagan speechwriter believes that Wonderboy's new healthcare will finally give the upper classes, with their better education, diets, lower smoking rates, and better fitness, all positively correlated, by the way, the right and avenue by which to curb unhealthy behaviors of the lower-class masses. As Noonan wrote,

"Only a generation ago such criticisms would have been considered rude and unacceptable. But they are part of the ugly, chafing price of having the government in something: Suddenly it can make big and very personal demands on you.

Those who live in a way that isn't sufficiently healthy "cost us money" and "drive up premiums." Mr. Obama himself said something like it in his press conference, when he spoke of a person who might not buy health insurance. If he gets hit by a bus, "the rest of us have to pay for it."

Under a national health-care plan, we might be hearing that a lot. You don't exercise, you smoke, you drink, you eat too much, and "the rest of us have to pay for it."

Wake up, Dear. It's already been the case for decades.

Have you never heard of health insurance mandates, Peggy?

See, I don't think these sentiments are at all ugly. And I think people have been voicing them, at least in certain behaviors, for decades.

But what really has had me feeling that way for ages is the fact that I can't buy a tailor-made health insurance policy for my lifestyle and specific needs. I don't need obstetrics or pediatric care. Since I exercise constantly, eat heathily, don't smoke or drink, I want a big, big discount on my policy.

But I can't get one. Instead, I'm carrying the load of a lot of unhealthy, sedentary fatties who are allowed to average-in to my policy class. Not to mention the higher price Americans have paid for steel or cars for years, thanks to the unions in those sectors securing generous, free or cheap healthcare which, of course, made it nearly costless for those blue collar workers to live incredibly unhealthily.

I don't think there's anything wrong with condemnation in the public square of unhealthy lifestyle habits, so long as we are all forced to buy mandate-loaded policies, and carry those with pre-existing conditions at no extra charge.

So, Peggy, you got this one all wrong. It's actually high time we either make criticism of unhealthy living explicit, or free us all to be allowed mandate-free policies.

There is no middle ground.

Charlie Rangel's Shameful Criminal Tax Cheating

Monday's Wall Street Journal lead editorial concerned New York Democratic Congressman Charlie Rangel's nauseating tax cheating, and how his party and the federal government has repeatedly looked the other way. It was a compilation of the many sordid aspects of this veteran Democratic Congressional incumbent. The sort of Representative who is a walking advertisement for term limits.

The Journal editorial began,

"Ever notice that those who endorse high taxes and those who actually pay them aren’t the same people? Consider the curious case of Ways and Means Chairman Charlie Rangel, who is leading the charge for a new 5.4-percentage point income tax surcharge and recently called it “the moral thing to do.” About his own tax liability he seems less, well, fervent.

Exhibit A concerns a rental property Mr. Rangel purchased in 1987 at the Punta Cana Yacht Club in the Dominican Republic. The rental income from that property ought to be substantial since it is a luxury beach-front villa and is more often than not rented out. But when the National Legal and Policy Center looked at Mr. Rangel’s House financial disclosure forms in August, it noted that his reported income looked suspiciously low. In 2004 and 2005, he reported no more than $5,000, and in 2006 and 2007 no income at all from the property.

The Congressman initially denied there was any unreported income. But reporters quickly showed that the villa is among the most desirable at Punta Cana and that it rents for $500 a night in the low season, and as much as $1,100 a night in peak season. Last year it was fully booked between December 15 and April 15.

Mr. Rangel soon admitted having failed to report rental income of $75,000 over the years. First he blamed his wife for the oversight because he said she was supposed to be managing the property. Then he blamed the language barrier. “Every time I thought I was getting somewhere, they’d start speaking Spanish,” Mr. Rangel explained.

Mr. Rangel promised last fall to amend his tax returns, pay what is due and correct the information on his annual financial disclosure form. But the deadline for the 2008 filing was May 15 and as of last week he still had not filed. His press spokesman declined to answer questions about anything related to his ethics problems."

Amazing, is it not? Were this you or I, we'd be slapped with huge penalties or taken to court and jailed for tax evasion and/or nonpayment of taxes. The Journal piece then turns to a possible motivation for Rangel's clear-cut tax evasion,

"Besides not paying those pesky taxes, Mr. Rangel had other reasons for wanting to hide income. As the tenant of four rent-stabilized apartments in Harlem, the Congressman needed to keep his annual reported income below $175,000, lest he be ineligible as a hardship case for rent control. (He also used one of the apartments as an office in violation of rent-control rules, but that’s another story.)

Mr. Rangel said last fall that “I never had any idea that I got any income’’ from the villa. Try using that one the next time the IRS comes after you. Equally interesting is his claim that he didn’t know that the developer of the Dominican Republic villa had converted his $52,000 mortgage to an interest-free loan in 1990. That would seem to violate House rules on gifts, which say Members may only accept loans on “terms that are generally available to the public.” Try getting an interest-free loan from your banker.

The National Legal and Policy Center also says it has confirmed that Mr. Rangel owned a home in Washington from 1971-2000 and during that time claimed a “homestead” exemption that allowed him to save on his District of Columbia property taxes. However, the homestead exemption only applies to a principal residence, and the Washington home could not have qualified as such since Mr. Rangel’s rent-stabilized apartments in New York have the same requirement."

Thus, Rangel has been deliberately been playing fast and loose with various residency rules in order to maintain rent-controlled apartments in New York, lower cost residential space in DC, and evading Congressional rules, not to mention, again, taxes, on the interest-free loan for his problematic Dominican Republic villa.

By the way, how, again, does such a long-serving Representative amass enough wealth to buy such a rental property?

The whole thing is stomach-turning. Ironic, isn't it, that Rangel has, if I'm not mistaken, the same seat as disgraced Harlem Representative Adam Clayton Powell.

So long as charlatans and crooks like Rangel not only sit in Congress, but chair committees, swagger around pompously, having buildings in New York college campuses named for them while sitting in Congress, the public will continue to distrust this body of legislators.

The low regard and contempt in which American voters hold Congress is due to the body allowing lawbreakers such as Rangel to continue serving there, instead of time behind bars. So long as Rangel sits in the House, voters will rightly suspect anything the chamber does.

Why HSA's Are The Way To Go For Health Insurance

Yesterday I read "Theodore Dalrymple's" excellent editorial on the notion of a 'right' to healthcare in the Wall Street Journal. "Dalrymple" is the pseudonym of Anthony Daniels, a British doctor.

His argument that there is not such a thing as a 'right' to healthcare was persuasive. Daniels crystallized it in this passage,

"When I then ask my interlocutor whether he can think of any reason why people should not be left to die in the street, other than that they have a right to health care, he is generally reduced to silence. He cannot think of one.

Moreover, the right to grant is also the right to deny. And in times of economic stringency, when the first call on public expenditure is the payment of the salaries and pensions of health-care staff, we can rely with absolute confidence on the capacity of government sophists to find good reasons for doing bad things."

Daniels' observation immediately gave rise in me to a clear argument for partially-government-funded health savings accounts, or HSAs.

Suppose you give in to the notion that everyone in the US has a "right" to health care. But, you don't want to needlessly infringe on anyone's private rights to choose their health care providers, or what is treated, within a societally-agreed level of affordability?

What would you do to effect that? Easy.

You'd provide each person with a government-funded HSA. Every taxpayer would be allowed a credit sized to allow purchase of health insurance. Those taxpayers above a certain income threshold would get no further assistance. Those with no income would be given a voucher with which to purchase health insurance. Those below a threshold would be provided with an actuarially-determined payment into their HSA, in addition to the health insurance credit or voucher.

In this manner, everyone would be 'covered.' Everyone would have insurance, and those too poor to have money for deductibles or out of pocket health expenses would get money in an HSA, to be used only with approved medical care providers.

Once someone has used up their government-provided HSA dollars, they are on their own. We can't provided unlimited health care to everyone. But family and friends could spend their HSA dollars for really sick relatives or friends.

Nobody would have their right to choose providers, or care, rationed by anyone else. And 15-20% of our economy, the health care sector, wouldn't be radically altered to allow for a government-run system.

Thus, a wealthy country, like ours, could relatively easily provide real, cash health care assistance to those who need it, without changing private medical care systems.

Further, the expense has to be funded in cash, so Congress would have to place the expense of this assistance on budget. The public would see just how much its compassion really cost.

Let's see, private rights not infringed, an entire economic sector not taken over by government, poor people provided dedicated health care assistance.

Not a bad way to provide healthcare, if you really think it's a "right" we must guarantee. Clearly superior to the 1,000+ page pig of a bill being rammed through Congress by Wonderboy and his minions.

Rahm Emanuel's Blue Dogs Bite Back

Monday's Wall Street Journal featured a piece on the 'Blue Dog' Democrats in the House who have become a major thorn in the sides of California Representatives and uber liberals Frisco Nan Pelosi and Henry Waxman.

The article details how Rahm Emanuel, now Wonderboy's chief of staff, personally devised the strategy, when heading up the House Democrats' re-election efforts in 2006, of recruiting moderates in key districts to run as Democrats.

Now, that strategy is coming back to bite him, and his party, in the form of some 50+ Blue Dogs. The name, of course, precedes Emanuel. It was, according to the article, derived from pictures in once-Democrat Billy Tauzin's office.

But Emanuel thought he was being clever when he deliberately ran moderates. And, in his own way, he admitted that liberal Democrats can't get elected in sufficient numbers of districts to form a majority in even their own party.

Thus, the common sense and self-preservation instincts of this group are now causing the healthcare stampede being foisted on American voters by Pelosi and Wonderboy to grind to a halt.

It's poetic justice, isn't it? The very freshman and second-term moderate Democrats who Emanuel personally recruited are now blocking his boss' biggest move toward socialism in America.

Senate Democratic Fear On Healthcare

I saw an interview on Friday with a Democratic Senator in some leadership position, vowing to cancel the Senate's recess and force its members to stay to pass some sort of healthcare bill, simply on Wonderboy's orders.

The most amazing illustration of the Senator's misguided loyalty and sense of obligation was when he solemnly intoned that, if the Senate dared to go home without a healthcare bill's passage, voters would say they had shirked their responsibility and gone on vacation with work left to do.

What a crock!

By now, nearly every voter in America wants the opportunity to do two things before that bill is passed. One, they want to know if their Representatives and Senators understand it, let alone even actually know what's in it. Two, they want to express their profound concern over a bunch of politicians with practically no special knowledge of healthcare messing with 15% of the nation's economy, and the most sensitive personal services and decisions any Americans will ever make.

This Democrat has totally corrupted his values and sense of duty as a Senator. His duty is not to the president, or his party, but to his constituents. Most of whom, I am sure, are concerned about this piece of crap the Democratic Congress calls healthcare 'reform.'

Shame on him, and them, for worrying more about party unity and shoving some unread, omnibus legislation through by August, rather than going home and listening to voters on this important issue.

Wonderboy Inflames Racial Tensions

The story involving Wonderboy and the run in between police and a Harvard professor in Cambridge is just too good to be true, isn't it?

Mr. post-partisan and racial healing criticized police for doing their job, and instinctively sided with the black person in the case.

I guess Wonderboy is showing us how it's done in the new America, isn't he?

Then, to add insult to injury, after putting his foot in his own mouth, he alleged that, because his statements caused such an uproar, it proves that racial tensions still exist.

Just incredible. This guy can't let well enough alone and simply believe in peoples' inherent goodness.

As president, his comments make extra waves, but our First Rookie still thinks he can serve via sound bites, speeches and press conferences. I don't think the real gravity of office has hit him yet.

Maybe it never will.