#12 A CONUNDRUM ?

http://www.tenurecorrupts.com/strategies

Conundrum, def:
a : a question or problem having only a conjectural answer
b : an intricate and difficult problem

We have a conundrum here.

One day while working on the website, it occurred to me that my preferred
‘basic strategy’ may be essentially counterproductive. Do I have a conundrum
on my hands ?

The strategy I am talking about is the one where I suggest that we adopt
an amendment which is worded so as to exempt current incumbents
from being term limited, as long as they continue to be successfully
reelected. The theory here is that such an amendment would be easier
to pass Congress, since it does not affect current members.

I suddenly woke up to the fact that, if the current reelection rate of 99%
continues indefinitely, then it will take a mighty long time for term limits
to have any significant effect on the Congress.

For example, using very rough arithmetic: Congress has 535 members,
and is currently at a 99% reelection rate . So, if we were able to change
only 1%, or 5 or 6 members every 2 years, it would take approximately
50 elections, or 100 years, to change only one-half of the membership
to be term limited !!

On the other hand, if the reelection rate was only 95%, thereby changing
5%, or 27 seats every 2 years, it would take only 10 years to get one-half
of Congress to be term limited, which, of course, is much more reasonable.

Obviously, my strategy to use the incumbency exemption was valid a few
years ago, when the reelection rate was less than 95%. Is it still valid ?
Only time will tell.

If the 99% rate in the 2004 election was an anomaly, and it returns to a
more acceptable 95% level, I would still be inclined to stick with the
‘exemption amendment’, because I believe it improves our chances of
getting the amendment thru two-thirds of each house of Congress.

If, on the other hand, the reelection rate appears to be ‘stuck’ at the 99%
level, it serves to confirm the real necessity for Congressional Term Limits,
and only emphasizes how difficult the job is going to be. It shows that
a significant fraction of the electorate is too lazy or indifferent to realize
that a Congress ‘elected for life’ is not a healthy situation. Commonsense
tells us all that ‘tenure corrupts’ ! Even ‘good’ politicians become tainted
after serving too long in the same office, even if the taint is ‘only’ arrogance.

I'm Nelson Lee Walker, and I believe our country needs Congressional Term Limits.

http://www.tenurecorrupts.com/strategies

#11 TERM LIMITS VS CONGRESSIONAL CLIMATE

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One of the somewhat valid arguments proposed against Congressional
term limits is that truly ‘worthy’ congressional incumbents would lose
their seats for no other reason than an arbitrary tenure limit, and that
would be foolish. We have few enough ‘good guys’ as it is.

Agreed, but this argument misses the point in at least two ways:

First, no one has any idea how many worthy individuals are discouraged
from running, or how many who do run lose to firmly ‘locked in’ unworthy
incumbents. This is a significant loss, which if reversed by term limits,
could change the whole ‘atmosphere’ in Congress.

This leads to the second point: In a Congress full of only short-term,
‘inexperienced’, freshman-like legislators, the environment of the body
will be transformed from a careerist ‘old boy’ club atmosphere with
hardened artery ancient ‘rules’ about how ‘we’ve always done it this way’,
to a forward looking group of younger people from the ‘outside the Beltway’
world of commerce and industry, who are used to getting things done with
commonsense effectiveness, and who plan to return to the real world
after their service in one or two seats in government.

We all realize that all changes come with tradeoffs, and what we too often
do not acknowledge, is that controversial changes often deliver benefits
which far outstrip the negatives forecasted by opponents who favor the
status quo. I believe this will especially be true of Congressional Term Limits.

Nelson Lee Walker

http://www.tenurecorrupts.com

#10 THE JUDICIAL STRATEGY ROUTE

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Another strategy which may enable the advent of Congressional
term limits is reversal of the Supreme Court’s 1995 5 to 4 controversial
decision (US Term Limits vs Thornton) that the states do not have the
right to determine the terms of their Congresspeople.

At the time of this 5 to 4 ruling, 14 states had already passed term limits
for their Congresspeople, and 11 more had scheduled ballot initiatives
to do so for the next election. There is little doubt, considering the
general feeling in the country in favor of term limits, that once 50%
of the states had done so , the rest of the nation would follow shortly.

Despite the current furor in Congress over the filibustering of
judicial nominees, it appears that due to the ages and infirmities
of some of the incumbent justices, that there will be some new
appointments to the Court during 2005 or 2006. Should the Administration
succeed in getting confirmation of 2 or 3 relatively conservative
justices (‘strict constructionists’), it would not be surprising
to see new challenges reach the Court defending the right of states
to set term limits for their congressional contingent.

We now can count on one more viable strategy fo Congressional Term Limits.

This is Nelson Lee Walker, and I believe that our country needs Congressional Term Limits.

http://www.tenurecorrupts.com