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 Todd DormanTodd Dorman is a columnist for The Gazette. His blog has been bringing smiles to readers' faces since November 2007. |
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Term Limits Reconsidered
(AP photo)
Washington Post columnist Dana Millbank wrote a piece about disgraced former lobbyist Jack Abramoff’s appearance before a group of campaign finance reform activists. Abramoff has now fashioned himself into a truth-telling reformer.
It’s a good column. A sample:
Consider his argument for term limits, for example. “I was against that as a lobbyist,” he said. “Frankly, I was against it because once you buy a congressional office you don’t want to have to repurchase that office a few years down the line.” And the longer lawmakers remain on the job, he argued, the more likely they are to have a price tag: “Most people start slipping into a corrupt — they fall into the miasma.”
I’ve been thinking about term limits lately. The Millbank column, and an exchange between frequent commenters Lori Morris and Todd Johnson under my post Monday about Gov. Branstad’s potential to seek a sixth term reminded me of the issue again. And no, it’s not because I want to target any particular politician.
I was once strongly opposed to term limits, believing that it should be up to voters to decide who stays and goes. We don’t need automatic mechanisms to improve democracy, we need engagement.
I still think that. But I’ve also started to wonder about the possible advantages of limiting terms.
There’s the threat of corruption, as Abramoff outlines. He oughta know. Although I’m under no illusion that term limits would magically make politicians pure as the driven snow. Presidents are term limited, and I don’t see much evidence that influence buyers have been deterred from pouring oceans of cash into presidential campaigns. President Obama is now going full super PAC.
Actually, my reconsideration of term limits mostly stems from watching political institutions that seem profoundly broken, especially at the federal level, and where very little of significance gets done. Maybe if politicians’ time in office was shortened, they might feel more compelled to accomplish something, or at least less compelled to avoid doing something for fear of losing a sweet, sweet gig. Perhaps one answer to our perpetual election campaign is to make a political career only temporary.
I suppose that’s naive. Lobbyists, after all, aren’t subject to term limits. Neither are many bureaucrats. And perhaps short terms would make some politicians work even more feverishly to cash in before time’s up. This sort of thing is like Whack-a-Mole. Whack one mole and another pops up.
I don’t really have a specific proposal. But I think the concept is worth reconsidering. I’m interested what you think.
I’ve for a long time felt that imposing term limits on legislators would cause a loss of “institutional memory”. I used to think that causing such a loss would have bad results for the country; now, however, I’ve come to believe that it might be the best thing that could happen to us.
Term limits are an attempt to cure a symptom, while neglecting the disease. The money that must be raised to win an election is staggering and forces even the most righteous candidates to compete in a corrupt system were a form of bribery is perfectly legal. Term limits will not change this.
We need to attack the cancer. As long as a candidate must raise hundreds of thousands of dollars (for a seat in congress) to hundreds of millions (for the presidency), they will have to spend a significant portion of their time fundraising, when they should be doing the peoples work. When it is much more efficient to get a $5 million donor than to work for 200K $25 donors, Daddy Warbucks is going to get the access that influences legislation and policy. So when they are working, are they really working for the people or for those who funded their election?
The issue is not how long they serve, but what they are doing when they are suppose to be serving the people.
“Term limits are an attempt to cure a symptom, while neglecting the disease.”
I agree with Terry on this one.
I believe we need term limits, let’s give some one new a try and get rid of some of these old crooks. Politics today is all about party line not what’s right or wrong for America. Was Charles Grassley on Jacks pay roll, during the indian casino scandal along with Grover Norquest.
Yeah, I wish I knew what the solution was. I used to say:
I thought we had term limits. It’s called: voting. Ba da bum.
Unfortunately, the older I get, the more I understand, that’s not true. The system is not set up to bring in new people. No one, within their party, runs against Grassley or Harkin, for example. A potential candidate cannot fight their own party system and run against someone who is “successful.”. But these guys have been in office for decades each. And, I mean, we know that Grassley is by now the ignorant punchline to an untruthful joke but even Harkin is getting pretty long in the tooth and I would like to see a Democrat with more energy in his seat. And, I would like to see a new candidate, but I’m not going to cross party lines to replace Harkin (in my case). But if another younger, more energetic Democrat would challenge him, I would probably vote for that candidate and I wonder how many Republicans feel the same. I sort of wonder if it’s possible for these old guys to mentor someone, although that too can be a fraught proposition.
So, yeah, I don’t know what is the right solution, and I’m not ready to say term limits is the way to go, but I wish there was a way to bring new blood the electoral system.