Dianne Feinstein Continues to be a Good Argument for Term-Limits

They haven't normally stopped basic committee assignments like this, as they understand that the Dems could do the same thing to them if they regain control. Neither side is going to have 60 votes.

Guess we'll see.

If they do block it, all bets are off.

And that will put even more pressure on Feinstein to resign.

They live in a duopoly, with election rules defined by the parties themselves. I'd love people to vote third party, but people still think it's a wasted vote, and so they vote for the "lesser evil" because other local options that might run against these cranks don't have the inside lobbying power, or the party support to push them off their seats most of the time.

That is how we get here, it's how we continue to burrow our noses deep into the mud and sink further in. You don't get good with a lesser evil type of voting choice, you just get more evil, only "less" of it than the other option.

I don't blame voters for believing their vote doesn't matter. Thanks to redistricting, and just plain old corruption, it often doesn't for the people who need help the most. That's why we get these ancient assholes like Mitch McConnell, and the like. Most people have just given up and figure "might as well vote for the person who might fuck me over the least," and up against voters who believe in Mitch McConnell's inhumanity (mostly corporations), they don't stand a chance.

I mean, hell, we got Joe fucking Biden when we had much stronger candidates as options. You think the people voted for Joe Biden because they thought he was the best man for the job? Hell no. He had the right people in right places to push things along. Then America got to decide between "grab 'em by the pussy" and "hang them for everything short of jaywalking."

Her opponent was a Democrat.

That only reinforces what I said.

In Florida, it's worse than that. Handing things over to staffers (sort of a real-life "deep state") is problematic, but it's also given lobbyists a lot of sway since they (and the staffers) are the ones who have the institutional memory of how things can actually get done. The term limits of 8 years for representatives and senators mean that just about the time they're learning how to find the john, they have to move on. It also means that everything takes a back seat to setting themselves for the jump to the next job. I'm not totally opposed to term limits, although I still prefer to vote the bastards out if they're really that bad, but Florida isn't any better off than it was before term limits were imposed in 1992 and I'd argue that it's worse off. It's an argument that supported in a book called "The Failure of Term Limits in Florida". Here's a brief snippet from the publisher's blurb on Amazon: Proponents view term limits as part of a battle against the rising political class and argue that limits will foster a more honest and creative body with ideal “citizen” legislators. However, in this comprehensive twenty-year study, the first of its kind to examine the effects of term limits in Florida, Kathryn DePalo shows nothing could be further from the truth. Instead, these limits created a more powerful governor, legislative staffers, and lobbyists. Because incumbency is now certain, leadership races—especially for Speaker—are sometimes completed before members have even cast a single vote. Furthermore, legislators rarely leave public office; they simply return to local offices where they continue to exert influence. It's always interesting to me that people who scream the loudest about term limits are aiming their wrath at politicos from outside of their district or state, but not as often at their own.

We already have term limits. They are called elections - Jed Bartlett

Voters have the opportunity every two years to re-elect house members and every six years to re-elect senate members. It's not the fault of the system that so few people exercise their right to vote. If you want to blame someone, blame the people who dont engage in the process and stay home on election day.

Regardless of the poster or how I feel about the majority of the posts posted by the poster, this is absofuckinglutely correct.

Americans have gotten VERY lazy and depend on blaming politicians for all our problems. The problem is Americans DON'T FUCKING VOTE nor do they ACUTAULLY READ NEWS and understand what is happening.

It's not RBG's fault our government is so fucked up that she felt she needed to do her job until she died, she couldn't even trust her own fellow judges to do what's right. That's not her fault. It's the fault of the American people. Including everyone on this board. I hate all of you.

Term limits wouldn't have stopped you chowderheads from electing Biden or Fetterman.

Ho, why is you here?

Regardless of fault, the fact is that it is exceedingly difficult for a primary opponent or a member of an opposing party to overcome the advantages of a long-time incumbent in terms of name recognition, fundraising capability, turning actual presence in the office into an arm of the campaign at no cost to the campaign, etc. There is no meaningful way to have a level playing field between a 3+ time congressperson/Senator and a challenger.

Which is not to say I'm pro-term limits. Just that there is a problem that term limits would solve that I am not sure anything else can.

The fault, then, lies again with the American voters who elected corrupt people in the first place who fixed the system to allow more corruption.


It's not one single person or single event.

We all fucked up.

When one falls, one can choose to get back up, or to try and drag others down.

Volpone chooses to shit in peoples' faces.

Again, who or what might be to blame is pretty irrelevant.

If we accept it as a problem that incumbents are pretty much in office until a) they are convicted of a crime b) voluntarily opt not to run again c) die -- and we should -- then the question is what we should do about that problem.

We can say: nothing. That's just the way it is.

We can say: term limits.

We can say: age limits.

We can say: Some sort of health/mental competency certification.

We can say: campaign finance reform.

There are potentially other solutions/mitigations out there.

TLDR: vote damnit!

Pass or suggest any laws you like. But, as long as humans are in the mix, it will just get fucked up all over again.

Governments are run by people. As long as people are corruptible, there will be a problem.

How do you suggest we curb that?

The fact that there's no perfect solution to eliminate all possibility of corruption and problems doesn't mean that there's not a better alternative to the system we have or that we shouldn't seek one.

I think I would like a basic mental/physical health certification for most elective offices. I think I would also like some form of campaign finance reform but I'm not sure what would be plausible to enact and not get in the way of free speech rights.

The idea that Republicans will hold off from doing something because then Democrats might do it to them is ... no longer outdated.

Republicans will do anything to increase their power, no matter how shady or underhanded, and they understand what Democrats apparently don't -- that there's a strategic advantage to being the first one to change the unwritten rules.

If there's a maneuver they haven't used, it just means they don't see any particular advantage for themselves in it at this point.

It's the same in Michigan. Now that they're term-limited, legislators basically spend their entire time in office setting themselves up for whatever job they want next. For a handful, that's governor or a seat in the U.S. Congress. But for the vast majority, it's a job as a lobbyist or the head of some think tank, or maybe a few cushy spots on corporate boards. Which means their main priority while in office is currying favor with the people who can make that happen.

The best way to set things right, IMHO, is to hold up your own side to the same standards you demand of the other.

Yea, yea, Franken was forced out senate, but he’s hardly the only (and, personally, I believe his only sin was abject stupidity, but that’s the way I feel about most men - most of whom like to joke around about violating women without permission) Democratic politician with not only skeletons in their closet, but fresh decomposing bodies in their closets.

Vote
Demand transparency
Avoid violence
Be better humans
Read and actually understand the news
Pay attention

Lots of things ALL people should be doing, not just some.

It all comes back to a line in a tv show - if nothing we do matters, all that matters is what we do.

Do you mean "no longer true"? or "outdated"?

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez primaried a ten term incumbent and Dave Bratt primaried the Republican Majority leader Eric Cantor. Liz Cheney just got primaried despite her rich family connections. It happens far more often than you think.

Yup. Too many of the people complaining about the quality of candidates fail to do the necessary work during the primaries to get the sort of candidates they'd prefer on the ballot.

Every rule has exceptions. Those are three. One is because AOC is an exceptionally charismatic and different candidate than most. Another is because basically the entire Republican party sought revenge on Liz Cheney for her turning against Trump. It remains exceedingly difficult.

And half of them secretly feel the way she does.
Fucking cowardly pigs.

The biggest reason AOC primaries the incumbent was because he was so cocksure he would win that he launched no campaign whatsoever as AOC went literally door knocking to meet people.

And Liz Cheney's constituents are absolute lunatics.

Long term incumbents can lose, but it usually takes a huge push or spectacular incompetence for that to typically happen

In fairness, thwy know their base are armed to the teeth and they won't hesitate to shoot. If they were willing to chop off the VP's head in the WH lawn, they wouldn't blink to go after them.

I haven't checked since the last election, but prior to that, the average length of time that a person served in Congress was ~10 years. So, setting the term limits at 18 or 24 years, wouldn't significantly change the makeup of Congress, but it would push out the folks who're dinosaurs. Something that's otherwise not going to happen under our current election system.

And for all those people saying, "Well, if people would just _______." Remember, if "people would just" do what they're supposed to do all the time, we'd have no need for government to begin with.

I'm not really a fan of age or many health restrictions because when this country was founded, 55 was considered ancient, and today, we think of nothing about someone running for Congress (or starring as an action hero) at that age. (Fun fact: Thomas Jefferson was 33 when he wrote the DoI, so he was old enough to write the foundational document of this country, but would not have been old enough to be President under the Constitution that we later adopted.) Cancer back then was almost universally fatal and diseases like HIV and COVID-19 didn't even exist then. I can see having a requirement that says if you have a health issue that prevents you from attending, say, 51% of sessions in Congress (and throw in a caveat that you can't be wheeled in while in a hospital bed and hooked up to all kinds of medical gear) that you have to give up your seat.

You get more restrictive than that, and it gets a bit problematic because what we consider fatal today, might not be fatal in a few years. And I know a number of people who are 70+ who are mentally alert and can function just fine. Sure, they don't get things like TikTok (even though they do use the internet daily) but they also recognize that they don't get it and defer to people who do. Somebody who's been in office since Ike was in the White House might be just as alert, but their ego is going to be so inflated from being in power for so long, they're not going to have the self-awareness to realize that they need to STFU on certain topics. They're also going to have such a massive campaign war chest and supporter network that the only way you can hope to unseat them (provided they don't so some kind of massive foot-eating comment) is to have a shit load more money than they do. If you think a wealthy politician is corrupt, think of how corrupt you have to be to have a lot more cash than them.

If we're going to have term limits it makes sense (to me anyway) to leave them in place long enough to become effective legislators, otherwise you risking causing the mess Florida made. I remember being shocked when I was doing news (remotely) for a Christian radio station in Hagerstown, Maryland and found out that the president of the state senate, a guy named Thomas V. "Mike" Miller had been in place for decades. He started his senate career in 1975 and became senate president in 1987, a job he kept until he "retired" (died) in 2020. I'll admit that strikes me as a bit much.

It must really burn you that a man who’s mental faculties are clearly declining and has trouble finishing sentences is doing a way better job than Trump ever did