Tuesday, January 24, 2006

Editorial of the day

Another fine wine from the vineyard of Thomas Sowell:

"At the heart of much government corruption is one simple thing: Re-election. It takes big bucks to run a political campaign and all that most politicians have to sell is the power of government that they control. That is what they do sell in various ways to various special interests.

Term limits try to deal with the problem of re-election but the fatal weakness of term limits is the "s" at the end of the word "limits." So long as there are multiple terms, the first term is going to be spent trying to get re-elected to a second term -- instead of devoting that time to serving the public interest.

What really needs to be done is to put a limit of one term in one office and a waiting period of several years before being elected or appointed to another office in government. In other words, make political careers impossible."


While I have favored term limits, I always supported two terms. Sowell makes a very good point for one term. I think I may have to write my congressman and senators.

Time to bring the career politicians home.

2 comments:

Howard said...

Our government was never intended as a career development center. I favor one term of 6 yrs for everyone and out you go..Even six years is enough time to drive the government into bankruptcy..

EdMcGon said...

I think the current 6 years for senators, 2 years for congressmen, is sufficient. But if I had to settle for one term of 6 years for everyone in order to get term limits, I would.