Congressional Term Limits

1. New ethics reform measures are pointless. You honestly think Congress can be trusted to police itself, to make its own rules? That's absurd. Banning lobbyist gifts is a waste of time, too. No matter what the new rules are, the lobbyists and the corrupt congressmen will always find a way to circumvent them -- especially when they are the ones left to do the policing! What you say is a good start is just a flat-out joke. But congressional term limits are not even as pointless as your other heralded "reforms" -- they would be more damaging than the status quo. 2. Re-election rates are high. This, by itself, is not a bad thing. People are voting for their congressmen to re-elect them. Why do you want to override the people's democratic initiative? Why is a central planner (i.e. you) better at determining how long a congressman should stay in office than the people? The truth, of course, is that congressmen get in and stay in office because they are master criminals who steal money from Group A and dole it out to Group B, their constituents. People re-elect their congressmen because they keep the welfare flowing for both rich and poor. You even touch on this yourself. This is the real problem, but your "solutions" (outlawing "pork" and requiring a balanced budget) are laughable. One man's pork is another man's beef, and there are still people arguing over whether we had a balanced budget under Clinton. There is only one real solution: RESTORATION OF THE CONSTITUTION. 3. You complain about Senate re-election rates. You later quote Jefferson. Well, in Jefferson's time, the Senate was not even elected by the people, but by the state legislatures, and senators were to serve as ambassadors of the states to the federal government. Here we touch on the real problem -- the federal government has too much power. It is this power that corrupts. The solution is not term limits or more bogus rules, but restoration of the Constitution. Term limits for Congress would be disastrous because they would concentrate even more power in the executive branch -- we need a stronger Congress within the frame of a much, much weaker federal government. Let's repeal the 17th amendment before we talk about term limits. 4. It is better for a congressman to want re-election than to always be looking out for his post-congressional career. After all, if he doesn't care about being re-elected, he has no interest in doing anything other than serving special interests -- which will help him get a cushy job as a lobbyist once he's term limited out. Term limits are a bad, bad idea. The only term limit I would be in favor is one for the presidency of 0 days. 5. You correctly diagnose many of the problems but you are missing the solution. Your little fixes ("granted, we could do this") would easily be overrode by a body you know full well to be criminal in its corruption. The House of Representatives is supposed to be the people's house, and it's not -- but it has nothing to do with term limits. It has to do with usurpation of power from the people and the states into the hands of elites in Washington. Let's repeal the 17th, reduce the power of the executive branch and the federal courts, and return power to the people. Oh, and it should not be lost on the voters that my opponent criticizes the power of the Senate and of long-serving senators, and yet he supported Joe Biden for president.