Term Limits for the Federal Government

We do have the problem of "career" politicians, who figure out how to game the system in Washington for benefit to their constituency, along with personal benefit. There is a lot wrong with this statement but lets start with the term "career" politician. For starters there should be no such thing as a "career" politician because politics was never meant to be a job but instead it was meant to be a service, a citizen's civic duty. civic duty - the responsibilities of a citizen [1] It is men's responsibility to run for office if they think they can help to better the nation, it was never meant to be a job or a career. This was demonstrated by George Washington and all the presidents up until FDR when they respectfully and dutifully stepped down after a mere two terms because more than that would have been too much. Even when he was asked to run for a third term Washington said "No. " [2] This statement sent a clear message that governing was a duty and something that was only to be held for a certain amount of time. 'gaming the system'My opponent goes on to say that while some politicians do indeed game the system that if they are the most well liked, most qualified and do not breach any ethics laws they should be free to stay. In times past I would have agreed with you however times are changing and with the new level of media pressure in the system today incumbency becomes an almost godlike status. "In November of 2004, 401 of the 435 sitting members of the U. S. House of Representatives sought reelection. Of those 401, all but five were reelected. In other words, incumbents seeking reelection to the House had a better than 99% success rate. In the U. S. Senate, only one incumbent seeking reelection was defeated. Twenty-five of twenty-six (96%) were reelected. " [3] In today's world where political affluence has reached an all time high term limits are needed. The fact that there was a 99% success rate for incumbents in 2006 flies in the face of liberty. This trend of zero rotation stifles growth and new ideas and allows politicians to become so ingrained that they are impossible to uproot. PointsWhen Enough is EnoughThere is a trend of "career" and "lifelong" politicians that stay in office for decades. Robert Byrd was in office for 57 years, 176 days [4] a ridiculously long time. And in the list of the top 100 longest serving members of Congress the lowest one is 36 years. [4] So there is a growing trend of untouchable incumbents and long serving career politicians. But why is this such a bad thing? Why Unlimited Terms are BadUnlimited terms promotes a system of seniority amongst its members along with a spoils system and a crony politics system. With an unlimited time in office policians will be able to garner favors, figure out how the system works and create cartels of politicians that all work together. My opponent says that term limits will remove the good politicians that do a good job but the current system protects politicians who do a bad job. The seniority system will allow members of Congress who may or may not be qualified to sit on committees and head projects just because they have seniority. This trend of senior vs. freshmen politicians has been shown to favor the senior politicians over the freshmen; which my opponent demonstrates by using this exact terminology. The media has painted the new "freshmen" Congress as being in poor taste and inexperienced. i. PerksUnlimited terms allow politicians ample time to get addicted to the "perks" of office. Being able to travel around the country, the best food, free limo rides around D. C, these are all things that a man could get used to. And they do. With unlimited term limits politicians can get addicted to these perks and in doing so will begin to make their choices based on re-election instead of what's best for the country. If they want to retain the perks, the fame and the free stuff they will have to get reelected and in doing so will sell themselves out, make deals and compromises in order to secure favor for reelection. As soon as that happens politics becomes about the politician and not the country. Competition My opponent has stated that term limits will reduce politicians "accountability" making them make decisions that will make them look good. My answer to this is a question. Why would they do that? There would be no reason to look good for people if there are term limits in place. This argument does not make sense. If reelection is not a problem then true politicians can make decisions based on what they feel is best for the nation and not on choices to help them in reelection. Also if there are term limits then everyone will be relatively new, no career politicians to be seen meaning that the choice on who to vote for is no longer about perks or seniority but will be based on merit and merit alone. Since there are no slick wealthy people who you are totally familiar with people will be forced to evaluate each candidate based on their views knowing that they will be making the best choices due to term limits. Public Favor76% of American voters approve of term limits on Congress16% are in favor of unlimited terms [5]As you can see three in four American voters are in favor of term limits which is five times greater than the number in favor of unlimited terms. As you said this is a "representative democracy" so according to these numbers the people have spoken and we should have term limits for Congress. Then why hasn't it happened? This type of argument is exactly where unlimited terms damage the institution of government because career politicians will never bring such an issue to a vote. Why would they want to vote on their own firing? Such sensitive issues as Social Security, term limits and abortion are no longer touched in Congress because the career politicians are afraid of losing reelection. According to this poll (and many others) we should be voting on term limits but never will because it will be blocked by senior members of Congress who will refuse to let it be heard. Social Security is known as the "third rail" of politics [6] because no one wants to touch it because they are afraid of frying their chances at reelection. There should be no third rails of politics! I am running out of space so I will list the other pros below:1. Overwhelmingly, voters prefer term limits. (It's their native commonsense! ) 2. Term limits downgrades seniority, favors meritocracy.3. Increases competition, encourages new challengers.4. Builds a ‘citizen’ Congress, drives out career politicians.5. Breaks ties to special interests.6. Improves tendency to vote on principle.7. Introduces fresh thinking, new ideas, eliminates 'old bulls'.8. Reduces power of staff, bureaucracy, lobbies.9. It will create a natural reduction in wasteful federal spending.10. Encourages lower taxes, smaller government, greater voter participation in elections.11. There are more reasons in favor of term limits than reasons against.12. Gets reelection rates back to near 50%, versus the current 99%. (Founders called it "rotation in office") [7]As you can see there are many reasons for term limits to be implemented. It would reduce the power of Washington, return Congress to a citizen's group, increase political interest in the country and not on their reelection campaigns. Rotation in office is a healthy thing and was championed by the Founders. Lets bring that principle back to America. [1] . http://www.thefreedictionary.com...[2] . http://gardenofpraise.com...[3] . http://thisnation.com...[4] . http://en.wikipedia.org...[5] . http://www.foxnews.com...[6] . http://hnn.us...[7] . http://tenurecorrupts.com...