Career Politicians and Term Limits

Folks, you simply cannot spend your way out of debt; especially if the money you are spending has no intrinsic value and goes into the pockets of countless bank and corporate officers rather than to create badly needed jobs. Someone needs to get President Obama's ear and explain this simple logic to him. 12 Trillion dollars and counting should not give you the warm fuzzies.

Try dividing 12 Trillion by the number of WORKING Americans (not children, retired folks, those on welfare, or those being paid under the table) and see how much each will be responsible for paying back via their tax dollars. Scary isn't it . . . it's also impossible to do in a single lifetime.

That is why I say that there is no way that one or even two or three generations of Americans can undo the harm done by President Clinton, President Bush, President Obama, and too many years of other career politicians in Congress. Look at Social Security.

When FDR established it, the monies therein were supposed to be reserved to help supplement the retirement of working Americans. Then along came the Vietnam War and President Johnson put through legislature (in 1968) to make the Social Security funds part of the General Fund which could be tapped for virtually anything by the career politicians who have been running our government for the last couple of generations. They in turn tapped these monies for projects that would help them be re-elected with no thought what-so-ever for the people who earned the money that funded the program. What do we have left? IOU's (mostly in the form of low interest government bonds) that will likely never be repaid!

My point is this, if blame can be fixed (and it can) it belongs on the shoulders of the following individuals:

(1)every career politician who ever sold their favors to lobbyists in return for re-election donations,

(2)every career politician who ever agreed to programs such as that which forced banks to give mortgage money to people who everyone knew would never be able to make the payments, in a poorly shrouded attempt to buy votes,

(3)every career politician who ever decided that they were too important to take the standard commercial flights most of us have to take so they commandeered a jumbo jet to fly them home across the country every weekend at an outrageous cost in taxpayer dollars,

(4)Every career politician who believed they had a right to spend monies reserved for your retirement as well as every dollar you paid in Federal Income Taxes,

(5)every career politician who ever placed the good of the party before the good of the people.

. . . in other words, every career politician!

If we really want to fix the problems plaguing our country, our first step needs to be to put strict term limits in place for Congress and the Senate, in an effort to eliminate career politicians and replace them with individuals who are truly interested in helping America instead of themselves.

The next step should be to return Social Security to the lock-box type trust it used to be in and to take the funds set aside for congressional and senatorial retirements and roll them into Social Security. Then we should force congressional representatives and senators to rely on Social Security and Medicare at the same rates the rest of us have to, for their retirement, because unless this happens, Social Security will remain broken until it dies the death which now appears to be eminent.

Next, we need to stop spending like fools. You simply cannot spend your way out of debt . . . just try it with your household budget and see how far you get. Then we need to start some serious investigations into this banking/credit fiasco and put the individuals responsible for it in prison for life - and not make exceptions for governors, congressional representatives, senators, vice presidents, or presidents.

As long as those who create situations like this for their own good or for the good of the party are allowed to go on their way fat, dumb, and happy, others will believe that there are positions in our country that are above the law and the these abuses will continue.

Corrupt career politicians want you focused on the rah-rah party rhetoric they (both sides of the political aisle) promote. We all need to understand that it’s supposed to be about the United States and United States citizens . . . not about a specific political party. Both parties have more than their share of politicians who continually vie for the title of “worst politician who ever sold us a bill of goods”.

If we can’t get the term limits this country needs so badly, we can accomplish the same thing by voting correctly. How? Simple . . . every election (primary and regular) simply vote the incumbent out of office. It does not matter whether you vote a different representative from the same party in or a representative from a different party. After all, do you really care whether it is a Democrat or a Republican who is picking your pocket this time, because both parties have ertainly done so many times?

The important thing is to send a message to the current crop of career politicians. That message should be: "If you are going to take hope away from the American people, you had better replace it with "something of value” (to quote Robert Ruark) in exchange, and, hollow words or broken promises from career politicians just won't do it anymore"!  But . . . That is just my opinion. 

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Writer Robert Collinsworth is an American who isn't hesitant to talk about the good side of his country, and that is a welcome thing in this day and age. Salem-News.com admittedly, is very critical of both American politics, as well as those of other nations that we perceive is being wrong in their motives and actions. At the same time, within these structures we criticize, are many outstanding people who make each day a better place for all those around them. They embody and personify the American spirit that is sometimes fleeting, but always present. These are some of the things Robert takes into account when writing commentary that is designed reach people, to "get them thinking" in his words, and indeed it does. Salem-News.com's goal is for all people to be on the same page, we appreciate Bob's more conservative approach toward that same goal."

You can write to Bob Collingsworth at this email address: colli2@webryders.net