Term Limits of Endearment

Jumpstarting a district-by-district movement of qualified independent candidates won’t solve all our problems. The D.O.P.es will still have a hammerlock on the legislative process, at least for the near term. And you know they’ll stop at nothing to keep themselves in power. So how can we hasten their demise? Most importantly, how can we make sure that we’re sending the most qualified people to Washington, people who will actually make the right decisions for our future?

In a perfect world, I’d say we should start by changing the length of presidential and congressional terms. Two years in the House is too short; they should serve for four years instead so that they don’t have to spend their entire time in office running for re-election. And we should give commanders in chief each one six-year term. That’s enough time to implement their vision for the country, but not enough time to become a national joke. Of course, the lengths of service are enshrined in the Constitution and we shouldn’t start monkeying around with our founding document. So, with that in mind, we should simply cap the total number of years anyone can serve in federal office.

We already prevent presidents from serving more than two terms. We should take that same idea and apply it to all forms of federal office. How about this: You can serve eight years as an elected official, but only eight. That means you can win one term in the Senate, plus one in the House or four terms in the House. Time in the White House should count as well. You can take your pick as to which office you’d like to hold, but when your time is up, it’s up—your carriage turns back into a pumpkin and you must return to the “real world.”

An eight year limit is just a starting point, a rough idea. Maybe ten or even twelve would be a better number. I’m open to debate on the details. What’s absolutely critical is that we force our public servants to return to being members of the public. (What a concept!) If they know they’re going to be one of the little people again, perhaps they’ll actually care about what happens to them.

NEXT: Peel Away the Perks of Office