New Faces New Ideas Part 1

Pop quiz:

What world leader observed: “After a time, civil servants tend to become no longer servants and no longer civil.”?

What President said: “My reason for fixing them in office for a term of years, rather than for life, was that they might have an idea that they were at a certain period to return into the mass of the people and become the governed instead of the governors which might still keep alive that regard to the public good that otherwise they might perhaps be induced by their independence to forget.”?

What President said: “The security intended to the general liberty consists in the frequent election and in the rotation of the members of Congress.”?

Who wrote: “If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself.”?

Answers at the end of this post.

“Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely.” Lord Acton

“The greater the power, the more dangerous the abuse.” Edmund Burke 1771

“A fondness for power is implanted in most men, and it is natural to abuse it when acquired.” Alexander Hamilton 1775

The Acton quote is the most famous quote regarding the abuse of power. The quotes from Burke and Hamilton were fresh in the minds of our Founding Fathers when they met in Philadelphia in 1787 to draft the US Constitution. It was a fear of centralized power that motivated the authors of the Constitution to build into the grand design of our government a separation of powers, checks and balances, and a robust federalism. Protections such as the Electoral College, election of US Senators by the state legislators rather than directly by the people, and the amendment process were designed to devolve power closer to the electorate.

Article 1 of the Constitution provides the blueprint for the legislative branch, i.e. the Congress of the United States. There was a vigorous debate about the length of the term for members of the House of Representatives, the branch designed to be most responsive to the people. Some delegates wanted one-year terms but the Founders settled on two years. Those who argued for a one-year term felt that it would encourage a steady rotation of new members in order to ensure there would be no shortage of new viewpoints and ideas..

One of the primary draftsmen of the final product was James Madison. He was the author of Federalist Papers 51 and 53 that addressed the composition and election of the House. Madison was a firm believer that the House should be comprised of citizen legislators and not professional politicians. For just over 100 years the process worked as designed and power was divided between the executive branch, the Senate and the House, with appropriate checks and balances. The proof: Can you identify the following men: Nathaniel Macon, Langdon Cheves and Andrew Stevenson? They were all Speakers of the US House of Representatives and they left no fingerprint on our legislative history. Contrast these august gentlemen with Sam Rayburn, Tip O’Neill and Nancy Pelosi, all graduates of the Peter Principle Community College, and also Speakers of the House. The position has, over the years, acquired far too much power.

So what changed our legislative construct? When the Progressive virus infected our Federal power structure the seat of power moved from the states to Washington. George Washington’s cabinet was comprised of four Departments State, Treasury, War and the Attorney General. Between Washington and Theodore Roosevelt three new cabinet offices were added: Postmaster General (1829), Interior (1849) and Agriculture (1862). Eight new positions have been added since 1903.

With each of those new agencies the connection with the voters became more attenuated and the Executive branch inexplicably abrogated its Constitutional powers, through Congress, to those unelected bureaucracies. In addition enforcement (judicial) powers were also transferred to many of those agencies. The budgets of the various agencies were defined and approved by the Congress. In short, Congress came to control the activities of the cabinet level agencies. In many cases that control was not transparent or apparent.

The result was a corresponding increase in the power of Congress and a concomitant increase in the length of service by members of Congress. For years the selection of committee chairman was based solely on seniority. The South had disproportionate power in Congress because they returned the same Senators and House members to Washington for decades in order to control the agendas of Congress…usually for nefarious purposes.

Based on this much abbreviated history of the aggrandizement of power in Congress it is time to seriously explore the imposition of term limits for Senators and members of the House as a means of reducing legislative power.

The abuse of power by members of Congress appears in two forms: the aphrodisiac of political power and the control of vast sums of money to be disbursed as they see fit. What Team DOGE has exposed shows the scope of the latter and the resulting corruption of our fiscal disciplines. Literally billions of dollars are wasted or unaccounted for and the invested members of Congress have no inclination to allow the magnitude of that waste and corruption to be exposed to the people from whom that money was extorted by the IRS.

Our Congressional masters censor or silence anyone who dares to point out the absence of integrity or principles of the Senators and House members. They have allowed the cover-up of the truth regarding Covid and they still speak in outraged tones about the imaginary Trump Russian collusion. Terms like “existential threats to Democracy” or “Constitutional crises” are thrown about interminably for the purpose of keeping the electorate in a permanent state of alarm. Congressional hearings are not intended to shed light on the truth but rather to provide bushels to hide the light.

Congress has become a collection of Chatty Cathy dolls…pull the ring on the back of the neck and get one of twelve completely original talking points. It was recently noted that multiple members of Congress were using the exact same speech to address the perceived depredations of the Team MAGA. Not even the punctuation was altered.

What is absent is the presentation of any new ideas, new theories or new observations…in large part because we see no new faces in Congress. Incumbents win more than 90% of their re-elections bids. They are now part of the permanent power structure and they use this power to line their pockets. The last member of Congress to leave office with a reduced net worth is unknown because there was inadequate financial tracking in the early 1800’s.

There may be advantages to an endless incumbency, but they are far outweighed by the disadvantages we see today. We have, for the past four years, endured an object lesson in obsolescence, i.e. a President, with tapioca for brains, who was first elected to the Senate in 1972. He did not improve with age. In Congress today we have: Mitch McConnell (50 years in Congress) who may already have been embalmed, Ed Markey (48 years) who has a child-like understanding and obsession with climate change and Chuck Schumer (44 years) who does a credible impression of Biden. The argument that these wax museum exhibits have valuable “experience” is laughable as most of them can’t remember what they had for breakfast. Collectively they have not had a new idea for decades. Paraphrasing the bromide from the 60s…never trust anyone who has been in Congress for more than 30 years.

A proposed solution will be offered up in the next post.

The 125th Congress is the most compelling argument ever made against the DEI culture. A kakistocracy on steroids. You want a Constitutional crisis and I give you the 125th Congress.

Lamest media argument in opposition to the pending dissolution of the Department of Education…it will have a disparate impact on the poor and people of color. One is reminded of the quip from the 1970’s…world ends children and minorities hardest hit.

Answers to the Pop Quiz:

What world leader observed: “After a time, civil servants tend to become no longer servants and no longer civil.”? Winston Churchill

What President said: “My reason for fixing them in office for a term of years, rather than for life, was that they might have an idea that they were at a certain period to return into the mass of the people and become the governed instead of the governors which might still keep alive that regard to the public good that otherwise they might perhaps be induced by their independence to forget.”? Thomas Jefferson

What President said: “The security intended to the general liberty consists in the frequent election and in the rotation of the members of Congress.”? James Madison

Who wrote: “If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself.”? Publius aka James Madison in Federalist 51