Respecting the press …

I almost burst out laughing when I hear the media complaining that Trump is damaging their collective reputation, and endangering our democracy in the process.

That’s akin to a hooker picked up for prostitution complaining that police are damaging her reputation, and endangering our capitalist system in the process.  

Then there's John McCain – the “maverick” the media love – saying that suppressing the press is how dictators get started. Nice soundbite John, that got you to the top of NBC.com’s web page.  A really over the top statement since nobody is proposing “suppressing” the press; the most Trump’s done is question some in the media’s honesty and fairness. 

Which a lot of the public at large do as well. For good reason.   

Now McCain is a bona fide war hero. Sadly, at times he’s also a publicity whore trying to stay in the limelight. Sorry but that’s true.  This is just another example of him trying to be the “voice” of a Republican Party that doesn’t really exist anymore. And a party that – prior to Trump – managed to lose two Presidential races in a row in part by allowing the media to get away with character assassination and incredibly biased reporting essentially unchallenged. 

Trump is calling out the media for what he sees as more of the same. He’s not completely clean himself when it comes to facts and slanting news to make a point, of course, but his attacks on the credibility of how the media covers him and his administration have caused an uproar. 

The media, predictably, are going absolutely nuts.

They see themselves as the enlightened guardians of what they alone determine are truth and justice, and what the masses should know. And what the masses should believe. They truly think they are above reproach by mere mortals. The media are accustomed to being the only ones allowed to question the integrity of others and the sole arbiters of what is or isn’t fair. How dare anyone, especially Trump, question their integrity and fairness?  It’s nothing short of heresy.      

Their party, the Democrats – and make no mistake, that is the party supported by the overwhelming majority of members of the media – are going even further,  calling Trump’s assault on the integrity of the media an assault on democracy.  Hyperbole, much? 

Remember, these are the same Democrats and media that have praised the often violent protests and riots to overturn the results of a completely legal and democratic election. It kind of makes you wonder exactly what kind of “democracy” they’re in favor of. 

And to John McCain’s point, isn’t overturning the results of a legal and democratic election through violence how dictators get started?

Just a thought. 

A free and independent media are indeed an important safeguard for democracy. There needs to be an independent force to fairly and honestly report what government and its officials are doing and hold both accountable for their actions. It should always be, by its nature, an adversarial relationship between a free and independent media and government. Otherwise, if the media only report what government officials want, it’s propaganda and a disservice to the electorate.

So I am all in favor of a free and independent media. I just wish we had that.

Unfortunately we don’t. If the past eight years – and the recent election campaigns – have demonstrated anything, it’s that many in the media have chosen sides.

Historically, that’s not all that uncommon; the “titans” of modern journalism – Hearst, Pulitzer, Ochs, Sulzberger, Graham, among others – often slanted the news they reported to favor their own views.  The hallowed “objectivity” of the media has always been questionable, to be kind, but lately it’s become even more of a farce.    

Part of that is because the nature of gathering and reporting the news has changed: the news cycle is dramatically shortened; the perceived attention span of the audience is smaller; and more and more “journalists” are seeking notoriety by any means necessary.  Now, practically anyone with access to the Internet can “publish” and claim to be a “journalist.”

It’s a mistake to consider all these a unified “media.” All compete with each other for attention, for audiences, and for ad dollars. That’s the problem.   

It’s important to recognize this very real divide in the media. On one side there are the more traditional media outlets – newspapers, TV and cable networks, and now their online extensions; on the other side literally thousands of bloggers and click-bait sites that view news as an entertainment medium competing for eyeballs and ad revenues.   

It’s now like the Wild West out there. Nobody in the media governs how other members of the media should act. There are no recognized ethical guidelines in force. Actually, for many years the media have celebrated with awards those of their own who broke laws, obtained information illegally, and destroyed the reputations of others. For all the right reasons, they would say.   

What we see now is the logical outcome. There are no rules.   

Rather than democratizing the news, as those in the “new media” of bloggers and click-bait sites like to say, all this has led to chaos. Rumors have replaced reality, fake news masquerades as fact, and responsible fact checking – such as having at least three nameable sources to verify the facts of a story – is a thing of the past, in the rush to be first to break news.   

Consequently, by volume, most “news” today is the journalistic equivalent of junk food. 

The media aren’t solely responsible for this. Politicians and activists have learned they can get away with playing fast and loose with the facts, or even a bald-faced lie, and somebody in the media will give whatever it is coverage it doesn’t deserve.  Even just to cause a stir.   

By the time it’s completely debunked, if ever, it may have already gained hundreds of thousands of hits online, and reported as absolute fact to millions. The damage is done.

The media get used this way all the time. Somewhere out there are principled reporters and online or print publications that work hard to report honestly and fairly.  I’m certain they are appalled at how little respect they now get, and how their efforts are diluted by the rabble of would-be news outlets only interested in boosting their audience to gain more ads. 

However, they are being washed away in a sea of hype and misinformation. Reporting honestly and fairly isn’t rewarded anymore, either by publishers or audiences, and without audiences there’s no ad revenue to support them.  In the end, it’s a money thing. 

Trump is right when he says the media are dishonest and ignore the facts at times. But he ignores or misrepresents the facts too often as well; something many in the media are all too happy to point out as often as possible.

However, at times it seems some in the media are indeed grasping at straws to make more out of something Trump says off the cuff than they should, or rushing to publish something for which they are woefully unprepared to back up except with “unnamed sources.” Those efforts make the media look even more petty and vindictive and less worthy of respect.

Trump’s playing their own game now, setting them up, and making them take the bait. The more they keep spinning out of control, and overreacting, the more they make his case. 

It’s time for our media to take a cold, hard look at how they’ve devolved from being fairly reliable sources of actual information to the factual equivalent of the Weekly World News. 

I don’t know if the genie can be put back in the bottle.

As long as the media keep acting like they have a monopoly on truth, and refuse to recognize that many in their profession are more propagandists than reporters, nothing will change.

Respect is earned through your deeds, not granted.  

A day without immigrants …

That’s today, February 16, 2017. The idea is that if all immigrants – legal and illegal – decide to stay home today, it will prove to U.S. citizens how important immigrants are to our country.

Nobody doubts that immigrants are important to our country. Almost everybody here is descended from immigrants to this nation. Immigrants have helped us become the world power we are in science, in medicine, in technology, and in a variety of other fields. 

However, not making the distinction between legal immigrants and illegal immigrants is intentionally misleading. The former are always welcome here; the latter are here illegally. And there’s absolutely no way, no wordsmithing, no weasel wording or moral equivalency that makes illegals legal. 

They have entered our country illegally. Many have used bogus Social Security numbers to gain employment, and perhaps vote. That’s all clearly against the law. 

The defense of illegal immigrants usually follows one of two paths: the Jean Valjean rationale – “they were only trying to feed their families”; or the Steve Martin “I forgot” rationale, where people “discover” that, contrary what they’ve always believed, they are in fact here illegally.

The latter is my new favorite for silliness. Unfortunately, it’s also the flawed basis for Obama’s executive order to protect “dreamers” from deportation because they were brought here illegally as children by their parents who also entered illegally.  Then, of course, their parents never told them about entering illegally and so they never knew.  Bullshit. They knew.      

Both are ridiculous.  And disingenuous. 

The media and politicians prefer to publicize the plight of poor Mexican and Central American illegal immigrants. We often see sob stories about families making dangerous crossings through deserts simply in search of “a better life” here.  The constant theme is that these are decent, honest, hard-working people whose only crime is trying to provide for their families.

So, the argument goes, is it really a crime to break the law to feed your family? 

Hence the Jean Valjean rationale.  And the drama that follows is right out of Les Miserables – a “minor” offense, like crossing our border illegally, apparently – leads to a lifetime of pursuit by the authorities out of proportion to the original “crime.”

However, we’re not talking about stealing a loaf of bread here.  Entering our country illegally is a serious violation of our sovereignty and our laws. Try that in almost any other country in the world – and especially in Mexico – and you could end up in prison for up to 10 years.    

For some reason we’re not supposed to enforce our immigration laws the same way.

The reality is that what those particular illegals from Mexico and Central America really want is not simply a loaf of bread, but to make a lot more money, have better healthcare, send their kids to better schools, and live under a less corrupt political system. 

Who can blame them? 

Actually, most citizens here would like to have the exact same things. However, most of us aren’t willing to illegally enter another country to get them; if, in fact, there were another country that could deliver all that better than here. 

I’m sorry wherever the Mexican and Central American illegals came from doesn’t offer those things on the same level as the U.S. But that doesn’t give them an excuse for breaking our laws. 

There is an alternative for these people: they could apply for legal entry. But they don’t. Having been through the process with some employees I can confirm it can be a costly and time-consuming process to get a green card.  Getting an experienced immigration lawyer to push through the process costs as much or more as some illegals paid professional human smugglers to get here. 

Instead, illegal immigrants from Mexico and Central America choose to skip that step and the waiting lists and enter illegally, hoping they never get caught. Even if they do get caught and sent back many will just sneak across our border again. And again. And again. Paying the coyotes each time.  

Frankly, going the legal path might be less expensive in the end for some.      

Most deceptive in all this is that the media constantly show the anguished faces of Pepe and Maria and their kids in fear of getting caught and deported, and how they tremble at the thought of returning to whatever country they left. The media find that focusing on Latino illegals, many of whom need an interpreter to respond to reporters’ questions even after living here for more than a decade, puts a more sympathetic face on the illegal community. 

The problem with illegal immigration is much bigger than the usual Latino nanny, housekeeper, fast-food worker, or field hand here illegally and bravely struggling to survive doing jobs citizens don’t want.  The truth is, illegal immigrants from Mexico and Central America comprise only a bit more than half of all the people here illegally.

The rest are those who overstay their work, education or tourist visas and then disappear. You don’t see the media devoting much coverage of that. That’s because it’s much better optics to demonstrate the “heartlessness” of our immigration laws using the plight of an ethnic minority closer to home – like Western Hemisphere Hispanics, especially if they are poor.   

It’s much harder to get the public on your side by when about 40+ percent of the illegal immigrants are from places like Europe, Asia, Africa and the Middle East. Most of these aren’t poor nor did they take a perilous journey to reach this Promised Land.

Unless you consider flying coach or having an inside stateroom on a cruise ship perilous.     

They, like their Mexican and Central American counterparts, are still here illegally, regardless of how they got here.  Yet there’s little coverage of that because they don’t further the narrative. Plus, they aren’t likely to hold public demonstrations demanding their right to stay. 

That doesn’t make them any less illegal. And for sure most aren’t here doing jobs ordinary U.S. citizens don’t want to do. A lot of them are doing jobs citizens would love to have. But many are doing these jobs for less than a U.S. citizen would get.   

Just like many of the illegals from Mexico and Central America who work on the farms, on the construction sites, in the restaurants, and in the factories across this country.  Only the visa violators aren’t usually working for minimum wage, but still below what a U.S. citizen with the same education and job skills would cost.      

So take a big guess why the U.S. Chamber of Commerce is opposed to cracking down on illegal immigration, and why Silicon Valley titans are also opposed to tightening immigration laws and finding and deporting those who overstay their visas.

Go ahead. Think about it for a minute. 

Nobody is opposed to legal immigrants.  Conflating illegal immigrants with legal immigrants simply to make it seem we’re opposed to all immigrants is dishonest. 

And the media giving credence to that myth of America’s intolerance of all immigrants makes the media appear even less credible. 

If that’s possible. 

Stop defending stupid stuff …

This is for both sides of the political spectrum.  But first, Trump. 

There are some things I like about Trump. Still, there are many, many things about him I don’t, including his apparent inability to know when to STFU.

Especially when he is clearly wrong, or completely out of line. 

Those are actually two entirely different things, both bad.  Even worse, for me, is when he doubles down on stupid stuff, and when his own staff perpetuates the nonsense making him and them look even sillier and immature. 

We and they don’t need this crap. The job of running the country is hard enough without constantly shooting yourself in the foot.

Before anyone goes there, I’m not concerned about bridging the political divide, reaching across the aisle, or even the opinions of other world leaders.  Nor should Trump – he was elected to shake things up and overturn the status quo here and abroad.  However, to do that he needs to be taken seriously, something he seems intent on preventing. 

Part of the problem is that he doesn’t get his facts straight before he spouts off. Some of his supporters love that he says whatever’s on his mind. However, there’s such a thing as restraint and holding your opinion until you have facts instead of just feelings.  If Trump would just take a pause to gather real facts before he spoke he’d be much better off. He’s a smart guy, he’s surrounded himself with smart people in most cases, plus he has access to the best information in the world.  Use it. 

Rather than make a completely false statement – such as that the crowds were bigger for his inauguration than for Obama’s, or that the murder rate in the U.S. is higher than it’s been in 40-50 years – a simple pre-emptive fact check would prevent him from looking like a complete ass. Then there would be no need for his spokespuppets to come up with ridiculous assertions that what he said is actually true, based on “alternative facts.”

There’s no such thing as “alternative facts”; something is either a fact or it isn’t.    

Another part of the problem is crossing the line between fair criticism and ad hominem attacks. It’s one thing to be critical of a court’s decision; it’s quite another to attack individual judges. Calling a sitting Federal court judge a “so-called judge” is indefensible, especially for a President. 

It’s no wonder Trump’s nominee for the SCOTUS, Neil Gorsuch, reportedly called that and other derogatory statements Trump’s made about other judges “disheartening” and “demoralizing.” I would expect nothing less from someone who might possibly join the highest court in our land one day; in fact, I was proud Judge Gorsuch might have said that. It made me think Judge Gorsuch is the type of principled straight shooter we need on the Supreme Court.   

Still, even though other sources confirmed what he said, and Judge Gorsuch didn’t deny he said that, Trump and his spokespuppets have tried to claim that Judge Gorsuch’s comments were taken out of context. Trump tweeted that Senator Blumenthal – to whom Judge Gorsuch said those things in a supposed closed-door meeting – was misrepresenting what Judge Gorsuch said.

Possible. However, that wasn’t enough. 

In the same tweet, Trump felt compelled to also bring up “lies” Blumenthal made in the past about fighting in Vietnam, nakedly implying that no one should trust anything Blumenthal says.

The latter, my friends, is what’s known as an ad hominem attack. When someone can’t disprove the message, then attack the credibility of the messenger. 

Finally, Trump seems unable to resist rising to the bait.

When Nordstrom decided to drop Ivanka’s line of clothing because of what it said were poor sales, that’s purely a business decision; even if it came because of public pressure on Nordstrom, it’s still a decision fully within the right of Nordstrom executives.  Yet Trump felt it necessary to claim it was unfair and the result of targeting Ivanka because of him, alone. 

Why? As a businessman he should be the first to defend the right of any business to decide which vendors to use. I doubt he would question any other business's motives were it not affecting a business associated with his daughter. Doing so in this situation made him look narcissistic – all about him – and  thin skinned, as if he needed any more help with either. 

Of course, his spokespuppets once again leapt into the fray to defend him saying he is very protective of his family, which any father would be.

In one sense, that's understandable. 

Except for two things: Ivanka doesn’t run that company anymore; next, he is the President of the United States of America and shouldn’t be overreacting to stuff like this.

Then there’s the “killers” debacle. 

When Bill O’Reilly interviewed Trump, he asked Trump about Assad, Syria, and Putin’s support of Assad. When O’Reilly said Putin was a killer, Trump couldn’t resist saying that America wasn’t innocent either, and that we’ve had a lot of killers, too.  While historically true, it implied a moral equivalency between Putin’s Russia and America.

While O’Reilly wasn’t baiting him, Trump bit anyway and went too far. Once again. 

There’s really no excuse for all this.

Trump is doing a lot of good things right now – things with which I completely agree. I like his cabinet picks for the most part.  I like that he stepped right in and started to make necessary changes; changes his supporters wanted. He’s delivering on his campaign promises.   

But he’s also doing a lot of damage to himself and his agenda by getting caught up in petty crap and shooting off his mouth when he doesn’t need to.  Especially when he doesn’t have – or seem to care about – the facts. 

He’s not on the campaign trail anymore. Everything he says actually matters. 

He needs to remember that.  And he needs to have a frank discussion with his staffers and cabinet members about their need to more aggressively manage up as well as down. They can’t stop him from tweeting, but perhaps they can convince him to wait a bit before he lashes out, and to focus on what’s important instead of what bothers him at that particular moment. 

He can’t afford to surround himself with people unwilling to challenge him. Someone he trusts needs to have a serious come-to-Jesus with him if he hopes to succeed.  

Otherwise, at best he'll be a one-term President. If he lasts that long.    

Singers who "interpret" the national anthem ...

Near the top of the list in the pantheon of things that tick me off are singers at sporting events that feel compelled to make our national anthem “their own.”

Now, to be honest, I’d prefer our national anthem to be “America the Beautiful” rather than “The Star- Spangled Banner.” The former is a beautiful, inspiring piece of music; the latter is very difficult to sing and a rework of a one-popular British song with newer lyrics.   

Maybe “America the Beautiful” is too politically incorrect. It does have a line that “God shed his grace on thee.” Still, I much prefer it because it speaks to the goodness of America rather than to a flag that prevailed during a bombardment.

Anyway, back to the original topic.

What is it with singers at major sporting events?  “The Star-Spangled Banner” is a fairly straightforward piece.  Sure, it’s not the easiest song to sing, but there’s no need to interject extended phrasing, or warbling, to prove that a singer can not only hit all the highs and lows, but can also add flourishes of their own to demonstrate their talent, creativity and unique vocal range.

Hey, for better or worse it’s our national anthem, not an audition.   

It doesn’t seem to matter which part of the music industry the singer comes from – hip-hop, pop, country or whatever – they all appear to want to show off, much to the absolute boredom and impatience of thousands of people who just want the event to begin. The singers may think they are adding something new – a bit of personal expression – but most everybody else in the stadium or at home watching TV simply wants them to get on with it.  

In short, just sing the national anthem. If we’re there we’ll stand up.  Some of us will sing along if we can. Wrap it up. Get off stage. And let’s get the game started.

Pretty simple, huh?

But nooooo.  We have to put up with “star of stage, screen and winner of Grammy Awards” whoever dragging out their “interpretation” of “The Star-Spangled Banner” as long as possible. I actually cringe whenever I see some solo “star” heading out to sing the national anthem; I just know what’s going to happen, and I’m rarely wrong.   

It’s such a joke anymore that one of the big “prop bets” for major sporting events is how long it will take the designated “here to sing our national anthem” performer to finish.

Playing the “Star-Spangled Banner” before the start of a sporting event is a good thing.  Especially by a good marching band.  It’s patriotic, and often quite moving. 

But I think I speak for millions of other Americans when I say I could easily do without all the other self-indulgent interpretations designed to bring “star power” to our national anthem.   

It doesn’t need it.  

Fixing this nation …

There are many who say there’s nothing wrong with our country.  Everything, in their view, is working just fine – there’s no need to “fix” anything.

I disagree. And so do more than 60 million other citizens. 

First and foremost, the government has been out of control for decades. That includes decades under Republican leadership as well as Democrat leadership.  It’s not something brand new.  We’ve been continually careening toward this point for a long, long time. 

As citizens, we’ve allowed this to happen. We’ve elected the same types of politicians time and time again.  And predictably, the same types of politicians have done the same types of things that brought us here – they’ve promised changes and never delivered.  Instead, they’ve made government bigger, more distant from the people it’s supposed to serve, and more insular.

The needs of the nation as a whole have taken a back seat to the wants of a few. 

We’ve allowed the growth of a political elite class.  A political aristocracy for all intents not just comprised of elected politicians, but hundreds of thousands of Federal bureaucrats, innumerable contractors, legions of lobbyists and grant mills, and “social activists,” all committed to maintaining power – and the money that flows from power – by whatever means necessary.

It should surprise no one that some of the richest counties in America surround Washington, D.C. Even in economic recessions that devastated millions of working Americans, those counties grew and became even more prosperous. 

That’s the canary in the coal mine indicating something’s desperately wrong. 

Now we find ourselves in a place where only two things can happen: we continue on the present course and get deeper and deeper in debt, while government becomes larger and still more invasive in our personal and business lives; or there’s a true revolution with a great deal of short-term pain, with the possibility of a better future for most of us. 

As you might suspect, I’m willing to have the short-term pain to stop the madness. 

We cannot count on the political aristocracy to simply lie back and accept change.  I believe a hidden goal of government bureaucrats for years has been to grow the size of government, and government spending, so large and pervasive that it becomes impossible to cut either back.

It’s a variation on the “too big to fail” scenario.

If we cut back on unnecessary defense contracts, the threat is always that it will hurt workers in some powerful legislator’s district or state. Forget for the moment that many of these contracts are for weapons systems and equipment the military itself has said it doesn’t want or need.  And in some cases had said it will never use under any circumstances.   

The same goes for closing military bases. Again, the military – which is in a far better position to determine its needs than some politician – has tried for years to close and consolidate bases. Yet every time a base closing is brought up we hear about the economic impact on the area around the base and how disastrous it will be to some local economy.       

Then there’s the bureaucracy itself.  If we were to eliminate whole departments and agencies, thousands would also become unemployed.  Many of those would have no discernable skills transferable to the private sector. Politicians are always loathe to cause job losses – except in industries they despise – so you can guess how that will go.

Some say that Federal employment – not including the military – is at its lowest level in many years. That’s true. But spending continues to climb because that’s a bureaucratic shell game. When bureaucrats reduce headcount, usually by attrition, they just hire outside contractors to do the work of the people no longer there. So yes, their headcount is down, but spending is up. 

There may "only" be about 2.79 million non-military Federal employees now, but there are also outside contractors making fortunes doing those “cut” jobs. Edward Snowden – of WikiLeaks fame, and once an employee of the CIA – was actually employed by an NSA contractor, Booz Allen Hamilton, when he decided to copy and release data from the NSA. Was Booz Allen performing the job Snowden held cheaper and more securely as a contractor? I don’t think so.

I also doubt many people have ever heard of Level 3 Communications. If they have it’s probably because of its Internet and broadband operations. But on a cruise one time I met a guy from Level 3 who worked as a highly paid consultant to the DOD, under an apparently very large contract.  He laughed about how much money the Feds are willing to spend to verify what they already know, or to get generally available information repackaged and re-presented to them.

The Beltway bandits, as the many contractors used by the Feds are called, are aptly named. They all make a fine living under the radar. It’s not just defense contractors either; hundreds of thousands of other civilian contractor employees work under Federal grants to help facilitate social engineering programs here and abroad.   

Outsourcing is not just for American businesses seeking to make bigger profits by moving their work overseas; it’s the bedrock of Federal bureaucracies. It provides highly profitable projects to friends of the politically powerful and – until now, perhaps, if Trump is successful  – also paved the way for some high-ranking bureaucrats and politicians to cash in when they decided to leave “public service” with a fat pension and move to the private sector, often to the same contractors they once gave projects to. 

It’s an incestuous little circle.  It’s what Trump accurately described in his inauguration speech when he spoke of the few who reaped the benefits at the expense of the general public.  

So what to do?

Trump has promised to drain the swamp. That’s an enormous and perhaps unworkable goal without substantial pain. The end result may be worth it, but I’m uncertain whether the public is really prepared for all that entails.

There will be substantial short-term job losses.

Now, you and I may not care if thousands of bureaucrats suddenly lose their jobs; that really won’t affect most of the nation. But you might be in a region that sees significant spikes in unemployment and loss of tax revenue because defense contracts get cancelled, or bases your region’s been milking for decades get closed. The same goes for areas dependent on Federal funding of pet projects spawned by your Senator or Representative.

If the budget axe actually falls on wasteful spending a lot of people will be hurt.

Is the American public ready for that? 

The political aristocracy isn’t and will fight those changes tooth and nail. 

It’s one thing to talk philosophically about reducing wasteful spending and limiting the influence of special interests, but quite another to do it.  That’s been the problem. 

The only way change will ever happen is if term limits for Congress are enacted. Politicians like to say the public always has the power to replace them in every election.  But, for some reason, the public rarely does, so a lot of politicians stay in office election after election. 

The reason our elected politicians are rarely unseated is simple: the power of incumbency.

An incumbent has an advantage a challenger can almost never match – the ability to buy off the voters in their state or district with pork. Federal bucks for a new bridge, a new road, a new library, or improvements to a local airport can make a big difference; voters reward a politician who brings home the bacon.  An incumbent can also almost always count on big money and support from the same special interests that keep him or her in office. 

So how do we get term limits?    

The first step is quite straightforward: push for state legislatures to call for an Article V Convention to propose amendments to the Constitution, specifically to enact term limits for Congress. I’d suggest two terms for Senators; three terms for Representatives. The rules in the Constitution are quite clear on this: two-thirds of the state legislatures (34) have to vote for this to happen.  It’s never been done before, but now may be the time; after all, Trump won 30 states.   

The usual way amendments have been brought up is by a two-thirds vote in each of both houses of Congress. The people now in Congress simply will not do that – the push has to come from the public and their state legislatures, not members of Congress. But if a Constitutional Convention successfully proposes term limits for Congress, Congress will face an uncomfortable choice – either ignore what the public wants, or start the process for an amendment.  

Even if Congress bends to the will of the people, expect the members to attempt to protect their own with a variety of conditions, such as exempting anyone in Congress who is nearing or has already exceeded those limits, or postponing the effective date for many years. 

I suspect this will clearly demonstrate to the public how absolute power has corrupted absolutely. I also suspect that those in Congress who fight against term limits will face the wrath of the voting public in their next election.

Just calling for term limits on Congress would begin the revolution. Trump’s call for term limits on Congress has already sent chills down many members’ spines, presuming those in office have much of a spine to begin with. 

Congress may be surprised that so many of the voting public really are in favor of term limits. If you think about it, there are probably just as many Democrat voters who would like to see some of the Republican dinosaurs like McConnell kicked to the curb as Republican voters who would love to see Pelosi hit the bricks.

If we are serious about fixing this nation, term limits on Congress are the first step.