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.