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Do you support term limits

Term Limits


  • Total voters
    45
Don't dodge.

You want to overrule the voters because you don't like their choices. There's nothing more anti-democratic than that. Who do you think you are?

Why do I want to overrule voters? Because I would think term limits would do good? If that's your take on it, I suppose that's it. But you'd be mistaken. It's just a little more protection against government corruption. We could use a lot more.
 
I did ask a question though.

I want to know, from anyone who supports term limits, why they think they are justified in overturning the will of the voters. Anyone?

Is a good question. I'll let those that are Fully in favor of that answerit since that's your target.

Now, do you support "overturning the will the voters" as you say, or are you for repealing term limits on the President
 
No term limits are worthless and pointless... They do zero good..
 
I've been practicing my position on term limits for years. I do not vote for the incumbent. Simple as that. People have the power to change the country, they rarely use it.
 
A 2003 NBC/Wall Street Journal poll indicates term limitation is supported by 67% of those polled. According to the last nationwide poll on term limits conducted by Public Opinion Dynamics for Fox News in September 2010, the issue enjoys wide bi-partisan support. The poll showed that 78 percent of Americans support congressional term limits, including 74 percent independents and 74 percent of the nation’s Democrats. How is that against the will of the voters?
 
I want to know, from anyone who supports term limits, why they think they are justified in overturning the will of the voters. Anyone?

I already told you why. Because long-term incumbency breeds corruption.

You want to overrule the voters because you don't like their choices.

Yep.

There's nothing more anti-democratic than that.

Instead of foaming at the mouth, you COULD try explaining why you think unlimited democracy is inherently a good thing...but I'll not hold my breath. ;)
 
But in all honesty, one amendment I think would be good would be one to give the People a way to remove SCOTUS justices. Every election cycle...or every 4....no more than 6; the Justices come up for a confidence vote. If 85% of Americans vote no confidence, then that justice is removed. The new justice will be appointed as normal. This keeps removal of justices out of the hands of Legislature and Executive, for the founders were wise is isolating them from the Judiciary. But it does leave them in the hands of The People. A supermajority, necessarily must be a supermajority. 85% could be argued to be too low, that it should be like 88-90.

I'm all for removing SCOTUS Justices. Lifetime appts are just insane. However, do you think it should be a confidence vote by the people or elected officials? I personally am unsure. I might just prefer to have them go through the confirmation process occasionally. I would also say they need some sort of final limit. Say no more than 20 years serving.
 
In a world where I trust everyone I'd be willing to accept no term limits for anyone... but I trust people in power very little. I think of places like Egypt, Syria, Lybia,... where their "leaders" were able to hold on to power for so long. They clearly have rigged the system to hold onto power. And given that there was no constitutional limit on how many times they could run, who's to stop them? I cringe at the thought of our country being run by one man or woman for more than 10 years years.

At the very least there absolutely should be a term limit for the president.
 
I don't know because on one hand, we would have still had Clinton as a president for example, instead of Bush. On the other hand, BUsh would still have inevitably been president and by that time people would have gotten so damn tired of Democrats that Bush could get away with even more ****. I dunno. Then again FDR served 3 terms, and having the same guy in the front row for such an insane amount of world changing **** probably helped us, and the rest of the world out for the better.
 
So you are in favor if removing term limits for presidents?

You did not specifically ask me, but I will answer anyway. Yes, I do, but in the abstract. For practical reasons(it would require changing the constitution, which is near impossible to do these days), I do not actively support and push for the change.
 
I don't know because on one hand, we would have still had Clinton as a president for example, instead of Bush. On the other hand, BUsh would still have inevitably been president and by that time people would have gotten so damn tired of Democrats that Bush could get away with even more ****. I dunno. Then again FDR served 3 terms, and having the same guy in the front row for such an insane amount of world changing **** probably helped us, and the rest of the world out for the better.

Allowing unlimited presidential terms could potentially pave the way for a dictator to gain power. It's important to note that FDR wasn't eventually ousted by the voters...he died after being elected four times. Had he lived longer, could he have succumbed to the power and become a dictator? Possibly. He was already displaying some dictatorial tendencies during his presidency (e.g. trying to pack the Supreme Court, suspending habeus corpus, etc). I think his presidency lasted plenty long enough.

That's not to say that he didn't do plenty of good stuff too...I just question whether some other president couldn't have done it just as easily. We Americans tend to turn some of our presidents into myths and think that no one could have possibly replaced them...but I think that nearly all of them were just a product of their time. Had the circumstances been different, we might remember average presidents as legends, and legendary presidents as average or worse.
 
Allowing unlimited presidential terms could potentially pave the way for a dictator to gain power. It's important to note that FDR wasn't eventually ousted by the voters...he died after being elected four times. Had he lived longer, could he have succumbed to the power and become a dictator? Possibly. He was already displaying some dictatorial tendencies during his presidency (e.g. trying to pack the Supreme Court, suspending habeus corpus, etc). I think his presidency lasted plenty long enough.

That's not to say that he didn't do plenty of good stuff too...I just question whether some other president couldn't have done it just as easily. We Americans tend to turn some of our presidents into myths and think that no one could have possibly replaced them...but I think that nearly all of them were just a product of their time. Had the circumstances been different, we might remember average presidents as legends, and legendary presidents as average or worse.

I am sure you realize the problem with slippery slope arguments....
 
I am sure you realize the problem with slippery slope arguments....

It's not like we don't have plenty examples of this happening from other countries. In fact, one of the telltale signs that a president wants to become a dictator is when they try to avoid or change their term limits (e.g. Vladimir Putin, Hugo Chavez).
 
It's not like we don't have plenty examples of this happening from other countries. In fact, one of the telltale signs that a president wants to become a dictator is when they try to avoid or change their term limits (e.g. Vladimir Putin, Hugo Chavez).

Right but the difference between other countries and ours is thast our leaders age horribly because they got more **** to worry about. Dictators try to turn themselves into Gods. None of our presidents have ever tried to do that. That is a key difference.
 
Okay, guys, both of you have made the quite amazing claim that the voters are somehow incapable of getting rid of a politician by simply voting him out of office. How can you make such a ridiculous claim? Explain it please. How are the voters going to the polls and voting for someone they don't want? Is it the work of an evil wizard? Or aliens with a special laser beam?

Votes can be bought. esp on a local level.
 
But in all honesty, one amendment I think would be good would be one to give the People a way to remove SCOTUS justices. Every election cycle...or every 4....no more than 6; the Justices come up for a confidence vote. If 85% of Americans vote no confidence, then that justice is removed. The new justice will be appointed as normal. This keeps removal of justices out of the hands of Legislature and Executive, for the founders were wise is isolating them from the Judiciary. But it does leave them in the hands of The People. A supermajority, necessarily must be a supermajority. 85% could be argued to be too low, that it should be like 88-90.
I agree but, I would need more time to analyze this matter
 
I voted YES because I am kind of on the fence about Term Limits.
I like Term Limits because they permit politicians less time to carry out their abuses but, I see Term Limits masking the symptoms and not curing the disease. What about electoral accountability? What about the National Government dismantling the checks-and-balances system (like the 17th amendment)? What about the corrupt nature of politics?
I could go on and on but, I think we need to finally cure the disease and if Term Limits make sense after, then we can keep them.
 
I'm all for removing SCOTUS Justices. Lifetime appts are just insane. However, do you think it should be a confidence vote by the people or elected officials? I personally am unsure. I might just prefer to have them go through the confirmation process occasionally. I would also say they need some sort of final limit. Say no more than 20 years serving.
I would be open to this. Just thinking out loud, but maybe 15 or 20 year terms, then reconfirmation, but not renomination by the then sitting President. I wouldn't go for a hard time limit, though.
 
(Take Two - D'oh)

Some people seem to like term limits, feeling it keeps people from being "career" politicians, takes away the "incumbant advantage" from stiffling competition, lowers the amount of special interest, makes politicians focus on legislating not running for reelection, etc.

On the flip side, some seem to dislike them as it limits the peoples choices, doesn't allow people to become well versed in effectively doing the job, amongst other reasons.

What are your thoughts on term limits on the federal level and why we should / shouldn't have them.

The only term limits I am for is for the President, and I am fine with the way it currently is - 10 years.

I am against term limits for Representatives and Senators. Instead, I'd prefer age limits in which incumbents cannot be a candidate after their 62nd birthday.

The reason why I am for term limits for the President is because that office holds so much political power and is being given more political power every day. Because of the amount of power the office has, term limits are required for it so one man and one political party does not act in a dictatorial manner.

The reason why I am against term limits for Representatives and Senators is because it takes time for each of them to accrue a professionalism in that office. That is Congressmen need time to gain experience as a legislator in order to be able to effectively legislate. Having term limits will cause those Congressmen to rotate out before they get the ample experience needed to fully understand how the writing of legislation works.

Look at your average bill from Congress. They tend to be hundreds of pages long. The reason isn't because Congress wants to make overly-complicated bills for their own benefit. Rather, the reason is to ensure as much as possible that no legal loopholes exist that could be exploited or abused. Which I think is a good thing since it means that Congress is not afraid to hash out particular details so that the laws they write become exactly the laws they wanted to write.

Establishing term limits gets rid of the kind of professionalism needed to write laws for a nation as large and with as many valid special interests as the United States has.

But we do need a mechanism for turnover. And I think that mechanism should be age limits. After all, all flag officers must retire 1 month after their 62nd birthday; this retirement must be deferred to his 64th birthday by the Secretary of Defense and it may be deferred to his 66th birthday by the President. The reason why is because the older someone gets the less they are able to keep up with the advances in technology and culture. Which means younger people need to be able to get into those positions of authority so they can use those advances in effective ways.

So I think that Senate campaigns may not have anyone over the age of 60 on the ballot at the time of an election and that House campaigns may not have anyone over the age of 64 on the ballot at the time of an election. That means no one over the age of 66 will be in Congress.

But what it also means is that these long-time incumbents have a hard limit on how long they can serve, which provides the benefits of term limits. But it also allows professional politicians time needed to accrue the experience necessary to be an effective legislator.
 
But in all honesty, one amendment I think would be good would be one to give the People a way to remove SCOTUS justices. Every election cycle...or every 4....no more than 6; the Justices come up for a confidence vote. If 85% of Americans vote no confidence, then that justice is removed. The new justice will be appointed as normal. This keeps removal of justices out of the hands of Legislature and Executive, for the founders were wise is isolating them from the Judiciary. But it does leave them in the hands of The People. A supermajority, necessarily must be a supermajority. 85% could be argued to be too low, that it should be like 88-90.

Are you saying that Justice must maintain 90% of the popular vote to stay in office? Or are you saying that a Justice may be recalled from his office with 90% of the popular vote?
 
Most voters pay more attention to dumb ass reality shows,sports, celeb bull **** news and other stuff than they pay attention to politics. This is why the same old scumbags keep getting elected.They will keep voting for the same scumbags as long as the idiot box tells to.

While this is true, the thing is that term limits only improve things if we assume that the people replacing the corrupt idiots in office are less corrupt and less idiotic than the people they are replacing. I've seen no evidence that this is all that true.

Personally, I don't think they're all that beneficial, nor do I think the idea is harmful. I think whether someone becomes corrupt after having held office for a long time depends on the person, not how long they've been in office. So a term limit might force out someone who has become corrupt and replace him with someone who isn't in some cases, while in others it will force out someone who hasn't become corrupt and replace him with someone who will. Their impact is neutral by my reckoning.

Edit: The only term limit I really support is for the President. Not so much because of stupidity or corruption, but simply because I think the job is too draining for someone to be capable of doing it well for more than 2 terms.
 
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I'm all for removing SCOTUS Justices. Lifetime appts are just insane. However, do you think it should be a confidence vote by the people or elected officials? I personally am unsure. I might just prefer to have them go through the confirmation process occasionally. I would also say they need some sort of final limit. Say no more than 20 years serving.

I think it needs to be by supermajority of the People, else it will degrade into standard politics and polarize the courts even more than they are now.
 
Are you saying that Justice must maintain 90% of the popular vote to stay in office? Or are you saying that a Justice may be recalled from his office with 90% of the popular vote?

That they are recalled from office with the high percentage.
 
I don't know, I'm on the fence.

When it comes to Congress, I think voter districting is a bigger source of the problem than indefinite reelection.
 
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