Necessary Roughness

The New York Times reports that even before this crop of newly elected Democrat representatives is sworn in, they are already campaigning for the next election. It wouldn’t surprise me if Republicans had been doing this also, but this is the first time a party has been this overt about the use of Congressional power.

Those new members are methodically being given coveted spots on high-profile committees, in particular the Financial Services Committee, a magnet for campaign contributions, and the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, a platform from which to send money for projects back home.

Their names will be affixed as co-sponsors atop big-ticket measures on ethics and stem cell research that are to be voted on in the first 100 hours of the new Congress, Democratic leaders said.

(skipping)

Ron Klein, a Florida Democrat who defeated E. Clay Shaw Jr., a 13-term Republican, said the tenuousness of his standing, and the need to start preparing now, had been drilled into him since he arrived here.

“You’re running in two years,” Mr. Klein said. “The campaign starts now, and you need to be prepared. We’re not wasting time.”

One can read this article and argue for term limits and the abolition of political parties. Term limits would help get the current crust out of office, but they would merely select a successor and shower that person with favors in return for Congressional votes in the future. The abolition of political parties would be favorable to those who have read The Federalist Papers, but people have the right to associate.

The real problem here is that Congress has too much power that wasn’t meant to be theirs. People make careers in lobbying because legislators can do things that benefit a company or an industry. The federal government has yet to relinquish control on the size of toilets. Tell me that’s what the Founding Fathers had in mind when they wrote “promote the general welfare.” It is the overextension of power that keeps people in campaign mode for two, four, or six years.