Term limits -- for politicians, or for spending and bureaucrats?

I had a thought last night. It seems one of my Senators for Oklahoma, has self-imposed a limit on the numbers of terms he will serve, 12 years or two (2) terms, and he is not seeking re-election to the Senate.

And I got to thinking about that. So I wrote Senator Dr. Coburn:

Dr. Coburn, Instead of the warm fuzzy (and deceptive) banner of term limits for elective officials, please consider -- limiting the terms of Federal expenditures. Of every Federal program and expenditure. Require the dispersal, without continuation, of every Federal program. Perhaps a term limit of ten years for everything but the Uniformed Services, the Coast Guard, and the few other actions explicitly and specifically called out in the Constitution as direct responsibilities of the United States government.

Term limits impose a censorship on a people's rights to representation.

California, and indeed the Federal Executive Administration, show that term limits absolutely and completely fail to accomplish the stated goal, of avoiding accumulation of power in ways subject to corruption and tyrannical self-preservation.

Term limits push the accumulation of tenure, of gathering of sycophants, of establishing spans of control, down to lower, election-proof, bureaucratic levels. Meaning that term limits remove the possibility of an election righting a wrong. We see it in how bureaucracy in California, since embracing term limits in their state legislature, has lost control of the legislative process to union civil servants and tenured staff.

In the Administration, it has long been observed that Federal Bureaucracy has a lethargic inertia quite resistant to mere Presidential elections.

President B. Hussein Obama has used bureaucratic tactics to subvert Congress' role in checking and balancing the accumulation, and moderation, of power and control in the US government. From recess appointments to stacking the National Labor Relations Board, to his infamous "we don't have time" to let Congress perform it's required duties -- we see, blatantly, what term limits do, and must, accomplish. We see it in testimonies before Congress when Administration members fail to answer questions, when subpoenas are not answered, when records are not provided, when deception against Congress happens -- unchallenged in the public eye.

We don't need a change to the Department of Homeland Security, or the Department of Education. We need a new, fresh statement and establishment of need of today, for whatever role the government and nation intend and need for today, without regard to legacy.

We need term limits on bureaucratic staff, with a maximum Federal service of six years in any office within 100 miles of current, or any previous, position held in the Government by that individual. We need the skills, as nation, we need the experience -- but we cannot allow the accumulation of power networks and spans of control growing outside the control of the electorate citizenry.

Thank you,

FBI -- Law enforcement, or national security -- are they confused?

Billll's Idle Mind reminds us that government is in the business to be in business. Expanding budgets are the mark of an ambitious bureaucrat and hungry politician. So I wrote Senator Dr. Coburn of Oklahoma.

There is a trope circulating around the internet, concerning the morphing of the role of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). It seems that the mission of the FBI has changed from investigating violations of the law, to "national security".

This seems wrong, and deflects resources needed to solve crimes, into activities that might or might not bear fruit, and certainly intrude into the lives of law abiding citizens because of the *possibility* that one or more might not be law abiding, or might intend to break the law.

This confusion of mission must be curbed. America still needs an FBI that is intent on, and focused on, acts of criminals. An FBI perceived as invasive and that self-defines it's roles, interpreting ad hoc what national security means at the time, not just dilutes that roll of law enforcement -- it perverts it.

Please, act to curb the perversion of creeping missions in this, and any, administration.

What direction is "forward" for gun restrictions?

The Washington Times, today, has an article that comments on increased gun sales and ammo shortages in the US, and notes that Congress "stalemated" on gun control regulations, but some states moved "forward". This seems wrong to me. So I wrote Senator Dr. Coburn of Oklahoma:

I resent the slant that mass media, and too many politicians, take about laws and regulations pertaining to guns, gum ownership, and the place of guns in the hands of law abiding citizens.

The Washington Times reports that Congress "stalemated" on increased gun restrictions, but some states moved "forward". I refer to this article, http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/jan/6/boom-for-guns-likely-to-trigger-rush-on-ammo/

Part of my resentment is a report that rage and mass shootings, with a single exception, have been perpetrated by people with *personality disorders*, not mental illness. That potential spree killers cannot be predicted, have no tell-tale history of treatment or behavior, and are completely beyond the realm of what gun regulations or laws could affect or prevent.

The other part of the problem, is the very long history of the US Government in the 20th Century, of fighting *losing* "wars" that create chaos, spend buckets of taxpayer money, and fail to accomplish stated goals. Prohibition clearly did not end alcohol production or consumption in the US -- but it did arm gangsters and bring the use of automatic weapons into American society.

The war on drugs has clearly failed to eliminate drug use, or to redirect the flow of money spent on production, trafficking, and use of drugs back into the main economy. The war on drugs does, however, fund an international flow of commerce outside the major American economy -- or the tax revenues that fund the many industries and federal employees dependent on the continued flow of taxpayer monies to "fight drugs". I wonder if Congress hasn't completely misunderstood it's Constitutional roll on drugs and guns -- that the intervention authorized isn't limited to assuring fair business practices.

The other part of gun regulations that bothers me, is that the poor, the minority, and the disenfranchised are those most affected. This has been true since the blacks were disarmed in the face of Ku Klux Klan terrorism, back in the day.

Mostly white-bread communities that have required every home owner to own and possess a firearm have seen declines in all forms of violent crime. FBI statistics over the last decade show the same result of lower rates of violent crimes where states increased the ability of citizens to carry and own firearms.  So -- why aren't we racing to arm people living in the most crime-ridden communities and inner cities? Why do we continue to empower the lawless?

Cities like New York and Chicago demonstrate, vividly, what prohibition of guns means -- a disarmed public not just at the mercy of the lawless, but with increased risk because the *lawless* face less risk.

"Forward" as a description of regulations of guns, of drugs, of clean air and water standards, all should mean closer to a responsible goal. We should be ashamed to refer to regulations that disarm the public, empower the lawless, and make the public less safe as "forward".

Forward should be a more secure America, and increase the security of each American. Gun control, like Prohibition, the war on drugs, the war on poverty, the drive to alternative energy, the obsessions with labor unions and recycling, accomplish little to the good for America: They spend tax dollars, they get politicians elected, many people make a good living convincing people of the "need" for continued government spending. We don't have noticeably fewer drunk drivers, or fewer drug users. And people with lower crime rates *don't* live where citizens cannot own guns or other weapons.

What we deserve

Jennifer makes a point about not everyone getting the same symbols of wealth and luxury, Income Inequality is Not Evil

One commenter offers, Deserve has nothing to do with it. How about "Some people have the skills to make more money than other people. Some people have earned nicer houses and nicer cars. And this is the way it should be."

I think this still overlooks some of the important aspects of things.

"Have", I think, is an incomplete replacement for "deserve".

What we are talking about is getting more -- whatever the mechanism, the intent is not what we have today, but what we will have, or what is (or should!) be available in the future. Often, we mean "very soon" in the future.

In Dicken's time, this was called "prospects". Or, as one novel put it, Great Expectations.

We live in a monetary economy. Civilization has ever concentrated wealth. When the economy is based in money, that means concentrating wealth is measured in dollars, and the luxuries money buys. We all should know that love grows in small walls, that joy and family are more abundant when living outside of the money/wealth cycle -- those with the luxuries live for the wealth or power or keeping same, and cannot be diverted to the wealths of family and personal joys.

And yet we are driven by the concentrators of wealth that need the lower classes to work the factories, to flip the burgers, to milk the government entitlement programs to continue the wealth generation that keeps the rich wealthy, and the money economy moving wealth their way.

Back in the '60s the phrase was "drop out" of the "rat race". Since then their have been many individuals and families that have dropped out, or gone back to the land. Have taken up gardening for a significant part of their food, have taken to very lightly mechanized and small farming, gone to crafts like blacksmithing and horse shoeing and growing heritage crops that don't rely on industrial fertilizers and industrial practices to control weeds and other pests.

So, one choice an individual or family can make is how to invest in the "generate more wealth" monetary economy. Another is to choose a middle way, to live on the fringes and let the wealth generation pass them by. Pulling off a Jeremiah Johnson and just wandering off into the mountains takes generational wisdom, and is not to be lightly chosen.

Another issue is limits. Not all of us are as capable as someone able to choose between software engineering and Walmart associate -- allowing for economic circumstance that might prevent following a job that ends, that might eliminate the resources to move to a new job. That might allow age, or a college degree, to limit ability to apply for work. There are physical handicaps that limit what one may contribute to the community, the family, or the wealth generation economy.

In a very real sense, most of us, whether living in the wealth-generation economy, including farming the industrial-style way of most of America's farms and ranches, or being cared for by family, community institution, or government handout, are living a dependent way of life. Our "standard" of living is determined by commercial interests, and political expediency, We "better" our circumstances by pleasing our benefactors (not to say, masters).

In some ways, a benevolent feudal system would make better use of resources, and care better for those needing the most care. As today, just choose (your master) wisely.