Lobbyist and K-Street are at the core of the problem in the Beltway. I've spent a long time trying to figure out the root issues there, and I think short term l

Lobbyist and K-Street are at the core of the problem in the Beltway. I've spent a long time trying to figure out the root issues there, and I think short term limits are the best way to prevent this, because here how it happens. You get elected on hopes and dreams, and propose a bill, but you are a freshman. The senior guy you ask to help you sponsor the bill which is only 10 pages long then says he will support you if you add an amendment that says X, even that amendment has nothing to do with the main bill, and he has been donated money or promised campaign support by $KSTREETGROUP. If you say no, you get derailed, the bill never leaves committee, and you have made an enemy. You agree, and then the floodgates are open for 10 other sitting house members to throw in their amendments too. Before you know it, your bill is 250 pages and they removed all your original text and it's no longer your bill. If you rock the boat, you make enemies and forever get shoved aside. Agree and support the bill you introduced, that is actually now bad legislation, and all those people say they will help you next time. In this case, it's more of the, this bill has to pass, so we can add all kinds of little tidbits and the public won't know about them in time to stop it!. Then you might have a guy or two who actually put that tidbit in vote no just so he has some plausible deniability to his constituents who don't know any better because reports on the hill suck these days. We need to get rid of excessive riders, last minute riders on big bills, extend time for public review, and give power back to congress/senate to take stances without being pushed over politically. The thing is that the lobbyist will mostly just promise to get the guy fired if they push back too much, or they will then donate to another guy who's been in for 18 years and get him to put the pressure on. If we put short term limits (and I don't mean 12 years, I mean 6 year limits) then you can get people who will do stuff and not care about getting booted out, because they never had the intention to turn it into a lifetime job in the first place. Also, we need to stop the revolving door between the hill and k-street. Staffers should not be allowed to turn around and go work for them, as Jack Abramoff put it, once he promised a staffer a job, he found out that they would do more for him than he even asked them to do! We have a broken system, and until we address these fundamental problems, all the other issues people are passionate about will never get fixed properly. Fix the system first, then work on the more mainstream issues. Vote arca_vorago for congress.