Monday, November 23, 2009

The 28th Amendment

I get a lot of useful, funny, not-so-useful, and not-so-funny emails. I also get some things that are, in their own way, profound and deserve attention. One of those I feel deserving of attention recently came across my screen. It proposed a 28th amendment to the United States Constitution. The proposed amendment read as follows:

Congress shall make no law that applies to the citizens of the United States that does not apply equally to the Senators or Representatives, and Congress shall make no law that applies to the Senators or Representatives that does not apply equally to the citizens of the United States.

In principal, I looked at this and thought “Yup! This needs to be done.” As a practical matter, I thought “I wonder if this will really serve its intended purpose.” I believe it was conceived with regard to the idiotic “Health Care Reform” proposals now floating among the idiots in Washington DC.

Its intention appears to be to get rid of the special health care plan for congress, their ability to vote unconscionable pay raises for themselves, their 100% pay pension for life regardless of time served, and their apparent disregard of tax laws that they ignore or short-circuit, confident that their colleagues will not prosecute – or even investigate – them. People in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones, after all.

I would be interested in the opinions of others on this. Specifically:

-Should the wording be otherwise worded to better eliminate the new class of royalty?

-How do YOU feel about such an effort?

-What are the non-violent alternatives in dealing with an American aristocracy that was never supposed to be able to exist?