Get your history straight. FDR was elected to four terms not three. Nothing he did was so spectacular. You can argue that many of his actions actually prolonged the great depression. When the Supreme Court ruled against many of his programs, he came up with a scheme to allow him to appoint more justices until he had a majority on his size.
Sir, I think you need to read my post more carefully. FDR is the only President who ran for more than two terms. I'm aware he ran for a fourth, but that is irrelevant compared to everyone else's two.
FDR oversaw us come out of the Great Depression and lead the U.S. to victory in Europe in WWII. If that is "nothing spectacular" to you, then we'll have to agree to disagree. Most historians place FDR as one of our best Presidents of all time, though, so you're not exactly in good company.
I don't think you can argue that electing Reagan to a third term would have benefited the country. Then you would have had a sitting suffering from a mental illness (Alzheimer's).
Well, at that point he would presumably resign or simply choose not to run for a third term. The point I was trying to make is that why should we have to change leaders if the people of the U.S. deem that the one we have is excelling at his job?
Why is there a requirement a president accomplish something during his tenure? It is the same a changing something just to get a FITREP bullet. If current works, why change things and screw them up.
It is not a requirement that a President accomplishes something, and I never claimed it was. What I am claiming is that it is impossible in our current political structure to have a President accomplish a long term solution.
For example, let's say we elect a President who wants to genuinely get rid of entitlement spending. That's not a one-day decision; there are many Americans who paid into the system for a long time who are counting on its benefits. Such a plan to tackle this would require a long term solution that would undoubtedly be modified and eventually overturned by future administrations. So we have what we have now -- a bunch of "let's do nothing" as the budget spirals out of control.
How effective is Sen Bryd at representing W. Va. when he is in the hospital all the time? He has be a senator for 23% of this country's history (50 years) and what has he accomplished. He has a lot of buildings named after him, but what else can you say he has done? If you can't accomplish what you want as a legislator in 12 years, you are a failure. Where else in the country do you have the same job for so long?
It doesn't matter how effective I think this Senator is; I don't live in W. Va. What matters is that the people of WV have a right to re-elect this man if they feel he is adequately representing them in Congress. Clearly they are not as upset about his health as you are since they have continued to re-elect him.
Congressmen aren't being re-elected through some crazy corrupt scheme to keep them in office. They're being re-elected because people aren't paying attention. People go to the polls and decide to vote for a person because he's a member of a party. It is not the government's responsibility to change the system because people are lazy; it's the people's responsibility to be aware of who they are electing. It's not like this information is hidden -- a simple internet search (at a public library for those unable to afford internet) can reveal an entire voting record, how often a Congressman is present, etc.
Term limits aren't going to make people pay attention, and replacing one yukko with another every 12 years isn't going to change a damn thing. They only take away my Constitutional right to vote for my representative and Senators. But I suppose taking away people's rights is the de-facto solution to every problem in this country (see: The New Deal, Obama's healthcare). Congress didn't like FDR because he was the first President to shift the balance of power from Congress to the Presidency, so they took away our right to vote for a Presidency beyond two terms through amending the Constitution.
And as much as what I think Murtha is doing in the video is flat-out criminal, the fact of the matter remains that if the other Congressmen are not so disgusted by it that let him remain a Representative and his constituents feel like he is representing their interests, then they have a right to re-elect him. I'm not going to push for term limits because I don't agree with who someone else elects for the House.
