Comments? Smilies?
I can’t help but think that this is BC floating the idea of running again to see how it sails.
My first reaction: :rolleyes:
Yeah, sure Bill. I’m sure you mean it when you say this isn’t for you. Just for some other guy who was “president at age 45 or 50” and wants to return to office. Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight.
Hell yeah, I would vote for him a third time. Can’t be worse than what we have now. Although, I did get my fed tax return last night; I think I am going to buy a gun with it in true republican tradition.
Personally, I wouldn’t vote for Bill Clinton unless the only other people running were Idi Amin, Adolf Hitler and Pol Pot.
That aside, however, I have never liked the 22nd Ammendment and would be happy to see it go, even if it means that Clinton could run again.
Elections should be decided on the merits of the people running. I don’t see any logical reason why a person should be barred from running for an office simply because s/he held that office in the past for X number of years.
I understand that some people want to see “new blood” in office. Well, if you want “new blood” then vote it in during the next election! If you’re worried about corruption by officeholders who hold on their offices for extended periods, then don’t vote for those people again.
In short, term limits simply get rid of good politicians along with the bad indiscriminately. We need a way to keep the good ones and get rid of the bad ones. That way, my friends, is through elections. If we’re too stupid/lazy to not re-elect the bad politicians, then we deserve the government we get.
Zev Steinhardt
It would be nice to have a return to conservatism in the White House. These radicals we got right now kinda scare me. I’d vote for Clinton again just based on that, but I’d prefer a liberal.
Unfortunately, we will find just how stupid/lazy the American electorate is in 2004.
If I might be allowed a hijack, I have a hypothetical question…
Say the 22nd amendment was appealed today and Clinton announced that he was running against Bush in 04. Who do you think would win?
Even given the current popularity ratings, I think Clinton would win hands down. And I would pay money to see them debate each other.
And Zev, even though our opinions of Clinton differ greatly, (seriously, Hitler? C’mon), I couldn’t agree more with your opinion concerning the 22nd. Well said.
**
I didn’t mean to seriously equate Clinton with the other personages listed (I did say I’d vote for him rather than them!). I was simply excersizing some hyperbole.
Thank you. 
Zev Steinhardt
Like Zev, I’ve never been a Clinton fan, but I don’t see any great need for the 22nd amendment. It was passed by a Republican Congress as a retroactive poke at Franklin Roosevelt. It amounted to little more than a tantrum against a guy who’d beaten them in 4 straight elections.
Ironically, the amendment has hurt the Republicans! Like it or not, Ike probably could have been re-elected in 1960, and Reagan could probably have won again in 1988!
I wouldn’t vote for Clinton, but I don’t see any good reason for a Constitutional amendment prohibiting him from running.
Two words: Strom Thurmond.
Here’s a new concept - I’m not arguing for it, its just a random idea. What if, to get elected a third (or more) time, the candidate would be required to win by a cosiderably larger margin than in a normal election?
Same argument. If you thought he was good, then there’s no reason not to re-elect him.
If you thought he was bad, too old, etc., then he should have been voted out by the voters, not subject to any arbitrary “term limit*”
Zev Steinhardt
*****Yeah, I know that Thurmond wasn’t TLed out of office.
Why? For what reason?
Secondly, suppose you set the level at 60% (just to pick a number). So, now you have the election and it comes out to 59/41. You’re going to give the election to the person who only got 41% of the vote and didn’t get a plurality? There were people who thought the 2000 election was unfair because Gore got more votes than Bush did. This scenario would send them over the edge if Clinton got 59% of the vote but lost the election…
Zev Steinhardt
Maybe Clinton was just yankin’ the chains of all the Republican politicians who are currently gung-ho to repeal other government laws and procedures – like, y’know, fillibusters and judicial nominees?
I’m not sure. But there are some Democratic candidates getting pretty mad right now, I’m guessing. Another situation where they won’t be able to break through a Clinton story to get some ink. Some things never change.
I agree that there is no intrinsic value to term limits as expressed in the 22nd Amedment. I would have a problem with Clinton being the beneficiary of a quick repeal of the amendment. I doubt I’d care as much as the Democrats already running.
Clinton comes back to take on Bush the Younger? Deja Vu from 92? The mind boggles.
I agree with Zev. I’ve never liked term limits for exactly the reason stated.
And I need to add: It’s hard for me to imagine a reasonable scenario in which I would vote for Clinton.
Or vote for her husband, either for that matter.
I think the 22nd Amendment was the result of a little healthy fear of the rash of dictators romping about in that era. Stalin, Hitler, Mussolini… all of them dictators, and all of them democratically elected. In Hitler’s case, at least, his rise to power was perfectly legal within the limits of Germany’s constitution, right up until he decided that “Dictator” had a nice ring to it. Could something similar happen in the US? I doubt it. But who knows, 50 years down the line? If the US had a real crises, we may be a little more eager to throw our liberties down the drain, and the 22nd is a way to keep that from happening. Nobody can ever be President For Life, by any means, elections or no. Frankly, this doesn’t bother me. Of course, one could debate the arbitrary number of term limits… maybe it should be 3, or 4, or some other number. But I think the existence of term limits is a good idea, in principle.
Another side effect of term limits is a tendency towards moderation. Just as our two-party system tends to prevent extremists from taking high-ranking offices, a two-term limit prevents our nation from going in the wrong direction too long, by putting fresh blood in there every decade or so, at maximum. Sure, sometimes we may lose a good president, but just as often, we probably prevent the re-election of a complete hoser. And for those of you saying that it should just be up to the people, and if they vote badly, so be it… I’m sure everyone here can think up an example of a president they simply can’t BELIEVE was re-elected, and thank GOD he couldn’t hold on for another term.
And lastly: “It wouldn’t affect me, but for future generations the 22nd amendment should be modified”…
I wish there was an “I laughed so hard I think I chortled my spleen out through my nose” smiley.
Jeff
I suppose one could consider term limits to be as “fair” as requiring that the president be at least 35 yrs old. That deprives people of a choice of all the competent 19 yr olds who could be president, but one never hears any complaint about it.
It doesn’t really bother me all that much, but if I had the choice, I’d rather we didn’t have them. It’s unclear to me how a president who was elected by the process in place could be considered taking the country in “the wrong direction”. And wouldn’t that be equally as likely under a new president as an old one? If we were really conserned about that, we’d require term limits on the party of the president.
No Democratic president for more than 3 consecutive terms, for example. (Just to pick a random political party.:))
Say the 22nd amendment was appealed today and Clinton announced that he was running against Bush in 04. Who do you think would win?
That’s a darn good one.
On one hand, you’d have the Democrats, who are still pissy over their loss in 2000. They would probably dig up every convicted felon, dead person, and inactive-but-registered voter in the country to show up at the polls. Hell they’d probably PAY people to vote for Clinton.
On the other hand, the Republicans are quite enjoying having Bush in office. I can’t see them (hypothetically) losing to Clinton without a nasty fight.
There would definitely be chads involved, too.
Ultimately, though, I really do think Bush would win. Clinton would take the big liberal states but I think Bush would take the rest of 'em.
I think it is wrong to deny Americans the right to elect a president who is under 35 or foreign born or who has already served 2 terms or for whatever reason. People deserve the right to elect the leaders they think can get the job done. The nanny-conservatives think they know what is best for us. They are entitled to their opinions on what makes a good or bad leader but those beliefs shouldn’t be allowed to limit our choices. It further perverts our already biased electoral system.