WE COUNT FOR SOMETHING

Monday, December 13, 2010

SOLD DOWN THE RIVER

Ten years ago Republicans passed a law that they knew had an expiration date of December 31, 2010.  Now they cried, spilled tears and threatened economic damage on jobless citizens and instead of letting the law expire, the president of the United States "cut a deal" and paid the ransom.  That's what he does best, "cave."
Now we are being bombarded with waves of disingenuous rhetoric telling us how good this whole thing has turned out to be.  I am not sold.  Here's what I want to propose.
Because Washington cannot ever either tell the truth nor live the truth,  propose that every law passed should  have a ten year term.  After a while, say over fifty or more years, law makers would spend all their time looking at the laws that they considered to be impossible to let expire.  Then all they would have to do is to argue a bit over how to "tweak" them, vote them up or down and move on.  This is really not such a bad idea because after about 75 years or so, there would not be any new laws to pass, since all the laws being argued would be past constructs.  
The lobbyists would then have nothing to do because they would all know what is expiring and what is going to be either dead or alive, depending on the mood.  
Frankly, if I were president, I would have let them talk all they wanted and then just write "no" on it if they voted to keep it alive.  My only question is, "How hard can it be to enforce the law?  Just do it, damn it!