Term limits and why they're not the "evil" folks make them out to be.

"To lodge all power in one party and keep it there is to insure bad government and the sure and gradual deterioration of the public morals." ---Mark Twain Who would have thought that Mark Twain's views on politics would accurately describe the Missouri political stage 113 years later? Probably not, because we were accustomed to our progressive and thinking moments in history that lit a fire across the nation, like the sharecropper strike of 1939 to a progressive educational system that rivaled most places in Europe. But somewhere along the way, we lost that, and now find ourselves slowly being herded back into the "Gilded Age" of the 1890s by our supermajority in 2023. Sure, there's a lot of blame to go around for this massive shift in political regression, but there's also the nonstop scapegoating that tags alongside the blame. No, I'm not talking about political parties (although it could be said that there's a fair share of the blame that goes to the Democrats for dropping the ball), I'm actually talking about term limits. You know, a political mechanism that is meant to curve the uses of the partisan lobbyists and corporations and corruption that plagues politics and gets fresh people in with new ideas. I think it's fair to say that politics can go stale like a box of whale cheese crackers you forgot you had in the cabinet. And like those same crackers, when the governing policies go stale, you have to throw them out instead of letting them sit there and rot because that's how to progress and innovations are supposed to work. While limiting the reach of corporate interest and lobbyists to our elected officials. Well, that was the original idea of Missouri's term limits back when it was a ballot issue in 1992 that passed with 72% of Missourians voting in its favor, but somewhere along the way, it got lost in translation. Keep in mind that in '92, Missouri was primarily a blue state with seats still being contested and politics working as they should. So, it really was meant to be a check and balance or "safety" feature to ensure that we would always have an equal balance in our political scene to get representation or find someone that would actually do the job. Let's be honest, it's hard to get someone out of a seat once they're in it, especially a lazy incumbent. So, naturally, folks thought this was a good idea to have that "safety" net for future generations to keep democracy, a democracy. But that started to change when the birth of the internet, and the creation of Fox News in the mid-90s to spread the "Gospel of radical Conservatism" to every home in every forgotten and isolated place in rural America, and the once "blue" districts started going "red" to turning "Soviet Union" shades of red. By 2002, the GOP had already found a way to manipulate the system. With their propaganda machine that would make Himmler blush and push any and all democratic presence out of districts through gerrymandering -made term limits more or less a nonexistent thing or at least acting like term limits didn't exist, particularly in rural areas that had no other choice but to vote for whoever was on the ballot, term out, and already have their "freshly minted" from the GOP "assembly line" candidate in mind for the next cycle. And it's this "rinse and repeat" cycle that has made rural folks numb to the political "White noise" that politics brings with it, and accepting the system for the "way it is and some things will never change" as Bruce Hornsby would say. But also shows us things that our friends in more heavily populated areas tend to miss, like the fact that corporations and lobbyists are knee deep in both parties and those term limits are meant to shorten their reach. Make no mistake, the GOP grooms and trains their candidates as soon as they find the right recruit that will make their agenda possible without asking too many questions or raising too much of a fuss prior to winning a seat. And it's true folks that live in the democratic party "strongholds" absolutely hate the idea of term limits on their favorite state representative or senator, but they don't really know what it's like to have no actual representation or to watch actual fascism stem from the "rinse and repeat" cycle. They also don't fully grasp the idea of hoping that the next one that gets put on the ballot can reverse some of the damage the previous joker helps decimate our homes with. Granted, it's a short-lived hope, but with no other voting options--It's all they have to cling to at the end of the day. I think the biggest thing folks are missing is the fact that its term limits are the only thing restraining these jokers from really expanding their ambitions of the "Big Red" agenda. Otherwise, without them, the state would have the fascist movement would have exploded a lot sooner than 2023. I say that because it puts a small stumbling block in their road to absolute power, forcing them to get more creative about their networking and when to come from under their rock per se. It slows them down just a bit. That's why their push for fascism seems to be rushed, sporadic, and more extreme, because of the limited time they have. That's just an illusion though, because the GOP started building an "assembly line" of such things back in the 90s just to see what they can normalize and what folks so their next "superstar" can take the lead they bring their god-awful agenda mainstream. Then the idea of term limits becomes a moot point. I mean, could you imagine the damage some like Bill Eigel (the self proclaimed "not Darth Vader") would do if he wasn't termed out? I shudder to think what our state would look like with folks like Bill not terming out. On that note, let's make sure he doesn't become the next governor. In short, term limits aren't really a problem itself, as there are a few red states that don't have the same term limits as we do--fighting the exact same fight we are with religious fascists. No, the real problem is the lack of opposition running against extremism. Especially in the "no-man's-land" parts of Missouri and rural America. We literally can't have a functioning government body if it's only one party, as we're a pluralistic government that requires more than the "Party of No". So we have to address the real issue (because they're very much interconnected) and that's the void of opposition. The only thing that a term limit harms are the "easy" win for folks and makes them have to work a little harder to reach the goal of a functioning government. Folks that complain about them don't really have to do the kind of work and rebuild the political infrastructure that's needed to remove the term limits, unlike rural folks that have to do all that and more to get balance out of the scales. And we also have to recognize that if it wasn't for term limits, folks like Bill Eigel (self-proclaimed "not Darth Vader" term) would still be allowed to continue their destruction of our democracy. I mean, could you imagine the amount of damage folks like Mr. "I'm not Darth Vader" would do if he didn't get termed out next year? I shudder to think at what the entire heartland states would look like if these fools went completely unrestrained with no term limits. On that note, let's not make not make Mr. Star Wars governor, because he really is Darth Vader that would make the road to the empire a reality minus the cool lightsabers, voice effects, and flying jet crafts. I'm going to leave you with a thought for a day. Since we all can agree that term limits are a double "edge sword" in the political world, ask yourselves what our state would look like if we didn't have some kind of restraint on politicians. ( side-note: Fascism can occur on either side of the aisle of the political spectrum if it goes unchecked) What would our democracy look like or would we even have one considering the GOP has been doing the fascist theme for the past 40-odd years? These questions one should consider before blasting a safety net, that's not necessarily broken, but has been manipulated to beat. I also ask you to consider all the factors that have led us to this point, because to understand how this all came to fruition a person has to look at all the facts, and how much worse it would be if we didn't have some kind of stumbling block for the fascist to fall over. As always, Take care and take care of one another Much love Jojo