The Biggest Waste of Taxes is Congress

A month or two ago, there was a big flap over an ad by MoveOn(left).org that drew a response from Congress. Last week, there was a flap over a resolution recognizing Christmas. This week, a committee is going to unleash hearings concerning last week's Mitchell report on steroids and hormones in Major League Baseball. And I'm sure I've left out an assload of resolutions and a shitload of committees. I'm sure if I looked on C-Span, I'd be bored by some policy wonk a'wonking or clueless congressman making a grandiose speech about something utterly pointless.

What do all of these things have in common? Well, most of the blather is Congress attempting to find things to do to justify their existence, nurse their pet project, or pull in the pork so they can secure their reelection. Also, while each item is important in its own way, it's simply not something we need taxpayer dollars wasted on so Congress can have something to do. It's especially senseless when Congress can't even get necessary spending passed due to the desire of every politico with an agenda trying to stick their personal appropriation in. In fact, the best thing that happened in the 90's was the battle between the President and Congress over the budget led to a government shutdown. That's a good thing.

At this point though, even shutting the government down won't stop the excessive spending. At this point, it will take radical change to fix the mess. First, part of the process to pass the FairTax is repealing the 16th amendment. That will take the power of taxation out of the hands of Congress. Second, while we're in the business of amending the Constitution, let's add term limits for Congress. Give the House 3 terms (6 years) and the Senate 2 (12 years). I know that's 18 years total, but the House will have fresh blood every 6 years. As for the Senate, it was always supposed to be full of experienced legislators. But they have no pressure to please people after their second election, unless they're angling for the presidency, so we may see better results.

After these changes, then we can start the mass drawdown of the government monolith. Because the problem is not any one person. It's a system that perpetuates eternal government growth.