Our political landscape has become hopelessly divided and contentious. Newt Gingrich started this lasting antagonistic and ideological battle in the mid-90s when he was dead set on defeating Bill Clinton. As the battle for entitlement cuts and a balanced budget actually ended with proper results (literally our last balanced budget and budget surplus was the end of the Clinton era, late 1990s). The aftermath was a distaste for moderate politicians and a slow, painful edging towards primary battles that encouraged extreme left or extreme right candidates and resulted in the defeat of moderates in droves over the next decade. To further complicate the move away from moderate politicians was the Citizens' United decision in 2010 forever changed the magnitude and scale of political contributions. This enabled virtually limitless contributions to political campaigns as big money donors and corporate donations were, in the view of the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS), protected speech. The First Amendment had only previously been held to protect an individual's right to free speech. Now, in the view of SCOTUS, a corporation (or Political Action Committee (PAC)) was viewed as an individual with afforded First Amendment rights.

The devolution of our political dialogue into pure demagoguery and ideological grandstanding has peaked in the 2020s. Many of these issues can be resolved by returning to the intent of our fore fathers in the purpose and function of the government. We are a Republic. What this primarily means is we elect representatives who we best feel will take our constituent needs to Washington D.C. In terms of pure democracy, local/municipal/state ballot initiatives are the best example of the people choosing policies they want the government to enforce. Marijuana decriminalization/legalization and voter identification are two of the most common state or local driven issues that the voting public has had recent opportunity to enact their democratic will over. As a Democratic Republic, our constitutional framers knew there would be conflict over Federalism vs. State's Rights. They properly envisioned a system that provided adequate checks and balances and divided government to avoid autocracy or monarchy.

Unfortunately, because of the disappearance of the political middle, the falling away of elected moderates, and the runaway spending now possible in elections, our fore fathers never foresaw our current state of politics given duly elected leaders who manipulate the system, condemn all unfavorable media as "fake", and have complicit members of their party in the legislature that refuse to perform their basic duties of pushing back against an autocratic leaning executive. In this author's opinion, the greatest threat to our Democratic Republic is the complicit behavior of the legislative branch in promoting and supporting the anti-democratic, anti-constitutional actions of this President. One can argue that gerrymandering has established electoral districts in which extreme positions are protected and which has expedited the abandonment of political moderation as a means to effect change and progress in Congress. To complicate this matter further, we have a great number of career politicians in Congress. Men and women who have been elected officials from the districts or States for over 15-, 20-, 25-, and 30-years. The average net worth of a member of the US Congress has exponentially increased over the past three to four decades. Without even broaching the subject of corruption, this just does not add up. Our elected officials were never meant to be career politicians who have no fear of upsetting their constituents as long as their donors and corporate sponsors are content.

Our movement has two primary goals. The first and foremost is to end the incumbencies that plague our politics. Members of Congress must return to citizen politicians. They should be men and women that reflect the common, middle class citizen. The US Senate term is six years with elections for essentially a third of the Senate occurring every two years. The US House term is two years with Presidential and Mid-term elections occurring every two years. Over the Mid-term election of 2026, the Presidential Election of 2028, and the Mid-term election of 2030, our sincere hope and goal is to elect 535 NEW members of the US Congress. We must end the incumbent and radical ideologues in our current legislative body via the ballot box. We must find 535 new candidates from the over 3000 counties in the United States. The two party system is so fully entrenched in our system that it is highly unlikely to attempt a third party revolution at the same time. Therefore, we must find 535 citizens who will align themselves broadly with either the Republican or Democratic parties. The basic commitment of each of these new members must be to call for a new Constitutional Convention by 2031 or 2032. The purpose of this Constitutional Convention is primarily to enact term limits over all three branches of the United States government.

Starting with the legislature, total term limits of 12 years maximum. This would allow for a Senator to serve two terms. Campaign finance requires extensive reform as well. First and foremost would be to end the disastrous fallout from Citizen's United as well as concentrate political spending at local and state levels. In pursuit of the goal of pragmatic political action, it makes sense to expand the individual terms of each member of the US House to three years, while maintaining a total term limit of four terms, 12 years maximum. By expanding individual terms to three years would allow for two solid years of congressional action versus the current frenetic pace where members of the US House spend about six months of each year in legislative duty and the remainder of time attempting to raise money for their next election. If we can change both campaign finance and the lobbying interests and support common funds for advertising and political communication each election we can re-direct the Representative towards their legislative work and away from donor phone calls and events to raise money from affluent donors.

The executive branch already has an established constitutional term limit of four years, with no president able to serve more than two terms. The judicial branch, namely the Supreme Court, has historically enjoyed appointments for life terms. Once again, this enables ideological extremes to proliferate the federal courts. The Constitutional Convention should place term limits on the judicial branch as well with a term limit of 18 years in the Supreme Court. This would protect justices from undue political influences and the whims of public sentiment while allowing for expertise and experience to guide our highest court.

With term limits for each branch of government in place the next issue to address is the potential longetivity of Congressional members. While many Americans can enjoy an excellent quality of life into their 8th and 9th decades of life on earth, it is not ideal to have octogenarians in elected positions. Incumbency and the lack of term limits has allowed this scenario to profligate over and over again. Strom Thurmond, US Senator from South Carolina retired after 47 years in office at the age of 100 and died six months later. Dianne Feinstein, Democratic Senator from California, died at the age of 90 while still in office. There were many documented incidents over her final few years that reflected a poor state of health, far from being healthy enough to hold office.

Therefore, age limits for every member of Congress, the President, and the Justices of the Supreme Court should be 72 years of age. If their final year of service (12 years Congress; 8 years President; 18 years Supreme Court) will not end prior to their 72nd year of life on earth, they should be precluded from serving. We have age limits for highly technical and professional careers like pilots and surgeons, we ought to have age limits for the elected officials expected to run our government and promote our country's best interests.

In summary, it has taken nearly thirty years, since the mid-1990s, for our political dialogue to be reduced to it's current state. Many Americans view government as intrusive and inefficient. Primary causes of these perceptions are rooted in career politicians who are no longer committed to constitutional values and their constituent needs. End the incumbencies. Join our political movement. Join the cause and purpose of electing 535 new members of Congress over the next three election cycles. And we must ensure these newly elected members are committed to our plan, a Constitutional Convention with term and age limits being the primary goal.