Free Press – October 19, 2006

Term Limits 2006, Regional School Board, Upper Bucks YMCA, Regional Rail

Dear Friends,

Good morning. You’ve read my whining about term limits before. Now, before your eyes glaze over, you’ll see in a moment why voters across America will install term limits on the U. S. House of Representatives in November…just as voters did 12 years ago. Remember the number 12.

But first, I have a few comments about the news of the week.

First, four days ago, Quaketown students, faculty, and residents discovered Terry Madonna in their midst. The superstar pollster, Madonna founded the Keystone poll in 1992. He is Pennsylvania’s premier political pollster and commentator. I spent Monday with him as he made the rounds. Madonna created quite an impression and I’ll devote my column next week to his visit.

Second, the Upper Bucks YMCA finally has a new home. Bravo! Now the citizens must get to work to move the activities at Park Ave and 14^th Street to the new site. That means building not one, but two indoor pools! The community will have to be generous and I have no doubt that it will.

Third, “An ongoing survey will help in the first step of the implementation process to restore passenger service from Quakertown to Lansdale,” Free Press reporter Toni Becker wrote last week. Let us pray! We need to reduce the clogged highways.

Fourth, Quakertown Borough Manager, David Woglom, may be hounded out of office. That would be a shame if that happens. Several councilmen are agitating for his dismissal. Woglom has done a good job for the borough. The council should always keep that fact on the front burner. Does he need supervision? Of course he does…and the council has that responsibility and ability.

Last, Milford Township has weighed in on the Quakertown school board representation controversy. Richland Township started the fight by suggesting that the school board abandon the three subdivisions and change to an at large method of representation.

Like Quakertown Borough Council, the Milford supervisors agreed with the school board. To make the three divisions equal in population, the school board is moving one voting district in Richland Township into the Quakertown district. Richland objects and will soon have its day in Bucks County court.

Personally, I think that Richland’s idea of having all nine-school directors serving at large is better. The six municipalities, which comprise the school district, have a plethora of qualified citizens who’d make fine directors. For example, the three Bucks County Commissioners are elected at large. Why should it matter that all nine school directors be from one municipality if voters judge them to be the best?

Only if you’re of a parochial mind do separate districts make sense.

But, historically, that’s what we are…parochial. Why else would Pennsylvanians put up with 2,600 competing municipalities? Why does Bucks County need 54 separate municipalities when 13 school districts work just fine?

My bet is that the court will not interfere with the school board’s decision.

And now to the 2006 version of term limits.

You and I know that only the federal and state legislatures have the keys to term limits. And because legislators desire to die in office, we’ll never see them voluntarily changing the rules, to limit years of service.

If you pick unsolved issues at both federal and state levels, you’d conclude that they would have been solved eons ago if a congressman or state legislator only had 12 years in office. Here are just a few: tobacco, illegal immigration, dependence on Middle East oil, 2,600 Pennsylvania municipalities, and the reliance upon property taxes for schools and local government support.

Well, my 12-year limit may happen anyway.

Twelve years ago, the Republicans swept into the congressional majority because the Democrats finally became too arrogant and too greedy. Voters gave the Republican party the opportunity to do better.

Now, it’s 12 years later.

What do we have? In the state, Republicans may lose control of the majority because they’ve become what?…that’s right…greedy and arrogant. And in Washington D.C., the GOP has stunk up the place as well.

Here are a few examples.

President Bush endorsed House Speaker Dennis Hastert even though the Speaker knew of the sex charges against former congressman Mark Foley. Foley resigned in disgrace. “This country is better off with Denny Hastert as the Speaker,” the President said at a Republican rally last week.

It’s all about protecting the Republican majority. Neither morality, nor illegality has anything to do with it.

Guess who is visiting Pennsylvania to campaign for Republican Don Sherwood? George W. of course…in spite of the fact that Congressman Sherwood has admitted to having a five-year affair with a woman 35 years his junior. What will the President’s religious right have to say about that? Who knows?

No matter…holding on to the Republican majority in congress is more important than principle. To the surprise of no one, the President is visiting Virginia to help U.S. Senator George Allen seek reelection in spite of Allen’s racial slurs. Now we read that Ohio Congressman Bob Ney plead guilty in the Jack Abramoff influence peddling scandal.

Ney may have endorsed term limits by issuing this written statement after his court appearance. “I allowed myself to get too comfortable with the way things have been done in Washington, D. C. for too long,” he said. That may be Ney’s shining moment of truthfulness.

I forget who said this: power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely…suggesting that term limits may be at hand, though temporarily.

Sincerely,

Charles Meredith