Lynch Pen - Voters have opportunities to make a change

— If last week’s article prompted a few people to begin looking at all the upcoming political elections then it was successful. We are going to have plenty of opportunities to make a statement, or maybe many statements, concerning our political leaders at all levels. Most of the emphasis is going to be on Washington, but we need to recognize the potential we have locally in county offices and state level positions as well.

At this writing we have not heard Congressman John Boozman announce his plans for a run for Senator Lincoln’s seat.

Regardless of his ultimate decision, I would not want to be in his position of dealing with the politics of the Republican Party. After reviewing the information J. C. Watts’ Web site provided (reported in this space in November 2009), the political parties leadership apparently can exert a great deal of influence (or pressure) on candidates.

That would add to the list of discrepancies on my resume if I were involved since it is my opinion the political parties are too interested in winning an election to really care about governing.

As I have considered what my list of qualifications for Congressional positions requires, a new one has emerged. Given a chance to discuss this issue with the candidates one criteria would be they must sign a pledge to quit, not run for re-election, term limit themselves, or whatever you prefer to call it after 12 years. That would allow them twoSenate terms or six House terms. Men and women who truly desire to serve as national leaders should also recognize that being unwilling to set some kind of timeline for that commitment does not say very much about the purpose for being there.

Looking around the room at the audience during the president’s State of the Union address, I couldn’t help marveling at how long some of them have been in Washington. When the states are known as being “solid” for either party, the likelihood is small that an incumbent is seriously in danger of being replaced unless we have a situation such as we are seeing here in our Arkansas senate seat held by Senator Lincoln. Far too many of the people I recognized listening to the president were entrenched in their political party’s inner circle. We have no choice how other states vote and they may have their own reasons for re-electing their congressional members, but until term limits are established for congressional seats, we run the risk of perpetuating the same problems of ignoring what America needs and what the citizens actually want. All we have to do is look at the health care debates and how that overshadowed our nation’s economic recovery needs.

There seems to be a lot of talk about replacing every incumbent with a new person which certainly has appeal. It might have similar effect to the first year we went through the term-limits transition in Little Rock, but we survived that even with all the threats of shutting down our government.

We always have those who fear any change and they seem to be the ones who offer those threats of doom at every discussion about term limits. However, there are good and bad consequences to replacing every incumbent. We have some very good people in Washington and their experience and their work for their constituents and our nation would be sorely missed. No matter how we personally feel about an elected representative - county, state or national - we need to make sure why we support any candidate.

Two years ago we had a problem with our assessments across Benton County and many people were angry about their increased property taxes.

That could be a factor in this year’s county elections if someone opposes the incumbent based on that assessment cycle. Our Benton County judge has made enough headlines to gain attention and although I haven’t heard any rumors about a challenge from any source, it is early in the year. The healthcare issue could be an equally serious liability to Senator Lincoln, but anyone who gets my vote in opposition to her must give me some reassurance that they willrecognize where the citizens are on an issue and stand in opposition to the president and their own political party when necessary.

The potential opening of Congressional District 3 if Congressman Boozman seeks the Senate nomination of the Republican Party even has a “city flavor” if one of the newspaper article’s report was correct. In many ways it must be like going to the race track in Hot Springs. Lots of horses, lots of races, but nothing sure until they finally post the names and numbers.

Ultimately there will be a winner, and only one, in each race.

I look forward to hearing Congressmen Boozman’s decision soon.

Leo Lynch, a native of Benton County has deep roots in northwest Arkansas. A retired industrial engineer and former Justice of the Peace he believes all government should be servants of, and accountable to, the people.

He can be contacted at [email protected].

Opinion, Pages 4 on 02/03/2010