Abolish the Senate, Starting with Some Whittling

Seeing the way a handful of senators are serving their health industry contributors better than they are their constituents, or the health of the nation, it is clear the US Senate itself needs some major surgery.

The United States has the world's oldest living democracy. It is a problem. We are stuck with a house of congress that utterly fails to fairly represent the people, giving disgracefully disproportionate power to a handful of people.

I realize it is nigh on to impossible to get rid of the senate but someone should be talking about what a worthless body, or worse, the negative impact it has on democracy, freedom and justice.

We need some kind of replacement that is more representative, more responsive to changes-- where the people elected are replaced far more often. At the recent netroots nation conference a number of activists basically said they'd given up on influencing the senate because they couldn't see a way to reach these granite icons, installed for six long years, massively protected with incumbency and the backing of their parties.

Elected officials should never be allowed to become such monolithic entities, unaccountable to their constituents.

It's time to eliminate the senate, to update the constitution. This will not ride well in the smaller states. They will fight it. Perhaps it is totally impossible. One way to address it is to make it an issue, so every member of the senate has to take a stand on it. Another way to address it is to change the term length for senators. Make it the same as for members of the house. At least that will make the senators more accountable.

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http://www.opednews.com/articles/Abolish-the-Senate-Starti-by-Rob-Kall-090818-896.html