Ways to shorten the U.S. “election cycle” or political campaigns.
H/T @chris407x
It is often said that the highest priority of most politicians is to get re-elected. Towards that end, many politicians in the United States are in an eternal election cycle. The day after they win their seat, they are almost forced to start planning the next campaign. Here are some ideas that might help to break that cycle.
1. Term limits
With term limits, every politician at some point would be in their "last" term. As such there wouldn't be a next election cycle. But this would only work if...
2. Only citizens not currently holding political office would be eligible to run for office. Not including incumbents who have not hit the term limit.
No more would a sitting Senator be planning his Presidential campaign instead of tending to his Senatorial duties. Even career politicians would have to either leave or surrender their current seat before they would be eligible to run for a different office.
3. Pass legislation stating when ads, political rallies, etc. are allowed to take place.
As an example, in our local elections, candidates can only place lawn signs or other public displays 30 days prior to the election. Of course, with more jurisdictions allowing early voting, this has extended this period. Maybe 60 days for state office and 90 days for all federal elections.
4. Limit the amount of money that can be spent on political campaigns.
Again, this would require legislative action and would face an uphill battle to be passed.
5. Limit the amount of political revenue that a media source is allowed to accept.
6. Regulate how much of a media source's broadcast ads are political content.
Regulations such as this would surely face a stiff 1st Amendment challenge and may not be constitutional.
7. Have political candidates take a public position self-limiting campaign expenditures.
This has always been a self-inflicted losing strategy in American politics, but a smart campaign might be able to pull it off by continuously pointing out the incessant, wasteful spending of their opponents.
8. Equalize office terms (at least at the Federal level).
House representatives have 2 yr. terms. Presidential candidates have 4 yrs. And U.S. Senators have 6 yrs. So the next election cycle is never more than 2 yrs. away. If we standardized on 4 yrs. for everyone, there might actually be a little time for legislating instead of campaigning. Or go really wild and stretch all terms to 6yrs.
9. As the voting public, let your politicians and candidates know how you feel.
If you feel strongly that too much money is spent on campaigning or that you are seeing to many political ads, let them know. Otherwise, it is a sure thing that nothing will change.
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