"...But some committee members seemed to have their minds made up Friday. Del. Johnny Joannou, D-Portsmouth, said the existing one-term limit serves as a check on executive power. The only way to balance power under a two-term governor is to make the legislature a full-time body, he said."
A full time body? Heavens to murgatroid! Are we, the people, slavedrivers? You cannot ask the body of representation to work FULL TIME in your interests can you?
A full time body? Heavens to murgatroid! Are we, the people, slavedrivers? You cannot ask the body of representation to work FULL TIME in your interests can you?
4 comments:
I think he means having the legislature working year-round instead of having the part-time citizen legislature meeting in 45- and 60-day stints.
You mean like a normal place? With a perhaps reactive and responsive governing body? Not one that waits for months before officially meeting to accomplish little?
/sarcasm off
Sorry - this is what you get when you come from a place that gives a damn about the citizenry, as vague as it may seem at times.
It would also mean increasing the pay of both the legislators and their staff, which is currently paltry. Legislators' salary is under 20k a year. I would assume, based on your history- that you would be against that. It also flies in the face of the vaunted Mr. Jefferson... so we'll never see it unfortunately.
Funny thing that history - just because you read it doesn't mean it's the way things happened.
Pay the legislators, and staff salaries like any other state. It's not like we see a surplus at the end of the year from the money save by having a bunch of part-time employees, we are barely seeing any benefit from the budget as it is.
Full time or no time, and as for the vaunted Mr. Jefferson - he was a great man, for the time he lived in. This is the 21st century, with new rules, new modes and models... Even ol' Thom would have very different ideas on that. But hey, what do I know - I'm no student of history.. or am I?
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