Gohmert: Fight Health Care Bill By Repealing Popular Election Of Senators (VIDEO)

Just when you think these guys can't get any dumber they prove you wrong.

If we're going to make changes, how about giving California about eight more senators, New York and Texas the same. And give DC a couple.

They have gone off the deep end.

I don't see 34 legislatures signing on...let alone the 38 it would require to ratify it.

... because there is nothing Americans love more than having their right to vote taken away!

Congressmen Gohmert is on a roll today. He also introduced a resolution endorsing an Israeli airstrike on Iran:

http://thinkprogress.org/2010/03/23/gohmert-bill-israel-iran/

Yea lets take away peoples power to elect senators.... iam sure they will LOVE that idea.

After the 2008 election, I predicted that the republican campaign slogan for 2010 would be:

"Crazy? You ain't SEEN crazy yet!"

I meant it was a joke.

I'm guessing he's not that enthusiastic about amendments 13-15, either. Or 16, 19, 22 (when there's a Republican President), 23, 24...oh hell, can't we just go back to 1830 when everyone was happy?

Go for it is right.

I lived through the failure of the ERA. Twice.

Go right ahead and try to amend the constitution.

I would rather pass an Amendment that mandated IQ tests for members of Congress.

Well, unless there's something I'm forgetting, it may be a decent thing for this to happen or not make a difference at all.

At the bottom of my post, I put a link. I'll do the counting for you first. Its a map of the country where the state is colored by "Current party control of United States state legislatures".

13 red
1 black (Nebraska, Nonpartisan legislature)
9 purple (Mixed)
27 blue

2 Senators a state, so multiply by two. 54 blue, 26 red. Would that mean the other 20 senators would be moderates?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:US_state_legislatures.svg

Dumbest stunt ever. Beyond the notion that the people should not elect Senators directly anymore, what this tool also fails to realize is that it would likely not change the composition of the Senate in his favor if you factor in the number of state legislatures controlled by, or split with Democrats.

If you go by which part controls which chamber in each legislatures and tally them up and assign a Senator according to the formula, the Democrats end up with somewhere between 62 and 72 Senators.

I guess this ass-clown was unaware that the Democrats control a large majority of State legislatures.

When is Tx going to secede anyways? Hurry up!

"Article V requires a minimum of 34 states to request a Convention which in this case, would be an Amendment Convention for only ONE amendment."

Except you can't have a Constitutional Convention AND specify that it's only to modify one part of the Constitution. Once you call a Convention, everything is up for grabs.

One major question is whether the scope of the convention's subject matter could be limited. The consensus is that Congress probably does not have the power to limit a convention, because the language of Article V leaves no discretion to Congress, merely stating that Congress "shall" call a convention when the proper number of state applications have been received. Comments made at the time the Constitution was adopted indicate that it was understood when the Constitution was drafted that Congress would have no discretion. In The Federalist No. 85, Alexander Hamilton stated that when the proper number of applications had been received, Congress was "obliged" to call a convention and that "nothing is left to the discretion of Congress."

Wikipedia

Talk about "going against the will of the people". Jesus, can't these idiots keep their story straight for more than 5 minutes?

They say things grow big in Texas...And ignorance is cheif among them!

Let's not elect Republicans anymore.

As Dave Weigel points out, this setup would result in Democrats losing a few Senate seats under the current balance of power in the state legislatures.

Somehow I rather expect that the balance of many state legislatures would change considerably if this amendment went into effect. There are a lot of suburban districts full of country club republicans who are happy to send republicans to their state legislatures right now, but who would not risk the chance of Roe v. Wade being overturned in a world where the state legislature selects the state's senators.

Of course. This makes perfect sense. Idea is to remove federal governance further from voters and closer to state control -- that's what "Constitutional Republic" means. It's one of the issues over which the Civil War and oppo to Reconstruction, which was heavy national power, was fought, and is being fought still.

Next up would be repeal of Income Tax amendment and the Civil War amendments with their enforcement structure.

Let's see now, if some of these Repubs have their way they will be campaigning on a platform of:
- Repealing health insurance protections now signed into law, and
- Repealing the ability of people to directly elect their senators.

This election could really be fun!

Ever since the safeguard of State legislatures electing U.S. Senators was removed by the 17th Amendment in 1913, there has been no check or balance on the Federal power grab for the last 97 years

Um, yeah, the US government was run by docile little angels until that damn 17th Amendment. Riiight...

I'm surprised he didn't slip up & say the 14th should be repealed.

The GOP is morphing into the party of the Confederacy.

Man, he is the splitting image of his twin brother, Goober!

This democracy thing isn't working out too well for Republicans; maybe they should try to abolish that too.

It is amazing how ignorant of history Leftists are. All you Lefties complain (rightly) about Congressmen being unduly influenced by money yet when an idea comes along that would prevent that very influence you ignore it because you can't get beyond partisan nonsense. If your Messaih, Chairman maObama had thought of this you would be drooling all over yourselves trying to figure out a way to make it retroactive. Allowing the State legislature to once again choose US Senators would force the Senators to be beholden to the State's they serve, not the business interests who donate to their campaigns.

And rynato, get over the democracy thing. The USA is not now and has never been a democracy. The Framers created the Constitution because they felt the State's had become to democratic and bent too easily to the daiy whims of the people. The framers loathed democracy and believed it to be nothing more than mob rule. The USA is a Constitutional Republic.

The original idea was to have the Senate more closely represent the interests of the individual states while the House was to represent the people. I believe that many forget that one of the reasons this was changed was the corruption that was occurring in several states with respect to vote buying. Although this would be one of the few times there was actually a suggestion that we can attribute to the framers.

Well, I suppose I’m jumping into a pool of sharks – but what the hell.

Obviously, the word compromise had been left out of the political dictionary; so has, respect - on BOTH sides. Personally, I will not claim affiliation with either party, both have become intolerably big headed in that they think they have the one, true answer for what ails this country – and both are wrong.

You guys are as bad as the dude you’re sniping, no willingness to see the other side’s point of view. I think he’s wrong in what he’s doing – but I do understand why he’s doing it. The fact that numerous states are trying to block this legislation because their constituents are screaming at them to do so, should say something. He’s doing his job, representing the people who elected him the best way he knows how, as foolhardy as that may be.

Personally, I am for healthcare reform, but the way it was handled left a sour taste in my mouth. It should have been handled better – on both sides. Neither was willing to work with the other side, neither was willing to listen to the people that elected them – they never do. They give good lip service, but at the end of the day, it’s politics as usual.

Blood's in the water…