INTRO MUSIC : “1,000,000” by R.E.M.
Philip Blumel: Congressional Term Limits broke through last week as an issue in the race for the Democratic Presidential nomination. Hi. I’m Philip Blumel. Welcome to No Uncertain Terms, the official podcast of the Term Limits movement for the week of June 10, 2019.
Stacey Selleck: Your sanctuary from partisan politics.
Philip Blumel: We are thrilled to report this news, but we’re also reminded by other news that rotation in office isn’t only beneficial for governmental organizations. In addition to politicians were else have term limits found to help? Nick Tomboulides, Executive Director of U.S. Term Limits, knows. Hey, Nick.
Philip Blumel: Well, the big news this week, Nick, is that Beto O’Rourke, candidate for President of the United States with the Democratic party has put forth a package of voting reforms, and at the center of it is something dear to our hearts, Congressional Term Limits. We talked about this a couple weeks ago. We were hoping that somebody would come forward and make this the center of their campaign. It looks like someone has.
Nick Tomboulides: Finally. Mazal tov, excited to see it. Yeah, I’ve been asking for a long time. There are over 20 Democratic candidates running for this position and they all seem to have very similar platforms. I’ve been wondering who is going to try to differentiate themselves. It looks like this is the first step in the right direction, because he is the only prominent candidate who is making this a focal point of his campaign. This was an announcement that was very well received among mainstream media, among voters, among left-wing journalists, right-wing journalists. People were kind of excited about this because it’s something different. Instead of just saying, “These are the policies I want,” he’s saying, “I want to totally transform Washington. I want to fix the way business is done there.” I think it’s going to resonate with a lot of people.
Philip Blumel: That’s right. Let’s here him talk about it. This is from CBS News last week.
Beto O’Rourke: We have term limits for President. He or she can only serve eight years maximum; term limits for the Mayor of El Paso, also eight years. So, we try to think about what’s the amount of time needed for a member of Congress to be able to make a difference? Six terms in the house, which is 12 years, or two terms in the Senate, also 12 years, should be enough to be able to confront those challenges that you were elected to confront, to move the ball forward on those things that you want to pursue, and then to get out of the way so that our Democracy and our institutions are reflective of the people of this country. There is a proposal that would have five Democratic Justices, five Republican Justices who would then elect another five Justices. In my opinion that further entrenches, or enshrines, the partisanship that we’re seeing play out in the court right now. Instead, I think having term limits, which perhaps reduces the level of partisanship and certainly the anxiety and the bitterness of the discourse leading up to those confirmation proceedings, I think that can be even more helpful.
Philip Blumel: One complaint I have about it, though, is that he is going with the weaker 12-year limit, even though when he was in the Congress he was a signatory of the U.S. Term Limits pledge that held him for a six-year limit in the House and 12 year in the Senate. He was also on the bill to do just that. He was on the U.S. Term Limits limit bill. So, he definitely fulfilled his obligations when he was in Congress, but I was disappointed to see him come out with the 12 number now that he’s on a bigger stage.
Nick Tomboulides: It’s disappointing but it’s certainly not too surprising. What tends to happen with these politicians is, when they first run for office they’re close to the voters, listening to us as often as they can. That’s probably why he signed the U.S. Term Limits pledge. But, once they kind of rise in the ranks and they become more senior, they become more a part of the system, they increasingly stop listening to the people and listen more to these beltway consultants.
Philip Blumel: Right.
Nick Tomboulides: I like to sometimes colloquially refer to them as bloodsuckers …
Philip Blumel: Right.
Nick Tomboulides: … telling him what to do, telling them how to market their campaign. Those folks are really no fans of term limits. So, I’m sure it might be something the consultants came up. I don’t know. It’s just a positive thing to see him talking about term limits in the first place.
Philip Blumel: It is. It’s a very positive thing and it’s also not an actual firm … It’s not a bill or anything, it’s not a firm plan. It’s basically a talking point, meaning this is a package of things that he likes to do. It’s aspirational. There’s over 60 people in the Congress that would be required to vote on this thing that have signed a pledge saying that they would not support a longer limit than six terms in the House, so it’s not a practical thing to think that a 12-year term would get through the Congress. So, no, I agree. I was totally excited about it. I loved to see the press coverage it got. I loved to see the acclaim it got from the public. I want to see it show up as a debate point between the candidates running for the Presidential nomination.
Nick Tomboulides: Yeah. I haven’t really seen a lot of opposition to it. Sometimes just for balance these articles have put in a few quotes about why term limits are terrible and, surprise, surprise, all the quotes come from politicians and lobbyists. Earth to the Media, that is a conflict of interest. Find somebody objective. I challenge you to find anyone objective on this planet who has a real legitimate gripe with term limits. You will not find that person, because they really don’t exist. Anyone who is against this is somehow connected to the political class, and I’m grateful that Beto’s announcement is helping to reveal that.
Scott Tillman: Hi. This is Scott Tillman, the National Field Director with U.S. Term Limits. We asked candidates for State Legislature to sign a pledge to help us get Congressional Term Limits. The pledge reads, “I pledge that as a member of the State Legislature I will co-sponsor, vote for, and defend the resolution applying for an Article Article 5 Convention Convention for the sole purpose of enacting term limits on Congress.” There are only a few states having Legislative elections in 2019. We have had 13 candidates take the pledge this week. We now have 20 candidates in Mississippi, 12 candidates in Louisiana, 1 candidate in New Jersey, and 11 candidates in Virginia who have signed the pledge to support Congressional Term Limits of State Legislatures. We also have three candidates in an Alabama special election who have pledged to defend the resolution already approved by the Alabama State Legislature. If you have access to a candidate, please ask them to sign our pledge. Pledges are available at termlimits.com.
Nick Tomboulides: Another interesting announcement last week, Kevin Hassett for the last two years has served as the Chairman of the Counsel of Economic Advisors for the President. This is, basically, the chief advisor on economics, and he left the position last week. He made an announcement, and the reasons why he left, I think, really give us some insight on what is important about term limits, even though he really didn’t face a codified term limit. Let’s hear that. He was on CNBC last week talking about why he is leaving.
Speaker 7: Joining us right now is the man himself, White House Counsel of Economic Advisors, Chairman Kevin Hassett. You’ve been there as the head of the CEA since September of 2017, so this is a little less than two years, but you are one of the longer-serving people in the administration. I realize it’s a tough workload. There’s a lot that goes on. But, with the announcement of these Mexico tariffs coming just last week a lot of people are wondering, is that why you’re leaving?
Kevin Hassett: Oh no. I mean, this is something that’s been in the works for a little while. Actually, I’ve been there for almost exactly two years, because before I was confirmed I started to work as a consultant in the White House, so I started the first of June, or something like that, about two years ago. If you look at the history of the CEA it’s very normal for the CEA Chair to move on after about two years, and I think it’s really quite healthy for the organization, because the CEA is supposed to be this objective economic body rather than a political animal. I think the longer you stay in the White House, the closer you get with everybody in the West Wing, the harder it might be to be objective. So, I, as you know, a student of CEA, and I think it’s really a good think that President Clinton had, I guess, four CEA Chairs. I think President Bush had five. President Obama had four. I think that’s about the right [crosstalk 00:08:05].
Speaker 9: So, why do you want to leave?
Kevin Hassett: Oh, I think that’s it’s really partly respect for the institution and the sort of normal two-year role, and then there’s also just wanting to go back and spend time with my family. I’ve got a youngest kid who is going off to college in a year. I wouldn’t mind seeing his senior year, and things like that. Yeah, no, it’s absolutely just normal, circle of life kind of stuff.
Nick Tomboulides: He’s not a politician.
Philip Blumel: No.
Nick Tomboulide: He’s not elected. He’s appointed. He’s not accountable to voters but he still acknowledges that this is a good idea.
Philip Blumel: Right. I think it’s interesting the way that he shows how you could become part of the administration by working with it over a period of time when you originally came in as an independent advisor to the administration. That would require refreshing this position from time-to-time.
Nick Tomboulides: Yeah. It’s definitely good to see someone who is admitting that sometimes your objectivity can get compromised when you become too close to a system, and that regular refreshment is a positive thing, whether you’re elected or not. It just has kind of a re-invigorating effect on that position and makes sure that person can be a true advisor rather than just a loyalist or a lapdog for whoever appointed them.
Philip Blumel: Right.
Nick Tomboulides: You know, I think it’s part of a broader discussion about nonpolitical term limits in general. I was testifying at a legislative committee not too long ago. I think it was here in Florida, and one of the Legislators confronted me. He said, “Would you let a Board of Directors only serve eight years?” I was trying to argue for term limits on school Boards. He said, “Would you let a member of Board of Directors serve for only eight years?” I had to inform him that the average tenure for a Director in an S&P 500 Board is approximately eight years.
Philip Blumel: That’s right.
Nick Tomboulidse: There are-
Philip Blumel: Eight is enough.
Nick Tomboulides: Yeah, eight is enough. There are a whole host of apolitical term limits out there as people increasingly acknowledge that fresh ideas and refreshment are healthy for any system. No matter where you are, if you’re given power …
Philip Blumel: Sure.
Nick Tomboulides: … you’re going to have a tendency to become more entrenched and it’s going to compromise your ability to do your job. So, we’re seeing nonpolitical term limits get traction everywhere.
Philip Blumel: Right. It’s interesting when you look at the corporate Boards, as you mentioned, it’s about eight years for a large cap company for their Board members. You know, for smaller companies in the Russel 2000, that number is closer to six years as the median tenure. So, it’s fascinating that profit-seeking companies they see the value of having that constant refreshment, and they get reminded because whether they’re succeeding or not shows up in their financial statements. They’re looking for ways to change their governance in order to improve those results. They’re looking at it very closely. We’ve seen the tenure of Board members and of CEOs continue to decrease to these numbers over time. But, interestingly, they do this without codified term limits. Very few, although it’s a growing number … Less than 5% of S&P 500 Boards use codified term limits mandating that someone leave after a certain time, although most of them do have age limits, by the way, that aren’t mandated. But, it’s actually fairly unusual in the S&P 500 companies.
Philip Blumel: But, on the nonprofit side we see something very different. Most nonprofit Boards have codified term limits of one kind or another, either on the Chairman or on the Boards themselves. I saw some figures that suggested that about 70% of Chairmen of nonprofit Boards have term limits and about 60% of most Boards, Board members, face term limits. This is something that is a consensus view of organizations that promote better Board governance, and consultants that help companies improve their Board governance. They support the idea of having term limits on these Boards.
Nick Tomboulides: Yeah, and there are a whole host of benefits for doing that. First of all, in any organization you eventually run into some Board members who aren’t doing their job effectively. This is sort of a graceful and painless way for those people to retire without having to force them out and start a huge brouhaha over it.
Philip Blumel: Right.
Nick Tomboulides: I think it also helps you get a higher quality of person, because you know when you’re appointing someone to a Board, if they’re a prospective they haven’t been added to the Board yet, they’re going to be more likely to join if they know that there’s a set amount of time and energy that they need to commit, as opposed to just joining indefinitely.
Speaker 10: This is a public service announcement.
Speaker 11: Senator Ted Cruz of Texas is the sponsor of the U.S. Term Limits Amendment Bill in the U.S. Senate. Here is Senator Cruz making his case at CPAC 2017 in Washington D.C.
Ted Cruz: You look across this country, people are fed up with Washington. This election was the American people saying, “Enough already with the corruption in Washington.” It’s both parties, it’s Democrats and Republicans who have been here too long, who’ve become captured by this city. If you look at President Trump campaigned on Draining the Swamp on term limits, you look at Congressional leaders, we’ve got majorities in both Houses. I think we ought to demonstrate that we heard the voters, bring up term limits, pass it, send it to the States for ratification. What’s amazing is the support for this it cuts across, in this polarized time, you get super majorities of Republicans, of Democrats, of Independents who all say, “Throw the bums out,” and we ought to listen.
Nick Tomboulides: We have so many high-profile examples of organizations where a lack of term limits has produced corruption and has fostered malfeasance, misfeasance, and a whole host of different problems at the corporate level, at the advisory level. The one that I am fond of pointing out is FIFA, the International Soccer Federation. There was a very high profile scandal a few years ago. They’re an organization with a billion dollars in annual revenue, by the way. Nearly half of what they bring in comes from selling these broadcasting rights to the World Cup, which is the Big Kahuna of soccer tournaments. It’s like the Super Bowl of soccer, happens every four years. I’m probably butchering this. The real soccer fans are going to email me later and say, “It’s football. It’s way bigger than the Super Bowl. What are you talking about?”
Nick Tomboulides: So FIFA had a President, this guy named Sepp Blatter, who stayed in power for 15 years. He’s now facing a six-year ban from their Ethics Committee because, while he was never personally indicted, a truckload of corruption happened under his watch. One has to assume he knew what was happening. Basically, you had 18 of the top FIFA officials indicted for bribery, and a majority of them have already entered a guilty plea. They were taking millions of dollars in bribes, and they were awarding these marketing, these television, contracts to their specified cronies. It’s even alleged, by the way, that the decision to put the World Cup in South Africa, Russia, and Qatar was a result of bribery although, of course, the FIFA President dismisses that notion. But, it’s kickback city and long tenure was right at the heart of this scandal.
Philip Blumel: This wasn’t even the first time it’s happened. I mean, they had an earlier Chairman of FIFA, forgive me I can’t pronounce this guy’s name, I think it’s João Havelange. Anyway, he was in there for 24 yrs between ’74 and 1998. He was mired by allegations that he accepted bribery payments from a group which marketed broadcast rights for the World Cup also. So, it wasn’t even the first time it occurred.
Nick Tomboulides: No. I think it’s a reflection of some essential wisdom that we’ve heard for a very long time, that if you hold power, if you hold office, for a very long time it can lead to abuse of power. It rarely tends to lead to better government when someone is allowed to keep one seat of power for a long time. It leads to self-enrichment more often than not. Even if not every single long-tenured officer is going to participate in misconduct, it’s a risk nobody should be willing to take, because when it happens the damage is very difficult to undo. In this case hundreds of millions of dollars were essentially sucked out of an organization as a result of corruption.
Philip Blumel: Now FIFA took some steps.
Nick Tomboulides: Yeah, as soon as this scandal was publicized the Ethics Commission of FIFA mobilized and recommended that they pass term limits on their President and on the members of their Advisory Council. It passed by an overwhelming margin, because FIFA not only wanted to clean up the mess they had made, but they also wanted to reassure the public that they were an organization with some corporate integrity. There’s no better way to do that than term limits. Term limits sends a message to all the stakeholders that you can have faith in an organization, because you know it’s not going to be used as a vessel for profiteering. FIFA has, I think, in the last four years since this was passed they haven’t had another scandal.
Philip Blumel: The United Kingdom Corporate Governance Code, by the way, I want to throw this out there, assumes that Directors lose their independence after about nine years of service, on the theory that they become too defensive of the status quo or too close to management to effectively fulfill their oversight role after that. I think that’s telling. Again, that’s coming from another angle of people that come around this eight-year time period when it’s really time to move on and have someone else come in and fill the position, even out there in the private world.
Nick Tomboulides: It kind of reminds me of that scene from Office Space where they bring in the consultants and they’re sitting down all the senior employees and asking, “What is it you do around here again?”
Speaker 13: I think I’m going crazy.
Philip Blumel: Nick and I try our best but in some ways Representative Hank Johnson of Georgia is the real star of our podcast. In May, Representative Johnson was at it again, amusing the House Judiciary Committee as it discussed an amendment that would restrict the granting of amnesty to dreamers, that is illegal aliens, who are brought to the United States as children if they were convicted of gun violations. Apparently, Johnson’s argument was persuasive, as the amendment offered by Matt Gaetz of Florida was soundly defeated.
Hank Johnson: When I close my eyes and think about an illegal alien I do think about somebody from out of the world, some out of the world individual teaming with tentacles, and just a frightening entity. Then, when I put guns in the hands of a frightening monster it really raises, you know it heightens my sensitivities.
Philip Blumel: I came across something else interesting, Nick. In Science magazine there was an article a couple of days ago about the National Institutes of Health at their main campus in Bethesda, Maryland. They have about 272 Lab and Branch Chiefs. These are management types, not scientists directly, who oversee the research being done. The NIH is going to establish term limits on these 272 positions. Their long-term limits are 12 yrs, but they want to start seeing some rotation, new ideas.
Nick Tomboulides: There’s nothing new under the sun, and don’t worry scientific knowledge is not going anywhere, because their only term limiting the bureaucrats, the administrators. But, what’s amazing to me … I read the story you emailed. What’s amazing is the reasons they’re giving for doing this. They said, “The leaders have held power for too long. A lot of them have been there 20 years or more, with 17 of them being there more than 30 years, and they are blocking newer and more energetic talent from moving up.” What does that sound like?
Philip Blumel: I know. Also, they want to encourage gender and ethnic diversity.
Nick Tomboulides: They said there’s a lot of stodgy old white men who don’t reflect the population at large, and they don’t reflect the diversity of our society and the diversity coming out of universities. What does that sound like?
Philip Blumel: I know.
Nick Tomboulides: And the positions, they actually described it as fiefdoms where the Chiefs have power and resources. There’s a quote in here from Hannah Valantine, who is their Chief of Diversity, about that calling them fiefdoms. What she’s hinting at is when people control power and resources for too long they tend to abuse it. They can abuse it for personal gain. We’ve seen it in Hollywood. We’ve seen it in Academia, industry, politics, and now even science. It’s remarkable. Term limits is such a universal idea. It’s really a check on, I guess, the most obvious fundamental human behavior which is greed.
Philip Blumel: That’s it. Another reason they gave, which is related to something we’ve been talking about recently on this podcast is that people in the organization are frustrated. They feel like there’s no way they’ll ever have a leadership position because people don’t leave these jobs. They’re cushy and there’s a certain amount of politics involved in the National Institutes for Health, of course. So, you have younger people that have a lot to give but they’re not going to stick around. Maybe it does relate to the idea of adverse preselection which we’ve talked about recently.
Nick Tomboulides: Yeah. For sure. It’s funny because one of the most senior incumbents was also quoted here, the guy who’s headed a lab at the National Institute of Allergy and Diseases for 37 yrs. He said, “The appointment of more women could be a plus, but the ‘coin of the realm’ still remains scientific excellence and productivity.” He’s making the same garden-variety excuses that you hear from like crooked mayors and city counselors and members of Congress who just want to cling to power for years and years unended. It’s really funny how predictable this is.
Nick Tomboulides: (singing)
Philip Blumel: Thank you for joining us for another episode of No Uncertain Terms and thank you, those of you who provided comments and critiques of our podcast. If you haven’t yet, please weigh in at podcast@termlimits.com. We’re going to give a prize randomly to one of our respondents, plus we’re going to collect all of your suggestions and hold a special meeting of our team this summer to discuss every one. Be sure to tell us how you listen to the program. Do you listen via iTunes, or the Apple podcast app, or maybe Google Play or Stitcher? Are you a subscriber? If not, please become one. We’ll be back next week.
MUSIC CREDITS – Full versions of the music sampled during this podcast may be purchased via iTunes at the following links : “1,000,000” by R.E.M., “Think I’m Going Crazy” by Cypress Hill
The “No Uncertain Terms” podcast is produced by Kenn Decter for U.S. Term Limits
Executive Producer Philip Blumel (President, U.S. Term Limits)
