Some voters, though, think we should have clearer rules about when a politician is too old to serve. Sixty-seven percent of respondents strongly or somewhat supported an age limit for serving in the Senate in a YouGov/UMass Amherst poll from June, and 58 percent of adults thought age limits for serving as president would be a good idea in a Marist poll from last November. Sixty-eight percent of respondents favored mental competency tests for candidates over 75 in a YouGov/Yahoo survey from February. A plurality, 48 percent, think the job of president is too demanding for someone over 75, according to a CBS/YouGov poll from June. And overall, Americans’ preference for younger leadership is clear: About half of Americans think the ideal age for a president is someone in their 50s, according to the Pew Research Center.
Term limits just ensure the incumbent doesn’t care about their last term. If they do a good job and the incoming candidates look lousy, they should be allowed to continue. Want to really make a difference? Get money out of politics. Big corporate donations and mega media are what drives the campaigns, including who gets on the ballot in the first place, not the voters.
Direct democracy with real-time vote retraction, even better.
If an incumbent doesn’t care about their last term, get them out, now. Can’t take money completely out of politics, but can reduce its weight significantly.
The flip side is good politicians that don’t need to care about reelection can do the right thing instead of the thing that would be most likely to get them elected.
Term limits doesn’t have to be 2 terms. We also don’t want all our politicians to lack experience. We have a minimum age limit. We could also have a max.