Flight from Politics: Danger to Democracy

By Shlomo Maital  

    In today’s New York Times, Robert Draper reports that 54 members of the US House of Representatives,  fully 1/8 of the total membership, are not seeking another term this November. They include rising stars, seasoned legislators and committee chairs.

       Why?

        Said one legislator, who is not quitting: “The institution’s not functioning, the incentive structures are messed up and we’re not doing real legislating. So people are like, why am I here?”

          And another said, a lot more would be leaving if they had a good alternative. The good resign, the bad and the ugly remain.

           In my country, Israel, a dysfunctional incompetent government full of far right radical politicians, who have gotten my country into deep hot water, cling to their seats and refuse to allow national elections, though a large majority of Israelis would support it.  

            So why are competent politicians fleeing, and incompetent corrupt ones remaining?  

            This model is known as ‘adverse selection’.   Groucho Marx defined it with bitter irony:  “I would never join a club that would accept someone like me!”.  

             If legislatures were filled with nasty, foul-mouthed, partisan, stubborn, self-seeking people who only pushed what their narrow ‘base’ wanted,  why would anyone with ability and intelligence choose willingly to commit to such a life?  Only others equally corrupt, self-seeking and loud-mouthed would choose to do so. 

              This is a disaster for my country, and, I believe, for the US. 

               Today, the US has a leading presidential candidate who is a convicted felon.  Who in the world would ever choose to become a follower – except, the unworthy?  The result:  An utterly dysfunctional political system. 

               Only a thorough house-cleaning – elections that send the rascals into permanent retirement – can help.  Maybe, in the US, on November 5, it will begin.  Maybe, in Israel,  on November 4,  2024,  second anniversary of the election that brought the narrow hard-right crackpot Netanyahu government into power, we Israelis will at long last send all the scoundrels home for good, forever, in new elections.