What if the same rules applied to everybody?

Scarecrow is really onto to something here. This dovetails nicely with a post I just put up at Newshoggers about the failure of our Congresslizards to take any responsibility for the current mess they allowed Bush to make of this country. How about they hold themselves to the same standards they seek to impose on everyone else? Scarecrow has a good list of suggestions about where to start.

1. Reduce everyone's pay to $1 per year until the recession is officially over.

2. Increase the deductible/co-payment requirements on their health plans to 100% and only decrease it in steps as more and more uninsured Americans are provided with full health coverage equivalent to that Congress now receives.

3. Suspend all government contributions to and payments from retirement funds for all current and ex-Congresscritters and senior Executive Branch officials. Restore them only on the passage of comprehensive retirement reform, beginning with broader funding of, and greater benefits from Social Security. Seek repayments from anyone named Bush and all those who supported his privatization of SS.

4. Replace all government provided limos and other transportation perks with bicycles, and do not provide auto transportation for officials until Congress has passed and the President signed a comprehensive energy and global climate change bill.

5. Enact a statute prohibiting any senior government official from being susequently hired in any private sector position unless and until the nation's unemployment rate returns to 5 percent or less.

That's some post-partisan thinking I can support. Our system is fine, it's our entrenched politicians who have failed us. One might think if they were forced to suffer the consequences of their bad decisions, they would be much more motivated to put aside their personal political considerations and come up with some realistic solutions.

[More posts daily at The Newshoggers and The Detroit News.]