Run for President - Give up Senate or House Seat.

[GoneOffShore]

In an ideal world of my own devising - If someone declares as a candidate they should be obliged to give up any currently held elected office. For instance, here in Philadelphia, if you're on City Council and you declare as a candidate for mayor, you have to give up your council seat.

Edit to add - Same rule would apply if you're the governor of a state. Declare as candidate for President - give up the governor's office.

If this was instituted on a Federal level, it would prevent a lot of the whack balls from running and also shorten the Presidential election/re-election season.

I'd also like to see the election campaign shortened down to 6 weeks maximum. No campaigning, no issue ads, NO FUNDRAISING until 6 weeks before an election. Plus a law for PAC contributions, ads, etc restricted to the same time period.

I know, I know. I'm just a dreamy old hippy, but hey, it could be a good thing.

[Uben]

1. If only.........I live in Texas

..and that would mean no more Good hair Perry.

[Laura PourMeADrink]

7. was wondering what he would do. Sanchez is the Dem for gov

if Perry wins the nomination wouldn't he have to give up the governorship?

wonder when the repuke convention is. guess if he doesn't get it, he would still
gave time to campaign and win (throw up now)

[Uben]

8. He's such a grifter....

I don't know for sure if he would have to give it up just for a nomination. I'm sure he is going to protect his job by any means possible because he has enriched himself greatly as governor.

[Obamanaut]

2. If it is an incumbent trying to retain his/her position, absolutely no use

of office staff or equipment or use of franking privilege for anything that has to do with the campaign - no sly asides stuck in at the end or a district update pamphlet, newsletter, nothing.

Challengers have to pay the full freight, so should the incumbent.

[Ken Burch]

3. The problem is, that would leave the candidate unemployed

and might have the effect of making the presidential campaign even more of a millionaire's club.

What good, for example, would it have done to make Dennis Kucinich give up his House seat?

[GoneOffShore]

6. Should have put in a thing about publicly financed campaigns.

Along with limiting the amount that could be spent on ads.

No candidate, PAC or individual could spend more than x dollars on publicity. Sliding scale based on the race - allot units to national, state, regional, local campaigns. Candidates could spend all of their CU's (campaign units) wherever they choose in whatever medium they choose, but once they use up their allotted units, that's it. PAC's, union's, private individuals would not be able to air/publish/promulgate more than X ads in any single market and would be restricted from airing/publishing/producing ads more than six weeks before and during the week prior to the election.

Making a declared candidate give up their seat would make them think more seriously about running. Keep the "vanity candidates" out. If you're serious and think you've got a chance, you should be more than willing to give up your sinecure. If your constituents think you're worth the effort, you'll get your Senate or House seat back at the next election.

Corrected for stupid grammatical mistake.

[unblock]

4. sure, we can call it the sarah palin rule.

[sofa king]

5. I foresee problems with that.

I believe Bob Dole is the poster child for that effort. The election of 1996 took him out of the Senate and sent him on his way to television commercials about his under-performing Snuffleupagus, which turned out to be the apex of his career.

Unfortunately, in hindsight it appears as if Bob Dole was also the last reasonable Republican Senator, ever. So we lost something in that deal, too.

More importantly, if the candidate is already an elected official, that candidate still has a duty to represent the people who already voted that candidate into office. I think that worked against Bob Dole.

Of course, there was a reason why Dole resigned, which is that he planned a big showboating year in the Senate to bolster his campaign, but Robert Byrd ran procedural rings around him so that he had little choice but to resign or be tagged as the majority leader of a Senate that couldn't even pass a resolution.