Fewer elections, better leaders

Elections for the U.S. House of Representatives, as well as manystates' lower legislative bodies, are held every two years. Today,with political action committees, soft money and negative campaigningdominating the landscape, holding a two-year office amounts to havinga full-time job of running for office and raising funds.

As a politician, you are constantly either trying to retire debtfrom the last election or gearing up for the next one. And often,raising that kind of cash requires one to seek funding fromnarrow-minded special-interest groups, which won't give money thenext time around if you vote against their interests - even if yourvote satisfied the interests of the people of your district.

So how do we cut the special interests out of the loop, withouttinkering too much with the way campaigns are funded? Simple. Makeall state and federal two-year offices into four-year offices. Thosewho win elections won't have to spend as much time raising money,since their next election is more than three years away.The legislators can spend more time doing what they are supposedto be doing: representing the districts that elected them. Fewerelections means less money spent, which gives us a better chance ofhaving legislators who represent our interests, and not thenarrow-minded slants of the far left and far right special interests.In addition, I believe that political campaigns are entirely toolong. Let's limit campaigns for political primaries and generalelections to three calendar months. If the Illinois primary is July15, no paid political TV ad can be aired, no paid political newspaperad or editorial endorsement printed, or paid political roadsidebillboard posted before April 15. If you can't sell your candidacyto the electorate in three months, your message is bad.The same would hold for general elections. The less time theyhave to work with, the less money they'll spend. The less money theyspend means the less money they have to raise, and the fewerprinciples they have to compromise.Michael Shalloo, BridgeviewBlack hole of taxesMany special interest groups and newspaper editors are callingfor "leadership" from Springfield in promoting tax increases tobetter fund education. The unwarranted assumption here is thatincreased funding for education brings about higher educationalachievement. But that does beg the question: Does increased spendingin education increase student achievement? The answer is aresounding "no."So if higher spending doesn't cause greater academicachievement, what does? Academic achievement has been shown to becorrelated with ability, age, motivation, time spent learning,quality of instruction, home, classroom, social group, out-of-schoolpeer group and out-of-school time.Most of those situations can be nurtured through parental orlocal control. But the educational funding proposal that the specialinterests endorse would take away local control. He who pays thepiper calls the tune, and if educational spending shifts from apreponderance of local property taxes to state income taxes, thenlocal control also will move even more away from the community and tothe power of the state.And when educational quality gets no better, then the educationbureaucrats and the teachers' unions will clamor for even highertaxes. The property tax reduction now proposed is illusory, limitedand will be temporary.Kenneth Prazak, East DundeeHardworkin' folksOnce again, newspaper articles about labor costs at McCormickPlace fail to tell the whole story. First of all, the contractor ischarging twice our hourly wage to the exhibitor. That's how theystick it to them. The McPier Authority just jacked up the price offloor space per square foot. That how's they stick it to theexhibitor. This all happens before we do any work for the exhibitor.Now I'll give you a few examples of why we have been paidovertime.For the auto show, workers usually work four or five days puttingthe show in, and two days taking it out. That's six or seven days ofwork. But the 10 days the show runs, we are unemployed. So in 2 1/2weeks, we get only one week of work.On the recent manufacturing show, I worked a Sunday from 9 p.m. to 4a.m. So that was three hours of double time and four hours of timeand a half. That works out to a gross pay of $213. Not a bad day,but it was the only day I worked. That was not a good week.Mayor Daley mentioned GES Exposition Services and Freeman Decoratingas contractors (news story, March 19), but there are a few othersmall ones. What I'm trying to get at is that it is possible to work35 hours with two different contractors during all seven days of theweek, and with the changes under consideration, not receive anyovertime. How many of your readers would be willing to work a70-hour week with no overtime and no time off?We are not greedy monsters. We're just trying to feed ourfamilies. Your jokes about how many people it takes to screw in alight bulb aren't funny to people just trying to make a living(editorial, March 21).Tony Karl, Edison ParkA vote for CarolSteve Neal (column, March 11) hit the nail on the head when hewrote about the improved political prospects for Sen. CarolMoseley-Braun (D-Ill.)."Just wild about Carol" (headline) mentioned that Mayor Daleyand former Sen. Paul Simon are among her big boosters.The column overlooked, however, the most important reason thather prospects are looking better: Her outstanding track record as aU.S. senator.Moseley-Braun and President Clinton are leading the call formore federal support for elementary and secondary education. Thepresident mentioned her "crumbling school" initiative in his State ofthe Union address. On the environmental front, the president alsopraised her proposal to offer tax breaks to the businesses that cleanup polluted property and revitalize communities.Of those and other issues, Moseley-Braun has written a record oflegislative accomplishments that make me proud to have her representIllinois in the Senate.John E. Clay, WilmetteWatch your walletWhen you see a labor-related issue favored by the Republicans,grab your wallets, because everything they do is for the corporationsand the employers. In this case we are talking about the comp-timebill. Organized labor fought long and hard for the 40-hour workweek, time-and-a-half for work done after 40 hours, and in some casesdouble time for Sundays and holidays. They did not fight for comptime.If the comp time bill became a law, would the employer payinterest on the value of the comp time? Absolutely not. Whenbusiness is bad an employer could, without fear of retribution,threaten to lay off a worker unless he took comp time. If theemployer or corporation went bankrupt or out of business, you couldkiss your comp time goodbye. Would the corporation compute the comptime equal to the entire amount of overtime earned? Who would keeptrack of the comp time? Could they be trusted?If the comp time bill is passed, do not take the option of comptime overtime pay, because the next thing corporate America will wantis for the employees to work overtime for straight-time pay. As aworker, protect what you have; don't give the corporations any morebreaks.Louis Stehlik, WoodridgeDemocracy for saleThe suggestion that we provide free air time to candidates forfederal offices to reduce the influence of campaign contributions onour elections confuses the problem. The problem is not that peoplewith too much money are trying to buy influence, but that there istoo much influence to buy.If government were not micro-managing every aspect of ourbusiness and personal lives there would be less of a compelling needfor individuals or corporations to attempt to sway the direction ofgovernment. Cut down the number of ways government controls andaffects our lives and we will cut down on the attempts to control andaffect government.Daniel John Sobieski,Garfield Ridge