We’ve heard a lot of negatives lately about “career politicians.” How we should send them home and replace them with candidates who have not yet been corrupted by political office.
This movement is heavily promoted by the tea party and similar organizations. This is the same group of people who revere the Founding Fathers, ceaselessly quote Ronald Reagan and view Sarah Palin as the ultimate conservative leader. Many campaigns across the nation are even running against “career politicians” as Ronald Reagan conservatives.
The irony of this “anti-experience” argument lies in the political leaders that these conservatives idolize. A quick rundown of several revered, conservative Republicans show that they too are “career politicians.”
Reagan was a “career politician” by anyone’s definition. Reagan was in office 16 years and spent another four years hosting a political radio talk show.
If you have visited a tea party supporter’s Facebook page, it’s likely you’ve seen a Thomas Jefferson quote. Jefferson, our nation’s third president, spent a whopping 36 years in office! John Adams spent 17 years in office.
In case you are wondering, Palin has spent 13 years in office beginning at the age of 28. I have yet to see a definition of a “career” politician, but I am comfortable assuming all of these examples will suffice.
The anti-experience political campaigns are not only hypocritical, they are counter-productive to everything the tea party and similar organizations are trying to accomplish. While trying to hop the tidal wave of frustrated voters, these campaigns are often damaging good elected officials who share the same conservative ideological outlook.
Good and bad elected officials are not determined by the number of years in office. Many benefit from experience that can only be gained while serving multiple terms. As with everything, there are exceptions to this; let’s not be so quick to throw the baby out with the bath water.
I write this not to imply the anti-“career” politicians are bad candidates, I simply point out the long-term irrationality in this campaign strategy.
In recent months I’ve seen multiple qualified, conservative candidates, who exhibit the very values tea party voters are looking for, receive harsh criticisms for their time in office. This frustrates me; I hope we can focus on issues and voting records and not talking points during this critical time for America.
While national legislation may not represent the values you share, your local member of Congress may have been voting on principle every day. I know mine was.
Seth Weathers is the founder and president of Gwinnett Broadcasting Co. He has also worked as a political consultant for GOP candidates, including Rob Woodall and Eric Johnson.
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