Speaking of the Chicago Tribune, they’ve published a declaration of all the reasons Gov. Rod Blagojevich should be thrown out of office. In conjunction, they’re also gathering comments from readers (until 2 p.m. today) on whether the state constitution should be amended in 2008 to allow us to recall the governor before his term is up in 2010.
What do you think? Should we pass the necessary legislation to allow us to recall Blago and get him out of office as soon as possible?
Yes.
Absolutely!
A recall provision would be good.
Let’s not stop with the governor. How about broadening the scope by giving the voter the ability to recall any elected offical for dereliction of duty?
I agree with Karrie, the people should have the option to be able to remove any and all elected officials. Let’s amend the state constitution, but say no to a convention.
Would this ‘amendment’ include any Peoria Republicans? I would like to ‘recall’ Shock before he even makes it to congress. Can we send him back to college?
Isn’t there already a way to impeach the governor?
I’d like to see him go as much as anyone, but until we either vote him out or go through the impeachment process I’m a bit wary of changing the constitution on this without at least a failed attempt at using the means already there.
Impeachment would require the cooperation of the legislature. It is a legislative removal. Recall originates directly from the citizens and is put to a popular vote by the public, bypassing the legislature. Recall is removal by the citizenry.
We already have a way to kick Blago out of office. It’s called “an election.” We had an opportunity to remove him from office back in 2006, but we chose to not do do because he was able to prove to us that she happened to be a republican at the same time George Ryan was. Besides, she looked funny in those campaign ads.
Yes. The sooner, the better.
Billy’s solution (an election) won’t work for the reasons he alludes to – voters don’t get much of a choice. Perhaps we should reform the election process by offering “none of the above” as a choice, and forcing the parties to nominate someone else if “none of the above” wins?? Better yet, we could get rid of the parties. Then many (granted, not all) in those mindless crowds that would (a) vote for the Democrat if he/she were a dead skunk, or (b) vote for the Republican if he/she were a dead skunk, would have to educate themselves on the issues or stay home.
The ability to recall a politician would be spectacular. Karrie nailed it on the head, but I would remove the ‘dereliction of duty’ and replace it with ‘for any reason.’ It would be nice to vacate the Gov.’s office of Mr. Blago.
The law as proposed needs work though. It takes 12 % of the last vote to remove the Governor, but 20 % to remove a legislator of judge. I think it should be the same for everyone.