Posted on 10/25/2009 3:08:57 PM PDT by MitchellC
Breazeale pledges to stay in Congress three terms or pay $250,000 to private charity
RALEIGH – Iraq war veteran and congressional hopeful Will Breazeale on Thursday became the first candidate in the nation to take a bonded term limits pledge, agreeing to donate $250,000 of his own assets to a private charity if, after being elected, he doesn’t limit himself to three terms in office.
Breazeale, a Republican hoping to unseat 7th District Democratic Rep. Mike McIntyre next year, made the announcement at a noon press conference outside the New Hanover County Government Center in Wilmington.
“I see [bonded term limits] bringing about the largest power shift in this country since we became a country,” Breazeale in a telephone interview shortly after the press conference. “This will be the standard one day. If you don’t put up personal net worth, then you will not be elected.”
Breazeale partnered with the Alliance for Bonded Term Limits, a national nonpartisan group, to sign the pledge. Alliance president and board chairman John Skvarla told Carolina Journal that bonded term limits are about accountability.
“This is a politician’s word, integrity, and ethics on the line with this pledge,” Skvarla said.
Breazeale is the only candidate in the country to sign the pledge, which allows those vying for elected office to voluntarily bond “their term limit promise with personal assets in advance of the election,” according to the alliance’s Web site.
Breazeale, who now works as a commercial airline pilot, promised to give $250,000 to the Cape Fear Volunteer Center in Wilmington if he breaks his three-term pledge.
“Even though I know I won’t be breaking my pledge, it was a scary moment signing that $250,000 check today,” Breazeale said.
Last year, the three-time Iraq war veteran lost to McIntyre, who has served in Congress seven terms, 69 percent to 31 percent.
The state’s 7th Congressional District encompasses much of southeast North Carolina, stretching from Fayetteville in the north to Wilmington in the south. The district is a mixed bag politically, according to The Almanac of American Politics 2010, and tends to vote “Republican in national contests but still Democratic in some state races.”
John McCain won the district 52 percent to 47 percent over Barack Obama in the 2008 presidential election.
McIntyre, first elected in 1996, is a member of the Blue Dog Coalition, a group of conservative-leaning Democratic lawmakers in the House. “His voting record — conservative among Democrats, especially on cultural issues — is centrist in the House as a whole,” the Almanac says.
Aside from pushing for all candidates and elected officials to take a bonded term limits pledge, Breazeale said his top three priorities in Congress would be replacing federal income and sales taxes with the Fair Tax (a national retail sales tax), ensuring victory in Afghanistan, and passing “a fair health plan.”
“It’s far-reaching,” Breazeale said of his health care proposal. “It asks sacrifice of everyone, but it reduces the national debt because it finds a way to eliminate Medicaid, probably the government program most fraught with fraud.”
McIntyre’s spokesman, Dean Mitchell, didn’t return a phone call and e-mails seeking comment.
David N. Bass is an associate editor of Carolina Journal.
He’ll still get his lifetime retirement and healthcare package. Pretty sweet.
I know the guys who started The Alliance for Bonded Term Limits. Its a great idea.
Strange stunt. Hope he wins but this isn’t going to push him over the finish line.
He bettter not be good, and then keep the pledge.
I know Freepers who will denigrate him as a quitter.
Didn’t McIntyre vote against Cap and Trade?
Without going to look, I’m sure he voted against it. For a Democrat, McIntyre is hard to complain about (I would bet he’s in the top 5 Dem ACU scores).
He may actually be the last of the true Southern Dems, as opposed to all of the hardcore liberals in NC’s House delegation who try to pass themselves off as that, with the folksy ‘aw shucks’ stuff.
But he caucuses with Nancy Pelosi, so he needs to either switch parties or be defeated.
In my birthplace district, in what has proved to be a decisive election back in the 1990s, FOB & Hill Capps, Lois (D) pledged to abide by term limits. The younger Tom Bordanaro (R) did not. Guess which one is still in office (after ignoring her term limit pledge)?
Those in the class of '94 who abided by the term limits pledge plank in the Contract With America fatally weakened the house just when it came time that they could actually accomplish something.
The Supremes have ruled that term limits are unconstitutional. Why does this continue to be an issue?
I’d love to see McIntyre switch parties!
McIntyre is my Congressman. As noted upthread, he's basically a good guy as far as conservatives are concerned. However, even if he wanted to there's no way he could switch parties and keep his seat. The North Carolina Democrat machine has this state and it's people by the throat and would destroy him if he did that. They'd replace him with a pliable party hack they could be certain to control as an object lesson to any other would-be "traitors" to party loyalty.
As others have stated, term-limits are not the solution, re-educating the American people is.
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