Outrage of the year

THE STUFF that gets passed in the closing hours of a legislative session in the Great (and unnoticing) State of Arkansas . . . .

There’s no telling what all our shiftier legislators will put over on We the People while we’re diverted by the happy prospect of the Ledge’s finally closing up shop and going home so the whole state can breathe a sigh of relief, and the women and children can come out again.

This year, under cover of the usual last-minute rush to adjourn a regular session, our solons agreed to put a little ol’ constitutional amendment on the ballot, one that won’t do much of any importance (Quick! Look at that horse climbing the marble steps inside the Capitol!) except, uh, ahem, extend the term limits for state representatives from 6 to 16 years and for state senators from 8 to 16 years. The total time each could serve in both House and Senate combined would be 16 years, rather than the current 14 years.

But no need to bother your pretty little heads about that minor detail, dear voters. You just leave it to the honorables to look out for your interests (or at least their own), and you good people go on about your business. Move on, folks. Nothing to see here. Surely you’ve got pressing matters to attend to at home . . . .

What an outrage. Also an act of insolence, arrogance and general sneakiness. To top it off, the honorables (that’s a title, not a description) wrapped this power grab in a grab-bag of a proposed constitutional amendment called the Elected Officials Ethics, Transparency and Financial Reform Amendment.

There’s no telling what a piece of legislation is by its mere title. The more noble it sounds, the more ignoble its aim can be. For when Doctor Johnson, he of the English dictionary, defined patriotism as the last refuge of a scoundrel, he overlooked the rich possibilities for chicanery offered by words like Ethics, Transparency and Reform.

If this slick maneuver is as example of ethics, transparency and reform, what would trickiness, opacity and a return to the Bad Old Days be?

All told, this quiet end run around the letter and spirit of term limits is almost as outrageous as our failure to spot it earlier. Yep, your ever-observant editorialists here at the Democrat-Gazette, Arkansas’ Newspaper no less, let it get by us without our sounding the alarm. Talk about sleepy watchdogs.

Our deepest apologies, Gentle Readers, for being asleep at the switch as this outrage went roaring right past us. Now that the sales tax on groceries is being whittled away, this proposition is a prime nominee for the next Shame of Arkansas.

We are so sorry to have missed this betrayal of the public interest back when it was committed. But not half as sorry as the voters of Arkansas should make every legislator who helped put it on the ballot. It deserves to go down in resounding defeat come Election Day 2014. Please, dear voter, make a note.