The search. The recovery. The flowers. The Kennedy Compound flag at half-mast. The memorial service at sea. The grieving nation. Day and night for a week straight. The top story of every newspaper, Web site, and television newscast. And yes, now the topic has breached the electronic pages of Capitol Action Weekly.

But why? Why so much hype? Why are we glued to our televisions 24 hours per day waiting for the latest "breaking" news? The news has come and gone -- another Kennedy has died a tragic death -- and now it's time to move on. It's time to let the family mourn in peace, without television cameras following its every step.

-Gabe

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When California voters decided in 1990 to limit the terms of the 120 members of the Assembly and Senate, the Legislature was viewed as rife with corruption, disconnected from the lives of ordinary Californians, bloated by staff and enviable pensions and an insiders' club that perpetuated its own power and engaged in political hijinx at the expense of an exasperated citizenry.

The criminal cases stemming from the FBI's "sting" of the Legislature were in full flood, the power of Assembly Speaker Willie Brown was at its zenith and the intrigues of the Capitol seemed to make daily front-page news.

But term limits, and the accompanying cuts in the Legislature's budget and staff, did little to address those problems. It's true that by limiting terms to three two-year stints in the Assembly and two four-year terms in the Senate that veteran lawmakers were pushed from office. The most famous of these, of course, was Brown, who was forced out of the Legislature and later became mayor of San Francisco.

To that extent, term limits succeeded: Veteran legislators were ousted and fresh blood came in to Sacramento.

But consider the cost: Legislating, like any other occupation, demands experience and savvy. When the experienced lawmakers left, they were replaced by neophytes who, however bright, faced a sharp learning curve. The new legislators depended ever more heavily on staff and the information of lobbyists. The self-assurance that comes from years of battling over issues and representing contstituents was denied the newcomers, who never really established solid power bases. The years of the great Assembly speakers, whether Democratic or Republican, are over. Now, there is no effective counterpoint in the "people's house" to the executive power of the governor. As the current governor, Democrat Gray Davis made clear last week, the Legislature is really only a debating society whose purpose is to rubber stamp the desires of the governor.

The Legislature, particularly the Assembly, is filled with few people who have a sense of statewide issues. Indeed, few Californians even know who the members of the Legislature are, beyond their own representatives and, perhaps, the Assembly speaker or leader of the Senate. Even the members of the Press Corps have difficulty following the changing array of new faces.

Term limits were backed originally by conservative Republicans who sought to break the Democrats' lock on the Legislature. With one very brief exception, however, Democrats have maintained, even increased, their control of the Legislature. And barring a major upset, they will continue to do so after the newly reapportioned districts take effect in the 2002 elections.

The only real impact of term limits seems to have been to replace experienced lawmakers with inexperienced lawmakers. Are we better off for it?

Lobbyists complain privately that the quality and continuity of staffing in the Legislature, particularly the Assembly, have suffered as the staffers change with the shift in bosses. Bill analyses, to cite one small example, have diminished in quality, according to the lobbyists, some lawmakers and other professional observers who rely on them.

Finally, there is the question of fairness. The members of Congress are not bound by term limits. Why should state officials be booted from office while Congress members aren't?

There's something wrong here.

I was pleased to see you take up the subject of HMO reform [http://www.capenq.com/newsletter/archives/1999/july99/0302.html]. There are two important bills being proposed that would absolutely skyrocket health insurance costs even higher than they already are -- thus denying coverage to even more Californians. These are SB 468 and AB 88. They will make it mandatory for health insurers to cover mental health "treatment" to the same extent as physical treatment.

Well, anyone who saw the recent "60 Minutes" program -- "Unsafe Haven" -- has just a sampling of the rampant fraud in this industry. Seventy-nine percent of the fraud cases collected on by the government are in the field of mental health. Last year alone 86 psychs were jailed for either fraud, patient abuse (usually rape) or other offenses. The most common is fraud: charging for services never delivered, for patients never seen, all the travesties seen on the "60 Minutes" program and more.

I encourage your readers to write their legislators to kill these and any other "mental health parity" bills.

Marc Ferreira
Sunnyvale, Calif.

To the Editor,

Bear in mind that some HMO "reform" bills are meant to protect the economic interests of the supporters (from labor unions representing nurses to specialist physicians to trial lawyers) and are not always "consumer" related. The Governor's slow pace on defining an HMO reform agenda is baffling, to be sure, but he would be smart to seek a core group of meaningful reforms (binding external review, a strong new department, second opinions for surgeries, for example) rather than embrace every piece of the alleged "HMO reform" agenda pushed by anti-managed care groups.

Beau Carter
Executive Director
Integrated Healthcare Association

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