Overview:
• Former President Joe Biden's decision to withdraw from running for a second term has sparked calls for mandatory retirement age and term limits for aging members of Congress as 28% of them are over 65.
• Biden's move, based on age and mental acuity concerns, has brought attention to the issue of aging senators and representatives serving on crucial committees, impacting daily lives.
• This has prompted serious consideration for mandatory retirement age and term limits.
Joe Biden has done an honorable thing. He set aside his ego and put America first. He has withdrawn from running for a second term as Commander-in-Chief. His mental acuity decline, his physical stamina, and his age were the major issues.
He did the right thing for the good of the nation. There are others serving the nation, serving in Congress that should consider bowing out for the good of the country.
More than a quarter of House and Senate members should consider retirement. Twenty-eight percent are over the age of 65. Many of them serve on committees vital to the operations of our country, our economy, agriculture, energy and climate, and our relationship with other nations.
Six are ages 86 to 90; fifteen are ages 81 to 85, and forty-five are 75 to 80. The work of these committees touches our daily lives in personal ways.
Here are a few of the crucial committees that these aging senators and representatives serve on:
The Committee on Appropriations; the Committee on Commerce, and Transportation; the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions; the Committee on Finance, the Committee of Foreign Relations; the Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship, the Committee on the Judiciary, and the Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs; and the list goes on.
It is the legislative branch that touches our lives to the greatest extent.
Mandatory retirement age and term limits have received light discussion and scant media attention; it’s pass time to give it serious considerations.
Can a 90-year-old, an 89-year-old, an 87-year-old, or 86-year-old senator or representative come to the job each day fresh, energetic, cognitively sharp and ready to give their best for the good of the country?
We saw Joe Biden lose focus, mumble answers and Donald Trump slur his speech and trail off into incoherent musings; we saw Mitch McConnell have a mental pause in the middle of a speech. What signs of diminished capacity are we missing from senators and congressional leaders who are not always in front of the camera?
It should make you wonder.
President Joe Biden is 82. Chuck Grassley, R. IA, is 90 and serves on the Committee on Agriculture, Committee on Finance, and is ranking member on the Committee on the Budget, and more. The 86-year-old Hal Rogers and Mitch McConnell, 82, both serve in vital, demanding roles. We should monitor their vitality.
Rep. Grace Napolitano, D.CA, Delegate Eleanor Norton, D. DC, and Bill Pascrell, D. NJ, are all 87 years old.
An adage is that “with age comes wisdom.”
Wisdom recognizes when we have stayed too long; wisdom acknowledges that essential skills necessary for valued contributions have diminished; wisdom does not ignore the signs written in large letters — IT MAY BE TIME TO TURN IN YOUR PAPERS.
Editor’s Note: The views expressed in this commentary piece do not necessarily the express the opinions of The Cincinnati Herald.