There is one, and only one, way to end the corruption and cronyism in the House and the Senate:  impose Term Limits.  The President is limited to 2 terms, and many states do it, so why doesn't the Legislative branch to this?  It is simple a case of the fox watching the hen house, and until the American people accept this reality and insist on term limits via a Constitutional amendment, our political system will be status quo, plus or minus we collectively wake up.

Even Jeff Flake, who I've met and like more than most politicians, couldn't resist the urge to remain in power forever despite promising he'd leave after three terms.  Sure, he had his reasons (don't they all), but the fact remains that if we can't trust a guy like Jeff Flake, who can we trust.

One issue with doing this is the lack of qualified, motivated candidates to replace incumbants, right?  WRONG.  The reason candidates don't emerge from the populace is that they can't, for the most part, begin to compete in terms of the financial demands of a campaign.  To run against a reasonably popular incumbent is a losing proposition, and an expensive one at that.

If Jeff Flake wasn't permitted to run again, he wouldn't have, so there's that.   But what he might have done is identify a candidate in his district that shares his limited government values, and help that guy or girl out.  Politicians keep their campaign contributions when they lose (somehow they end up having $1,167.222.34 in the treasury and, dog-gone-it, they just have to have $1,167,222.35 in expenses!  Isn't that sumthin'?)!

My thought is that when a politician runs of out terms he should return the leftover campaign money to a campaign fund in his district for his party to distribute for candidates who are worthy but don't have the financial wherewithal to run for office.  

I'm not for the Campaign Reform Laws of McCain and his lot, but short of returning the excess donations to all contributors on a proportionate basis using a formula 2 pages long, there is no other practical solution that I can identify.

Yes, it gives an advantage, potentially, to the new candidate from the incumbent's party who runs following, but that is far from giving the same guy a free ticket to Washington every 2-4years.  Perpetual incumbency is the root of all evil in Washington, in my opinion.

Responsible parties with contrasting opinions are encouraged to comment.