One Term Pledge?

In the April 2, 2007 issue of National Review, Ramesh Ponnuru wrote in the interest of the McCain campaign that the Senator should pledge to serve only one term as President if elected. By doing this, he writes, “McCain would implicitly be placing himself on the right side of the divide between those politicians who run to be someone and those who run to do something…that ’something’ would be to see America through an especially dangerous phase of the war on terrorism and, secondly, to address the nation’s looming fiscal wreck.”

I have to agree that a one-term pledge would be beneficial. It would enhance his image and reputation as an unconventional politician, especially among independents, who have had it with Washington and the poisoned politics that have come to fester therein.

I think it would also assuage some conservatives’ concerns that Sen. McCain is trying to remake the Republican Party anew, especially if he were to pick a young and enterprising conservative who would, presumably, run in his own right in 2012.

Finally, it will define him as the statesman in this race; not a messiah or someone solely interested in his own political advancement, but one solely interested in serving his country and helping it resolve some of its most pressing challenges and issues. He commonly says on the stump and in his victory speeches that he owes everything to his country, is proud to have served it for decades, and asks only to serve it a little while longer. Pledging to serve only one term as President would only confirm and enhance that sentiment, and I think it would be rewarded by the American voter.