“You can choose not to run, but that’s not retirement.”
I might agree, except that in some cases elections are formalities and they’d be certain to hold their seat for the 40th or whatever term had they not bowed out. Retirement is a perfectly acceptable term for that.
“Congress is NOT a career choice.”
Yes it is, as obviously many make a career out of it. I’m, not sure what you’re getting at here, exactly. Congressmen don’t decide on their own whether they’re going to be elected, although often enough for the ones who have been in there long enough election is all but guaranteed. But it’s not as if in other lines of work people unilaterally decide whether they’ll stay employed. The entity employing you, or if you’re self-employed the market, may decide to chuck you out of a job just as surely as the electorate may fail to re-elect a senator.
A career choice: A career I choose to work towards and remain in through my own hard work. Not a career choice: Continued employment is directly related to a popularity contest held every two or six years.
Service as a representative or a senator was never created nor intended to be a 'full time job,' nor would it be if the federal government limited itself to the powers granted it by the constitution. It is by corrupting this ideal that many of these asinine and idiotic ideals keep pumping out of Washington, as people try to justify their extended efforts there.
As I said, I certainly view them as the worst of the worst when it comes to public employee unions, liberal or conservative.