Excerpts from a chain email that came my way:

When young men and women dedicate 20 years of service in the U.S. Armed Forces, they get 50% of their top pay as an annual retirement income. For this stipend, they risk their lives protecting our freedom. Meanwhile, politicians only have to hold their office for 1 term to receive a life long pension that continues to pay the current salary of current office holder.

For too long we have been too complacent about the workings of Congress. Many citizens have no idea that members of Congress can retire with the same pay after only one term, that they specifically exempted themselves from many of the laws they have passed (such as being exempt from any fear of prosecution for sexual harassment) while ordinary citizens must live under those laws. The latest is to exempt themselves from the Healthcare Reform... in all of its forms. Somehow, that doesn't seem logical. We do not have an elite that is above the law. I truly don't care if they are Democrat, Republican, Independent or whatever. The self-serving must stop.