Californians must no longer have recourse to the recall election. If Golden Staters still have the recall, surely they’d be using it to oust their useless mayors who have allowed their once-beautiful cities to degenerate into filth and ruin. They’d also be mounting a recall of their new governor, Gavin Newsom.

Back in 2003, before the mass exodus to Texas, there were still enough decent Californians remaining to recall and oust Gov. Gray Davis. Davis’s replacement, Arnold Schwarzenegger, might have become a terrific governor had he been paired with a decent legislature. But the Governator didn’t have a decent legislature; it was populated with progressives.

New Yorkers don’t have recourse to the recall, which is a pity, as it seems that most New York City residents think Mayor de Blasio is the worst mayor ever. So they must put up with him until the next election. New York’s governor is also a piece of work. Perhaps New Yorkers should consider instituting the recall.

New York City lost its bid for a new Amazon facility due to the efforts of one of its new representatives in Congress, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. New Yorkers in Cortez’ district might find it hateful that they’ve lost a chance at a good job while their representative can’t be removed from her job until the next election. Sad to say, but the recall is not available for federal officeholders.

Some Americans might resent that unavailability, given the performance this year of the U.S. House of Representatives. The new Democrat-controlled House is so intent on impeaching the president that it can’t do the business of the People. If the possibility of recall and removal were hanging over House members’ heads, maybe the chamber wouldn’t be so dysfunctional. In 2011, Rasmussen Reports ran “Expand Voters’ Rights to Recall Politicians” by Howard Rich that’s worth reading, especially for its gloss of the history of the recall.

Giving the People the power to recall federal officeholders would involve amending the Constitution. Creating such a right to recall could be folded into a term limits amendment, such as the Citizen Legislature Act proposed in the Contract with America.

Apart from the expense, the problem with recalls is that they’re a lot of trouble. You have to gather signatures and jump through hoops to mount a recall of a duly elected official. But, if one doesn’t want recalls to become routine, the process should be difficult. If made sufficiently arduous, then the recall could be available for all elective offices in America, including on the federal level.

Recalling a representative should be far less of a chore than recalling a senator or a governor, as it would involve just a single congressional district. Recalling a U.S. president would be about 435 times more difficult than recalling a member of the U.S. House. As we’re seeing, impeachment is also fraught with difficulty. Section 4 of the 25th Amendment could be used to relieve a president of his duties, but that’s also difficult.

Rather than mess around with a recall, an impeachment, the 25th, or some other means of removing a problem president (perhaps a coup d'état or putsch), wouldn’t it be far better to get a decent president on the first go-around through a regular election? But what good is any kind of election, be it primary, general, or recall, when one doesn’t have decent choices on the ballot?

I’m from the private sector and I’m here to help.

None of the top-tier candidates in the Democrat field are fit to be president; they are all too old, too infirm, too crazed, and most of all, they are too un-American. Take Bernie Sanders. If you want to know just how un-American Bernie Sanders is, then read “A Totalitarian Marxist, Not a ‘Social Democrat’,” which appeared on Nov. 4 at FrontPage Magazine.

Democrats need to reject their entire crop of candidates running for their presidential nomination -- they need a new candidate. Democrats need to go outside of not only the D.C. swamp but also outside of all career politicians. Delegates to the Democratic convention need to do what the GOP did in 2016 and nominate a non-politician. They need to nominate a businessman, like Bill Gates, or someone from the military, like Gen. James Mattis, or anyone who doesn’t disgust or scare half the country. And most of all, the Dems need to nominate someone who doesn’t promise to “fundamentally transform” America.

By nominating an outsider, what I’m suggesting is that Democratic delegates do what primary voters did in 2016 and forced on GOP delegates. But how would Democrats get an outsider nominee if none throws his/her hat in the ring and enters the race? Democratic convention delegates must be prepared to override the primary voters, and draft an outsider.

But delegates might need to mount their draft on the first round of voting, because their new rules bring the superdelegates back in to take part in subsequent rounds. Starting with the second round of voting, regular delegates will be strapped to their seats with duct tape watching a rerun of The Return of the Swamp Thing.

The reason the current crop of Democratic candidates for president is so godawful is because of the current primary/caucus system, which is a legacy of the “reforms” of 1972. The current system allows anyone to grab a nomination by going around party insiders and directly to voters. It’s what allows a non-Democrat, like Sanders, to run for the Democratic nomination.

That such an unrepentant commie “party crasher” could run for the presidential nomination of a major American political party is proof positive that the current primary system needs to be tossed out. If Americans were so dim as to actually elect Sanders, we’d have finally shown ourselves to be no longer capable of self-government. (Hopefully, the military would not allow Bolshevik Bernie anywhere near the White House, and put him under house arrest in one of his dachas.) Our weak parties have lost control of the nomination process. To produce better candidates and nominees, we need to create stronger parties.                              

Just in case you’re wondering, this kid intends to vote a straight Republican ballot next November and suggests you do the same. And that goes even if the Democrats nominate an outsider. The only way any real American would consider voting for a Democrat presidential nominee is if by some miracle they nominated someone of the caliber of Victor Davis Hanson. But it’s difficult to imagine the Dems doing such a thing; their delegates would need to be in extremis, on their hundredth round of voting or something.

Regardless of whom the Democrats nominate, the most important votes Americans will cast next year will not be for the president, but for their members of Congress. The current U.S. House, controlled by Democrats and led by Speaker Pelosi, has demonstrated that the midterm elections of 2018 were a huge mistake.

One hopes for an all-Republican government. But if the choice were between Trump paired with a Democratic Congress, or a Democratic president paired with a Republican Congress, the second alternative would be far better. Put another way, voters need to “recall” a bunch of worthless Democratic House members next year.

Jon N. Hall of ULTRACON OPINION is a programmer from Kansas City.