For the longest time, if people wanted answers they turned to their trusty encyclopedias.

In the 21st century, the go-to place for ideas is the Internet.

But because it is accessible to anyone with a computer, it contains a lot more chaff than wheat and some information that is flat-out false.

Like the claim that Congress exempted itself from the Affordable Care Act.

It didn’t.

The law, as written, required members of Congress and their staffs to buy their health insurance through the same marketplace exchanges as everybody else not covered by employer-sponsored health plans.

But that wasn’t good enough for the ruling class in Washington. After members realized that their out-of-pocket costs would go up, they whined to the president, who directed the Office of Personnel Management to grant Congress the same subsidy they were getting under their current plans – a benefit the ACA expressly forbids anybody else from receiving.

Not exactly equal treatment under the law.

Which brings us back to the ideas currently circulating in cyberspace. There are a few that we think merit consideration.

One is a proposed 28th amendment to the Constitution. Maybe you’ve seen it. It says:

“Congress shall make no law that applies to the citizens of the United States that does not apply equally to the Senators and/or Representatives; and, Congress shall make no law that applies to the Senators and/or Representatives that does not apply equally to the citizens of the United States.”

Sounds fair to us. Perhaps you should bring it up with your favorite candidate.

We also like the one that says members of Congress shall not be paid until and unless they pass a budget.

Or the one that purportedly came out of a Warren Buffett interview on CNBC some years back, in which he said he could end the federal deficit in 5 minutes: “You just pass a law that says that anytime there is a deficit of more than 3 percent of (gross domestic product), all sitting members of Congress are ineligible for re-election.”

In the absence of anything resembling progress coming out of Washington, we’ve heard crazier ideas than those.

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