…apparently state Rep. Rickey Hardy (D-Lafayette) thinks that old people shouldn’t run for office.

Hardy, who is hard at work earning a reputation as the goofiest legislator at the Louisiana state capitol, has now filed a bill which would ban Louisiana citizens 70 or older from running for office.

“You need to be sitting in a rocking chair, kicking back…Pass the baton to someone young,” Hardy told the Lafayette Advertiser. “You become stagnant. You’re taking up a seat. You’re no longer energized.”

Hardy justifies his bill, which seems on its face to constitute age discrimination, on the basis that since judges have mandatory retirement, all elected officials should have it as well.

Of course, HB 470 is written in the nature of a constitutional amendment – so if your reaction is that this one is unconstitutional, Hardy seems to have that one covered. No word if the bill seeks to amend the U.S. Constitution as well as that of the state of Louisiana.

If Hardy’s name is familiar, that’s because he’s already drawn ridicule for authoring the “Pants On The Ground” bill and bills which would make fighting or carrying guns at parades illegal. So far, the third-year legislator – who disturbingly but perhaps unsurprisingly came up through the Lafayette Parish School Board (school boards seem to be veritable petri dishes for petty tyrants) – has filed 24 bills already in advance of this year’s legislative session – the latest round of them tackling such burning issues as providing for a high school voter registration week, requiring the state Board of Elementary and Secondary Education to establish a uniform grading scale and rearranging the employment statuses of school bus drivers.

One fervently desires to see a 72-year old run against hardy in next year’s elections and beat him in a landslide. Perhaps a wiser, more intelligent and more mature state representative – who might be less energetic and less prone to authoring moronic legislation in an effort to appear effective – would serve Hardy’s constituents more ably than their current elected fool.