I'd like to do that, but when I 'exit' an app and/or swipe it off of the list of program cards I want it to ACTUALLY exit (at least within 30 seconds).
What if that app is say and open source messenger app that doesn't use GCM/FCM. For that to work you need to maintain a connection with a remote service. You don't need the UI hogging memory the whole time but you definitely want messages to come in immediately. IMO the system should offer a way to completely kill and app but "killing the UI" should not stop critical services utilized by the app.
Okay so maybe you could argue that if you never "swipe kill" the app it should be allowed to have background services executing much like e.g. Slack on macOS. But you can't even do that. Having your ui in the recent tasks list does not exempt you from background restriction.
There is a way to kill an app process, but it's in Setting and takes several clicks. I think it's for the best that killing isn't easier, because users don't generally know the implications of killing an app. In Square's Register app for example, force killing the process could prevent the app from uploading important payment data in a timely fashion.
You just don't know much about android dev it seems.
When an app gets put in the background it gets an event from the OS it's then the devs job to not keep everything loaded in the background but most don't.