It strikes me that legislative bodies have nothing that resembles a Quality Assurance effort. A law is passed, and then we just assume it works the way it was intended. Even in cases where it quite obviously did NOT (such as California's Three Strikes Law | http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/cruel-and-unusual-...), that horrible piece of legislation lives on for years and years. Only the most atrocious pieces of legislation are ever repealed.
I think it would make sense for all pieces of legislation to have something like a 1-3 year (depending on the type of legislation) review period. At the end of that time, a committee would make an assessment of the programs true impact, keeping in mind unintended consequences, and Congress must vote to either retain or repeal the law.
Just something I'd been pondering lately after reading about legislation which had huge unforeseen repercussions.
Because they had to look like they were doing something.. though they all basically knew they were remove it once the heat was gone. In this case, a Friday afternoon vote immediately before the tax filing deadline did it.
