Posted by
Patrick Henry on Sunday, May 01, 2011 1:14:29 PM
America is awash in Harvard educated liberals of the "political class" who seem
to have a stranglehold on the presidency and high appointed offices. Many of them
lack significant real world accomplishments, and can only point to academic and
political achievement as ther bona fides. It seems that wealth and an Ivy League
degree are the twin grails for any potential nominee.
But whatever happened to Joe Mainstreet, the hard-working guy who graduated
from state university, rolled up his sleeves and made a business work? Where is
Sally housewife, who at least has the sense to know she can't spend more for
groceries than she actually has? With presidential campaign costs weighing in
at around a billion dollars, and no fancy diploma on their walls, most of these
folks who are patriots with intelligence, common sense and a knowledge of how
things actually work in real life are simply shut out. Until we find a way to fix that,
America will be perpetually deprived of its finest talent and real leadership.
A starting point might be to convince America that presidential elections are
NOT American Idol. On the latter TV reality show, America has witnessed serial
performers with clearly superior talent voted off the show by tittering teenagers
speed-dialing their little pink cell phones to support their current heart throb. The
best actual singers rarely win. It is a precise parallel to the present presidential
election milieu (or malaise), with the result that the best qualified candidates
rarely even get to run, much less win. And we end up with a series of pretty faces
who are popular with certain segments of the population but have no real world
experience, poor problem solving skills, little interest in what the voters really
want and weak character that makes then simply unable to effectively lead.
To make the shift away from reality show to evaluation of actual qualifications
would require, among other things, a media that focuses on (a) what pertains to
actual issues instead of what doesn't (b) not being partisan and (c) asking the
hard questions of and about ALL candidates equally. Since there is about as much
chance of that as there is of pigs flying, perhaps the best remedy is a crusade to
encourage Americans to think for themselves and simply boycott partisan or
fluff-focused media outlets. The press, unfortunately, wields enormous clout in
electoral cycles which is too bad in light of their perpetual inaccuracies and
purposeful misrepresentation. Face it: the media is comprised of people who lie
for a living.
A great deal was made of the current president's failure, until recently, to show
his long form birth certificate. What is more concerning is his constant attempts
to hide his academic transcripts and his complete absence of real world business
experience. No one should be surprised that when we flocked to a smooth-talking
minority candidate with zero scrutiny of his experiential background, what we got
was a deeply-flawed ideologue who is more concerned with "fundamentally
transforming" America than he is leading it and making it work. Why should we
be surprised, and why would we ever again let such a flim-flam man sweet-talk
his way into the highest office in the land with no experience, no leadership
credentials and a highly debatable commitment to Ameriucan values? W were
asleep at the wheel, and it's time to wake up.
We need to get real and understand that a degree from Harvard is just a piece
of paper, and that there are plenty of Ivy Leaguers walking around who don't have
the common sense God gave a goose. Barack Obama is a Harvard Law School
graduate. Enough said. Wisdom and common sense trump erudition in leadership
every single time. Obama leaves a legacy of astronomical gas prices, 9%
unemployment, ballooning deficits, bloated government and a welfare state where
18.3% of all income is in the form of government assistance. If that's what they
teach at Harvard, then Anerica doesn't need any more of it. There's an old saying
among golfers that seems to apply here. "Them as can, do. Them as can't teach."
What we have in the so called "political class" is "them as can't." In our
presidential candidates, we need to find "them as can."
Finally, we need to make it impossible for the wealthy, the unions and political
action committees to buy the presidency by establishing constitutionally vetted
election laws that level the playing field. In our current system, the Supreme Court
sits on high to pass judgment on election practices that are constitutional or not,
as they did in refusing to deny corporations the right to make financial gifts to
candidates just as individuals (and unions) can. Why not actually enlist these
brightest and best of our constitutional law scholars to help craft laws that they
could support as constitutional, yet would have the effect of giving Joe Mainstreet
and Sally Housewife an equal chance to make their case to the American people?
If something isn't done soon, we will continue to exclude from consideration all
those not rich and famous. Which is to say we will perpetuate the election of
spoiled buffoons who could care less what we want.
To our detriment, we practice a political caste system just as shameful as India's
social one. We need to fix it, and today would not be too early to begin.