A green light means go, so you went. Unfortunately, the driver in the other car is more of a “yellow light means speed up” kind of guy. His truck clips the back of your car with enough force to send you rolling. The sounds of crunching metal and breaking glass are terrifying, second only to the loud explosions of all the airbags deploying. When the car finally comes to rest you are upside down and everything hurts. You test to see if you can still wiggle your fingers and toes. They seem to work but the pain in your chest is unbearable. Every breath feels like someone is stabbing you in the side with a hot knife. All of the blood is rushing to your head, making it harder to stay awake. You hear the faint sound of sirens just as you slip into unconsciousness.
You wake up strapped to a backboard as the paramedics are wheeling you into the trauma center. He is explaining to the medical team how it took 35 minutes to extricate you from the wreckage and they are worried about your chest and head. The room comes alive as the nurses and doctors begin trying to put you back together again. Your head is immobilized so you are forced to stare into the bright light directly above you.
Then a voice from behind you says “Hang in there buddy, I know this is scary.” Someone takes hold of your hand to reassure you that everything is going to be okay. Why does that voice sound so familiar? They lean over into your line of sight and say, “My name is Dr. Sheppard and we are going to take great care of you, okay.” At first, you doubt yourself. It can’t be. Even with all the glass and blood in your eyes you can’t help but think the doctor looks a lot like the Emmy award-winning actor Patrick Dempsey. “We need to get an IV started, so you are gonna feel a few sticks.” Concussion or not, you are now 99% sure that is actually Patrick Dempsey starting a line in your arm. The broken ribs make it hard to speak, but you have to know for sure. Nobody can hear your first attempt through your oxygen mask, but they see you struggling to talk. Patrick lifts the bloody mask off your face and leans in close so he can be sure to hear you. It takes all your energy to utter four simple words: “Are you a doctor?” As you drift off into the darkness your suspicion is confirmed. “No, but I played a trauma surgeon on the hit television show Grey’s Anatomy for 11 seasons, so you are going to be just fine.” You die ten minutes later of an untreated tension pneumothorax. Something any licensed ER physician could have easily treated on the spot.
Your family is devastated. After they learned what happened, they file a malpractice suit against the hospital and are eventually awarded $5,200,000 in damages. The judge does not hold back when issuing her opinion. “The decision to let an actor practice medicine in a real emergency room was reprehensible. It takes years of formal education and many more years of practical experience to become a qualified trauma surgeon. It is astonishing to me that nobody within the administration took exception to this decision. Any reasonable person, with or without medical training, should have recognized this malfeasance as a disaster waiting to happen.”
I bet you, the reader, would consider yourself a reasonable person and would agree with the judge’s decision in this fictional scenario. So how the hell did half of the country vote to elect an unqualified, senile, psychotic, ignorant, chauvinistic, narcissistic actor (and failed businessman) to lead the free world? Anyone who voted for this man should be ashamed of themselves and lose their future right to vote.
Not because I disagree with your politics, but because you are a moron. You might also think I am picking on the GOP, but the Democrats are just as susceptible to this idiocracy. Don’t believe me? Then how did Marianne Williamson make it anywhere near a debate stage in 2020?
Even worse, this seems to be happening all over the world. Take Volodymyr Zelensky as an example. Prior to assuming office in Ukraine, his political experience consisted of playing the president, ironically for four seasons, on a TV show called “Servant of the People”. He then created a new political party with the same name as the fictional party in his television show and ran for office. At least you can argue that some Ukrainians were legitimately deceived. Donald Trump doesn’t even have any fake political experience. And now we are surprised that he can’t do the job (or even pretend to)?
There is no doubt that the word “politics” has a negative connotation. But that doesn’t negate the fact that “Politician” is a respectable profession with a specific set of skills and competencies required to do the job successfully. You want someone who has been educated in public administration, political science, or international relations. To gain their valuable experience, they should spend several years cutting their teeth in local or state government, learning how to compromise to achieve results. Since they will be the Commander in Chief of the armed services, some military service wouldn’t hurt. Even better if they spent some time overseas in the State Department learning how to respect and appreciate other cultures. In the end, they should possess some level of basic qualifications and experience before being nominated to office.
Seriously, it should give us pause to know we have higher standards for positions that are far less important to the survival of our country. When I applied for my last corporate job I had to take a personality assessment to make sure I would be a good fit within the organization. Next came a series of job-related competency tests to assess my ability to successfully execute my day to day responsibilities. Finally, they checked my personal references, my criminal record, and my credit history. All of that for a routine middle management position that does not have access to the nuclear codes. So how does our current political process still allow any moron to be president?
Did you know that most government positions require you to take and pass some form of a Civil Service Exam before you can be employed? Not the President. Did you know the process of obtaining a Top Secret clearance can take months to complete and includes filling out multiple forms and questionnaires, several in-person interviews (which can include interviewing your family and friends), a criminal record and credit history check, and usually a polygraph examination? There is, however, one person who is exempt from this process. Want to take a guess who? That’s right. The President of the United States is granted access to all government or military information, even if he or she would not have otherwise been able to obtain clearance. It is frightening to think that we require more education and licensure of our barbers, lawyers, accountants, pilots, and electricians than we do for our political leaders.
Again, my hatred of Donald Trump (and I do hate that man) has absolutely nothing to do with his political affiliation. I would say the same exact things if he were a Democrat or Socialist. I am pissed because our country is about to suffer significant hardship because of his poor leadership through this COVID-19 crisis. Some previous presidents were just as unqualified, but at least they surrounded themselves with intelligent and experienced officials in their cabinet and staff, and then actually listened to them. This guy listens to Sean Hannity more than he does Dr. Fauci. He is a danger to this country and we all deserve the pain and suffering he is about to inflict on the world.
This is the point where half of you scream out “Well, I didn’t elect him, the other half did!” True, but you didn’t elect officials that would demand the types of reforms needed to ensure this exact scenario never happened. We need things like minimum qualifications for office, term limits, and campaign finance reforms to make certain random idiots cannot buy their way into public office ever again. These changes would benefit all of us, regardless of party affiliation.
So, if you wouldn’t want Dr. Huxtable to deliver your next baby, you shouldn’t want Donald Trump, or any other unqualified non-politician, to be your next POTUS. It is time we demand more from our public leaders, assuming any of us are still alive to vote in November!
Be First to Comment