I’m not one to spend an inordinate time on pointless issues when I generally prefer to write about the big picture. However, our nation is completely pre-occupied with the trivial that these issues simply overwhelm reality and the many important things in life. Thus I must again put on my rubber boots and grab the plunger.
It is ironic that our shallow and manipulated 24/7 info-entertainment news media is covering the Royal Wedding in England to a greater extent than the British Press. While I wish the couple all the misery their vast fortunes can buy and hope that everyone attending and watching in the streets has a great party over a globally trivial event, I will not watch or care what happens. It’s certainly a lot more enjoyable for our media to fuss over this event than cover the myriad of depressing and major problems facing both the U.S. and U.K.
I chide President Obama for waiting so long into his Presidency to produce his “long-form” birth certificate in an attempt to debunk the hopelessly moronic, racist and surreal “birther” movement. He’s a typical law professor who didn’t feel it necessary to respond to every stupid comment because to him and the majority of law students, it is obviously beneath them to even give credence to such idiocy by responding to it. Unfortunately President Obama is no longer at the law schools of Harvard or Chicago. Instead he’s been dealing with reality and the fact that at least 20% of Americans are simply too ignorant, uneducated, fearful, prejudiced and angry to believe almost any falsehood. By ignoring the ugly and false rumors, they only got stronger in our country. Having waited this long to finally respond and debunk the rumors, it’s now just too late. Nothing will convince a noticeable percentage of the U.S. population that President Obama is a “legitimate” American.
There will always be group of Americans who will persist in arguing endless conspiracy theories that this recently-released long form was forged, faked, and a fraud. They’ll now demand proof that President Obama has a real navel since he could have been hatched from an alien life pod deposited off the Hawaiian coast by conspiring green-skinned extra-terrestrial beings that did not crash and die in Area 51.
The “birther” movement will never die as long as a mixed-race man occupies the White House. Even after he leaves office in early 2013 or 2017, some will argue that everything that he signed into law or vetoed should be reversed because he was not a constitutionally-authorized holder of the office. They will forever claim that the Healthcare and Financial Reforms are unconstitutional. Then would not have all the Bush tax cuts expired by their original statutory terms at the end of 2010?
Now we will move onto President Obama’s academic records – as if this will be more worthy of rationale debate. To become Editor of the Harvard Law School Journal, one is not going to be partying endlessly with the bottom part of the law class. I really doubt a person’s academic records or his IQ test scores are adequate predictors of a person’s competence in life or ability for leadership. If we had tests for sociopathic or psychopathic tendencies, those would be better predictors of an individual’s abilities to selfishly use and illegally walk all over other people to reach success.
Senator John McCain used to brag that he graduated near the bottom of his class at the Naval Academy. He was born in a place that was never a U.S. State (Panama Canal Zone) and that has been part of a foreign nation since Carter was President. Perhaps a Puerto Rican would have a good chance of qualifying for the Presidency. Less I forget – Senator McCain was a “super” old white conservative guy and a living Vietnam War Hero. All the stupid things he did and said during his life are beyond reproach in some quarters.
Perhaps we should demand to see every candidate’s “long-form” birth certificate, accompanied by signed affidavits or public statements of those who signed that document or who personally had first-hand knowledge the candidate was born within the 50 U.S. states. In addition, every candidate should release all his or her academic records starting with High School including verifications that those records are true from the issuing schools.
Should we allow people who were not in the top 10 or 20 percent of the class academically to run for the Presidency? What about extra-curricular sports and other activities – shouldn’t we know how they participated and fared? Do we want jocks, nerds, geeks and dweebs running for our nation’s top office?
Every candidate should also release his IQ scores, his 3 credit rating scores from each credit bureau, and all his federal and state income tax forms. Finally, all candidates would have to subject themselves to an extensive and independent physical exam and the results would be released to the public. We might also require a candidate’s physicians to release all prior medical records. Congress might need to pass appropriate legislation so these documents could be provided before the Iowa Caucuses and the New Hampshire Primary.
Otherwise, if all these documents and disclosures were not met, the candidate would be barred from running for the Presidency. If we mandate these onerous requirements from all candidates, then there could not be any claims of unfairness towards any particular candidate.
Only American voters can decide who is a “real” American who can hold the office of Presidency. Some people will not consider a person “real” if he or she is (1) Catholic, Jewish, Muslim, Mormon, Hindu, Buddhist, Agnostic, Atheist, or belonging to some other non-Protestant/Christian religious group; (2) Non-white, Black, Brown, Yellow, Red, African, Asian, Latino, Hispanic, Middle-eastern, Native American, mixed-race, or anyone with kinky hair, jet black hair or no hair at all; (3) Liberal, Progressive, Moderate, Democratic, Nazi, Socialist, Communist, or anyone not a conservative Republican – just as God is; and (4) Anyone not born in the 50 U.S. states whose parents were not natural-born citizens at the time of the person’s conception.
We could require a Presidential candidate to (1) have at least one college degree from an Ivy League Institution; (2) own real estate valued at more than $1 million and free of any mortgages or other liens; (3) have a minimum net worth of at least $5 million; and (4) come from a family with an annual taxable income in the highest marginal tax rate. However through various tax credits, deductions, exemptions and special loopholes for capital gains and hedge fund activities he or she would pay a smaller percentage in overall taxes than the lowest marginal taxpayers.
It might also be required that every Presidential candidate is a verifiable heterosexual and married to a blond-haired spouse. We might require that at least one of the candidate’s children fits these requirements in case we find the need to draw from that same lineage in the future. A female candidate might be disqualified if she had a prior abortion, took birth control, or even visited Planned Parenthood for any reason in her past.
By limiting Presidential candidates so severely, we would effectively create a quasi-Monarchy that happens to be up for popular vote every four years – just to keep the Plebeians happily deluded that it even matters who holds the office when our wealthy Oligarchy really runs our nation. The only things we would never limit or even ask to be disclosed are the amounts a candidate raises from corporations and the identities of those contributors – that would be unconstitutional and very mean towards our plutocratic overlords.
If one reviews the specific backgrounds of the vast majority of the men who held the U.S. Presidency, these factors and limitations have already been subconsciously put in place – with only a few exceptional people getting elected. Overall, all Presidents have met more than 75% of the criteria stipulated above.
I – for one – am proud that I am not a “real” America according to many of my fellow Americans. (Many people don’t consider New York City where I was born to be part of “real” America.) Besides, who would want to be an American President in the 21st Century when the job would be quite similar to serving as the last Western Roman Emperor Romulus Augustus in 476 A.D.? Since no one at that time could find a competent guy who by law and tradition had been born in Italy to serve as Emperor, the Western Empire irreparably fell apart into many pieces under the control of various people who were not born in Italy.
It’s only a matter of time before the completely ossified, dysfunctional, corrupt, paralyzed, unjust, and over-extended American Imperium collapses from within. TMV readers are forewarned.
Submitted on 4/28/11 by Marc Pascal ranting happily under the desert sun from Phoenix, Arizona.