At one time or another, almost every child born in the United States has given at least a passing thought to the idea of being the President. It is a noble idea, and more than anything else, it indicates our belief in the American Dream.
Fortunately, most of us grow out of the idea, and that is a good thing. First, it is perhaps one of the most dangerous professions in the country. Out of 46 Presidents, four of them have been assassinated, and several others have died of natural causes while in office. That makes the odds about one in ten, more or less, of dying on the job. To put that in perspective, a rifleman at D-Day, on Pelelliu had better statistical odds of surviving the battle than a US President. Add in all of the assassination attempts, cancer and heart scares, or other medical problems attributable to stress, and the ratio is even greater.
And let’s face it: the job does not pay all that well. Yes, I know a half million dollars a year seems like a lot of money, especially to someone who earns far less. It certainly pays better than minimum wage, but it just isn’t all that much take-home pay when you take everything into consideration. It is petty cash or chump change compared to the salary of a successful attorney or CEO of a corporation.
Finally, as several of our Presidents have described the White House, it is a very fancy jail. Driver’s license and keys are confiscated for four years, a spontaneous drive to the grocery store or date night is impossible. Everything is restricted, carefully choreographed in advance, and monitored. That is not my idea of fun. Moreover, a member of the President’s family cannot go off to the bathroom without a Secret Service minder in attendance.
If those aren’t sufficient reasons to avoid this job, keep in mind how brutally rough politics becomes. It is worse than a rugby match, only it is much longer and with no time-outs.
We tend to think of the nastiness of politics as a modern phenomenon, but it dates back to 1800. Washington was more or less selected the first time, then re-elected without genuine opposition for a second term. After he retired to Mount Vernon, the presidency was a wide-open free-for-all. When John Adams and Thomas Jefferson vied for the job, they made it into a mudslinging festival. Jefferson had some saucy things to say about Adams’ testosterone level and questioned his manhood. Adams was just as bad.
It has never been a matter of the candidates themselves slinging mud and making wild accusations about their opponents. Everyone can get into the act, and often do. On a local level, it could be even more corrupt and more brutal. As for the contemporary claim of ‘illegal aliens’ voting, it was far more corrupt in the past than today.
In 1856, my great grandparents homestead in southeastern Minnesota. One day, as happened all across the country, the local postmaster turned up at his farm to inquire if Franz Joseph had registered to vote. He had not because he had not done anything about changing his citizenship. The postmaster smiled, pulled a document out of his saddlebag, and told him to sign the Letter of Intent to become a US Citizen. {Later, he would file the letter and become a naturalized citizen.} He signed it, and the Postmaster reminded him to vote in the next election, and firmly warned him he had better vote a straight Democratic-Republican party ticket, implying there might be difficulties if he did not.
When FJ and his brother arrived at the polling station, a group of young toughs were hanging around a barrel of what was euphemistically called “hard cider.” They were well lit up by mid-morning and told the voters (all men, in that era, of course) how they were to vote. A couple of others in the background had stout sticks to emphasize the point. Those who voted the ‘right’ way were rewarded with a large dipper or two of an adult beverage.
In one form or another, corruption, intimidation, and a whole lot of lying has been going on right since the beginning. It is not just the national elections that lead to bad behavior. It trickles all the way down to state offices, and local elections.
Just because politics has long been so contentious does not make it right.
If anything, it has continued to worsen, and that is primarily attributable to electronic media. A century ago, live broadcasts of an event were almost impossible. By the 1940s, that changed, when CBS Radio meticulously arranged for live radio broadcasts from Europe. In the late 1950s, live broadcast television came from studios, but not on-site. Perhaps you remember in the summer of 1960, NBC proudly explaining how they would be broadcasting highlights from the Olympics in Rome. Their cameramen would take movies, the film would be rushed to an airplane with a specially equipped dark room. It would then be edited somewhere over the Atlantic and broadcast on television within twenty-four hours. A few decades later we stayed up late into the night to watch the bombing of Iraq from a western new service that was broadcasting live from inside the city.
Therein is the problem, at least as I see it. We can see anything as it happens. The benefit is that the film and narration cannot easily be censored or edited. The bad news is that we do not have time to think, reflect, and make a rational decision. We make an immediate, emotional, and visceral decision that might or might not be the right one. That is very different from the early settlers in New England who would meet at the fence while plowing their fields. They rested the animals for a few minutes and discussed current events. Then they went back to work and thought over their conversation before continuing about an hour later.
I am convinced all of our advancing technology diminishes our connection with people, and in turn, it erodes our humanity and care for the other person. In the past, we were far more circumspect about what we said or wrote because it could very easily be traced back to us. Now, if we write something positively disgusting, we can hide behind a false electronic name and address. That means we can be as mean and nasty as we like with very little chance of it coming back to haunt us.
We had facetime with store employees, local officials, and others. Today, we use our devices to schedule medical and other appointments, often never speaking to another person as we punch buttons or text a message. We humans were made for connections with other humans, and we are losing the plot on this one.
How we might make some positive changes after two and a half centuries of sheer nastiness every time there is an election is beyond me. Maybe the best we can do is finding a way to lower the temperature a little. Lowering it a lot would be better.
First, let’s shorten the campaign season down from four years to six weeks. No more of starting to run for President the day after the election. Six weeks is long enough for a candidate to make their position clear, announce what they hope to do if elected, and keep it positive.
Second: Candidates may spend only their own money, and it cannot be more than the sum of what they will receive from their time in office. We keep hearing about the need for true fiscal responsibility, so let’s start at the top. For a president, the total four-year salary is two million dollars, so that means they cannot spend more than that amount on their campaign. City, state, and local candidates are likely going to be on a much tighter budget.
If someone is putting a lot of money into Candidate A’s campaign, it probably is because they have a vested interest and want something in return. Keep the money out of it, and we’ll end up with better government.
My third rule: No more ‘spinning’. Can you imagine the shock and awe the voters would have if a candidate admitted they made a mistake? Get rid of the spin doctors who think we are so stupid as to believe the way they change a story to fit their agenda. Candidates have to be honest and human enough to admit they can make some bone-headed decisions.
The payoff comes when we get ready to vote. Do you remember the first time you were eligible to vote, and the sheer pride and joy you took in marking your ballot, knowing that you were participating in running our country? That was big-time adult stuff. Or, can you imagine the thrill a naturalized citizen feels, after fleeing a country renown for oppression, swearing their allegiance to the USA and promising to defend the Constitution walks into a polling place to vote – without having a government official looking over their shoulder?
It is time for us to recapture some of that pride and joy.
