It
has been quite a week. Two presidential
candidates unknowingly disqualified themselves as being fit to be President of
the United States and a third voluntarily stepped out of the race. A fourth is on the brink of going down soon.
The
first to disqualify their self was Governor Rick Perry of Texas. Governor Perry dropped out of the Republican
race due to lack of traction. He should
be commended for not letting his ego get in the way of rational decision making. He never had a chance and he recognized this
fact and made a good decision. It’s a
shame that he threw his hat in the ring four years ago. The first impression he made was not good and
although he was a much better candidate this time around, he could not get
voters to see the new Rick Perry. During
his debut debate four years ago he stated that he would immediately eliminate
three federal agencies when he became president – but could only name two of
the three he would eliminate. He forgot
the third but said he would get back to us.
He looked bewildered and the nation wrote him off. First impressions are hard to overcome. In Governor Perry’s case, they were
impossible to overcome.
Hat’s
off to Governor Perry for calling out the Donald during his exit speech. Active candidates have been afraid of creating
a duel with the Donald. I guess a few
more drop outs will help shine some light on the crudeness of Mr. Trump’s
candidacy (not to mention his human nature).
Governor Perry was among the very few that criticized the Donald even as
an active candidate. For that reason
alone, I will miss his participation.
The
second to disqualify their self was the Donald.
I cannot imagine how anyone ever thought he was qualified in the first
place but the polls suggest that he may have actually had a fleeting
chance. The emphasis in that last
sentence should be placed on fleeting.
And, the chance has fled. The Donald
has been given more passes than any other politician I can remember. This was probably because he is not a
politician and spoke about the issues in blunt talk that spoke to frustrated
Americans. Now that he has been in the
race this long (who would have thought) he has now become a politician and he
will not be given a pass for his demeaning remarks toward Carly Fiorina. Nor should he be. I thought the Donald was just having fun self-promoting
himself as a pretend presidential candidate.
But, when his poll numbers skyrocketed it appeared as though he actually
believed that he could win – that made him a politician. Politicians do not get passes on demeaning, misogynistic
comments. Sorry Donald, I’m sure your
ego is not as salient as Governor Perry’s and you are sure to tweet you agony and
anger for days (not very presidential by the way). But to be honest, we beer drinking patriots
love to hear you speak about the things we are worried about in the way we
would speak them. However, we do think policy
solutions should be more than “I’ll be great for the military’ –“I cherish
women” - “I will repeal and replace Obamacare with something fantastic” and “I
will build a wall.” We are hopeful for policies
with more substance than you can muster.
And truthfully, although we loved your crude talk, we would not want to
see the President of the United States speak in that manner. The good news for we sane Americans is that
we no longer have to lose sleep at night worried that America will be the
laughing stock of the world because the Donald is our President. I wonder though if he would have put the “Trump”
lettering on the White House and Air Force One.
Oh well, another thing to stop worrying about.
The
third disqualification is sad. Vice
President Biden is an affable, even lovable man who has been eyeing the White
House for a good portion of his life.
The loss of a son would devastate most human beings. This may be harsh to hear, but I believe that
the Vice President has overplayed his pain.
Yes, he has gone through hell. He
lost his first wife, a daughter and just recently his son. I count my blessing that I have not had that
much loss in my life. With that said,
the Vice President has had more time than needed to decide whether or not he is
fit to become president. This is very callous,
but I believe that he is playing the sympathy card to garner a following – to enlarge
the “Draft Biden” movement. The Vice
President is a lovable man. However, if
he needs this much time to determine if he can devote his “entire heart and
soul” into being the President – then he is not qualified to be the President
of the United States. If he were to
decide that he can devote his entire heart and soul – that isn’t enough
anymore. I want more than a guarantee of
his heart and soul. I want a guarantee
that he nor anyone else could ever provide.
I want a guarantee that no one else in his family will (heaven forbid)
die or suffer a serious injury or disease.
If the Vice President does not
have the temperament to handle the horrible situation he has endured (and very,
very few people do) then he does not have what it takes to be the President of
the United States (again, not many people do).
His display of vulnerability has shown me too much vulnerability. The President of the United States is an
enormous burden of life and death decision making. The Vice President cannot take six months off
the job to heal his heart and soul if another family member falls victim to the
inevitability of human fragility. How
old is he? Will his fortitude improve
through the mere act of being elected?
Then
there is the fourth candidate who has become dangerously close to disqualifying
their self. This would be Secretary
Clinton. In the opposite of Vice
President Biden, Secretary Clinton has demonstrated a cold-heartedness that has
caused many to question her trustworthiness.
First her official United States government emails were none of our
business. Then 55,000 printed pages of
emails were made available after she and her lawyers determined (in a suspiciously
short period of time) which were private and which emails were official
business. Then the private emails were
quickly deleted. Now the FBI is
investigating and has confiscated her personal server that hosted both personal
and government emails to determine what else can be found. She claims that 30,000 of her emails were
personal and none of our business.
Finally, it appears that a State Department computer engineer (who was
paid personally by Secretary Clinton separately from his government paycheck)
may have scrubbed the Secretary’s server clean so that even the FBI computer
forensics team cannot recover any of the deleted emails. I don’t know about you, but when I delete my
emails, I hit the delete button. I do
not hire a computer engineer. The fact
that the same computer engineer has invoked his 5th Amendment right
to refuse providing testimony has also raised suspicion to extreme
heights. Watching Secretary Clinton on
national television speak of how “transparent” she has been does not give
anyone a warm and fuzzy feeling that she is bringing forth the truth.
Unlike
the first three candidates that have self-disqualified themselves, Secretary
Clinton has not yet gone that far. But
if the email server was professionally scrubbed – she might as well join
Governor Perry and say adios amigos. Just
when the threat of the Vice President running against her is evaporating, she is
self-destructing due to her own ill-advised decisions (and worse yet, her
attempted cover up). But to be fair,
this is speculation that has not yet been proven. It’s just that Secretary Clinton’s actions
haven’t been as “transparent” as she pretends – and most people’s antennas are
attuned to her aloofness and her “I’m above the law” attitude that she exudes.
Stay
tuned, more drop outs should be forth coming in the upcoming few weeks.
