I don’t know about you, but I’m already tired of the 2016 presidential race and it hasn’t even actually begun.
On the Democratic side the establishment and the news media have already crowned Hilary Clinton as the nominee, even though many of us in the rank and file are suffering from Clinton fatigue.
Worse, though, the Republican race for the nomination is looking more and more like a circus with too many clowns.
Clarence Darrow of the Scopes trial fame once quipped: “When I was a boy I was told that anybody could become President; I’m beginning to believe it.”
I think we are seeing his inclinations were spot on. The idea that you can become anything you want to be here in America sounds nice, and is something adults often tell kids to encourage them to work hard and do their best.
The problem is, that old adage has a fatal flaw. You cannot become anything you want to be unless you have the ability to do what it is you want to do.
Apparently most of the Republican presidential candidates haven’t yet accepted this fact. They say and do things that if they were still children an adult would sit them down and explain why they are not cut out for the job.
It’s enough to make you laugh except we are talking about something too serious to be funny.
Being president is about holding a position of power that requires above average intelligence, wisdom by experience, and an ability to keep your head when everyone around you is losing theirs (to quote Kipling).
Thus far the Republicans running for president (and those in Congress) are failing on all counts, especially the last one.
Not one of them is able to keep his or her head when it comes to important issues.
Take the Iran nuclear arms deal President Obama’s team just worked out. Before any of them had even read what the agreement includes they were ranting and raving about how bad it is.
This treaty is about one thing. Trying to curb Iran’s quest for nuclear arms without going to war. But as you would expect Republicans prefer the risk of war.
Sending someone else’s sons and daughters to fight and die in unnecessary and unwinnable wars has never bothered them before, and apparently still doesn’t.
They want Iran to become the nation they want it to be before they will talk about a nuclear arms treaty. On the one hand that is arrogance at its worse. On the other it is about a standard by which none of the arms agreements we made with the old Soviet Union would have been possible.
The fact is, what the Republicans are saying is not about the deal with Iran. It’s about politics. And when it comes to the ones who want to be president, it is the worst kind of politics. It’s about nothing more than promising to undo everything President Obama has done.
That is why their opposition to the Iran nuclear agreement is the foreign policy equivalent of their opposition to Obamacare. They have no sensible alternative to offer, but they are opposed anyway.
As I said, I’m already tired of the 2016 presidential campaign that is a year away.
I wish I had the power of God to turn the year into a day and then all of us could put this nightmare that promises to get worse behind us.
linnposts.com 
Jan, I do agree with all you say. I don’t think shortening the period of running is going to happen any time soon. Since the presidential election is bought and sold with huge amounts of money, it takes the candidates a long time to raise that money. We do need to overturn Citizens United very badly and a constitutional amendment is the only route I see. We know from history, this can happen, but it takes huge amount of work on the part of ordinary citizens.
Jane, you named the key to change, and it is, indeed, all of us. Thanks.
Jan,
We all tire of politics, but for better or worse it’s “all we have” in our hopefully still maturing democracy. In comparison to the Republican “circus,” Hillary Rodham at least presents adult proposals and the intent to DO SOMETHING about pressing economic and domestic problems, as opposed to years of Republican intransigence.
I agree, Bill, but I think the Democrats need to keep the race wide open lest they alienate too many non-Clinton Democrats. Bernie Sanders is a serious candidate and needs to be treated as such.
I think we have a serious need to shorten our campaign time. What we have produces mostly hot air and foolishness. I think that starting the campaign season on Jan 1 of the year in which an election is held should be adequate. Other countries do it and seem to do OK. What we have also burns money at a rapid rate and invites our current politicians for sale system.
Will that shortening happen? I doubt it because those who need to change it are those who benefit from it..
I too am a big fan of Bernie Sanders. He actually has something meaningful to day and seems to resist the influence of big money. But of course, in the minds of many people he is a big, bad “socialist” and therefore must not be listened to. much less be elected.
Wally, it’s curious, isn’t it, how people are afraid of someone who tells them the truth, as Sanders is doing.
Meanwhile they will listen to Trump talk a lot and say nothing.
The political campaign “circus”, hell, American politics generally of late, is political theater! The banking and business puppeteers are the ones needing real scrutiny and our two year campaign window is a huge waste of time and money, let alone another distraction from what the dominant minority is doing in all our names.
Yes, Sanders is a legitimate and serious candidate and deserves attention and respect for that. Because the very word socialism has been painted so negatively in the US, as though all individual freedoms are lost through it or that it means a 50% tax rate for everyone, causes many to dismiss him out of hand. I think socialism is confused for communism by many. Not at all the same!
Further, on Iran, I think the Jewish lobby pushes this agenda here. Pure fear! We recently heard a former ambassador to Iran remind the audience it has been 200 years since Iran attacked another nation compared to how Iraq, Saudi Arabia, the US and NATO, among others, have all destabilized the region through direct armed interventions just in recent decades.
Immature political leadership/statesmanship here is running amok and is contributing greatly to our decline. Sad!
“Immature political leadership.” You nailed it, Bob.