Should Testing be Required for Everyone Running for the Presidency, the House, the Senate, and for the Right to Vote?

Op-ed by TheWiseOldFart

Okay, don’t allow your emotions to override your intelligence and your logic. Think about my title and be honest about what is happening in today’s America.

Our government is dysfunctional, not because the system is not workable, but because the men and women who are simply taking up space in Washington are incompetent, and refuse to listen to the needs and wishes of the majority.

As far as the right to vote, just look at the results. In two out of the last three elections, the worst, least qualified, anti-American, fascist won although his victory was secured with the interference of the President of Russia. American voters are the least informed voters in the world.

And while we’re discussing changing the way we elect our nation’s leaders, let’s include the Supreme Court. Barrett, Kavanaugh, Gorsuch, Alito, and Thomas have the intelligence of a dung beetle, and are five of the nine most powerful people in our country.

Our nation has changed and the truth is frightening. It is unlikely to survive a second four years of the worst illegitimate president in history.

My interest in American politics began 69 years ago. I can attest to the fact that the quality of those serving in Washington in the 21^st century is far below the standard suggested by not only our Founding Fathers, but also the men and women who bravely served our country until the 1980’s. This is when our system became bastardized by professional politicians and the growing power of our nation’s wealthiest people.

Let’s begin my rationalization about why I believe political candidates should be required to take a test measuring their mental acuity, and their values based on American principles.

I begin at the top. Donald Trump continues to cause more damage to our nation than any other disaster in our 249-year history. I will not discuss his personal life, it is too disgusting, filled with tales of debauchery and crime.

Between 2017 and 2021, Trump intentionally divided our nation, was impeached for cause twice, failed to take timely action which would have saved thousands of lives when Covid-19 approached our nation. Instead, he told us time and time again that “it will just go away” for three months until Americans began to die. After he was soundly defeated in 2020, he told the big lie. On January 6, 2021, he executed an attempted coup which he had planned and organized for months. When he left office on January 20, he violated the Espionage Act with the theft of at least 14 boxes of national secrets. If this had been any other man or woman without great power and influence, he or she would have been placed in a prison for the remainder of his or her life, or executed for the most egregious crimes in American history.

Today, Trump continues to ignore his campaign promises as he violates the Constitutional rights of tens-of-thousands of men, women and children, placing them in concentration camps awaiting deportation. Fascism is now the foundation for America’s government.

His fiscal policy is destructive and will increase the national debt by nearly 10 trillion dollars. Between 2017 and 2021, he added more than eight trillion dollars to the deficit. Trump is the reason why our country is no longer a nation of compassionate, understanding, and accepting people, replaced by anger, hatred, and violence against all non-whites. He should have been tested. His lifelong disease of malignant narcissism would have been discovered and he would never have become your illegitimate president.

It would require a very long book to reveal the corruption by every man and woman in the legislative branch. However, if we take a serious look at just a few of our elected officials, you will likely agree with me about testing political candidates.

You know the following names. These men and women are simply morons and are why our federal government is broken beyond repair. Moscow Mitch McConnell, Chuck Grassley, Ron Johnson, Ted Cruz, Josh Hawley, Tommy Tuberville, Mike Johnson, Jim Jordan, Paul Gosar, Lauren Boebert, Marjorie Taylor Greene, and many others are totally unfit to serve in Washington or anywhere else, at any level of government.

Now for a short trip to the Supreme Court.

Moscow Mitch McConnell stacked the Supreme Court with three unqualified justices with the use of lies, trickery, and deception. Their only qualification was a promise to overturn a woman’s right to make decisions about her own physical and mental health. Along with two justices who support Trump and his fascist policies, they not only overturned Roe v Wade, but continue to vote along party lines, often in violation of the Constitution they swore to protect.

You may agree with me about requiring testing for those who seek public office, but what about the right to vote? There is no more controversial subject than the most important right guaranteed by the First Amendment.

However, a survey revealed that most Americans agree with Trump and “learn everything they know from television.” This is nothing less than a declaration of chosen ignorance.

If our elections were decided by an informed electorate, George W. Bush and Donald Trump would never have been allowed to cause irreparable damage to our nation.

The facts were there. However in 2000, 2016, and 2024, most voters believed lies without seeking the facts.

America is the laziest nation in the free world, and this is confirmed during every election year.

I ask you: should every American be allowed to vote? I once believed that the answer was most definitely “yes.” However, Bush 43 and Trump offer questions and create doubt.

I believe that an uninformed electorate is a great danger unreported by the mainstream media, and encouraged because television revenues increase with never ending ads during election years.

Most developed nations allow a three-month campaign season. In America, it lasts for more than 24 months, at a cost of many billions of dollars.

This is undeniable proof that money/profits, not people, are of greater importance in the 21^st century.

The right to vote is the most important guarantee in the Constitution. However, when that right is corrupted by lies and misdirection, it will always be destructive to the future of our nation.

You tell me: should every eligible voter be allowed to participate in our elections when a traitor like Donald Trump can become the President of the United States?

Op-ed by James Turnage

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