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Are You Experienced?
for release 09-04-08
Dallas, Texas
by Lighting Rod
Probably the most irrelevant issue that we will hear discussed over and over again in the presidential campaign is the issue of experience. The entire premise that experience matters in order to lead a country is a red herring.
Louis XIV was king of France when he was 4 years old. Talk about on the job training. That was on the job potty training.
Alexander was 17 when he became king of Macedonia and had conquered the western world by the time he was 24.
The reason that the 'experience' issue is completely irrelevant is that there is no possible experience that can prepare you for the job of President of the United States. As soon as anyone puts their hand on that bible and takes the oath, it's ALL on the job training after that. The only president running for office as a non-incumbent that had experience was Grover Cleveland.
But we are so bought-in to the corporate mentality, we demand a specific resume.
The Poet's Eye sees that this is one of the problems of our democracy: we have developed a professional class of career politicians. As Jefferson saw our representative democracy, the representatives of the people would be people, real people, who had farms, ran businesses, worked with their hands.
They would be an elected representative for awhile and then they would go back to their real lives. It was supposed to be more like jury duty, not a career.
Today we have a professional class of politicians. It's a caste really. If you look at history, you will see that this is what happens to a culture as it matures. Castes or bureaucracies develop as the society stratifies. The cream will always separate from the the curds and whey if left to stand long enough.
So now we have a political caste. It is rare when a person in high office is anything but a career politician. We plebes aren't allowed in the forum. You have to be vetted first, wear the right color of toga and have the proper credentials and experience. (It doesn't hurt to be born well either.)
This is the single most fascinating and beguiling aspect of Sarah Palin's sudden rise to national prominence: She is presenting herself as 'a regular hockey mom.' How Jeffersonian. I don't believe this for a moment, but it's a great gimmick. They should dress her up in an Annie Oakley suit and let her break plates with her M-16 at State Fairs. She has a great wild west image. It will be interesting to see if she can answer the questions.
Abraham Lincoln had been a small town lawyer just a few years before he was elected president. He had virtually no experience in national leadership and a few months after he took office, we were in a civil war. You don't deal with something like this by experience because there is no experience that could possibly prepare you for a civil war. What Lincoln needed was good sense and the ability to think on his feet. His oratory power didn't hurt either.
The Poet's Eye doesn't see that experience translates to either wisdom or leadership. Let's give both Obama and Palin a chance to demonstrate their respective grasp of the national and world issues and weigh them on the basis of vision, not experience.
If you can just get your mind together
Uh-then come on across to me
Well hold hands and then well watch the sunrise
From the bottom of the sea
But first, are you experienced?
Uh-have you ever been experienced-uh?
Well, I have---Jimi Hendrix
