It’s likely that by the time you have this issue of ALIVE in hand, we will have a new president.—baring, that is, another “hanging chad” fiasco like the one we endured in 2000.
Like many Americans, I was feeling queasy about this election early on, and now that it’s “over” (maybe), I can’t say I’m feeling much better. Emotions have been running high—so much so that people on both sides were predicting “violent uprisings” if the result wasn’t as they intended. Regardless of the outcome, roughly half the country is upset right about now—some, perhaps, to the point of downright despair or even anger. And Americans are more divided than ever on many critical issues. Veritable chasms exist in opinions on everything from immigration and healthcare, to abortion and energy. Looking back over the past ten presidential elections, I don’t recall it ever being like this.
It’s all deeply troubling. How did we end up here? Who’s to blame for this? Maybe we all should take a good look into that shiny, flat surface on the medicine cabinet in the bathroom and say, “Hello, Knucklehead. Now look what you’ve done!” We are all to blame to one degree or another. Either we’ve been too “busy” to pay attention, or we didn’t “believe” it made any difference, so we just didn’t care. But beyond these reasons, we have another serious problem in America—ignorance.
By and large, far too many Americans have little or no understanding about the role of government and the intended limits placed upon our leaders by the Constitution. As a result, we make bad choices then fail to hold our leaders accountable because we don’t even know the limits of their jobs ourselves. The fact that the final contest came down to a choice between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump bears witness to my point.
In the last debate for example, when asked by Chris Wallace how they would go about selecting a Supreme Court Justice, Hillary said, “I’d choose someone with ‘life experience,’” never even uttering the word “Constitution” in her reply. What does “life experience” have to do with the law and interpreting the Constitution? And Trump’s reply wasn’t much better. He rambled on about choosing “someone like the late Justice, Antonin Scalia,” offering scant evidence that he fully understands the issue. On the basis of their answers to this one question alone, neither candidate appears fit to serve as our Chief Executive.
The first and most important obligation of the President of the United States is stated in their oath of office: “I do solemnly swear that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”
If Americans had been well informed on this point all along, it’s likely neither Clinton nor Trump would be our president.
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