Conventional Wisdom?
What a crock.
Jonathan Alter writing for Newsweek penned this jewel, Is America Ready?, speculating on the chances of Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama becoming President.
Mr. Alter states: “For 220 years, Americans have elected only white male Christians with no hint of ethnicity to the White House.”
Prove it, Mr. Alter. Several of the people who have been President were definitely not “Christian” in the commonly understood meaning of the word, and a few may well have been atheists, although it wouldn’t have been politic to admit it.
As for them all being “white male”, I would like to see the DNA to prove that claim. I might concede “male”, but America is a country of mixed races and bad record keeping. There have been rumors of tampering with National Guard records, criminal records, and educational records at various times.
Now if Mr. Alter would care to change his quote to: “For 220 years, Americans have been under the impression that they were electing white male Christians,” I could accept it. Bigotry in the US has forced this meaningless restriction on the political classes.
After more than 50 million American voters cast a ballot for the current resident of the White House in 2004, I would think that most people would have to agree that the bar to enter 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue has been lowered to its Constitutional level of 35 years of age, 14 years of residence in the United States, and a native-born citizen.
Fortunately the Supreme Court will probably not recognize the conversion factor for dogs, or we could have a golden retriever as the next President.
4 comments
What?
Don’t you think a golden retriever could do a better job than the current President?
Or, are you holding out for a german shepherd?
Based on my experience, you wouldn’t notice the difference if it was a golden retriever. Now a German shepherd would at least keep things in line.
Maybe TBogg would let Beckham run, or Barney could finish out the current term.
Barney, surely the smartest of the lot, knows his limitations and does not seek more power. The man who occupies the Oval Office (verb chosen advisedly) could learn from Barney.
Years ago, I read (I wish I could find the piece now) that one Southern state… Mississippi? I’m not certain… once passed a law defining anyone who was at least 1/32 part black (i.e., who had a black great-great-great-grandparent) as black for legal purposes. It was a grand racist notion for the bigots in the legislature to vote for, but it didn’t take long for them to figure out that literally everyone alive qualified as black under that standard. Served ’em right, IMO… unless the whole story was a myth.
They passed the laws and altered the records, Steve. In Mississippi and the Carolinas the majority of people were “slaves.” Recent DNA studies have shown that “African” Americans are a good deal more European than assumed or suspected.