Goals for America

                                    Goals for America

Communication, despite our technological advances, seems to have become more difficult. As a social species, we are eager for interaction but writing is new to us and speech is our real medium. The written word has to be approached and decided upon so it is easily avoided but we are subjected to speech, whether we want to be or not. Technology has taken us far beyond the annoying town crier or the drunk in the road. We now have television, radio and countless portable devices chatting or blasting at us through walls or from across the street.

So, despite our basic tendencies, we are getting good at tuning things out.

We are protecting ourselves from everything; bad music, arguing spouses, advertisements, talk shows, weird game shows…and politics. We really try to protect ourselves from politics. There was a time when some profound leaders roamed the land but they are extinct. Now we are the victims of simply astonishing political nonsense, caused partly by the growing belief that everything is a performance. Children can make a good living performing on Facebook or Instagram. Clothing must startle. Private tattoos are creeping up the neck and into the face. 

When politicians perform, bad things happen. Intensity and distinctiveness demand politicians step from center stage to the sideshow. In the last months we have had an avalanche of political debris of every kind characterized by insincerity, grandstanding and laughable mendacity, lying so profound and pervasive that we accept it as a sort of compartmentalized argot to be understood, tolerated and ignored like Jehovah’s Witnesses.

Since Vietnam, military men seem to be in decline. And Lord knows what we can think of churchmen. Indeed, one might wonder if our culture of advertising, seduction and insincerity is capable of producing probity at all. Even baseball cheats.
            If true, we might turn to one group that consistently speaks with insight and truthfulness in their area of expertise: Hockey coaches. Whether between periods or at game’s end, hockey coaches consistently give accurate, unflinching assessments of the performance of the team and its coaching staff. They are determined, always looking forward, always as upbeat as the situation allows, always offering some suggestions for improvement. They don’t wander out beyond their field of influence. They seem to be better dressed. And they don’t cry. This is a virtual description of a desirable chief executive.

This leads to an obvious conclusion. Section 1 of Article Two of the United States Constitution sets forth the eligibility requirements for serving as president of the United States, under clause 5: 

            No Person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the Office of President; neither shall any Person be eligible to that Office who shall not have attained to the Age of thirty-five Years, and been fourteen Years a Resident within the United States.

It is time to change this rule to allow hockey coaches born in Canada, to run for president. And if they refuse, perhaps we could conscript them.