“Ridiculous…“We would never even discuss something like that. How many 30-year-olds could travel to Poland, get on the train? Go nine more hours, go to Ukraine, meet with President Zelensky? So, look at the man. Look what he’s doing. Look what he continues to do each and every day.”
—First Lady Jill Biden, after being asked during a CNN interview about Nikki Haley’s proposal that politicians over the age of 75 undergo mental competency testing.
In related news, Lance Armstrong declared that testing competitive cyclists for doping is “ridiculous,” and O.J. Simpson opined that DNA technology was “ridiculous.”
Fortunately, all we need to do to determine the competency of First Ladies is to analyze a cretinous answer like that one to a flamingly easy question. We are looking, Jill. And it’s not pretty. The words the First Lady was searching for were not “ridiculous,” but responsible, necessary, and “a matter of common sens
The United States has already courted disaster with Presidents continuing in office after their mental faculties have been damaged or declined. President Pierce was impaired by grief, crippling depression and alcoholism during his single term in office, which occurred at a crucial point in the deadly run-up to the Civil War. Woodrow Wilson infamously remained President after being crippled by a major stroke. There is evidence that President Reagan’s cognitive stability was declining during his presidency.
As for Jill’s human meal-ticket, no modern President has shown so many signs of mental decline and confusion, and this frightening development has come after a career in public office unmarked by intellectual acuity at its zenith. Every responsible Presidential candidate should be required to pledge to take such competency tests on a regular basis and agree to resign from office once a thorough, non-partisan diagnosis confirmed by multiple physicians concludes that there is significant cognitive decline.
Congress should pass a law requiring such tests for Presidents, SCOTUS justices, and its own members. There is no justification for not doing so. At least the First Lady didn’t quote Bernie Sanders, who has always been incompetent, when the 81-year-old Joseph Stalin fan answered a similar query in an interview with CBS News last month by blathering,
“We are fighting racism. We’re fighting sexism. We’re fighting homophobia. I think we should also be fighting ageism. Trust people, look at people, and say, ‘You know, this person is competent. This person’s incompetent.’ There are a lot of 40-year-olds out there who ain’t particularly competent.”
Yikes. Bernie’s fatuous excuses break down into rationalizations and good old-fashioned stupidity (or senility). He nicks too many rationalizations to list, though #33, “The Management Shrug”or “Don’t sweat the small stuff” is closest to his “We have all these other problems, why focus on whether the President can still think?” argument. At the same time Sanders played the discrimination card that worked so well for Senator Fetterman, currently unable to do his job, and defaults to blind trust, which President Reagan in one of his most lucid moments amended to “trust but verify.”
I especially like Bernie’s non-sequitur, “There are a lot of 40-year-olds out there who ain’t particularly competent.” It is, of course, no more “ageist” to test the mental and cognitive health of potential or current elected officials past the age when competence can be fairly and safely presumed than it is to give them physical examinations. If Bernie thinks it would be better and safer to check all elected officials for cognitive ability regardless of age, I’ll back him without reservation.
Ethics Alarms 
I’ll bet they would have had no problem with Trump being required to be tested.
None whatever. And a lot of biden’s most art defenders were calling Reagan a senile old man while he was still in office. You see, problems like senility and mental disability are no big deal when Democrats suffer them. They are a very big deal when Republicans suffer them. It’s just like refusing to confirm a presidential appointment is just keeping the bench free of politics, when Democrats do it, but when Republicans won’t grant His Hipness and Coolness’ chosen Justice a hearing, it is unforgivable.
By the way, most Democrat first ladies are bona fide heroines who tirelessly support their husbands who are just trying to make this nation and the world better places. Republican first ladies are either worthless, vacuous trophy wives or idiots who would be nowhere without their husbands. How dare you criticize Dr Jill? /Sarcasm
Bernie Sanders sure as hell ain’t in a position to talk about competence. He’s even older than Biden and he’s already had one heart attack. If anyone ever had one foot in the proverbial grave and the other on a banana peel, it was him. But because he is the Senate’s far-left loudmouth, they overvalue him.
Let’s also not forget how John Paul Stevens overstayed his time on the Supreme Court even after having had a stroke and William O. Douglas remained after being obviously disabled by one. At least Douglas, who listened to almost no one else, listened to his personal friend and colleague Abe Fortas, who told him it was time to go. I am certain that if Bush the elder had been re-elected in 1992, Harry Blackmun would have remained on the court until either a Democratic president was elected, or he finally went down for the dirt nap. Ruthie had her chance to walk away and be replaced by a like-minded successor, but she turned it down, and, partly because of her hubris, now Roe v. Wade is history.
The mistake too many high achievers make is thinking that they are either immortal, or too valuable to leave the field, even when it’s long past time to do so.
Knowing what we know about Justice Bader-Ginsburg’s feelings on Roe v Wade, would it have been history, though, if she’d lived. Would she have valued her belief that this was a bad law over abortion rights which she supported? We will never know.
But, yes, the glaring double standards when it comes to their people versus Republicans lights up like a supernova.
Abortion uber alles!
She’s a menace. And who the fuck is a first lady to be opining on policy matters? Go away, Jill. Just because Joe is MIA and you’re one of the chief people pulling his strings and writing his scripts doesn’t mean you get to be President.
I assume Bernie is referring to the Bernie Bros when he slimes forty year-olds.
I wonder whether anyone in the Biden cabal will agree to a book deal sometime in the future to spill the beans on how Joe’s been wheeled around over the last four years like a cardboard cut-out or a Chatty Cathy.
Sure, when they set out to prove how Kamala Harris is the best President ever. Then all of Biden’s dirty laundry will come out, go through the ringer and hung on the line for everybody to see.
And the media will tell us, “No, no, you’re wrong. We never told you he was a competent President.”
They act like he’s sitting in coach, not traveling on his own personal luxury airliner with a full bedroom suite and a staff physician. Yeah, I’m pretty sure most 30 year-olds could swing that.
I know a 30 year who made the trek out to the Poland/Ukraine border and helped with relief efforts. Hundreds of others do the same every two weeks. It is a pretty silly example.
“How many 30-year-olds could travel to Poland, get on the train? Go nine more hours, go to Ukraine, meet with President Zelensky?”
Better question is how many 30 year olds (or 40, or 50, 0r 60…) couldn’t do that…especially if travelling on a private luxury airliner and other similar accommodations, with a large retinue of servants and private security?
The problem is that I think they’re being honest.
Remember, progressives aren’t fans of the idea of meritocracy. Despite all evidence to the contrary, despite the obviousness of the differences in human capacity, I think that generally, they really do believe that all humans are basically placeholders. That anyone, given the opportunity, could do any job, and so why not get a disabled black female midget to play in the NFL? Ok… That might be too obvious even for them, but having a vegetable in the office of President or Senator doesn’t bother them because those people have good progressive handlers to do all the important work, like planning, thinking, or chewing and all that the vegetable was good for was tricking those rube voters into giving their side the office for a block of time so that they can go to work. What they’re looking for is electability, safe, familiar, nonthreatening names that anyone could vote for, packaged in a way that won’t make too much trouble for the people actually in charge.
And to an extent, it works, I mean… Just look at all the things this “administration” has done! I think Joe is probably struggling getting dressed in the mornings, but he’s been Weekend-At-Bernie’s-ing his way through the last few years and actually managed, to some extent, to run one of the more complicated nations on Earth. I just don’t think it’s what the voters were expecting, and because of that I don’t know if the model has legs.
That’s “differently-abled Black little birthing person”. to you, you monster! /s
I’ll strap on the cilice and flagellate for the rest of the afternoon.
I’m sorry I’m white
I’m sorry I’m male
I’m sorry I’m white
I’m sorry I’m male.
“[T]hey really do believe that all humans are basically placeholders.”*
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* See, e.g., John Fetterman.