It’s not really about age. There are plenty of older people who are still functioning fine. Hell, Biden is almost as old as Mitch, but he’s physically fit and doesn’t go into fugue states. (And the claims that his stutter and verbal gaffs are evidence of decline are utter bullshit. He’s been that way his entire life.)
Where we’re fucking up is that we don’t have any systems in place to require our elected officials or candidates to be mentally sound. We should require people running for or in elected office to pass cognitive tests the same way we require people on the roads to pass driving tests. Yes, more of the elderly will fail those tests because age is a factor, but the focus should be on “can this person do the job,” not “is this person too old.”
Mitch might be someone who’d be removed from office with a test like that, but it would also potentially catch young guys with catastrophic mental health issues, like Herschel Walker, who got frighteningly close to public office while showing blatant signs of illness.
An independent health exam to determine cognitive fitness every year you serve in public office once you’re over 65 was my thought when I saw this news last night.
It wouldn’t have stopped Walker but it would take care of McConnell and Finnstein. As well as any Supreme Court Justices that go that way.
Gods, remember the doctor that gave Trump his physical during his original campaign? The best health, the fittest adult male imaginable. That guy should have had his medical license stripped.
They already factor age into lifetime appointments.l with nominations (look at the median age of Trump’s appointments). I don’t see how requiring public servants be cognitively fit to serve and making them prove it if they’re getting on in years can be abused here.
That is an issue which is why we’d need an independent agency and transparency.
And yes, that means this would be public medical information. Want the right to medical privacy, resign. It’s a requirement of the position post 65 that you wave that right in this instance.
My fear is how easily it can be weaponized as a tool of oppresion if applied to broadly.
I.e. how we define cognitive fitness. But as I think about it I think you’re right. A person who isn’t competent to stand trial isn’t fit for public service, regardless of age.
Tie it into the legal definition. If you can’t pass a competency test legally you have no business writing laws.
Just like a lot of ideas that seem like they’d be good for government only work until the Right Wing (whichever party they’re corrupting, over the decades and centuries) gets ahold of them. Remember the poll tests they used against Black people to prevent them from voting. And think about how they’d slash and burn the funding for a National Healthcare System in order to cut taxes further for the wealthy. You can’t base the system on a premise that the people running it will have the good of the country at heart, you have to design it to prevent evil abuse of its power.
I’m still not sure that “let’s do nothing and hope for the best” is the best approach in a society where people now live so long that mental decline affects a much larger percentage of the population than it did in 1776.
I think it would be completely reasonable to put an upper age limit on elected officials - say you can’t run after 75. You can run right before 75 and serve as an elected official for a few more years, but after that you’re done.
It’s not really about age. There are plenty of older people who are still functioning fine. Hell, Biden is almost as old as Mitch, but he’s physically fit and doesn’t go into fugue states. (And the claims that his stutter and verbal gaffs are evidence of decline are utter bullshit. He’s been that way his entire life.)
Where we’re fucking up is that we don’t have any systems in place to require our elected officials or candidates to be mentally sound. We should require people running for or in elected office to pass cognitive tests the same way we require people on the roads to pass driving tests. Yes, more of the elderly will fail those tests because age is a factor, but the focus should be on “can this person do the job,” not “is this person too old.”
Mitch might be someone who’d be removed from office with a test like that, but it would also potentially catch young guys with catastrophic mental health issues, like Herschel Walker, who got frighteningly close to public office while showing blatant signs of illness.
An independent health exam to determine cognitive fitness every year you serve in public office once you’re over 65 was my thought when I saw this news last night.
It wouldn’t have stopped Walker but it would take care of McConnell and Finnstein. As well as any Supreme Court Justices that go that way.
This would be terribly abused. Imagine who Republicans would shoehorn in there based off their Supreme Court picks…
Gods, remember the doctor that gave Trump his physical during his original campaign? The best health, the fittest adult male imaginable. That guy should have had his medical license stripped.
You’ll love that the doctor in question, Ronny Jackson, now represents Texas’s 13th district in congress.
He couldn’t get a job doing anything else!
https://nypost.com/2022/11/25/jerome-adams-say-he-couldnt-find-job-after-leaving-trump-white-house/
Precisely because he said Trump was healthy and proved to anyone with a single brain cell that his medical opinion could not be trusted.
Shoehorn into the Supreme Court?
They already factor age into lifetime appointments.l with nominations (look at the median age of Trump’s appointments). I don’t see how requiring public servants be cognitively fit to serve and making them prove it if they’re getting on in years can be abused here.
I think the point is that the doctor making the call could be corrupted, or a corrupt doctor appointed to the position.
That is an issue which is why we’d need an independent agency and transparency.
And yes, that means this would be public medical information. Want the right to medical privacy, resign. It’s a requirement of the position post 65 that you wave that right in this instance.
I agree with all of that, except it should be for every person holding an elected position at that level.
Younger people can be mentally impacted by a host of issues, and, on the flip side, any whiff of ageism should be avoided.
So just make it a universal precondition.
My fear is how easily it can be weaponized as a tool of oppresion if applied to broadly.
I.e. how we define cognitive fitness. But as I think about it I think you’re right. A person who isn’t competent to stand trial isn’t fit for public service, regardless of age.
Tie it into the legal definition. If you can’t pass a competency test legally you have no business writing laws.
If you’re gonna do a Cognitive Fitness test it should be for all ages. Would Boebert pass?
She probably is emotionally unstable (along with MTG) but that’s much different than cognitive decline/fitness.
She barely passed the GED on her 3rd try. Decline? She’s never risen above the bottom of the mountain. And she’s never been fit for office.
Think of all the outrage it would cause people getting declared ‘unfit’. People would definitely think there is double play going on…
Just like a lot of ideas that seem like they’d be good for government only work until the Right Wing (whichever party they’re corrupting, over the decades and centuries) gets ahold of them. Remember the poll tests they used against Black people to prevent them from voting. And think about how they’d slash and burn the funding for a National Healthcare System in order to cut taxes further for the wealthy. You can’t base the system on a premise that the people running it will have the good of the country at heart, you have to design it to prevent evil abuse of its power.
Precisely. But how to do that? I would think multiple layers of control, but that would get too complex I think.
This has so much potential to be corrupted…
Just like any system in existence.
I’m still not sure that “let’s do nothing and hope for the best” is the best approach in a society where people now live so long that mental decline affects a much larger percentage of the population than it did in 1776.
I think you have a point.
I think it would be completely reasonable to put an upper age limit on elected officials - say you can’t run after 75. You can run right before 75 and serve as an elected official for a few more years, but after that you’re done.