Editor’s Note: The following story was created as an entry for the FSPA District 4 Workshop On-The-Spot opinion column writing contest. It won second place.
When you think of a politician, you may think of a young, dynamic and sound person. Instead of that, these government officials keep getting older and older.
Of course there’s a minimum age for president, senate and many other government positions, because obviously you need life experience and a fully developed brain. But what happens when these political figures reach ages of 70 or 80? The most people should be doing at that age is using their senior citizen discount at your local Dairy Queen buying a Blizzard for your grandchildren.
According to Pew Research Center, 79% of Americans seem to agree with that statement. Just as an example, the person running the country right now is a, not so crisp, 80 years old. Studies have shown that cognitive decline starts around age 70 or higher and that seems more than true for our commander-in-chief.
As stated by the National Institute of Health, the frontal cortex shrinks significantly with age. The frontal cortex controls things such as judgment, impulse control and memory. Why would anyone want the people making decisions about the general population to have poor impulse control and judgment issues? That just sounds like a disaster waiting to happen.
It’s not even just the president. Recently passed, California senator, Dianne Feinstein, was 90 years old at the time of her death, with no assumed plan of stepping down. Kentucky senator, Mitch McConnell, age 86, has had multiple “freezing episodes” of national TV, that has left many Americans questioning if he should still be in office.
Majority of positions in government have a minimum age, which is totally understandable, yet the supreme court does not, with the youngest justice is 51 years old and the oldest being 75. Ruth Bader Ginsburg was 87 at the time of her death and was still serving in the court. This is becoming extremally unacceptable.
My only question is, why can someone be 34 and not be able to run for president but an 85 year old can? By this logic someone can be 105 years old and run one of the most powerful nations in the world while being prescribed the best dementia medications out there.
