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| | Post New Topic | | democracy or aristocracy? | Views: 233 | | Jan 10, 2009 3:24 pm | | democracy or aristocracy? | # |
cameron jacobson | | Someone asked me the other day whether my idea is such that only the smartest people should have the privilege to run for office. No. Anyone who by definition of law can run for office should be able to run for office. The law doesn't stipulate that they have to have a certain IQ or list things they need to know in order to run, they just run. Also, this test would be voluntary. The thing that would make it work is if a significant percentage of the electorate decided that an understanding of government should precede running for a political office. If you don't take the test I won't vote for you. If you take the test and score horribly I won't vote for you.
It's up to the electorate as to what 'weight' they wish to put on academic achievements. To tell you the truth this idea of test taking isn't strictly about academic achievements. It's about having the capacity to understand what's going on in government, knowing what tools are at your disposal when elected to your office of choice, and finally knowing how to utilize those tools in order to make things happen. It's also crucial to have a thorough understanding of the issues, what steps have been taken in the past on those issues, why those steps were taken, and what steps could be taken in the future.
Ever since the market crashed I've been watching alot of c-span. If you ever get a chance I'd urge you to do so as well. It's especially interesting to me when they're showing a congressional hearing. This is our government in action. Listen to the congressmen / women asking questions, then imagine a mentally handicapped person asking the questions, finally imagine a university professor in that seat asking the questions. There are all sorts of shades of gray in between these extremes. I'm not saying only university professors should be able to run for office, and I'm not even saying that mentally challenged people shouldn't run for office. If you have an understanding of what you're getting into by running for office, you're likely going to be an informed individual who isn't going to have problems with the test. If you have no idea what you're getting into when running for office I would ask "why are you running in the first place".
In summary I see an 'assessment test' as just one of many possible solutions to the problem of assessing a candidate's capacity to perform the duties of the job they're running for.
In subsequent posts I hope to cover some of the other issues, in order to keep the themes of each thread somewhat focused on specific topics.
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