Republican Wannabees for the President Nomination seem to have drunk all the Kool-Aid.But they'd be great at a showbiz roast or, better yet, a Minstrel Show.

::::::::

Back in 2008, I wrote a column in which I promised my readers

that "I have watched my last presidential debate."

I went on: "I am sick to death of well-coiffed cable TV news

anchors asking vapid questions designed to generate heat, not

light. I am sick to death of presidential wannabees filibustering

questions they choose to avoid by delivering slogans, not

answers."

And finally, "I am sick to death of the faux choice presented to

voters: Change versus Experience. Could someone out there

please tell me exactly what that's supposed to mean?"

No, don't bother. It means nothing. It's an apple and an orange.

Well. I didn't do such a great job of keeping my resolution -- I

sneaked some very long peeks at this year's Republican

Presidential "debates." I saw (more than) enough to know that if

any debates could be demonstrably worse than the 2008

Republican models, I was seeing them now.

I could write that at least this harvest of hot air had some fun

moments. Who could forget Rick Perry, paralyzed from the

neck up, so that he couldn't tell us the third of the three Cabinet

Departments he would abolish immediately upon his election.

Or his (truth is stranger than fiction) line: "George W. Bush did a

incredible job in the presidency, defending us from freedom."

Or I could choose to recall Ron Paul's assertion that, "Opinion

polls consistently show that only about 5 percent of blacks have

sensible political opinions, i.e. support the free market, individual

liberty and the end of welfare and affirmative action." Right!

For Dr. Paul, it also follows neatly that, "Given the inefficiencies

of what DC laughingly calls the criminal justice system, I think

we can safely assume that 95 percent of the black males in that

city are semi-criminal or entirely criminal."

And how about Herman Dean -- who is still waiting for the other

shoe(s) to drop in his sexual harassment imbroglio -- sounding

off with "I get upset when the Muslims in this country, some of

them, try to force their Sharia law onto the rest of us."

Or how about his solution to illegal immigration: "It will be a

twenty foot wall, barbed wire, electrified on the top, and on this

side of the fence, I'll have that moat that President Obama talked

about. And I would put those alligators in that moat."

Then there was Rep. Michele Bachmann, of Tea Party fame,

who assures us that, ''There are hundreds and hundreds of

scientists, many of them holding Nobel Prizes, who believe in

intelligent design.''

And, she declares, ''The Democratic Leader, Nancy Pelosi, is

committed to her global warming fanaticism to the point where

she has said she has even said she is trying to save the planet.

We all know that someone did that 2,000 years ago.''

But after I stopped laughing at this or that gaffe, or at Mitt

Romney's flip-flops or at Newt Gingrich's faux intellectual

analyses of US foreign policy,  I had to remind myself that this

wasn't the Fryer's Club and the wannabees weren't rehearsing

their acts for some show business roast.

These debates would lead one of the angry warriors to the

Republican nomination. And, given the state of our economy, a

Republican could win this time.

It is that possibility that makes my hair stand straight up. The

reason is that there is not a single member of this motley crew

who has the experience, the knowledge, the mind, and the

temperament to sit in the Oval Office. To be mandated to look

after us -- all of us, all 308,745,538 of us.

Readers, think about 2012. How would we feel if at that year's

first G-20 meeting the United States was represented by Herman

Cain. Think about it. Herman Cain. What would he say?

Now, maybe I make a bit much out of Mr. Cain. After all, he's

only one of the group. It's just that when I see him on stage with

his colleagues, I don't expect speeches. I expect the performers

the break into that old Minstrel Show ballad, "Come Along My

Mandy."

Friends, these are not serious people. With the possible

exception of Ron Paul, these are opportunists. They have not

spent their adult lives preparing themselves for this toughest of

all jobs.

What kills this bunch for me is the high-test, non-stop hubris

they must all have even to think they have earned a right to try to

be President. It is a big part of the American mythology that

anyone has the right to do anything.

Well, they must believe it  -- aren't they all together on the same

stage?

The only glimmer of light at the end of this particular tunnel is the

voter.
The failed Mississippi "fertilized egg to personhood" law got

roundly defeated by the voters of a state that's about last in

everything in our country.

That didn't matter.

What mattered was that the voters were a lot smarter than their

politicians.

Let us pray!

Authors Website: http://billfisher.blogspot.com

Authors Bio:
William Fisher has managed economic development programs in the Middle East and elsewhere for the US State Department and the US Agency for International Development. He served in the international affairs area in the Kennedy Administration and now writes on subjects ranging from human rights to foreign affairs for a number of newspapers and online journals.