You don’t have to read the hate mail. That’s what secretaries are for.
If enough dirt can’t be found on you, it’ll be fabricated. OTOH if you were Tramp you’d brag of your crimes and be adored for your honesty. “In kindergarten I grabbed-em by the pigtails. Then I grew taller and aimed lower. It wasn’t rape if they enjoyed it.”
I would be knocked out of any race more elevated than county dogcatcher (and dogs like me). I’ve killed or injured nobody; racked-up no major convictions or settlements; not cheated on taxes much nor spouse at all; used Twitter. But I’m doomed politically. Too many minor creaky details infest my past. Must I bleach my history?
Me too, but such skills seem useless in Tramp’s DC. I recall an old underground comix bit showing “leadership training” as eating human shit when so ordered, to know how to similarly break others. Tramp’s minions seem fairly well-trained. That’s leadership!
It’s a little outdated, but the Onion had the answer to this:
Trump is a remoseless sex offender and felon and it didn’t stop him in the slightest.
Honestly, considering how radicalized this nation has become the idea of Trumps base disliking the next POTUS would be more of a badge of honor than anything else.
There’s a reason many children say they want to be President when they grow up. Sure, they are too young to understand the drawbacks of the position, but it’s still one of the greatest, most powerful, most impactful and attention-getting jobs a person could ever possibly get.
I certainly wouldn’t want to be POTUS, now or at any time. But I can imagine plenty of reasons, honorable and dishonorable, why someone (who is different from me) might want to, including:
It’s the job their whole life has been leading up to
The fame
The power
The prestige
The opportunity to serve their country
The opportunity to make a difference in the world
The challenge
“Surely I can do a better job than the current occupant of the Oval Office”
I wouldn’t do it. I would be a really terrible president, and there are lots of aspects of the job I would hate, even if I weren’t afraid of making a huge mess of the US. But I can think of lots of reasons a same person would want to do it
The opportunity to make the world a better place
The opportunity to make a TON of money after you are done with the job
At least for a guy, it makes you REALLY sexually attractive. (okay, present president excepted, but in general, power makes a man hot.)
The opportunity to meet lots of interesting people, and have them all care about meeting you.
Great healthcare for the rest of your life. Great security, too. (okay, mostly kidding about those.)
I’d love to be president. Honestly, I think I’m qualified today but I don’t believe that other people would agree with me enough for me to raise the money necessary to convince people that I’m awesome. Running for president would suck since you have to deal with people going through your background and defending things you did decades ago. Basically, running for president is letting people try and ruin you life if they succeed you get nothing but a ruined life and if they fail you get a great job. That a tought proposition.
Once you’re president though things get pretty good. You get access to information and get to make decisions that will change the world. Of course there is stress but every good job has stress. The only real problem with being president is the pay cut by the time people think your qualified for the job 400k per year isn’t that much. The life time pension of that 400k makes up for four years of lower earnings.
They may fail but they won’t give up.
I suppose, though, after four (or eight) years most will have found other targets.
Ehh, I can’t imagine caring about people saying I’m raping babies in the basement of a pizza place or that I’m not an American due to where I was born. In other words being Bill Clinton is a pretty good life being drug through the gutter like Hillary for nothing would suck.
I might do it for the healthcare.
Well in one direction there’s this:
but then there’s also this:
Especially the part about:
No matter how smart you are, and how well-informed you are, and how great you are at picking advisors: you are almost certainly going to get something wrong.
And people are going to die, because you got it wrong.
Sometimes people are going to die because of what you decided, even if you got it right.
And in some cases, it may not be possible to know for years – or ever – whether they died because you got it right, or because you got it wrong.
If installed as president, I promise to serve only long enough for a pension and then to resign and get the hell out of Dodge, maybe to Yucatan to mingle with swamp creatures.
Inanimate Carbon Rod for President!
Vote Rod/Wiggum 2020!
Also keep in mind that indications show we may be headed for a recession. If the economy tanks, we are fucked. The tools used by the government to fight a recession are usually to cut interest rates, and/or deficit spend to boost the economy. But what are you going to do when interest rates are already low and we’re all ready running trillion dollar deficits.
You’ll probably spend the 4 years being hated by almost everyone for not being able to fix the unfixable.
For a President, hubris isn’t a flaw - it’s a prerequisite. Even the very best Presidents had a massive ego and an ironclad belief in their own abilities, because otherwise they’d be paralyzed.
That’s why, if I were that kind of person, I’d *relish *serving after Trump. The greater the crisis, the greater the glory. No. 46 will have a shot at being the next FDR.
I’d think looking at the “before” and “after” pictures of the “winners” would dissuade anyone because why’d you want a job where physically you age that fast in it?
I remember how happy Jimmy Carter looked going being elected in 1980 then look at him just 4 years later with the Iran crisis.
I don’t think I’m qualified for the office of president, but if the World Dictator position opens, I’m available.
You’ve got it! Now fix global warming before it’s too late. Maybe your [del]survivor[/del] successor will manage that [del]when[/del] if you fail. But have an exit strategy ready. 