Avoiding the Trump Travesty

By Zoe Gabel

There is a fine line between ignorance and inexperience. Unfortunately, Donald Trump,

our newfound president exudes all three of these characteristics. This, as someone who was

running for presidency and is now the president can be extremely dangerous. However, this is

something that the American people seem to have either ignored or been fooled into thinking it is

not as important as it is. I believe that there should be at least a two-year requirement in either

public service/office or military service if not both. Every former president before Donald Trump

has had either public service experience or military experience and most times both which gave

them the upper hand in knowing how government works, what proper discipline is, and knowing

how to be a good leader to more than just themselves and the upper-class. These former

presidents experiences make it more apparent that the racist and sadistic comments he makes are

not only because of his ignorance and arrogance but because of his lack of experience.

According to Zachary Crockett in his article in Vox, previous presidents (1789 to 2016)

came into the White House with an average of 13 years in public office and 5.6 years of military

service. Donald Trumps tally: zero, on both counts. (Figure 1.).

 This lack of experience is dangerous when one is responsible for the future and the

present state of the entire country and other countries. The actions and behaviors Trump is

showing so far in his presidency and in his run for president are not only affecting Americans

but people world-wide. We have yet to see a policy change or even just a positive statement exit

Donald Trumps administration, let alone Donald Trump himself. In the run against Hillary

Clinton the WaPo poll finds that Americans say by 59-39 that Clinton is qualified to serve as

president, on the other half of things people say, by 60-37 that Trump is not qualified to serve

as president. (Sargent.). (Figure 2.).

If this is the case, my question is how Donald Trump remains as our president, and how did he

get elected in the first place. On top of this a CNN poll found that 64-36 people has that Clinton

has the right experience to be a good president whereas 67-32 said that Trump does not have the

right experience to be an effective president. Are those statistics are alarming and confusing to

you as they are to me? They should be.

During Barack Obamas run for president Americans claimed that he was not experienced

enough to be a good president. They called him untested and inexperienced. However, Obama
was a senator for 12 years prior to running for office. It now seems as though Obama was not the

most unseasoned and unfit for the job of president. His experience as a senator not only gave him

important political background, but gave him the leadership knowledge necessary to become a

good president. One cannot expect someone with no experience in their field to not need

training. In this case, the training is public service or military service.

This policy change of a requirement of at least 2-years in public or military service will

help to decrease this lack of leadership skills and may have increased Trumps numbers in these

two polls if he had such experience. This change can be considered a training course just as any

server, construction worker, or any other American worker. A president is just thrown into the

ring and is expected to run the country from day one in the office. Without experience, as we can

see with Trump, it is as though the manager/boss is going in with no clue as to what the job

really entails and how to do it in a way that positively affects people. One cannot be a good

leader, or be expected to be a good leader when they do not have the skills they need to learn

prior to the job. In this instance however, it does not just affect the success of a business, it

affects the world. My policy change can help to avoid this inexperience, ignorance and arrogance

from entering the White House for years to come.

Works Cited
Crockett, Zachary. "Donald Trump Is the Only US President Ever with No Political or Military

Experience." Vox. Vox, 11 Nov. 2016. Web.

Sargent, Greg. "Donald Trump Is Not Qualified to Be President. And the American People

Know It." Washington Post. The Plum Line, 18 July 2016. Web.