Posted on 02/18/2004 8:53:27 PM PST by fight_truth_decay
A lot of kooks run for president: Strom Thurmond, Ross Perot, Howard Dean. By comparison, Timothy Rexford Wilson of Belfast, Maine, seems almost normal.
Remember, I said almost.
In late January, Wilson sent out a news release announcing his independent candidacy for the nation’s top job. Since the 48-year-old Massachusetts native has relatively little money, no governmental experience, and even less name recognition, an impartial observer could be excused for tactfully suggesting that Wilson give a wide berth to any hungry squirrels he happens to encounter on the campaign trail.
Unlike the above-mentioned candidates, Wilson took no offense at the implication he might be a nut. "As the voters get to know me," he said, "they’ll see less nut and more common sense."
(Another suggestion from the impartial observer: Don’t ever say anything like that to somebody who might be quoting you.)
Wilson is an Air Force veteran, holds an MBA from the University of Texas, and spent 15 years in middle management at companies like Tandem Computers and Gillette. He decided to run for president while hiking, which is strong evidence for the impartial observer’s theory that outdoor activity is bad for your mental health. He walked the Appalachian Trail in 1998 and the Pacific Crest Trail in 2002, then wrote a self-published book called American Transformation about the ideas that popped into his head for improving the country.
"I’m a long-distance hiker," Wilson said in his release. "I don’t go left or right. I go forward up the trail."
The impartial observer is tempted to suggest that anyone running an independent campaign for president has already wandered off the beaten path and is plowing through the puckerbrush. But the impartial observer is too polite.
Wilson describes himself as "a bleeding-heart conservative," by which he means he favors lots of new government programs to improve our health and welfare, but opposes spending any additional money on them. He claims that approach has attracted interest from both conservative Republicans and Green Party members. George W. Bush and Ralph Nader must be worried sick.
According to his Web site (www.americantransformation.com), Wilson wants to weaken the influence of corporations on the political process (a frequent Nader theme) by "transform[ing] our system into a self-policing fair free market" (which sounds like something Bush would say). To accomplish that, he’d "strengthen horizontal and restrain vertical capitalism." As nearly as the impartial observer can determine, that means he’d put such a high tax on large corporations, they’d be forced to split themselves into tinier companies. He’d also authorize the government to seize the bank accounts of "irresponsible executives," and sell off the assets of badly behaved businesses to people who promised to be nice.
Okay, that’s a little wacky, but no more so than Bush’s proposal to bankrupt the country in order to pay for sending tourists to Mars.
In the area of national security, Wilson would end all military aid to other countries and use the cash to fund a new Department of International Justice. This agency, a division of the Supreme Court, would place special judges in every American embassy to hear the grievances of any foreigner against the US government, its citizens, corporations, or companies doing business with America. Wilson’s theory is that potential terrorists, rather than resorting to violence, would welcome the opportunity to resolve their complaints peacefully, employing not suicide bombers, but lawyers.
The impartial observer is not convinced much is gained in that trade. In addition, the i.o. questions how the new court would resolve the terrorists’ demands for an end to US support for Israel, since the judicial system has no constitutional authority to meddle in foreign policy.
A goofy idea? Sure, but then so are John Kerry’s varied and contradictory positions on the war in Iraq.
Wilson wants to establish a federal Department of Health to make sure we all eat the right foods and avoid the wrong environmental toxins. He’d also expand the school-lunch program to include breakfast and afternoon snacks to "relieve working parents of food preparation duties."
Hey, when was the last time John Edwards or Wesley Clark stopped by to help you make PopTarts or PB&Js?
Wilson plans to invest his life savings of $75,000 in his campaign. He hopes to attract national attention by walking from Boston to Washington starting in April, while also spreading his message on the Internet. "I’ve got to pull five percent in the polls by August," he said, in order to qualify for the nationally televised debates.
"It’s something like what Perot did," Wilson said. "A lot of this is an act of faith."
The impartial observer suggests Wilson lose the comparison to Perot. It’s going to be hard enough establishing his sanity without that.
I could be a couple of planks shy of a platform. Nail my problems down by emailing ishmaelia@gwi.net
Regards,
THIS impartial observer (in the first person!)
Oh yes, that'll work.
You bomb us and then you get to sue us too
Vote for Blake Ashby!
I've heard all of the voices of God's noblest creature: moans from bundles of filth in the streets.
I've been a soldier and a slave.
I've seen my comrades fall in battle or die more slowly under the lash in Africa.
I've held them in their last moments; these were men who saw "life, as it is".
But they died despairing. No glory. No bray of last words. Only their eyes filled with confusion, questioning "Why?"
I do not think they were asking why they were dying, but why they had ever been born.
Life itself seems lunatic. Who knows where madness lies?
Perhaps to be too practical is madness.
To surrender dreams, this may be madness;
To seek treasure where there is only trash.
Too much sanity may be madness.
But maddest of all, to see "life, as it is" and not as it should be!
(Courtesy of "Man of La Mancha")
Bring everyone who won't bow to Allah before the world court of the anti-Christ? Gee, good idea - NOT!!!!
This guy a Muslim?
Wilson describes himself as "a bleeding-heart conservative," by which he means he favors lots of new government programs to improve our health and welfare, but opposes spending any additional money on them.
He is, then he isn't, then he is. What's he trying to do? Out waffle Hanoi Kerry?
Play the UN? Was, was not, then was again?
I guess it depends on the meaning of the word "is."
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