Want to run for City Council? Get tested first, like everyone else

Norfolk Mayor Paul Fraim 

If you want a job, think how many tests you have to endure to even get in the door of a firm.

It’s only fair that if you want to be a City Council Member, a city treasurer or Commissioner of revenue, you should have to be tested.

If not, you can’t run for office.

Until you pass a battery of tests. It might eliminate some of the dead wood rotting on City Councils these days (and I am not just pointing a finger at Norfolk)

Too many people have been turned down for jobs because they failed a test.

Shouldn’t we hold our political leaders to the same standard?

We don’t.

We think our political leaders are pristine and law-abiding. That’s a fallacy.

We think they deserve to sit on City Council because they have given to the community and volunteered their precious time on boards and commissions.

That’s a fallacy.

City Council members and constitutional officers should undergo the following tests before they are allowed to run for office.

A pee test

Norfolk Vice Mayor Burfoot Can he pass?

A background check

A credit check

Up to date on all taxes

I also recommend a polygraph test, although I am dubious about the outcome. If you can’t trust a politician, how can you trust a lie detector test?

They should tell us, the public, whether they have ever been in jail.

They should tell us, the public, whether they have ever been accused of child molestation.

Or abuse.

Or rape.

Of not paying alimony or child support.

Of any DUIs.

Entrepreneur Tommy Arney: He doesn't need tested

This is only fair.

This is what the common job seeker endures every time he or she applies for a job.

Many job seekers never get a job because they don’t pass one or more tests.

Are our politicians so angelic?

I think not.

They are afflicted with the same flaws.

Pride. Lust. Gluttony. Avarice. Sloth. Envy. Wrath.

In fact, the bar for City Council members should be much higher.

And what is this with having city council members sit on a dais, looking down on the public?

As if they are Olympian gods, dispensing justice.

They should be at eye level with the public. They should be at tables on the same level as you and I.

Not sitting up there all grandiose and proud and patrician.

That’s the first step for city council – get down on our level.

But I propose other tests for the wanna be city council member or constitutional officer.

Rorschach test to determine if the ink blot is a bag of money.

A psyc evaluation to determine whether they are fit mentally for the job.

A physical fitness test.
A rabid test. 

But if all else fails, start a movement on Facebook.

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