The job of President of the United States is the most difficult job in the world. If the office is to be served well, the person who seeks to fill the office of President of the United States must have the ability to do the job. Being President of the United States is not a job that just anyone can do, and do well. These are difficult times and if a President is to be a strong President or by chance a great one, a person of quality and depth is required.

Today’s list of potential candidates for the esteemed and prestigious job of President from the Republican Party is both a lengthy one and a list of the most questionable candidates that we have seen arise to the occasion of putting their hat in the ring for the office in a long, long time. A mediocre list at best. Like the party whose blessing and votes they seek, the Republican candidates are an enigma wrapped in a riddle.

The list of Scott Walker, Rand Paul, Jeb Bush, Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, Huckabee, Carly Fiorina, Cain, Santorum, Perry, Christie and potentially several more candidates will not likely strike any objective student of history as including anyone of substance. It is true that being a good President is hard to predict but none of these gentlemen and lady will ever approach the original list of candidates who sought the office in 1860. Several of Lincoln’s cabinet were better qualified than the above listed cast of many who are actually candidates for President. And I do mean President not of the rotary club but President of the United States, the leader of the free world.

It takes a whole lot of ambition and ego to run for President. What life experience has any of these candidates shown in their lifetimes to make anyone believe that any of these people have the gravitas necessary to be President of the United States. It is an office that requires more than a figurehead. The Republican Party, which like Will Rogers once said is the best party that money can buy, should have at least one candidate suitable to be a good CEO, and I do mean a good CEO of a major corporation. But no we have candidates who profess to want to be a President but who want to diminish the power of the office that they seek if they are to be believed at all. They are against government when it suits them, but want to lead by taking away the power of our federal government and return most of the power to either the states or to Congress. This is why it can be said that the reasons given for running for office are an example of an enigma wrapped in a riddle.

This country has already had its fill of mediocre to poor and darn right lousy Presidents. Most of them our citizens can not recall because they were so inconsequential. Fillmore, Pierce, Buchanan, Hayes, Grant, Harding, Taft, Coolidge, Hoover, Carter and George Bush are just a partial list of forgettable Presidents. At best for those who were not up to the job, you would hope that at best they would do no harm, but the historical cast of characters who were weak presidents often left a mess for the next President.

I want to have two excellent candidates, one from each political party, to give the voters a credible choice. There have been plenty of decent and qualified men from the Republican Party in the past. I miss those days when each party offered as candidates people of substance. I wish Colin Powell could be a candidate, or a Barry Goldwater, but no we are left with a list of ideologues, extremists. We don’t need demigods, we need a politician in the best sense of the word. A person of the people who will listen to the voters needs. A candidate is needed who is willing to be pragmatic and a person who will be willing to compromise.

Well at least you can say that these Republican candidates believe in something, but is what they believe in really what we need in a President. A President is supposed to be a president of all the people.  At least you should make the attempt but instead we have numerous candidates who have indicated that it is either their way or the highway. Perhaps during the grueling race for the White House a candidate will become aware of the fact that the race is just one part of it and it is a marathon. If we are lucky a candidate will learn more about what they have gotten themselves into from the questions from the citizens of New Hampshire or Iowa.

The hope is that a candidate will pick up on the fact that America is made up of real people with real needs and hopes and dreams. We are more than just red and blue states we are flesh and blood human beings who look to our government for hope. The last thing voters want to hear is that it is up to us to govern ourselves. When you have the deck stacked against you these days with an increasing amount of power held by the oligarchs that is not what we the people want to hear.

I want two strong candidates for President of the United States, we the people deserve the best. Extremism has no virtue, give us reason and thoughtfulness, and not meaningless bromides.