Letter to the editor: Politics, a low-skill job

The Founding Fathers outlined specific standards in the Constitution regarding age, citizenship status and residency requirements for serving in Congress. They, sadly, did not go any deeper. They did not enumerate qualifications such as education, experience or technical skills, nor did they address leadership, stability of character, the ability to grasp complex domestic and foreign policy issues, active collaboration, honesty, trust, ethics, morals, etc., etc.

So what did that leave us with as representatives? People who have unique communication skills. By unique I mean the ability to lie by commission, lie by omission, palter, equivocate, prevaricate, conflate and double talk. Many of our Congress members and senators have taken the use of deceptive language to a new level.

Excepting this one skill, being a politician is a pretty low-skill job these days with the real skill of doing some concrete good for the country completely minimized.

John Meskanick

Lincoln Place