by Stephen Trimble

Created on: April 22, 2008

Mr. President,

It is astonishing to me the polarizing effect your presidency has had on the people of our great nation. Completely unaware, you have pitted brother against brother, friend against friend, in their respective hatred of or devotion to you. In your heart, I don't suppose that you waste much time worrying about this particular fact. I wonder if you have even noticed it.

I make no secret of the side of the fence on which I sit. I think you are perhaps the worst president in our nation's history. I voted for you in the first term, and I consider it the gravest voting mistake I have ever made. I do not think you are an evil man, nor a stupid one. I do not think you have actively led our country down a dark path from which it is unlikely to recover in my lifetime. Yet the harm you have wrought is immeasurable, and you should never have been chosen to hold the highest office of power in the free world.

I am sure you don't care to hear why, but I feel compelled to tell you. In my humble and uneducated opinion, you ran for president for one simple and disingenuous reason: because you could. You could in the same way that you could own a baseball team. You could in the same way you could run an oil company. Those opportunities were there for the taking, and you took them.

I am not of the opinion that great families should not hold high public office across generations. Strong families are the backbone of the American way of life-that is understood and agreed. The Bushes are a fine American family, and why shouldn't the progeny of a fine American family aspire to the highest office in the land, especially when his father executed the office with honor? Of course, the man should make of himself the most that he can.

But family consideration should be subordinate to the character of the man himself. I believe there are three overriding character traits that make the best Presidents. If a man is possessed of two of these traits, he will be a fine leader. If he is possessed of all three, he will be extraordinary. The first is the lust for power. A man must aspire to and execute power with facility in order to be an effective leader, especially on the scale of the President of the United States. The second is a paramount and undeniable patriotism and love of country. The third is a deep compassion for his fellow man, and especially for men of lower class. If you look closely at our best Presidents over the centuries, all have these traits in abundance. Our middle-of-the-road

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