By Raymond Viger
I worked in civil aviation for five years, as a pilot. The licences I carried meant that I had to be re-assessed every six months, through flight exams. It was a question of knowing if I had preserved my ability to fly in all meteorological or mechanical circumstances, such as in a storm or if some of my equipment failed. And I had to regularly pass medical exams.
All these protocols were to ensure that I was not putting the lives of hundreds of passengers my airplane might be carrying at risk. In politics, on the other hand, we’re ready to let someone of an advanced age govern us like a king for four years, giving him control of a nuclear arsenal, without any tests at all!
If the 2024 US elections had been rushed, and Joe Biden’s senility had been less visible, would the people have elected a senile person as President of the United States?
If a pilot has to undergo physical, psychological and technical tests to ensure the survival of hundreds of passengers, what should we make a president undergo? After all, he is responsible for hundreds of millions of human lives.
It would take more than the medical protection team escorting him to respond to the slightest emergency or manage any health issues. I am thinking more like a multidisciplinary team capable, if needed, of terminating the president’s mandate. A group composed of a doctor, a psychologist, a psychiatrist and other specialists. This team could sound the alarm when the president became senile; when he isn’t fully capable of exercising authority.
Democracy must allow for the granting of powers to a person capable of using them properly. But it must also allow for their removal at any time if they are deemed dangerous, whether to themselves or to society.
A doctor or a police officer can arrest and/or commit a citizen if he or she represents a risk to themselves or their entourage. Why not submit the President of the United States to the same rules?
Joe Biden was 81 when he left the presidency. Pressure from important personalities in the Democratic Party, including Barack Obama, persuaded Biden to step down as a candidate in July of 2024.
Trump is 78. He has been the object of several legal proceedings and has even risked imprisonment. That didn’t stop him from running again and being elected in 2024. An aggressive person who says anything.
The situation in 2020 played itself out again in 2024, when this time, Biden had to retire after a series of escapades linked to his senility.
Are these situations really democratic?
Were these really the only two choices that democracy could have offered the American electorate?
I reiterate my crazy dream. Let us adopt the example of how the Inuit govern their territories.
Nunavut and the Northwest Territories function without any political parties. All their elected representatives are independents. These elected officials decide between themselves who will perform what functions and tasks. They govern by consensus. Members of each legislature work together to adopt laws. Instead of sitting opposite each other as if they are facing off for a war, they sit in a circle.
If one representative becomes senile, the group looks after the proper functioning of the assembly.
As seen in Reflet de Société No. 33-4, mars-avril (March-April) 2025, page 4.
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