If I were POTUS
If I Were POTUS (President of the United States)
Original publication: 2001
Copyright Andrea Reynolds 2001 All rights reserved. Please do not distribute or publish this column without the author's written permission and without financial compensation.
During a conversation about the last presidential election, someone asked what I would do if I were elected president (Don't worry, I can't be: I don't meet the 14 year residency requirement.) Having a Canadian sense of humor – satire flourishes mostly in Canada and the U.K. – here are sixteen things I would do:
1. Make Ralph Nader my Vice President, and choose a cabinet of people who remind me of the surrogate President (Kevin Kline) in the movie, "Dave".
2. Eliminate all those extravagant, expensive state dinners. (Who lives like that?)
3. Use the money saved from #2 to feed hungry American kids.
4. If a world dignitary comes to visit and we're having meatloaf that night that's what he or she gets... along with my full attention and a meaningful conversation about things that really matter.
5. Retire Air Force One during my term of office and, like John Madden, travel only by motorhome. If the Pope has the Pope-mobile, mine can be the Prez-mobile.
6. Put a Quaker in charge of defense. Or a smart woman who can solve more world problems by talking it out than resorting to fighting with weapons.
7. With the money saved from #6, make higher education affordable and available to more people.
8. With #7 in mind, add Grade 13 to public education which is the equivalent of first year university. College would then be only 3 years, leading to a degree.
9. Require that all US phone companies upgrade their performance and customer service to the level found in Canada. (This one should be deleted as I'm not happy with Bell Canada. )
10. Require that any boy (or man) who gets a girl or woman pregnant is granted automatic, full custody of each child who results. If males are held accountable and responsible for the care and raising of their issue, there will be fewer teen welfare moms. And if females knew they'd have to give up their babies to the males they consort with, they might make smarter choices in the partners they choose.
11. Urge Congress to move toward a three-political party system, like Canada has.
12. Fund more reading programs for kids and adults, especially in zip codes where the reading level is below the national average. And, provide how-to booklets which provide important and practical knowledge while allowing new readers to complete a whole "book" in short time, thus generating a sense of achievement faster... which escalates their enthusiasm for reading.
13. Provide tax breaks so that families of all income levels can have in their home at least one piece of good art, and a minimum of 3 books: a dictionary, an etiquette reference, and a religious book of one's choice: Bible, Torah, Koran, etc.
14. Make foreign travel a graduation requirement for all high school students, especially to a Third World country. Seeing how life is in Asia or South America or India can wake up the most complacent mind.
15. Make available to the public all information the US government has been keeping secret about UFO's and extra-terrestrials. A list of all aliens living in your neighborhood will be provided on a special web site. Just plug in your zip code.
16. Bring speakers, teachers, and authors into prisons to help prisoners upgrade their knowledge of life skills, etiquette, health, morality, spirituality, and vocational skills that go beyond manual labor. (Why waste a captive audience?) This may reduce repeat offenders.
OK, laugh if you will... but do you really like things they way they are now?
Andrea Reynolds Copyright 2001
Who am I? I am a long-time consultant trained in family studies, education, and marketing and communications who looks for ways to make work meaningful. Lately I've been finding my work for experts not as fulfilling. I'm ready to be the one in the limelight, and also I have become frustrated with what's happening in our society and I can no longer stand back and do nothing.
Early in life I chose a life that was not boring. I've experienced life's highs and lows, and many unusual events. At the age of 50-something, I have gained the empathy and understanding to provide unorthodox but healthy solutions to others who are in a crisis, are headed for a crisis, or want to minimize future crises.
Debt collector or…?
Said he was from "Card Services" Called me July 4th. Who calls people on a statutory holiday?
July 4th must be the day they call PA residents as someone else reported receiving an unsolicited call from them today too. He told me I had a $5000 debt. I don't owe a cent. Started to say this was a new phone number and they probably wanted the people who had it last. The caller hung up in the middle of my sentence.
I suspect it's an identity thief... someone trying to con people into giving up their name and credit card numbers. Angry behavior like hanging up usually indicates lying.
Why are you driving like that?
I can't understand why people don't take driving more seriously. I'm a very good driver. I had my license for more than 44 years without a ticket or an accident. When I was 13 my father taught me to drive on a 4-speed stick shift, and in the winter, he made me practice going into a spin in an icy (empty) parking lot and getting out of it. As a result I've been an observant, defensive (smart) driver who has avoided many accidents.
Yesterday I passed a woman driving a car who was eating the fast food sandwich in her left hand and drinking from a soft drink container she was pressing against the steering wheel with her other hand. I have no idea how she was steering, let alone signaling turns, but I could see there was an accident waiting to happen.
I often go to WalMart to pick up prescriptions and despite stop signs in front of the store entrance and exit, as a pedestrian I have nearly been hit several times by cars zooming by without even slowing. What I've noticed is drivers on cell phones don't look to the side or in their rearview mirrors. They look straight ahead and still don't see what is slightly to the side of what is in front of them. This is scary. I've seen women and men drivers on phones who pull out from parking lots into the road right in front of me without even looking to see if there is any traffic or how fast the oncoming traffic is going.
If I could, I'd make a citizen's arrest on any driver I see who is talking on his/her cell phone, eating or drinking, putting on makeup, or shaving. If you need to do any of those things... pull over first. Being a few minutes late is certainly better than being referred to as "the late Mr./Ms. __________". I'm thinking I might starting writing down license plates and posting them, or maybe taking a photo and posting it online.
My message is this: Aim to save one life everyday. Focus on your driving and be aware of where you are and what's all around you. Nothing else.
Big, fat, car doors
At Lowe's the other day I parked my van far from other cars. I do this because my front van doors are big and they open wide. After shopping, I returned to my van where there was another big van parked right next to mine with a young woman in the driver's seat talking on her cell phone. I'm glad she was parked and not driving, but she was oblivious to the fact that she was parked so close to my van that I couldn't open my driver's side door beyond a few inches. She was driving a van the exact size as my own, so why wouldn't she realize the doors on mine would be like hers?
Oh, because she was on the phone and phone talkers are rarely aware of what's going on around them. I motioned to her to move forward or back, and finally got her attention and she backed up to give me room to open the door.
Very soon after, I was parked at the post office and when I came out a car was parked close to mine, again. Because it was a windy day, there is no way I could hold my door half-way open so the wind wouldn't smash it against his car while hoisting myself up into the driver's seat. (Because the seat is so high, it takes both hands to get up onto the step and position myself onto the seat.) Thankfully, the driver realized that he needed to back up for me, and did. But I wish other drivers would realize that big vehicle doors on vehicles like pickup trucks and cargo vans open wide, and would stop crowding big vehicles.
PNC Bank, Erie PA
On June 30, my 90-year-old father - whose dementia brought me back to the US - wrote me a check so I wouldn't be homeless, and his check bounced. PNC Bank, without my consent, allowed two small purchases totaling less than $15 to go through despite my not having enough money in my account. I was overdrawn by $1.13. As soon as I knew the situation - within 24 hours - I put cash into my account to cover my purchases. PNC Bank then proceeded to add penalty upon penalty amounting to almost $230.12, and then closed my account. They have since turned this matter over to collection calling it a debt. I call it a penalty for being jobless and homeless in order to be caregiver to an elderly parent.
In my conversations with two PNC branch managers, I asked one (Interchange Rd. near Erie's Millcreek Mall) if I could park in her parking lot at night to sleep in my van since I had nowhere else to go. She said NO. Her lack of compassion and unwillingness to be helpful was dumbfounding; I've been a good customer for more than 12 years.
Not only was I suddenly penniless, so I couldn't rent a room or book myself into a hotel, but PNC would not redeposit the check nor return it. Three-and-a-half months later they were still holding my father's check. By closing my account I could no longer access statements in order to accurately do my 2010 income tax. (On September 16 I also lost all data on my laptop in a storm, so the bank statements I had downloaded were gone.)
I didn't know then that if I had held the check back from deposit for one day the check would not have been returned. I visited my father's bank, First National Bank, and couldn't get any assistance or information because I didn't have Power of Attorney over my father's financial affairs. (I did later.) At the time I asked if I could put enough of my own money into my father's account to be able to cash the check. They said no. I later learned that $27 would have made his check good. I could easily have done that, saving myself several hundred dollars in penalties and a crippling blemish on my credit history.
So, by turning my account over to collection, PNC Bank affected my credit history so badly, that, even when I had enough money to rent an apartment of my own, I was denied a place to live and would continue to be homeless. And because PNC reported this to the credit bureaus I couldn't open an account at any other banks, not even in my father's name when I did have POA over his affairs.
And did you know that PNC Bank received a $7 million dollar bailout from the US government (i.e. taxpayers like you and me)? This is how they show their gratitude?
I can't wait to read the response to my letter.
Andrea
Yes, there is an Update/Conclusion to this case. It will appear in my upcoming book.