And he (Kish, a Benjamite) had a son, whose name was Saul, a choice young man, and a goodly: and there was not among the children of Israel a goodlier person than he: from his shoulders and upward he was higher than any of the people. (1 Samuel 9:2)
The Israelites, after they entered the promised land were told by God not to have any rulers over them except God. But there must be order so they had judges. A few were good, among them Gideon and one woman, Deborah. The country had peace for forty years under their judgeship, but most of the judges were bad. It got so bad they cried out for a king. After a series of events which you can read about in 1 Samuel 8 thru 10 Saul, the tall one was chosen and appointed.
We still tend to elect tall Presidents. To be tall seem to have its advantages, and according to evolutionary thought women tend to be attracted to tall men. Men also respect other tall men, since they are better at intimidating others. With a larger body comes a larger brain, and according to early evolutionary thought a larger brain means they are further along in evolutionary development than the rest of us.
Evolutionary thought tend to enhance prejudices. One early thought was that since a man’s brain on average is 40% larger than that of a woman, this must be a good reason why women should not be allowed to vote. We now know it to be true, a man’s brain is larger, but a woman’s brain cells are smaller, meaning that the cells communicate faster with each other. While we men take our time to get our threshing machines of brains in gear, a woman’s brain acts like a bolt of lightning, coming up with a plan of action before we even have defined the parameters. They have usually gotten good training dealing with active two or three year olds. An argument could therefore be made a woman would make a better president, having to deal with petulant people like Congress.
Lest this is a praise of women exclusively, they are not without their prejudices. The famous humanist Margaret Sanger, the inspiration to Planned Parenthood, idol of feminists and role model for Hillary Clinton once said:
“We should hire three or four colored ministers, preferably with social-service backgrounds, and with engaging personalities. The most successful educational approach to the Negro is through a religious appeal. We don’t want the word to go out that we want to exterminate the Negro population….”
Choose carefully, look into each candidate’s positions on policy matters, check their character and convictions, then make your decision.
It is the civil duty for every citizen over the age of 18 to cast a vote.
Get involved, get informed!
Only let not height be your choice this year.
Barack Obama
Len Bilén's blog, a blog about faith, politics and the environment. 