Why Age Limits Won't Fix Our Competency Crisis
“Still crazy after all these years” is how some people would describe drag racer John Force. At the age of 75, Force continues to don a firesuit and helmet, climb into an 11,000+ horsepower Funny Car, and blast off from the starting line, accelerating from a dead stop to over 335+ miles per hour in less than 4 seconds.
Force doesn’t show up at National Hot Rod Association (NHRA) events just to make an appearance for old times’ sake. Force is still winning. After seven national event races in the NHRA 2024 schedule, Force has won the Funny Car category twice and is currently 2nd in season championship points standing. Ironically, the leader in points standings is Austin Prock, one of his team’s other drivers.
Force’s performances stand in direct contrast to the mental and physical missteps taken by older politicians in general, and one in particular. Those missteps have brought calls for imposing an upper age limit for candidates running for national office. As is the case with many seemingly good ideas, the wisdom of imposing a hard and fast age limitation is questionable at best as it will arbitrarily limit the field of qualified candidates. Although age unquestionably has an effect on physical agility and mental acuity, it is not necessarily debilitating.
John Force has demonstrated that at the corporate level as well as on the race track. In addition to his own race car, John Force Racing fields two other Funny Cars and a Top Fuel Dragster.
If you’re unfamiliar with “Funny Car” racing, the class has evolved from the highly altered stock body vehicles that first appeared in the 1960s. Racers moved the rear axle and front wheels forward in an effort to improve weight transfer, and consequently starting line traction. With highly altered wheelbases, the cars looked funny, hence the name “Funny Car”.
Current Funny Cars bear virtually no resemblance to those of the 60s. As opposed to being altered standard production vehicles, they are purpose-built for competition and employ a tubular chassis, fiberglass body, and 11,000+ horsepower nitro-burning supercharged engines.
As with most forms of professional-level motorsports, Force has a team that builds and prepares the cars. And while preparation is an essential part of a winning effort, driver reaction times (leaving the starting line when the starting line lights flash green) must be razor-sharp to win a drag race. At the age of 75, Force’s reaction times are every bit as sharp as his younger competitors. And often better.
Certainly, John Force isn’t the only “senior citizen” who is capable of climbing a flight of stairs without falling and able to speak intelligently without a teleprompter. At 94, Warren Buffet remains one of the most successful stock market investors and is regularly interviewed about his perspective on stock market investing.
At 93, Thomas Sowell (who recently published, “Social Justice Fallacies”, his 40th book) remains one of the most intelligent, thought-provoking, and accurate philosophers in the world. It remains virtually impossible for any rational person to read a Thomas Sowell quote and not be amazed by the intelligence behind his words.
Joni Mithcell and Mick Jagger, both 80 are still rocking and rolling, and at 91, Willie Nelson is, “On the Road Again”. Certainly, every person mentioned above has lost a step or two over the years. As they age, singers find their vocal range becomes narrower, athletes don’t move as fast as they once did, and writers may find themselves searching for words that were once front and center. Yet in spite of their age, many people in their 70s and beyond are sharper and more capable than the young whippersnappers who think they should be put out to pasture.
It wasn’t that many years ago that 65 was the age at which people were pushed into retirement because conventional wisdom dictated that their only options for the future were limited to activities that involved sitting in chairs or taking short walks.
The increase in average life span has brought with it a raising of the commonly accepted retirement age and an understanding that many people in their 70s, 80s, and 90s are determined to stay mentally and physically active and productive. While they may be the exception, they are by no means rarities.
As such, it is both foolish and counter-productive to impose an iron-clad age limit on candidates for any job or political office. A much better approach is to evaluate the physical fitness and mental acuity of all candidates, as it relates to their desired position, regardless of age- a process used by many private companies. That approach would certainly raise the caliber of government employees and candidates for office, but its acceptance is doubtful because government employees and elected officeholders are so self-serving.
As Thomas Sowell has stated, “One of the real problems (with government) is that you have people making decisions for which they pay no price when they’re wrong, no matter how high a price other people pay”.
Wrong Speak is a free-expression platform that allows varying viewpoints. All views expressed in this article are the author's own.
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Well said!
This is a good column with which I agree but you need to proofread better. Several names were misspelled at least once and Willie Nelson is 91, not 87.