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‘Missing’ GOP congresswoman not seen for six months finally found living at dementia care home (wcbm.com)
submitted 2 years ago by to c/nottheonion@lemmy.world
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A Republican Congresswoman who has been “missing” for the past six months has finally been found.

Rep. Kay Granger has served as the representative for Texas’s 12th Congressional District since 1997.

However, she suddenly disappeared from the public eye around July this year, when she cast her final vote against an amendment to reduce the salary of Deputy Assistant Administrator for Pesticide Programs to $1.

A curious reporter at the local Dallas Express newspaper did some digging on Granger’s whereabouts and has finally been able to give her constituents some answers.
[...]

We then received a tip from a Granger constituent who shared that the Congresswoman has been residing at a local memory care and assisted living home for some time after having been found wandering lost and confused in her former Cultural District/West 7th neighborhood.

The Dallas Express team visited the facility to confirm whether Granger was residing there and to inquire about how she planned to vote on the spending bill. Upon arrival, two employees confirmed that Granger is indeed living at the facility.

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[–] 10 points 2 years ago (4 children)

I got accused of ageism before for saying the same that there should be mandatory retirement for public officials. However, the most convincing argument I heard for letting elders to still run for public office is that their accumulated experience, knowledge and wisdom could still be of great dispense for the public. Noam Chomsky is still doing well despite in his 90's, for example.

But Chomsky did not get it right with his genocide denialism on Cambodia and Yugoslavia. He may have great insights, but his ego seems to have been entrenched on downplaying atrocities of other anti-Western countries simply because they are anti-America. And then there is also the time when Chomsky basically brushed aside his association with Jeffrey Epstein, by telling the interviewer to mind his business. It's not a proof in and of itself, but it's very suspicious.

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  • [–] 15 points 2 years ago (3 children)

    You can share your wisdom and be of great value to the public without being in public office.

    At some point, though, you've gone from useful adult into honored elder, and while I'm not suggesting we put them all on ice floes, they shouldn't be running the country, especially since more than a few of them clearly don't even know which country they're in, let alone how to run it.

    If you can't walk, are having strokes, have developed dementia, and generally just sit around staring at the wall like my cat, perhaps it's time to gracefully retire and go spend the rest of your life doing conferences and speaking engagements and whatever the hell else you want, not trying to legislate.

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  • [–] 3 points 2 years ago* (2 children)

    There's also a common problem of no career path for politicians after holding some of the higher offices. It's either be reelected or elected to a higher position. I think it's more or less present in most countries.
    It's especially obvious with US presidents, none of them held any other office after being president. Even previous younger ones.

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  • [–] 5 points 2 years ago

    I kinda have two responses here, so uh, here's both of them:

    1. Well, by the time this is an issue, odds are you've been a career politician anyway and don't need another job. This is just old people who refuse to retire because they like the power and trappings more than they care about doing their job.

    2. By the time they MUST retire, these ghouls have stolen sufficient money that it doesn't matter, and sticking around is just them refusing to give up the power and feed their greed even more.

    Both seem equally reasonable and applicable to the problem.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 years ago*

    Don't most politicians have degrees even if unrelated to politics? They could fall back to the career relating to their degrees or at least close to it. There are some, however, who don't have college degrees or trade before becoming a politician. Bernie Sanders haven't had a proper career and did many jobs before becoming a politician.

    Although if the politician retires at ripe old age between 60-70, they could live off the pension anyway.

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