OP-ED: Bruce Wayne is the Better Man for President
Bats beats Shellhead's Shenanigans any day of the week
by: Jeffrey Howe
Bruce Wayne or Tony Stark? President or dictator? If you elect the latter, a dictator is what you will get.
Consider Tony Stark: A brilliant mind once seeking to better humanity, now pursuing an agenda of complete military and political control. We are on the verge of electing a war criminal that has already effectively gained military control over the whole of the U.S.
Stark was at one time the Secretary of Defense (pretty convenient for a weapon's manufacturer). This was supposedly to keep track of his technology. Now he is the head of S.H.I.E.L.D. and the Avengers. Is Stark content with so much power? Sadly, no. Now he seeks to control the rights of those who, through an accident of birth or circumstance, find themselves endowed with extraordinary abilities. The Avengers Initiative is nothing more than a thinly veiled attempt to consolidate all meta-humans under his thumb.
Perhaps this could be forgiven if Stark were competent enough to wield this power effectively. Sadly, he is not. Even with all of the resources at his disposal, Stark was unable to prevent – and indeed instigated – a massive conflict among the superhero community with the passing of the super-registration act. The country has still not recovered from the resulting damage and loss of life. Cities were leveled and heroes murdered. On the heels of this debacle, an irate Hulk returned to earth, after a forcible exile by a cabal of Stark and his peers. Stark is not even in office yet and he has brought our country to its knees twice in the space of a year. If this same caliber of damage had come from outside, it would be called an act of war.
This is in sharp contrast to Bruce Wayne, native son of a city so vile, even its prominent citizens could not walk the streets safely. Here more than anywhere else is where Wayne/Batman should be hopelessly outclassed by the government-endorsed, better-funded Stark; yet operating entirely on his own, at his sole expense, Wayne has managed to keep Gotham City in one piece, even reclaiming it from the devastating earth quake and subsequent No Man's Land conditions of 1999. Here, in a city that was riddled with corruption, rife with murder, and in the grip of a pandemic of criminal insanity, this ever-vigilant figure has managed to maintain order in what should be a lawless city.
No one has any illusions about Gotham City. At any given time one might run into the Joker or another rogue fresh from the revolving door that is Arkham Asylum. It is a city constantly on the verge of tearing itself apart. Yet the city stands. Its citizens live, prosper, and dream. How is this possible? The sheer determination of Mr. Wayne. His relentless dedication to the people of Gotham city has ensured the continued survival of his city.
By all rights Gotham should have fallen long ago to either anarchy or a heavy-handed fascist. Yet thanks to Mr. Wayne, this has never occurred. With a fraction of Stark's resources and casualties, he has maintained peace and order where there should be only chaos.
The people of this nation require competent leadership. Mr. Stark simply cannot provide that. He has spread himself too thin, and has too many vested interests to be either trustworthy or reliable. His actions have repeatedly endangered this country. On the other hand, Mr. Wayne has snatched his city, and in many cases the whole world, from the jaws of disaster time and again. In both cases the results speak for themselves.
The real question is whether you, the people, want America still standing in four years’ time.