Why can't we get candidates like this for POTUS?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Batt Boy
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I have no idea why we would want someone whose experience is primarily military as president. By temperament , training and focus, they aren't terribly well suited for the job. Eisenhower, because he was primarily a political general was an exception. Even in his case, maybe his biggest achievement, the highway system, was focused on a military objective.

We really need someone who understands the dynamics of the political system, how democracy really works, something most career military honor in the abstract while working in a system that doesn't practice it, and how to form consensuses, another trait not all that militarily common. Currently, they have to do that while taking a mile of crap from the opposition. I really don't see the role for someone with a primarily military background as president again. There's a hell of a lot more problems in our country that need a civilian approach and fewer a military one than probably about any time in our history.
 
Batt Boy said:
you should read him. and the military is all politics.
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I read it. He didn't really address the first single domestic issue. The rest was much ado about nothing and not in the Shakespearean tradition. There was a lot more comment than content.
 
Every perverse political incentive we have in this country discourages calm, competent people from running for President and steers people away from voting for them.
 
finesse said:
I read it. He didn't really address the first single domestic issue. The rest was much ado about nothing and not in the Shakespearean tradition. There was a lot more comment than content.
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It wasn't a read. It was a listen. I get it though.

A pro-choice, feminist military background with such a command of jurisprudence, poetry, philosophy, economics, attention to climate change and equitable urban strategies. I like a lot and will not reject him simply because he's devoted his life to service of the nation via the military.
 
I listened to about 10 minutes of it. He sounds like someone preparing to run for public office. He comes off to me as sounding similar to other candidates that run for POTUS. I don't say that as a negative. But I'm probably not as cynical about politicians as the OP.
 
Batt Boy said:
It wasn't a read. It was a listen. I get it though.

A pro-choice, feminist military background with such a command of jurisprudence, poetry, philosophy, economics, attention to climate change and equitable urban strategies. I like a lot and will not reject him simply because he's devoted his life to service of the nation via the military.
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There's a transcript for people who read faster and better than they listen.

In these modern times, the military has become more of a specialty and so has politics and in my opinion, the things that tend to make you good at one hurt you at the other. That said, coming into politics without having worked in that system and having no real intimate coterie who has, a military man is going to have very little actual power because he doesn't know where the bodies are buried, so to speak. It's either going to be like Jimmy Carter appointing Bert Lance or else W being run over by his daddy's old buddies. Standing for the "right" things in soundbites is long way from being able to do them, no matter what your intentions are. It takes political will and capital and it's not clear he has either. I mean, he's a fiction writer. He ought to sound good.
 
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