on politics...

[flea]

I have been thinking about what I would ask the presidential candidates, if I found myself with the opportunity to conduct one-on-one job interviews with them. My big question would be ye olde, "What is your management style?"

We see a lot in the press about likeability. I 'like' Obama, I don't 'like' Clinton, everyone seems to 'like' Huckabee, the press 'likes' McCain. But while I do like some candidates more than others, I hope it doesn't influence my actual voting much. (I realize that not all US voters are analytical like me, of course.)

We also see some comments in the press, and in those online quizzes that tell you who you should vote for, about policy positions. Nobody jibes exactly with my positions, and it feels to me like the differences between, say, Edwards, Clinton and Obama are miniscule.

What I want in a president is, first, someone whose basic stance I agree with. This matters a lot when it comes to things like Supreme Court Appointees and the power to appoint Cabinet ministers, conduct foreign policy, etc - the areas where the president has the most direct power. But second, I want someone who is intelligent and willing to think about decisions and their impacts, and is a good manager, able to delegate to good people when necessary, handle crises coolly and without being an asshat.

So I think if I had to vote for a Republican (which I don't, and I won't), I might well vote for Romney. I may like him least of the Republican candidates; I don't think he actually HAS any values, for example, and frankly I like someone with honest values that I disagree with wholeheartedly (Huckabee, McCain on many issues) much more as a person than someone who twists in the wind the way he does. But he does seem to have a high level of managerial competence (Massachusettians can correct me if I'm wrong). One could do worse (Rudy Giuliani, I'm looking at you.)

I don't have a firm handle on the managerial skills on the Democratic side, except that I know that much as my personal values jibe with Kucinich's, he was an absolute disaster as mayor of Cleveland (where mr. flea grew up), so even if he were electable I wouldn't be in his camp. I am not wild about Hillary Clinton's managerial skills; we saw plenty during Bill Clinton's years in office and one of my major complaints about the Bill Clinton presidency was the managerial incompetence that resulted in stupid time-wasting instead of accomplishing policy. I don't know much of anything about how Edwards or Obama actually run things when they are in charge of things; as senators and campaigners both have certainly had some experience managing things, and I haven't heard much about major screwups by either, but you just don't know.

I hope this doesn't sound dumb; I've never studied government, and I'm no political junkie. Feel free to correct any errors of assumption I've made.

Comments

[veejane.livejournal.com]

Now, now. At least he didn't resign while in office, as I think two governors in a row had done, to avoid a scandal. (I know Cellucci was cruising for prosecution, but I'm not sure about anybody else.

Romney's #1 problem in MA was that everybody could tell he was running for president the instant he was elected governor. So he didn't give a shit that he antagonized the state house and antagonized the mayor of Boston and antagonized all the city governments*. He was running for national republican office, and that meant he wouldn't win MA anyway, so it didn't matter that irate democrats were after him with a meat cleaver and a flow-bee.

(* Romney's real infamy comes from the fact that he cut state aid to individual cities, which led to the richer cities being able to pass tax overrides and pay their own way, and the poorer cities being stuck with insufficient funding and having to cut services. Way to govern, Mitt!)

[ocvictor.livejournal.com]

Yeah, it was the funding to the cities and towns that really did him in, here. The tax overrides everywhere put schools in peril and endangered middle class homeowners. He really was crap as a governor.