Jeff Jarvis writes;
Character is not a measure of competence. And what I really want in a President is competence. Jimmy Carter had character; he was a terrible President. Jerry Ford was his Republican counterpart: good guy, nothing President. Bill Clinton ended up with a cracked character but I say he was a good President. Richard Nixon had the character of a cockroach, yet he was, in many ways, quite competent.
I wasn’t aware the two qualities were mutually exclusive. Without character, competence promises you little more than a highly successful psychopath. See Joseph Mengele.
I also wasn’t aware that it was possible for someone as smart as Jeff to have such a fundamental lack of understanding about what character is. Or that all human beings of the age and political experience of those seeking presidential office will have had plenty of tests of their character, both small and significant, to be measured by. Character does not lie dormant until tested by crisis. It is measured in the day to day decisions we make as we grow from childhood to adulthood.
But, most of all, character is not about being without flaws. Character is the ability to recognize ones flaws and rise above them.
C. Dodd Harris emails;
Jarvis has been very impressive since 9/11, proving that one can be a liberal in one’s sensibilities and yet still retain some sense. But he will only really come fully into the light when he can finally admit to himself that Clinton really wasn’t an especially good President. Not bad, per se, but far too flawed – by the very character deficiencies Jarvis would excuse – to ever have been anything other than an placeholder President. By doing little, he managed to ride the waves created by better men and retain the office (which was all he really cared about), but no-one will remember him in 100 years. Bolder men like Bush, Reagan and Roosevelt meanwhile, will be marked down as linchpins of history.
Mr. Jarvis is only a step away, truth be told, as he is surely aware just how much the very size of the problem that loosed the shingles from his own eyes – Islamofascist terrorism – can be laid at the feckless feet of Bill Clinton’s lack of willingness to do anything about it. But he’s not quite ready to take the plunge just yet. Hence, the tortured arguments about how character isn’t important in Presidential aspirants.
Great thinkers all the way back to Aristotle have considered the inculcation of virtue the single most important task of any society. Because, as the Founders understood, without character not much else matters. That’s why they considered character the principal factor in measuring fitness for public office.
Rising above one’s flaws huh? You mean like someone admitting they were wrong about WMD’s?
What also baffles me about the argument is the premise that Kerry is somehow more competent than Bush. Based on what evidence?
I noticed that oddly unsupported premise in Jeff’s argument as well.
What bothers me is that he sees character in Carter. Dude, we’ve had years to sort out that dictator kissing back stabber. There is a reason he lost a blowout election to Reagan.
I noticed the absense of Lincoln and Reagan in his list of examples.
He could find worthier examples even from the Democratic side. JFK looks pretty good compared to later Democrats, and despite some serious character flaws. And what about Truman? The decision to drop the atomic bombs, the Truman Doctrine, the formation of NATO, ordering the integration of the armed forces, the Korean War, all testify to the man’s basic character.