12-17-2018, 11:54 AM
(12-17-2018, 10:14 AM)David Horn Wrote: Yes, it takes a person skilled at RUNNING for President to be ELECTED President. That said, the real skill set needed is BEING President, and getting the job is not the same as doing it, as Trump has shown in spades. I don't see any of the names on your preferred list being the one, though Mitch Landrieu is probably the best of those listed. What we really need is a Winston Churchill or FDR, and leaders of that caliber are always in short supply. At the moment, I don't see any. Beto O'Rourke may be one, but he's too untested for us to evaluate him, and Amy Klobuchar seems to have the chops but may be unelectable.
Success in prior elected office seems the most relevant factor in making a successful President. Beto O'Rourke is untested. He may have the political skills, but he has never won a statewide elective office. Congressional Representatives and big-city mayors are typically two steps away from the Presidency. At this point I would prefer that Beto O'Rourke run for the Senate seat up for re-election in Texas in 2020. He is young enough that he could win later in the event that something goes wrong between 2021 and 2024 for the Democratic President.
I see President Trump losing in 2020 to practically any Democrat. He has proved himself a mistake. Sure, he is a businessman and has brought his business-like ways to the Presidency, but there is more to the Presidency than saying "my way or the highway" to everyone in America. One can say that to one's employees or even to customers in a captive market -- but as President of the United States he is not everybody's boss.
As for Amy Klobuchar -- she may lack charisma, but she does know what to do. She typically wins her Senate seat by a landslide (which Obama also did, a fair indication of what she can do). She got 60% of the vote in 2018 in a not-so-strong D state, indicating that she does some things right. It may be Donald Trump who gives her a chance.
FDR was "too radical" in the 1920s, but in the 1930s he was just right after the problems of America were too radical for the canonical solutions of the 1920s. Churchill was too much of a troublemaker (a common swipe at him was "He will offend Hitler, so he is too risky") until the trouble was already in place. This is a 4T, and core realities can change drastically and decisively.
We may need a crafty politician who has the discretion to decide which derrieres to kick and which feet to step on -- and which people are to be treated with kid gloves. Trump is lacking in those aspects of politics.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.