With a lot of other rungs up the ladder before those.
One of the worst. Thanks for the example.
Alessan, thanks for the information. I was trying to think of a leader with a major accomplishment for which their resume was irrelevant, and wrote too quickly.
I kind of favor having control over a massive multi-national army of soldiers, using them properly to destroy an enemy, then negotiating a proper peace after, despite seeing some of the most grotesque horror man has ever visited on his fellow man.
I like Ike.
Not just for the military service, but for the massive executive and diplomatic experience as well as foreign policy and logistical experience it gave him. There is no question why we have our highways today.
In prior Federal office, Abraham Lincoln served just a single term in the House. He did pretty damned well in the White House.
Herbert Hoover and George H.W. Bush both had long and impressive resumes. Both were poor presidents.
There’s no one-size-fits-all template for pre-presidential experience, but given a choice, I’d want someone with executive experience (in government would be best, but big business would be next-best, as the President has to run a gigantic Federal bureaucracy), military experience (the better to understand the consequences of using armed force as CINC), and experience in elective office (the President must persuade others, particularly Congress, to do what he or she wants, and running for office yourself will ideally give a sense of how to move people).
That said, I support Obama, and I’ll concede he only has one of these. His intellect, temperament and communications skills give me cause for hope, though. I think he has the potential to learn in office and to be a very good President.
I know this was tongue-in-cheek, but it’s worth pointing out how valuable a law degree is for the President. Presidents are asked to interpret the Constitution all the time, for example, and not relying on one’s lawyers for the history and nuance of that interpretation is nice. Presidents appoint all the federal judges, a critical function. Presidents must manage and understand the administrative-legal bureaucracy. A legal background makes a President a better law-approver/molder; judging the likely effect of laws is a complicated business–there are few areas where unintended consequences are more relevant.
The list goes on and on. I think it’s quite clearly better than doctor, engineer, or even businessman. Each of those professional backgrounds has its advantages, but none so wide or as important as a well-developed personal understanding of the law.
Lincoln would not have been the President he was if he were not a lawyer. He had the courage of his convictions on the proper way to interpret the Constitution. Without a constitutional lawyer-in-chief, things might have gone much differently.
At a minimum, I think a President must have some experience which demonstrates sustained contemplation of the Constitution. They can gain this by being a Senator, having a history background, etc., or by being an lawyer.
Note that Ike had to do all of the above, except for elective office. He did have to deal with persuading others, especially the british military, to do what he wanted. God knows Montgomery was no easy man to deal with… but compared to DeGaulle, Patton and Bradley? Hell, he even worked with Zhukov… and more scarily, with Stalin directly.
How about stand up comedian.?
I strongly agree. I’m reading Jeffrey Toobin’s excellent book The Nine right now, about the contemporary Supreme Court, and what comes through loud and clear is George W. Bush’s contempt for lawyers (or, at least, any lawyers or judges who doesn’t fit the Scalia mold). I think there’s a direct relation from that to his administration’s policies on warrantless wiretaps, torture, Gitmo, Kyoto, etc.
“don’t fit” :smack:
Actually, in my experience in the military, people don’t follow orders “just because you issue them” there, either.
People follow orders because they trust in you as a leader. They trust that you have the experience and judgement to issue proper orders.
When a leader loses that trust, people ignore or evade orders, or worse, follow them maliciously. The latter is a phenomenon known as “malicious compliance,” where underlings scrupulously follow an ill-conceived order, even though they know following the order will likely cause problems.
Good leaders have to be able to balance a fine line, encouraging their followers to question ill-conceived orders, while still able to enforce compliance with those orders if they are confirmed.
All of this is a vital ability for a prospective Commander-in-Chief, who must be able to issue well-conceived orders that the commanders under him will faithfully execute.
I’m an Obama supporter, but I actually think being a heavily involved First Lady would be about the best experience possible, as you’re as close to actually being there as possible. Similarly, being White House chief of staff would have to be good preparation.
The always interesting website electoral-vote.com just posted an analysis comparing the relative years of experience of each of the presidents with their historical rankings. Although there are plenty of areas of discussion that the write-up leaves open, pretty clearly shows that years of pre-Presidency experience does not correlate will with historical greatness.
Obviously, by a huge margin, far and away the best experience would be having spent the most recent 7+ years as President. Whatever else could come even remotely close to that?
Number one requirement? Ability to work with people. Might sound silly, but looking at Lincoln’s cabinet, the only way he was able to save the Union was to direct all of those strong personalities.
Thanks, that’s very interesting. The contrast between Lincoln and Buchanan is telling.
One wonders how they were able to rate Wm. H. Harrison at all.
For the same reason that having been a “lab tech with maintenance and process improvement responsibilities” helps make me a good consultant. I understand what my clients are talking about in a visceral way that other consultants just can’t; I’m used to having conversations with the kind of “ground floor guys” that many consultants intimidate just by body posture and clothing, so I can get them to open up, I can find out what their problems are, I can find the solutions they need.
Having military experience means that the CINC will know how the military mind works better than someone who’s always been a civilian. He’ll be able to tell when they’re wanting to say something but not daring to; he’ll be able to tell what questions to ask and how; he’ll be able to use them without abusing them… hopefully.
Good point. He and Garfield are often omitted from historians’ presidential best-and-worst rankings, since they served so briefly.