You have commented 339 times on Rantburg.

Your Name
Your e-mail (optional)
Website (optional)
My Original Nic        Pic-a-Nic        Sorry. Comments have been closed on this article.
Bold Italic Underline Strike Bullet Blockquote Small Big Link Squish Foto Photo
Home Front: Politix
The Most Qualified
2008-08-31
Orrin Judd

The office that Barrack Obama is seeking is President of the United States, which is described as follows:

United States Constitution: Article II
Section 1. The executive power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America.

So, when we arrive at the question of whether he has sufficient relevant experience to quiet our doubts we would simply ask: of what institutions, corporations, organizations, polities, etc. has he been the chief executive, the ultimate decision-making authority?

Our answer is: The Harvard Law Review, if we choose to count it as significant.
But ... but ... but he was a community organizer! He organizes communities. He went into a chronically poor, gang-infested part of Chicago and ... put everything in alphabetical order! Sorted the gang-bangers by the color of their gang colors, even.

The truth of the matter is that many Senators are lifelong legislators, rather than past executives, and that's why we rarely elect them president. Not to mention that the legislators we have elected (and those who were primarily creatures of the legislature--like LBJ, despite his vp experience) have been such disasters. The sole exception may be Abraham Lincoln, but they aren't growing the Great Emancipator on trees.

The best presidents have been men with experience as governors (with a couple generals thrown in): Washington, Polk, FDR, Ike, Reagan, Clinton, and W, for example.

There are, in the Senate today, a few former governors who would certainly be considered to have the requisite experience, temperament and judgment to be good presidents: Evan Bayh & Lamar Alexander come to mind most readily.

It just so happens that Barrack Obama and Joe Biden are not two of those so qualified and that John McCain's main exercise of executive authority came in the military, where he was, of course, subordinate to others.

Indeed, if we look at the two tickets and ask which of the 4 persons thereon is most qualified the unavoidable answer is the Governor of Alaska, and former mayor, Sarah Palin.

There are plenty of reasons to favor or disfavor each of these four people--their politics, their personality, their values, etc.--but if the sole criteria by which we were judging them was their Constitutional qualification, then it is obviously the executive who is best suited to be Executive.
Posted by:Mike

#2  More than BHO or Biden.
Posted by: tipover   2008-08-31 14:00  

#1  But ... but ... but he was a community organizer! He organizes communities. He went into a chronically poor, gang-infested part of Chicago and ... put everything in alphabetical order! Sorted the gang-bangers by the color of their gang colors, even.

So, like, you're saying, the head honcho of the LA Bloods or Crips has executive experience too?
Posted by: Procopius2k   2008-08-31 13:53  

00:00