Ethicalego Opinion

            We need a better way to evaluate presidential candidates. 

      Voters often decide presidential candidates’ qualifications by how well they do during televised debates. This is unfortunate.  Debates are entertaining, but they do not show candidates qualifications for President.  

      Debates impress voters that executives need the ability to make off the top of their head decisions from experience and intuition. Senator Clinton promoted this same idea with her television campaign clip warning votes they needed an experienced President who can answer that dreaded 3 a.m. telephone call announcing a nation-threatening crisis.  

      Executives decide critical issues based on well-researched alternatives offered by their staff members. They are not Lone Rangers. Skilled executives or Presidents anticipate potential problems and crisis. They direct their staff to conduct research and prepare analysis so they are ready to make the best decision in those circumstances.  A President already failed his or her executive and leadership responsibility if a crisis catches him or her unaware. Nevertheless, Presidents still meet with staff members and experts before acting even when events like 9/11 catch them unaware.

      The moderators of debates can unduly influence voters’ opinions about candidates’ qualifications by the type questions they ask them.  A debate moderator asked Senator Clinton to name the person who was going to replace Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin as Russia’s President.   Clinton got the name right, Dmitri Medvedev, but she stumbled over its pronunciation.

      Many journalist and other pundits had a field day lamenting this alleged gaffe as if knowing this trivia was important.  Probably, they would have declared it a sign of weak foreign policy credentials if she or Obama failed this question. This is one problem with using journalist for debate moderators and as analysts of candidates’ answers. They value journalist questions too highly.

      This type question shows how debates often do not help to voters to decide candidates’ qualifications.  Too often, they are “I got you” questions by the moderator or by the follow-up responses by opponents. Neither Clinton nor Medvedev are Presidents setting policy for their nations.  She or the new President will have a foreign policy expert on the White House staff and in the State Department to brief her or him about this type information. Debate moderators and interviewers should ask candidates questions that reveal character, personal and governing philosophy, and executive ability. 

      Senator Clinton is the executive head of her presidential campaign. How she and other candidates run their campaign organizations show voters more about their executive skills than their responses to many of the debate questions do.

      Clinton claims 35-years experience. She has extensive experience working in political campaigns when her husband ran successfully for Arkansas Attorney General and Governor, and for two terms as U.S. President. However, voters cannot judge the quality of this experience.

      Candidates are the executive heads of their political organizations. Voters can judge their management skills by how well they manage and make without a script the most important executive decisions of their lives.

      Clinton started her run for president so far ahead many political experts considered her nomination assured. However, the difference this time she was the top executive and the final decision maker facing fierce competition. The results are there for all to see. 

      Immediately, the allegedly inexperienced candidate Obama confused her with an unexpected strategy.  He quickly wrested the delegate lead from her. This unanticipated turn of events confused Clinton so much that he she mismanaged her campaign and ran short on money trying to recover. She may recover to win the nomination.  Nevertheless, voters have a clear evidence of candidate executive abilities as they face the same challenges. They can heed or ignore what they see. 

       Writers also distorted the significance of Republican presidential candidate Senator McCain’s foreign policy remarks. He said the United States probably would be in Iraq for 100 years and he was fine with this ‘as long as Americans are not being injured or harmed or wounded or killed. He pointed out how the U.S. military stabilized Japan, Italy, and Germany after WWII by remaining there 60 years after WWII and in South Korea 50 years after the Korea War. 

      Obama said that McCain’s willingness to mire our troops  in Iraq for a 100 years of war is reason enough not elect him president.  However, some political commentators try to convince voters that Obama’s response was naive and McCain was knowledgeable and experienced.  Why? 

      McCain only repeated history most people know. He supplies no evidence why it was best policy in 1945, 1985 or now. He only suggests that American taxpayers add Iraq to the list and continue to support those nations indefinitely with our defense money. Americans need a better method of evaluating candidates’ qualifications than debates and unexamined remarks by journalists.

Contact Kenneth Brooks at P.O. B 882, Vallejo, CA 94590. opinion@ethicalego.com