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From: slj@mtung.UUCP (S. Luke Jones)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.misc
Subject: Re: A Pleasant Precedent
Message-ID: <791@mtung.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 14-Oct-86 11:16:30 EDT
Article-I.D.: mtung.791
Posted: Tue Oct 14 11:16:30 1986
Date-Received: Thu, 16-Oct-86 19:50:39 EDT
References: <8675@duke.duke.UUCP> <117200223@inmet> <8704@duke.duke.UUCP>
Reply-To: slj@mtung.UUCP (S. Luke Jones)
Organization: AT&T ISL Middletown NJ USA
Lines: 34

In article <8704@duke.duke.UUCP> rjn@duke.UUCP (R. James Nusbaum) writes:

>...
>We have gone from a country that elects brilliant statesman and
>legal experts as its leaders, to one that elects actors.
>...
>Jim Nusbaum

First I should point out that I agree with this statement; it
would do my heart good to hear that somewhere out there was a
politician of the calibre of Thomas Jefferson or, for that
matter, even Alexander Hamilton.

That said, I should point out that leadership is not necessarily
the same thing as statesmanship or legal expertise.  A president
can appoint most of the State Dept. and if she is a good LEADER,
then that will be enough.  The same goes for legal expertise:
neither Congresspersons nor the President draft legislation any
more -- their staffs do it for them under their leadership.

Practically speaking, by the way, it would be difficult to find
a single person who was a both brilliant statesman AND a legal
expert because the fields are too disjoint in this day and age.
A president who had been a brilliant ambassador might be rotten
at introducing domestic legislative initiatives, and vice versa.

Finally, speaking of actors:  if political activism is so much
to be distrusted in Ronald Reagan, why is it to be admired in
Jane Fonda or Paul Newman?
-- 
S. Luke Jones ...ihnp4!mtung!slj  (ATT-IS, Middletown NJ, USA)

"You should have bargained, Jabba.
That's the last mistake you'll ever make."