There's a question I've had for a while now, that I'd like to get off my chest. It's for Democrats who think Pete Buttigieg ought to move straight from being mayor of South Bend, Indiana to being President of the United States. The question is this: are you nuts?
I've been....unsympathetic to the idea that people within sight of their 80th birthday are up for four years of the Presidency. We haven't had Presidents that old before, for good reasons. We haven't had Presidents as young as Buttigieg before either, also for good reasons.
Political commentators in our culture are prone to overvalue in candidates qualities they most admire in themselves. Educational credentials, savvy about campaign organization and fundraising, and perhaps above all a commitment to messaging are key indicators for them.
But we're not going to be electing a pundit-in-chief next year. Buttigieg has shown he can talk about some national issues, including a few within the purview of a President. That's about it.
When we've put younger men in the Presidency before, they've been men with accomplishments & life experience enough to make Pete Buttigieg look like a pygmy by comparison -- and they were all older than he is. And for all of them (Theodore Roosevelt was, arguably, an exception)
....inexperience was a handicap they struggled to overcome once elected: Kennedy with Khruschev, Clinton with health care reform, Obama with the home foreclosure crisis. They all thought they understood more than they did.
But....Harvard. The story. The message. Why aren't they enough for Buttigieg to be a plausible President? They're not enough because we Americans will have a smaller margin for error than we did in, say, 1960 or 1992. We're going to need more than talk in the next President.
The next President is going to need to be able to run the government, while repairing the considerable damage left by the President we have now. On the next President's shoulders will rest the great burden of moving the federal government to meet challenges much of the nation...
....is ambivalent even about recognizing, while facing an international environment that is deteriorating rapidly. It will be an enormous undertaking. The credentials and punched tickets Buttigieg has acquired in his brief career offer no sign he's anywhere near up to it.
That's the bottom line for me. A candidate unequal to the staggering challenges the next President will face shouldn't be given the job. This means Biden & Sanders (too old), Buttigieg (too young), plus however many of the vanity candidates are left.
I don't dislike Buttigieg, or think he's a bad guy. He's certainly not the human cancer we have in the White House now. But we Americans really need to rethink our folk wisdom about a Presidential election campaign being good preparation for a new President.
Maybe it was, at one time. I don't know. It certainly isn't now. Twice in the last 20 years, it has given the country a new President not only far out of his depth in the office but indifferent to the fact. Our political culture admires candidates who master campaign skills...
....like firing up core supporters, developing a network of large donors, or getting a "big moment" in the absurd and frivolous game-show format of televised debates. None of these campaign skills -- however absorbing of time and effort -- are any help at all to a new President.
Buttigieg is considered a plausible candidate now because he's a talented campaigner. I respect the talent, as far as it goes. Americans would be screwing up if we made him President. That's all. [end]
