Arkady
President
I once worked for a boss who wasn't terribly bright, but she worked really hard. She often made the wrong call on some important stuff, but still things tended to work out well, because we were so organized and prepared as a group that we could clean up mistakes quickly. She was the type who'd email you at 2 am on a regular basis.... not expecting you to get back to her until work hours, but clearly hard at work herself. And she'd come to even the smallest meetings with a meticulously prepared agenda, which she'd already shared with everyone by email but which she also printed out and distributed, to keep the meetings running like clockwork. Working for her was an adjustment for me, since I'm the other way. I leave things loose and often ad lib. But working for her made me appreciate the value of someone like that. She made the whole team better.
I bring this up, because Clinton strikes me as that type. It's not that she isn't terribly bright. Judging by her academics and debate performance, she seems to be smart. But what really stands out is her prep. In each of her debates, you could tell that she simply out-prepared the other guy. This often gets held against her since, unlike last night, it can make her come across as robotic -- coldly delivering meticulously crafted talking points verbatim. But it strikes me as a likely positive for a president.
Whatever you think of her policy preferences, ethics, or the like, is there really any doubt she'll work her ass off for us? Is there any doubt she's going to "do her homework" -- dutifully reading her PDBs, taking careful notes in briefings, keeping on top of all the facts before meetings with foreign heads of state, and remembering to follow up on the loose ends? She comes across to me as a more severe version of her workaholic, micro-manager of a husband. That'll rub some people the wrong way, since micro-managers can be a pain. But the presidency is a tough job and I don't think things tend to go well when you have someone half-assing it, the way Bush did. And that's what I imagine Trump will do -- focusing on the "branding" part of the exercise, while counting on his "numbers guys" to figure out the details. The job demands more than that.
If you're just promoting a gambling establishment you can focus on playing the media and stamping your name all over everything, while letting Carl Icahn run the business end. But you check out like that in the Oval Office and you leave a power vacuum for the Dick Cheneys of the world. You get bored of the work and maybe you're on one of those month-long vacations at your country mansion when you ought to be reading about Bin Laden being determined to strike in the US. The stakes are just too high for someone not ready and willing to work like a dog.
I bring this up, because Clinton strikes me as that type. It's not that she isn't terribly bright. Judging by her academics and debate performance, she seems to be smart. But what really stands out is her prep. In each of her debates, you could tell that she simply out-prepared the other guy. This often gets held against her since, unlike last night, it can make her come across as robotic -- coldly delivering meticulously crafted talking points verbatim. But it strikes me as a likely positive for a president.
Whatever you think of her policy preferences, ethics, or the like, is there really any doubt she'll work her ass off for us? Is there any doubt she's going to "do her homework" -- dutifully reading her PDBs, taking careful notes in briefings, keeping on top of all the facts before meetings with foreign heads of state, and remembering to follow up on the loose ends? She comes across to me as a more severe version of her workaholic, micro-manager of a husband. That'll rub some people the wrong way, since micro-managers can be a pain. But the presidency is a tough job and I don't think things tend to go well when you have someone half-assing it, the way Bush did. And that's what I imagine Trump will do -- focusing on the "branding" part of the exercise, while counting on his "numbers guys" to figure out the details. The job demands more than that.
If you're just promoting a gambling establishment you can focus on playing the media and stamping your name all over everything, while letting Carl Icahn run the business end. But you check out like that in the Oval Office and you leave a power vacuum for the Dick Cheneys of the world. You get bored of the work and maybe you're on one of those month-long vacations at your country mansion when you ought to be reading about Bin Laden being determined to strike in the US. The stakes are just too high for someone not ready and willing to work like a dog.
