Quote:
Originally Posted by HDL66
Some people would say Truman was a very successful president, and of course he didn't have a great resume. You can make almost any point with an anecdote/example and we could go back and forth. I still don't think it's an unreasonable position to want a more experienced vs less experienced candidate. (As an aside, Truman did have real small business experience--and was a miserable failure there lol) I suppose that my biggest objection to Obama (other than concrete ones like his policies) is what Charles Krauthammer terms "The Audacity of Vanity." And I quote:
Americans are beginning to notice Obama's elevated opinion of himself. There's nothing new about narcissism in politics. Every senator looks in the mirror and sees a president. Nonetheless, has there ever been a presidential nominee with a wider gap between his estimation of himself and the sum total of his lifetime achievements?
Obama is a three-year senator without a single important legislative achievement to his name, a former Illinois state senator who voted "present" nearly 130 times. As president of the Harvard Law Review, as law professor and as legislator, has he ever produced a single notable piece of scholarship? Written a single memorable article? His most memorable work is a biography of his favorite subject: himself.
It is a subject upon which he can dilate effortlessly. In his victory speech upon winning the nomination, Obama declared it a great turning point in history -- "generations from now we will be able to look back and tell our children that this was the moment" -- when, among other wonders, "the rise of the oceans began to slow." As Hudson Institute economist Irwin Stelzer noted in his London Daily Telegraph column, "Moses made the waters recede, but he had help." Obama apparently works alone.
The op ed was in the Washington Post in July 2008. You can read the whole thing here http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...071701839.html.
And if you want to argue with Charles Krauthammer. . . be my guest.  |
That wasn't the point you were making previously, though. Your earlier point was that his resume was too thin to be President. Saying that he's conceited is a completed different issue, and no one on this thread is arguing for or against that point.
People want different things in their President, different ideologies and different areas of experience. Some people want "insiders," some people want "outsiders," some people want veterans, some people want those with foreign policy expertise. That's fine, and that's part of the reason people vote for different candidates.
I think, though, there's a difference between saying "He doesn't have the qualifications I would want in a President," and saying "His resume is too thin to be qualified to be President." One can ask for certain qualifications and yet still recognize that the present qualifications are more than adequate.