A Man of Character

If the gods had intended for people to vote, they would have given us candidates.
- Howard Zinn American Historian – 1922 – 2010


Howard Zinn, meet John Edwards.

Few American politicians have self-destructed with such flair, imagination and ego as John Edwards. The only other one who comes close is Richard Nixon.

To read the accounts in “The Politician”, Edwards comes across as mentally unbalanced in his belief that his affair with Rielle Hunter would not come to light, would not hurt his chances of winning the Presidency, or hurt his party.

As Bob Dole said in his 1996 campaign against Clinton “Character matters.” It does, but not in the way that Dole meant.

If you want to be President you have to have an amazing ego to decide to run, and then to go and solicit the support and buckets of money to make it happen. This is true whether you are a bottom feeder like Tom Tancredo or Dennis Kucinich or a top tear candidate like Obama, Clinton, McCain and Romney. Once candidates breaks through to that tier of plausibility their egos are stroked by a vast machine of consultants, staffers and groupies. At every turn they are asked their opinion on life or death matters of world and national import. Their product becomes their opinion.

This is the context we need to examine a candidate’s character – how do they view themselves in this environment.

Does a candidate’s ego consume them and leave them a hollow human being like it did Edwards? Are they so determined to prove themselves better than their father that they take on a messianic quality like W? Is a candidate so use to success that they are afraid to fail and so don’t risk anything like Obama? Or like Clinton, maybe they want to be loved so much that when they do fail they spend the rest of their Presidency risking little in policy initiatives in order to be liked by the most people.

In 2008, the Presidential candidates gave evidence of how their view of themselves would affect how they would govern. McCain was so cocky that he was sure Sarah Palin would be a good running mate, simply because, with a fighter pilot’s recklessness, he chose her.

Obama was quite different. In the campaign he came off as brilliant, eloquent man, who moved people through the power of his words. His whole candidacy grew out of his eloquence, whether it was standing in downtown Chicago opposing Iraq, or his speech to the Democratic Convention on 2004, the whole push for Obama was borne not out of any great accomplishments but out of his ability to move people with his words. Whenever he was challenged, a beautiful speech would put it all right and everyone would fall in line.

Today we can see this as forewarning for how Obama would govern. A good example is how he has dealt with Health Care reform. His main activity on the topic seems to have been his two speeches, one dedicated to health care reform and the other the State of the Union. He has this view, which he himself admits, that people will fall into line behind a policy if the reasoning for that policy is sound. He seems surprised this is not the case.

Reports are Edwards and Hunter are engaged. He seems oblivious to the damage that he caused. He betrayed his wife, his supporter and his staff, not through avarice but through ego. The same ego that drove him to believe he could get away with his affair also drove him to be a candidate. His ego drove him mad.

But each candidate for President must have an ego that borders on insanity. This is not how the Founders thought of the Chief Executive. He was to be a trusted “man of leisure” who had time to concentrate on society’s greater good. He wasn’t supposed to be a man or woman driven an insatiable desire to seek high office.

They would disappointed that today, the main requirement to be a candidate for President, is madness.