Battle4Liberty

During election years we hear a lot about the type of experience appropriate for the presidency. The topic is usually pushed by the camp of one candidate who has [fill in the blank] experience that other candidates lack. In elections past, military experience has often been touted as a necessity for service as “Commander in Chief.” Political experience is often an assumed qualifier, although it worked against most of the Republican presidential hopefuls this year. Clinton supporters claim that “foreign policy experience” is a must. Business experience is a hot button issue for Trump supporters because “you can’t create jobs if you haven’t met a payroll.” It’s tempting to jump on these bandwagons when they align with your favored candidate, but some intellectual honesty is in order.

The truth is—and history supports the fact—that that none of these requirements are absolutely essential to be a good president. Those with military experience might have firsthand experience on the realities of war, but veterans can be trigger-happy when it comes to overcommitting to military intervention. Hefty political experience means that you’ve probably learned to survive in a politically correct world, but I would argue that clarity—not PC—is more important. The world is full of dictators and thugs with a lot of “foreign policy experience,” none of whom would make a good president. Business experience might be the most attractive on the list, but there are plenty of executives who don’t respect the free market. You can be sure that the big banks didn’t overpay Hillary just to hear a speech.

So what should we look for in a prospective president)? Some of the above factors might be pluses, but I would sum it up this way:

1. Integrity. A good president will have a track record of honesty and believes in governmental transparency.
2. The right philosophy of the role of government. A good president understands what the government can and must do well, and what it should leave alone. A solid understanding of the Constitution and economics is a must. At the federal level, the government should provide for a strong defense and do what is necessary to protect individual liberty, but it should resist social engineering through its monopoly on force in areas such as the tax code, onerous regulations, and spending programs that are not constitutionally-mandated.
3. Leadership ability. A good president knows how to identify experts at various levels to oversee the major functions of government. The presidential function is executive, which means that you need to understand how all of the pieces fit together, but you don’t need to understand all of the details. It’s impossible for one person to understand everything anyway, which is why demanding that the president have experience in X, Y or Z is overly simplistic.

A big weakness in only one of these categories can be deadly. But while there seems to be a shortage in all three areas, the greatest is probably in the leadership arena. If an executive lacks leadership acumen, the vacuum will be filled by the usual suspects and political hacks from administrations past. In this respect, Trump’s executive experience gives him a distinct advantage. He has thrived in a world where profit and loss demand accountability, and ineffective programs get reworked or eliminated, not budget increases. While you can’t be involved in a large complex business without making some mistakes—or having those in the organization make some mistakes—you have to have a good winning percentage to survive. Whatever your concerns about the first two on the list, you have to respect his accomplishments.