Off Topic — HabitableZone

Off Topic » in reply to drafting leaders

re: leaders
Tom Brosz — (archived)

People don't often select the best leaders in a democracy. By definition, a leader is someone who takes you someplace you aren't already, and real leaders tell people things they don't want to hear, and take positions that don't put them on the top of the polls.

In America, the person most likely to win an election is the person who tells the voters that yes, you can have your cake and eat it too, that everything would be free if he were president, and that all problems can be solved without effort.

If you look through our history, real leaders have rarely been elected to the job during a crisis, but have developed into leaders when a crisis was thrust on them. Sheer good luck IMO, and something that would probably happen if you just drafted politicians, too.

Look at WWII. It started while Roosevelt was already president, and his vice president, Truman, took over without being elected. Nobody got to vote for a "wartime president." Truman's next election was that famous "squeaker" against Dewey, and by the time he left office, his popularity was at record lows. People don't usually LIKE real leaders. They take them places where they wouldn't like to go otherwise.

There are exceptions. Lincoln was re-elected during the Civil War, and Nixon re-elected during Vietnam (Kennedy was killed in office, and Johnson was never elected.) Neither election cycle was pleasant, and it would be interesting to speculate whether Lincoln would have gotten another term. Someone with more history at the tip of their tongue might have more examples.

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