April 27, 2004
Kerry's Restless Intellect
As a senator, Kerry seeks advice from many quarters, examines all angles, raises every doubt. At freewheeling debate sessions with his Capitol Hill staff members, he had a habit of keeping them guessing about his positions; sometimes they would not know how he planned to vote even as he walked onto the Senate floor.
Read the article. I imagine the truth about Kerry is, as usual, somewhere between the two characterizations. He could very well be a nuanced intellectual who makes some decisions based on political calculations. Still, given everything that I've read about him so far, I'm inclined to think most of his apparent self-contradictions are due to his understanding of the complexities inherent in many situations. Given that the mainstream news media do an execrable job of reporting the details of any issue, preferring instead to find the simple and ultimately obscuring explanation, it's not hard to imagine that the logic of Kerry's positions is often misrepresented by thirty second soundbites. Combine that with the Bush administration's frantic attempt to turn every aspect of his past into further evidence of flip-flops and the truth is obscured even further. The challenge for Kerry, as the article points out, will be to compress his positions into coherent, consistent bits of easily transmittable slogans and catch phrases. Unfortunately, along with focus and curiosity, our nation seems to have forgotten Emerson's admonishment that "a foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds."
Interesting. I think I'll try to read one of the biographies when I get back to the States.
While these sorts of articles certainly make me more sympathetic to Kerry as a person, they don't really inspire great confidence in his abilities and instincts as a leader. It seems to me that being an intellectual and a leader are two different things, though not necessarily mutually exclusive . A leader is, among other things, somebody whose values translate into charisma and a natural instinct to organize. It's great that Kerry is constantly questioning his premises, ideologically independent, and intellectually curious--but all this needs to translate into a vision--a place he wants to lead us to. Otherwise one becomes overly reliant on calculation, something the public doesn't like and can sniff right out.
I agree that Kerry needs to outline a vision of his own if he wants to defeat Bush. I believe the article also mentions that.
However, I'm not sure what you mean by "[a] leader is, among other things, somebody whose values translate into charisma and a natural instinct to organize." Aren't these characteristics both just methods of getting what you want done? They don't seem to have anything to do with one's values or even how good of a president one would be. Please clarify, I you would.
Hmm... well first of all, for my part I don't dislike Kerry's "dialogic" style--in a perfect system this would be great and there's lots of institutions where this style comes in handy. But since politics is essentially about conflict, about war, what we need in a candidate is someone whose charisma turns on a light in simian minds--whose belief makes others want to believe. Instead of having deep-set beliefs, it seems to me that Kerry's calculation is part of his character.
Hence his more than frequent attempts to be on both sides of the issue, mainly because he is genuinely capable of emphathizing with both opposing sets of values behind just about every issue. Naturally, I find this trait very appealing in a friend or a literary role model. But not necessarily in a politician, whose true task lies elsewhere. All at once, Kerry manages to piss off the troops, enrage the opposition, and look weak to those scarcely paying attention. Sometimes he fights back hard, but other times one wonders--just what is he fighting for, beyond the superiority of his own calculatons?