[flowerplough]

Five Keys to Statesmanship - where's our President fit on this guy's scale?

First, ideas and beliefs. Yep, Our George Bush has ideas and beliefs, I guess. One for one.

Next comes willpower. Two for two. Got the Petraeus surge pushed through, over the strong opposition of Democrats who squat to pee.

A third virtue is pertinacity. We'll let this one slide, since neither Dubya nor I can pronounce or define that kinda word. Still 2/2.

Fourth is the ability to communicate.
Errrnt!! Game over. Next contestant.

[K-oneTexas]

Sever key items for me in the reading:

War is the most serious business that statesmen-heroes have to undertake, and a proper understanding of the precise frontier between civilian and military decision-making is one of the most valuable lessons they teach, never more so than today. In Western democracies like the United States and Britain, the civil power, elected by the people, has the sole right to declare war and make peace. In the conduct of operations, it must lay down clear objectives and give the military commanders their orders accordingly. But then, having done that, it must leave the way to secure these objectives, subject to the rules of law, to the professional commanders. It is not for the military to dictate policies, as General MacArthur tried to do, but equally it is not for the politicians to tell the generals how to fight.

Both Kennedy and Johnson "imprecise about his war aims" during Viet Nam. AND " ... Reagan had been succeeded by a much less clear-sighted, albeit well-meaning, president, George Bush Sr. " As Well As: "The Allies in the First World War were never clear about why they were fighting it—and Woodrow Wilson’s Fourteen Points, it can be argued, added to the confusion. Therein lay the weakness of the Versailles settlement, which laid the foundations of another conflict. In the Second World War, the Allies agreed on at least one thing: the unconditional surrender of Germany and the total destruction of the Nazi regime. It was not everything but it was something. "

We haven't seen 'Statesmen' in many a decade ... and our current crop is somewhat junior grade. Our Military, IMHO, is awesome.

[vbmoneyspender]

I listened to Paul Johnson on Dennis Prager's show the other day and Prager asked him which current leaders he thought were heroes and Johnson instantly responded 'George Bush'.

It's true GW isn't a great communicator but he's a rock when it comes to the war and like the Iron Lady that 'is a form of communication in itself.'