This Must Be Beltway Insight (Broder admits none of Dem candidates have executive experience!)

Heading Right ^ | Jan. 17, 2008 | Ed Morrissey

[jdm]

David Broder has breaking news in the presidential race. He has discovered, through his own investigation that — brace yourselves — none of the leading Democratic candidates for President has executive experience. He points out that this leaves the Democrats at a serious disadvantage to their Republican counterparts:

It was fascinating to watch the three top contenders for the Democratic nomination discuss their concept of the presidency during Tuesday night’s MSNBC debate in Las Vegas. But it was also stunning to realize that the three current and former senators who have survived the shakeout process — Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and John Edwards — have not a day of chief executive experience among them.

By contrast, the Republican field is loaded with people who are accustomed to being in charge of large organizations. Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee were governors of their states of Massachusetts and Arkansas, Rudy Giuliani served as the mayor of New York, and John McCain, as he likes to remind audiences, commanded the largest squadron in the Navy air wing. …

All of this places an unusually heavy burden on the three Democrats to show they can do more than talk a good game of leadership — and actually lead.

This has just occurred to Broder? Well, excuse me for a little New Media triumphalism, but this has been a topic on my blog and many others since this time last year. And it’s not just a gap in executive experience, but in total experience as well. The time that all of them have in national public office put together doesn’t equal John McCain’s tenure in the Senate. Dan Quayle had more time in Congress, and even just in the Senate, than any one of the three Democratic front-runners. Every single Republican candidate remaining in the race has more experience in national office than the Democrats who appeared on the stage on Tuesday night.

Broder says that the Democrats have to show they can actually lead. How are they to do that — by talking about leadership rather than demonstrating it? Essentially, that’s their only option. Broder critiques their performance in the debate on this point, but it’s a fruitless approach. When looking for the best candidate to run a large organization, one doesn’t choose someone who can debate the finer points of such a role, but someone who has a track record in running other similar organizations. Otherwise, we could elect Broder as President, who might be a better choice than most of the Democrats and at least one of the remaining Republicans.

Of course, I’d have more confidence in Broder’s ability to do the job if he hadn’t taken a full year to notice that the Democrats lack executive experience.

The entry of Hillary Clinton into the race created this deficiency. At the beginning, she looked so inevitable to win the nomination that governors such as Mark Warner and Tom Vilsack either declined to run or quickly left the race. The only people willing to run against the Clinton juggernaut were people who clearly would have never had a serious shot at the nomination in any rational cycle. Only when Hillary proved herself a mediocrity on the campaign trail did Barack Obama gain any traction at all. By that time, it was too late to get anyone with real executive experience in the race other than Bill Richardson, who had already proven himself completely inept at a national campaign. Democrats tried talking Al Gore into another run at the White House, to no avail.

Instead, the Democrats will try to convince American voters that seven years or less of legislative experience at the national level comprises adequate preparation to lead the Free World. Can they make that sale? Only if voters fall asleep longer than David Broder.

[EagleUSA]

— none of the leading Democratic candidates for President has executive experience.
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More Pulitzer prize winning journalistic brilliance.....

[Renkluaf]

Read it this AM; Broder must be off his meds again!