Cruz v Trump: For the love of process - Part 1

So at this point I am a RINO. I remain registered because I live in a deep blue state and believe firmly in the two party system. The occasional GOP governor (as we enjoy now) keeps the system honest. 

My preferred GOP candidate is Kasich. His experience is is much deeper than the other candidates (this was frankly true even when there was a much wider field of candidates.) He espouses conservative values without being dogmatic and offensive - although he is not conservative enough for many in the party. The essence of politics in a republic is compromise and taking the best deal you can get. Maximalist positions will marginalized you. The GOP seems to have forgotten this which takes them on a path to defeat. Kasich could also plausibly beat Hillary - it is difficult to imagine Trump or Cruz doing so (barring some sort of Hillary scandal meltdown - which given the Clintons is not impossible.) That being said, Kasich has been painfully awkward on the campaign trail and one can see why he is not generating much enthusiasm. (And yes, his recent missteps are making it worse and worse.)

So the likelihood gives us Cruz or Trump. A fine conundrum for the party of Lincoln in the world's greatest democracy. I despise Donald Trump - I've said it before many times, no need to go into it. Cruz is hardly a compelling alternative. He is not moderate and there is something fundamentally dislikable about him and his actions do little I've wondered about this interplay between surface appearance and people's hearts before. As for his actual positions... two words: gold standard.

Cruz is a smart guy, Princeton and Harvard. One expects politicians to say all kinds of BS. (They all promise that they will get better deals from other countries or make congress get things done. Most have some ludicrous stand on some policy issue or other. Fine, that's the business they've chosen.) But the gold standard is absolute lunacy. It would up-end the international financial system in all sorts of really bad, bad ways with no upside. If Cruz really believes it, then he's pretty nutty. If he doesn't and is just saying it because it makes some constituency happy, well - is that kind of worse?

But if it has to be Trump or Cruz, well, I guess Cruz.

A democratic republic relies on rules of the road. There are actions that players within our system do not take. Presidents always push for authority against Congress (and other institutions). But usually only so far. The epitome perhaps was President Andrew Jackson responding to a Supreme Court ruling by says, "John Marshall has made his decision. Now let him enforce it."

What happens in a president simply refuses to do what Congress or the Supreme Court orders. There is a lot of push and pull in this, but it is rare to blatantly disregard Constitutional authorities. Presidents that start doing this will provoke crises - that will not be fun.

My fear with Trump is that if frustrated with Congress, he will summon a mob. I don't think he can upend our system, but I don't want to watch this process. It will be ugly. Assuming Trump plays the game more carefully, what he is likely to do is make lots of noise about key issues.

Now this is part of politics. Voltaire wrote that medicine is the art of humoring the patient while nature takes its course. So is politics, that's fine. But Trump will inject more bad feeling and anger into our system.

Do I believe that Cruz is a secret insider who will turn establishment where Trump will not? Hardly, rather I think he will suck at trying to upend the system. His appeals for action will be less effective. 

But yes, he will probably show a greater tendency to play within the rules. We are less likely to have mobs formed or impeachment hearing. I think politics over the next decade is going to be plenty nasty without any of that - so I'd rather skip it.

Let me be clear - this is not a full-throated endorsement - or any kind of endorsement. I think I'd vote for Sanders before either of these guys. Seriously (even though I have huge problems with him as well.)

Update: Dana Milbank in The Washington Post makes the exact same argument I make - better of course - but still the same.

Heart Bern: Evaluating Sanders

Let me begin by saying how much I like Bernie Sanders. Having someone who looks and sounds like one of my cantankerous uncles going on about some idee fixe running credibly for president rather than making us nuts at the Seder table is pretty fun and cool.

However, I am not a socialist.

I also reject the apocalyptic arguments around Sanders. In a choice between Trump and Sanders I would choose Sanders without any second thoughts whatsoever. First, Sanders is a democratic socialist. He is working within the system to achieve his ends. In fact by some measures he has been pretty effective as a legislator. This is legitimate activity within our system. He is not talking about storming the barricades our seizing the means of production. He might turn the U.S. into something a bit more Scandinavian (Euro-style mixed economies aren't all they're cracked up to be, but they have their virtues). These are still societies with vibrant private sectors, it is something we could vote for. Also, it won't happen. Our system makes it very, very hard to move things much. This has benefits and costs, but in our system it is a feature not a bug. The founders had studied history and knew the ancient democracies and republics had destroyed themselves.

(I fear Trump might damage our democratic processes - not fatally, but it won't be much fun to watch.)

Finally, I understand and sympathize with the broader forces driving Sanders' candidacy. A lot of people have been really screwed economically. Most young people who graduated since the 2008 crash see few prospects for moving forward. Further, there has been a broad decline in wages for certain kinds of labor. I have been personally fortunate, but I sincerely want to see policies that help address some of these problems.

However, I am not a socialist.

What I mean is that I sympathize with Sanders' goals, but I fear his means will actually make things worse. 

Let's put aside that (based on his recent interview) Sanders himself might not have thought through his proposals. He was incredibly vague about his signature issue of breaking up the big banks, nor did he make a terribly clear case that breaking them up would actually help anything. I want to insure everyone is benefitting economically. I have no love the big banks, but if it isn't going to move the ball forward, don't waste energy on it.

Peace, Land, Tuition!
Let's take a major Sanders idea and break it down. He wants state universities to be free.

What is the purpose of this proposal? It seems to me that there are two. The first is provide a better educated population overall and the second would be to improve people's employment prospects by making college more accessible.

I don't think the first purpose is what we are really discussing. As a small c conservative, I am skeptical of the ability of education to magically make people wiser and smarter. College is simply not for everyone. Many people do not wish to go to college. In terms of receiving a broad liberal arts background and broadening their perspective on the world, I am not sure people clamber for this. If we want a better educated public, let's figure out how to make our high schools work better.

Caveat: I'm not saying we should keep anyone out of college, I am just skeptical if it actually achieves the kinds of positive social ends desired.

As far as I can tell, we are talking about college like a trade school, it helps employment prospects. The problem is that it is a hideously expensive trade school and, for the most part, it does not actually teach a trade. College is a signal to an employer that you have some basic aptitudes, rather than specific skills.

This lecture will be standing room only in Bernie's America

So if we want to improve people's employment prospects is sending more people to college the way to do it? Since it is a vague signal, rather than a hard credential, it may not be the right way. That is, there is an employment market for people with college degrees. If a lot more people have college degrees, does that magically mean that there are a lot more jobs for people with college degrees - or - will it lower the value of these degrees and make employers choosier. Will a Masters be the new Bachelors? In that case, you've started an education arms race that the well-to-do are destined to win.

But, my small c conservatism aside, I do want more people to go to college and I don't doubt that there are many people who would benefit from college who cannot hope to attend now. My fear is that Bernie's plan would not help them - it would hurt them.

If state colleges and universities are free they will receive a huge number of additional applications. They will have two choices about dealing with this - they can either raise their standards and pick and choose who they accept or they can accept a lot more people.

If they choose to do the former, it will be much harder to get in and this could benefit the well-to-do at the expense of the less fortunate. The very rich will remain rich and send their kids to whatever private colleges they wish. The well-to-do however, will have had their taxes raised substantially under Bernie. This will make private colleges harder for them to manage, so if a free state university is an option it will become extremely attractive. These are parents who can insure that their kids receive the violin lessons, tutoring, and private coaching needed to get into the now more competitive state schools. Again, you've created an educational arms race that the well to do will win.

Alternatively, if the state schools don't raise their standards and accept anyone that can afford it that raises different challenges. Student bodies would expand very quickly and school would struggle to manage them. Here the concern is broader. Right now the U.S. higher education system is the best in the world. It is a tremendous engine of growth and innovation. Further it is an export (when a kid from another country comes here to study, he is putting money into the U.S.) I would rather not take risks with something that is working pretty well. If we break it, it may not be easy to fix.

But I do want to make college more accessible. I'd rather see it means tested. For the well-to-do state colleges and universities are bargain. You can raise the prices some and it would still be a bargain, while using that to subsidize the less fortunate.

Further, I'd like to see more creative approaches taken to preparing the workforce such as more apprenticeships and trade schools that were far cheaper and provided a better return on the public's investment.

But Bernie, as compelling as he is, offers simples cures that may prove worse than the disease.

We have entered an age of magical realism politics - and it isn't just the GOP.

Trump Dump: Last Word, for a while

OK, I have to take a deep breath on this. Pretty much every time Trump opens his mouth I want to write a new article. But that just feeds the beast. Not that I have so many readers, but it isn't good for me. I recall Achilles words of regret in the Iliad (Fagles translation):

anger that drives the sanest man to flare in outrage 

bitter gall, sweeter than dripping streams of honey 

that swarms in people's chests and blinds like smoke

Trump has learned the key lesson of reality TV (which I admit I don't watch), make sure you have an asshole who stirs things up and everyone loves to hate. I'm thinking Puck from the Real World or Omarosa from his own show. Even those of us who can't stand him can't stop talking about him.

But what is there to say? Rebutting his ridiculous policy positions - Dan Drezner is already there and much, much better. Punditry, why bother? They are just talking about shadows on the walls of the cave. Jeremiads about how he represents the collapse of American civil society - I don't believe that is true, it is just more presentism.

But of course it is a presidential election cycle and he is running for president, I can't just ignore him. So, one post a month specifically about him here. Here, and on my other blogs, maybe he'll be mentioned, but it will be about something else. Of course if something HUUGE happens, I'll take it on.

Most of what I want to say about Trump has already been said, here. So this is really just a footnote on my initial take. So here is everything I want to say.

Trump vs Reagan

We had another celebrity turned politician reach the presidency - Ronald Reagan. He said plenty of strange stuff and offered simple solutions to complex problems in an era of frustration and ferment. Like Trump, no one could figure out how to debate Reagan and win - he was a consummate performer. But there are a lot of differences.

First, as a human being, Reagan was a self-made man. He was born with nothing, enjoyed success in the movies and then transformed himself - via his service as a union president and then corporate spokesman - into a politician. He served two terms as governor of California. Trump of course inherited his wealth, he clearly has some talent at self-promotion, although his record as a businessman is less than astoundingly stellar.

Reagan also put in the time to actually learn something about policy and had a pretty serious political gig before becoming president (governor of California.) He also developed a pretty good team. Trump insists he'll get great businessmen into his cabinet. We'll see. In terms of rhetoric, Reagan broke a lot of rules. But with care, he was not a bully, nor did he shout down his opponents.

Trump is maddening because this campaigning thing, which all the other candidates find a hard slog, he seems to do so easily. Everything he does just garners him more support. But, he doesn't have real policy chops - he's a false Reagan.

President Trump

We have to seriously consider that Trump could become president. I am intellectually sanguine about this prospect. Rule of law is firmly established in these United States. Congress has incredible abilities to bring the president to heel. For starters they can carefully choose who gets confirmed. They can defund agencies, and yes, they can impeach and remove the president.

Our government bureaucracies are sticklers about following the law. Remember the warrantless wiretapping brouhaha? When half of the Justice Department threatened to resign? We'll see a lot of that.

Voltaire quipped, "Medicine is the art of humoring the patient while nature takes its course."

A big part of politics is gestures that are palliatives to public concerns. Trump will be pretty good at these kinds of symbolic gestures. He'll get a little money out of Japan and Korea for our military spending - it won't be enough to make a difference to anything, but he'll showboat it like it is. That will work for a while. But eventually serious problems have to be addressed. You can't fool all of the people all of the time.

Disjunctive Presidency

I am a big fan of Skowronek's theory of presidential cycles. It seems pretty evident to me that the Republicans are due for a disjunctive presidency. These presidents preside over the collapse of a long-standing political order because the party's basic policy responses are not relevant to the problems faced by the public, but key party interests won't allow the party to change. The last two disjunctive presidencies were Jimmy Carter and Herbert Hoover (both of whom were successful businessmen and engineers.)

One thing about disjunctive presidencies is that the president calls for efficiency, promising to be more effective as president than predecessors. Could Trump's highlighting his deal-making capabilities fit into that paradigm. One usually thinks more Mitt Romney, but if the Trump fits.

Doubts

When Reagan ran I was a kid. I don't remember it that well, but growing up in a typical liberal Democratic house, I didn't think much of the guy. I've come to respect and recognize his virtues, which were substantial. Am I wrong in dismissing Trump? Instead of being a disjunctive president, could he be a president of reconstruction? I kind of doubt it. It is tough to miss that the GOP is headed for a fall. The crazy train primary campaign is exhibit one. Also their core constituency - old white guys - has real problems with lots of critical emerging constituencies (women, Latinos.)

Still, could I be wrong. Could the Donald be heralding something new? I think he is a glitch, he emerged through a combination of strong name recognition and party dysfunction. But what if he's a not a bug - but a feature and I am the one missing it?

Now I'm angry again!

Belated President's Day - Some Lists of Great and Not-so-Greats

The typical Presidential list is of the greatest presidents. That is always Lincoln, Washington, FDR and then whatever particular political hobby-horse the list-maker has. Jefferson, Jackson, TR, Wilson, and Reagan all make regular appearances.

More interesting is listing the worst presidents, although that too is rife with current political judgments. Half of America will say Obama while they other half will say W. Andrew Jackson, who was a giant mere decades ago is now reviled. Nixon was hated, well, for being Nixon. I find this hard because in my humble estimation, our presidents were decent and capable people who did the best they could given the options they had.

So here, instead, are some odd-ball lists.

Unconventional Presidential Rankings

Greatest One-Term Presidents

1. James K. Polk
2. George H. W. Bush

Note that both had their big achievements in foreign policy. Other one term presidents include Herbert Hoover, Jimmy Carter, William Howard Taft, Franklin Pierce, Benjamin Harrison, John Adams and John Quincy Adam. Not an inspiring list.

Greatest presidents who took office on presidential death

1. Teddy Roosevelt
2. Harry Truman
3. Chester Alan Arthur
4. Lyndon Johnson

Teddy Roosevelt was, well, Teddy Roosevelt. Truman too had some pretty huge achievements, establishing the post-World War II architecture and the overseeing the Marshall Plan. Lyndon Johnson was the architect of the Great Society and a champion of civil rights.

Chester Alan Arthur is an interesting outlier - not normally on any presidential list except for great facial hair. He was considered a political hack. He had been appointed head of the NY Customs House (a really, really big deal because most federal government revenue was from taxes on imports and the biggest portion went through NY.) But he was appointed as part of the patronage system and then put on the ticket as VP as a sop to that political machine. (In fairness, he was actually a very capable administrator.) When President Garfield was assassinated, by a disappointed job-seeker, Garfield's political patrons looked forward to taking over the spoils system. But Arthur cut his ties with them and as president championed Civil Service reform. Arthur, surprisingly, turned out to be the president we needed, just when we needed him.

Presidential Achievements Outside the Presidency

Most significant accomplishments as military leader

1. George Washington
2. Ulysses S. Grant
3. Dwight Eisenhower
4. Andrew Jackson
5. Zachary Taylor
6. William Henry Harrison

The top three were all the leading generals in major wars, they are on the all-star list of generals in U.S. history and really world history. Washington gets the edge because , unlike Grant and Ike, he had the less economically capable army and managed to defeat a super-power. The bottom three were all good generals in their own right, but - as AJ Liebling said of Jack Dempsey, "He may have been a great champion, but he didn't have much to beat."

Greatest non-political achievements pre-presidency

1. Herbert Hoover
2. Thomas Jefferson
3. Teddy Roosevelt
4. Woodrow Wilson

All of these men were scholars of some renown and authored many books (note what I consider significant.) But, Herbert Hoover was also a very successful businessman. Probably the most successful businessman to be elected president - take that for what it's worth (personally, I think he had the misfortune to be president at the wrong time.)

Greatest public service achievements pre-presidency

1. George Washington
2. James Madison
3. Martin Van Buren
4. Herbert Hoover
5. Thomas Jefferson
6. Lyndon Johnson

George Washington did two enormous things in public life that had a profound impact on the United States of America before becoming president. First, he turned down kingship of the new United States and was a founder of the Order of Cincinnati and he chaired the Constitutional Convention. He was not the intellectual architect, but he had the political savvy and will to see the thing through. A huge achievement.

Madison was a key architect of the Constitution and co-authored the documents owner's manual (aka The Federalist Papers.) He was also Secretary of State. Martin Van Buren was a masterful politician and architect of the modern Democratic party. Hoover was nominated for the Nobel Prize for his efforts at famine relief for Europe after WWI. He was Secretary of Commerce and Under-Secretary of Everything Else under Harding and Coolidge where he had an enormous number of administrative achievements.

Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence. LBJ was master of the Senate, but threw it away to be JFK's VP.

Greatest post-presidency

1. William Howard Taft
2. Thomas Jefferson
3. Herbert Hoover
4. Richard Nixon
5. Jimmy Carter

Taft was Chief Justice of the Supreme Court - enough said. Thomas Jefferson founded the University of Virginia. Hoover reprised his role leading famine relief after WW2 and also chaired two commissions on re-organizing the government. 

Nixon had a huge achievement. He somehow crawled back from ignominy to become a respected figure - that's got to count for something. Carter, even though I dislike many of his undertakings, has had a vibrant post-presidency, trying to do good wherever he was able.

Analytics & Conclusion

This is utterly subjective, and with a bit more research I'd probably add a bunch more names to this list. But, let's do some very basic analytics.

Most appearances on any of these lists: 

1. Herbert Hoover (3) & Thomas Jefferson (3) 
2. Teddy Roosevelt (2) & Lyndon Johnson (2) & George Washington (2)

A few things leap out. First, Herbert Hoover was an enormously talented man who had the misfortune to go into politics. Being an executive and being a politician are very, very different offices. Although in fairness if Hoover had become president in 1920, he would have served a mild term or so, done some technocratic reforms and left the White House respected like Calvin Coolidge is now. Someone else would have presided over the great crash of 1929.

But the more presidential finding is George Washington. He has perhaps lost the battle against Lincoln for mantle of greatest president. Fair enough - Lincoln was a GREAT president. But, imagine if Washington had died suddenly before the first presidential election (people died all the time in those days.) He would still be remembered for his enormous military and political achievements - which were essential to the very establishment of the United States of America. He would not have been just rolled into Presidents Day Weekend - he might still have a day of his own. In that sense, like Hoover, was he a great, great man that was somehow diminished by the presidency?

Presidents' Day Weekend Reading: A Veepcritique Top 10

Gentle reader. I've been slacking at posting here lately (although there is new stuff over at Terrorwonk). I promise to do some special stuff in the next day or so over this long weekend dedicated to honoring our nation's highest office.

But in the meantime, here are some of my old, best pieces about Presidents and Vice Presidents (because, when you are talking about the Vice President, you are really talking about the President.)

10. Forward I wrote for the only illustrated book of vice presidents with pictures of octopi on their heads - VEEPTOPUS!

9. The presidents and politicians in general we see are mere caricatures of real people who wrestle with the same things we all face. (Two for one!)

8. A little something about a lesser-known president, and his surprisingly influential vice president.

7. As VP George H.W. Bush ran a counter-terror task force for Reagan (bringing together two of my areas of interest - terrorism and VPs), here's a short academic paper on it.

6. Here's a strange little thing about how - in high school about three decades ago - I kind of predicted Palin.

5. No writing about the presidency would be complete without a dive into Nixonology.

4. Here's a bit about the old/new phenomenon of White House courtiers - no presidency would be complete without some.

3. Here, I take a look at a well-known tale about Cheney, and turn it upside down, showing him, not as an all powerful eminence gris, but rather as a dutiful servant of the president.

2. This is the single most read/linked to/cited thing I think I have ever written. It is a summary and review of Stephen Skowronek's Presidential Leadership in Political Time, which I think is a hell of a book, with a very compelling model of political cycles.

1. There is no post which better summarizes what I have really learned - in the heart, which can matter a lot more than the head, than this post about critical empathy. The post is about Jimmy Carter (who I remember as a feckless, hapless figure) but it is really about every president each of whom "only did the best he could. No man could do more."

Presidential Efficacy & Foreign Policy: Not Really About Trump

Trump is the only candidate who is making a significant alternative foreign policy argument is Trump. It isn't an argument I agree with, but it is an argument. He insists he will be able to make better deals with the rest of the world than past presidents. He cities his business record as evidence. (This is questionable for many reasons.)

Overall the candidates agree that we need to defeat ISIS and just generally be stronger in the world. Sanders wants to do it with coalitions. Rubio, on the other side of the equation, talks about ground troops - although he actually has a more pragmatic understanding of foreign policy. But it is variations on a theme. The real outliers are probably Rand Paul (who's been demoted) and Lindsey Graham (who's dropped out).

There is also a sharp differences between the parties on immigration, but that - strictly speaking - is a domestic issue with big implications for other countries so I'll put it to the side.

The Art of the Dealmaker

Trump however is coming out against free trade. He insists that we are losing to the Chinese, the Mexicans, and the Japanese. Now yours truly believes in free trade. Big picture it helps everybody, but unfortunately capitalism involves a lot of creative destruction - which sounds good good in a lecture seminar, but in reality means lives being ruined. Most serious analyses find that changes in employment patterns are due to increased automation, not free trade. But trade has become a lightning rod for deep and legitimate grievances.

The United States has a long-standing commitment to free trade. Most countries have a Ministry of Commerce/Industry/Trade. We also have the United States Trade Representative devoted strictly to advancing free trade, while Commerce promotes U.S. products worldwide. Other nations find this confusing.

On the whole, free is good for the U.S. economy. By stimulating other nations economically it creates markets for more sophisticated goods of which the U.S. is a leading producer. If the U.S. imports sugar from Central America or textiles from Pakistan, U.S. farmers and textile manufacturers lose out, but those countries become wealthier and can buy smartphones, cars, software, and financial services. NAFTA was a component in the huge U.S. economic boom of the 1990s.

Trade also serves U.S security goals. The TPP, besides economic benefits, it strengthens security bonds and creates common communities of interest.

Long and short, as a  builder Trump wants to maximize his work at the expense of everyone else in NYC. But the President of the US is not a CEO, he's more akin to the mayor, maintaining the system of order. In the short run the US might win some, but fundamentally the US maintains a system of global order - protects and even creates global commons. If we initiate a grab for more we will also set in motion a global tragedy of the commons, to the detriment of all.

Tactics vs. Strategy

But this post isn't really about Trump. It is about presidential efficacy. All of the candidates insist that they will basically be better at being president than Obama is or Hillary will be. Hillary of course insists she has more experience than anyone and knows how to be president.

And let's be clear, every issue is a negotiation, a deal. When the US acts militarily, it affects other countries. When the US delivers aid, it affects other countries. Even if we do not discuss our actions with them, well that is a "negotiation" tactic.

We like the idea of the President going mano y mano with Putin or whoever at the negotiating table and "winning." So many candidates insist that they know how to do this kind of thing. That is certainly one part of the presidency. It is tough to know if someone will be good in this situation or not. My inclination is that anyone credibly running for president probably has what Schumpeter called "force of personality."

Besides that, just being president is a pretty significant power plus up! And of course a president has limited time and energy. They can get personally involved in an issue, but they will need to pick that issue carefully out of the literally hundreds that need to be addressed.

So consider Nixon, probably one of the least personally impressive presidents. He didn't like confrontation and was introverted. He found campaigning and gladhanding painful and was consistently awkward at it. Yet he was very effective. That doesn't mean I like his decisions, but rather that if he wanted to achieve a policy goal he was pretty good at getting it done.

Each deal, incredibly complicated in its own right, needs to be more broadly considered in two dimensions, time and space. How how will a deal we make with China today affect our relationship with China in two years or five years or twenty years. Because China will continue to be a factor. If we browbeat them into concessions now, will that hurt us farther down the line when we need something else from them. Also, whatever we do with China affects lots of other players. How will a particular agreement with China affect our relationship with Japan or India. Further, those relationships move in time as well. So how does negotiation today with China shape our relationship with Japan in five years? But wait, there's more because major international issues have a domestic component (Putnam's famous two-level game.) So every negotiation is a complex operation in its own right that also shapes and affects a huge range of other issues.

So which more valuable, a brilliant tactical negotiator or a brilliant strategist who chooses where and how to apply resources - including their own time and energy. Ideally you'd have both. Most people who reach the presidency are pretty capable. But strategy is another story. It would be nice to have a president who can win battles, but better one who can win the war - that is consider the panoply of U.S. interests and advance them broadly.

Estimating Presidential Efficacy

So how do we judge whether someone is up to high office. There is the resume/experience analysis. We can't know beforehand how capable someone will be. But, we can get at least a sense of their familiarity with the issues. Complex foreign policy issues have a pretty steep learning curve. Familiarity beforehand is an advantage.

On that one, Hillary wins hands-down (she of course has other negatives). 8 years as First Lady where she got a good look at what is involved with being president. Organizing ones time and staff are underestimated but significant challenges. She spend 8 years in the Senate and was well-regarded, then 4 years as Secretary of State. So she is familiar with the national security bureaucracy and the legislature and handled a variety of issues.

Kasich would probably be in second place. He spent 18 years in Congress, all of them on the Armed Services Committee. He was also governor of Ohio for 5 years. I happen to think gubernatorial experience is over-rated as preparation for the presidency, but I wouldn't argue it was irrelevant.

After that, probably Bernie Sanders, who has served on Capitol Hill for 15 years. Granted, he has shown little interest in foreign policy - but at least those issues crossed his desk. He is also familiar with the ways of congress.

After that it gets thin. Rubio and Cruz have first-term Senators with few accomplishments to their name (although there is some modest evidence that Rubio has at least thought seriously about foreign policy). Favorite son Martin O'Malley, Christie and Bush were/are governors - which represents significant political experience, but not real foreign policy experience.

Carson and Trump have no relevant experience with the nuts and bolts of foreign policy.

I'm ready to believe most of them are pretty capable negotiators. But have any of them shown a real capability to think strategically across the huge range of issues facing the United States in a world in flux? Can any of them "keep the whole equation in their heads?"

Busting Darth Cheney: Myths & Realities About Vice Presidents

The past isn't dead, it isn't even past - William Faulkner

With the recent unveiling of Vice President Cheney's bust on Capitol Hill history re-emerged. Cheney remains a polarizing figure, not the least because of his own continuing vociferous criticism of President Obama. In an unprecedented moment, not a single Democratic member of Congress attended the ceremony. Vice President Biden attended and spoke.

When Cheney left the House of Representatives (to become Secretary of Defense for George H.W. Bush) a Democratic colleague stated that this was the day collegiality in the House dies. He was known as a conservative who worked across the aisle. Even when he was selected as Bush's VP he was seen as a sober, well-regarded choice. (I was not the only one who watched the 2000 VP debate between Cheney and Lieberman who thought the wrong people were at the top of the ticket.)

What changed?

Interestingly, the most noted point (to everyone but yours truly) in George H.W. Bush's recent new biography was the ex-President's criticism of Cheney and his role in the Bush 43 White House. He was called iron-ass and scolded for his harsh rhetoric.

And yet, Bush pere ultimately granted it was his son's decision to invade Iraq and everything else that occurred in his difficult presidency. So what exactly is Cheney hated for?

Ahmed Chalabi 

He was a polarizing figure, to say the least. There are his many detractors who claim he was a smooth-talking con-man who, peddling fictional intelligence, led us down the garden walk into the hell-scape of Iraq. I met Ahmed several times and knew people who knew him pretty well. He was quite impressive and charming in person. I don't know if every single thing he told the U.S. was completely true. But I have some sympathy for him. His country was ruled by Saddam Hussein - a monster of epic proportions. Removing Saddam from power was essential above and beyond all other things. Ben Franklin didn't always play straight with French when he served as the Continental Congress' Ambassador in Paris.

Chalabi may have been a con artist, but truly if a con artist scams you it's because of you've scammed yourself.

Cheney backed Chalabi, was close to him and the Iraqi National Congress. But Bush didn't like Chalabi, he thought the Iraqi people should pick their own leader. For all of the talk of Cheney's influence, he couldn't get much of a hearing for his favored Iraqi proxy. 

So which is it? An all powerful Cheney who duped the President into invading Iraq but somehow couldn't cast the lesser spell of charming Bush into embracing Chalabi?

Cheney as Staffer

In a book on the chiefs of staff, Cheney recounted how Vice President Nelson Rockefeller invited everybody to the new Vice President's residence - everyone but Cheney. As deputy chief of staff (to Rumsfeld) and then chief of staff in his own right, Cheney had run interference for Ford - keeping Rockefeller out of things. Rockefeller wanted to spend money, Ford didn't. Rockefeller was constantly coming to the President with new proposals for programs, Ford would hand them to Cheney, who would shrug and say, "I'll staff them out Mr. President." The Vice President blamed the chief of staff for his being cut out of the policy process, but Cheney stated he was acting at the president's behalf. And oddly in his remarks, Cheney seemed hurt by his treatment at the hands of Vice President Rockefeller.

Ultimately, Cheney was blamed for his tone, that he made statements that were too harsh and undiplomatic. This is a common critique when things to appear to be going badly. The current administration suffers from it as well - much of the criticism of the president's policies relates to the president's failures as a communicator. Some of these criticisms are legitimate, but there is a certain sense that you can't put lipstick on a pig.

Presidents don't like to say no, they delegate the role, whether to the chief of staff or the Vice President or someone else. They also don't like to deliver the tough messages. An old friend of Eisenhower advised Nixon that Ike always needed a patsy around, someone who could take the heat for him. That's what Nixon did, delivering red meat speeches around the country.

Cheney served up the red meat as well. And he seemed to like it - in fact his post-Vice Presidency has been devoted to continuing to serve up steak for the party faithful. But the only important customer for the red meat was the president, and when he didn't want steak, the VP had little else to offer.

Vice Padawan? Darth Patsy?

Patsy or Darth Vader or a bit of both. In Star Wars, Darth Vader was a monstrous and compelling figure - truly the heart of the movie (I haven't seen the new one yet.)

But when his boss orders him to kill his son... At the same time, the Emperor is willing to drop Vader in an instant (just as he dropped Count Doku decades earlier) when a better Jedi comes along.

These are the realities of vice presidential power.