Though there is precious little actual analysis of the incident in this thread, this makes a decent jumping-off point:
Ivan Seeking said:
I think it is noteworthy that Fiorina made a huge mistake politically, but she clearly meant what she said.
There are several basic points to be gleaned from the incident:
1. She meant what she said.
2. She made a political mistake.
3. By making the political mistake, she proved the corollary to her statement (CEOs don't necessarily make good politicians).
4. She's probably right!
Did you hear her snicker when she answered the first time? The implied answer is 'Heh - yeah, right
Of course not!' But politicians can't say things like that because people react to the delivery without actually examining the statement.
So while politically it is a mistake, I
wish people in the media, the general public, and even in politics forums on otherwise scholarly sites could actually examine and take in such statements. I'm not naive enough to believe it possible, but this is the reason that political campaigns are reduced to mere marketing campaigns. There is no room for depth when people are driven by knee-jerk emotional reaction.
But what strikes me most is that many Republicans essentially want a CEO, not a President. In fact Bush has been call America's CEO.
That's a label Democrats use to ridicule him, not a Republican position. Nevertheless, he
is an MBA and some people value that. Cynically, I'd say that the primary function of Presidents and today's stereotypical CEO's are identical (keeping their numbers up as long as they can, until they escape), but to me that makes it a bad idea to have someone who thinks like a CEO in such offices. What you really want is the founder-owner type. The type who treats his company like his baby/family and takes a personal interest in its success.
The thing about the Presidency is that no one is ever really qualified for it. There is far too much to know. That's what makes appointing good advisers and listening to them so important. And that irked me about the last two presidents: Clinton picked like-minded sycophants. Bush picked high profile experts - and then ignored them.
