Is John Kerry A Leader?

One of the questions I have been asking myself is "Can Kerry lead?" Yes, I know he was a Swiftie. But that record is mixed and of extremely short duration. The POTUS is considered the "leader" of the free world and our next President must be a leader. So, where to go for answers?

I must say upfront I do not see him as a leader from his time in the Senate. As much as I disagree with people like Kennedy, Daschle, etc. they have distinguished themselves as leaders during their time in the Senate. Leaders of causes I don't agree with, but leaders nonetheless. I can think of no movement, no legislation, no precise position or even ideology for which I can assign Kerry status as a "leader," at least not a consistent one.

The notion that he was a leader with the VVAW gives me more pause for concern than it does answers. And, really, I can not even see what he did there as an organizer or manager. Stepping up to a microphone, or speaking before the Senate doesn't make someone a leader, as much as it might make them an individual who simply thrives on mass attention. Many references in his early career point to just such a personality. They called him "Quick Shot" as a young pol because of his ability to find his way in front of a camera. Again, more disturbing questions than answers.

Reading Volokh today led me to two somewhat recent stories in the Yale Daily News. I went to see what I could find and am using those as my source material. To quantify something of what I was looking to find I went here - Fred Greenstein: The Leadership Qualities of Effective Presidents: FDR to George W. Bush

Greenstein mentions, among other factors, three distinct areas for measuring the leadership ability of a President: communication, organization and political skill. The article states: "We will never have a perfect president, according to Greenstein, but if we had one, he or she would combine Eisenhower's organizational ability, Johnson's political skill, and FDR's mastery of public communication."

Having some sense of what I was looking for, one specific reference I found had to do with Kerry as athlete:

Although Kerry played three sports at Yale, he earned his only letter playing soccer his senior year. While he was not a star on the soccer team, he was a talented athlete, and he scored three goals against Harvard in his final game. As one of the fastest players on the team, Kerry's gawky running style occasionally earned him the nickname "The Camel" from his teammates, said David Thorne '66, one of Kerry's teammates and a fellow Bonesman. But in contrast to Kerry's other activities, he played more of a supporting role on the field, his teammate Landis said. "He was not really a leader on the team," Landis said. "Unless you were a really good player, it's hard to be a leader on the team.

I might accept the notion of his not being an effective leader due to a lack of athletic prowess. But there's more about that quote that troubles me. Thorne is a staunch Kerry friend and supporter. One might think that if there were more contributing factors - a team guy - a good motivator - even cheerleader, it would have been stated for the record. The article was obviously done in preparation for Kerry's present candidacy. No such positive reference is made. I did find a short personal story I'll relate.

Kerry also loved his parakeet, Dodi, whom he had taught to greet visitors in English, French and Italian. So when Dodi flew out Kerry's window and into a tree early one Sunday morning, Kerry was prepared for another adventure, his roommates said. Kerry found a ladder and climbed into the tree in pursuit of the bird.

Interesting story - touching even. But while some liberals might be impressed by the thought of foreign dignitaries being greeted at the Whitehouse by a tri-lingual bird, the story did little to advance my cause.

When I discovered that Kerry chaired the Yale Liberal Party (YLP) I thought I might be onto something. Unfortunately, I was disappointed. It would seem his "leadership" was not very effective.

"The Yale Liberal Party, of which I am a member and John Kerry used to be chairman, passes on many unpleasant stories about him. According to Liberal Party lore, Kerry was among the worst chairs in its history. Jorge Dominguez, currently a professor at Harvard and a member of Kerry's Liberal Party Executive Board, reports that under Kerry's leadership the party went on YPU probation. Probation means that the party's leader could not get enough of the party's members to sign a YPU attendance roster. Although getting people to sign in turns out to be a surprisingly arduous job, very few chairmen fail to do it in the end. Not getting enough signatures suggest one of two things: either the chairman faced some unfortunate circumstances or he has some personality problems. According to Dominguez, Kerry's leadership caused his probation."

While Kerry had friends at Yale, it does seem that he also had, if not enemies, plenty of people who were less than fond of him.

He clearly had nothing better to think about, such as de-bunking his bed or freshman English. Okay, fine, we all did some pretty silly stuff when we arrived at Yale. Kerry's problem was that he apparently never got better during his years at Yale. it seems that at Yale, he was generally disliked.

I'll concede that being "liked" is not the single best measure of a leader. Often times, and I am sure President Bush would agree, leadership can make you very "unlikable." Still, Kerry did chair the YLP and was later elected President of the Yale Political Union, or YPU. So, I read on.

In order to get back at Kerry, members of the Liberal Party formed the Dixwell Society. By now, the group is largely defunct, although it still officially meets during Liberal Party reunions and its story gets retold for everyone wishing to hear. The society's major point was to include every former chairmen except one who most people disliked. You can guess who.

And from Volokh's piece:

But wasn't Kerry later elected YPU president? It is true that he got elected. It proves much less then you think, however. First of all, the YPU presidency is a hard and often thankless job that very few people actually want. A person usually becomes political union president through some mixture of personal desire and Tammany Hall-like backroom deals. In my experience, very few political union officers get elected because they are liked or respected.

Then there is this from the conclusion of one Yale article:

Personally, I would not let Kerry circa 1966 run a public toilet, let alone a country. Hopefully, today's Kerry is a different man. Perhaps his service in Vietnam changed him for the better. Perhaps time has changed him. But maybe he has not changed. Recently Kerry mentioned that George Bush remains the same guy he was in college. If Bush didn't change, why would Kerry?

Every time I go to a political union debate, I shudder to think one of those YPU people I see in front of me may one day run the country. It may happen sooner than I expect. ... Still, Democrats ought to consider other options. Edwards anyone?

There are a few other bits of discovery I'll share before wrapping up with a conclusion. Kerry was clearly turning against the war prior to his graduation from Yale.

In March 1965, as the war in Vietnam continued to escalate, Kerry won the Ten Eyck prize as the best orator in the junior class for a speech that criticized U.S foreign policy as arrogant and unrealistic.

"It is the specter of Western imperialism that causes more fear among Africans and Asians than communism, and thus it is self-defeating," Kerry said in his speech. "We have grossly overextended ourselves in areas where we have no vital primary interest."

Kerry displayed the classic rhetoric of the liberal left even before it became codified around the anti-war movement. And I don't much abide his equating fighting for a people's liberation with imperialism, or the moral equivalency expressed as regards Democracy and Communism. Africa and Asia "feared" the West and should have been left to the communists? One need only look to portions of the planet where that happened to evaluate his position - talk about getting it wrong. So, why would a young man with such thoughts and feelings enlist?

"So when William Bundy -- assistant secretary of state and uncle of Harvey Bundy -- visited Kerry and his suitemates and said the country needed them to enlist in the officer corps, Kerry listened.

"I think that -- it would have been almost five times harder for him not to have gone than to go," Smith said. "The predilection of our class was much more old-school."

Given a chance to stand on principle, Kerry buckled. And I can only surmise he did it because of a combination of peer pressure and his being impressed with Bundy. I think I'd have preferred to discover that he stood on principle in this case.

The next year, Kerry discarded his original Class Day oration -- which had already been published in the Yale Banner -- for a new address echoing many of the sentiments of his prize-winning speech. In a speech that was unusually political for a Class Oration, he criticized the United States for intervening in Asian affairs and isolating itself from the world community.

But even before delivering his oration, Kerry had enlisted in the U.S. Navy. Despite his public misgivings about Vietnam, Kerry was preparing to enter the military soon after commencement. While Kerry criticized the war and its goals, he was committed in his decision to serve.

I've trouble reconciling these disparate positions. And he seemed a bit impulsive for someone already enlisted to join the Navy, someone who even then wanted to be President. His record seems to be as confused and confusing as the candidate I am seeing today. Even were I to conclude that Kerry is a leader, based on the Yale record, it might be impossible to genuinely ascertaining precisely what direction he would lead.

One of the Yale articles is misleading. It suggests that given all this he still volunteered for combat. The record proves that to not be true. He had actually volunteered for positions that would keep him from combat and the Swiftboats only became combat units after his assignment. Can one conclude that Kerry was anti-war while in the Navy and, upon finding himself in combat, looked for the first, fastest way out? It's speculative. But in this case it is the facts that lead to that speculation, not my own political bias.

Kerry was quoted as saying:

"I was very proud of my decision to go into the Navy and I still am," Kerry said. "But keep in mind, when I joined the Navy, the first draft card hadn't been burned. Vietnam was nebulous. It wasn't yet the war it would become."

It's almost as if he were saying that had the anti-war movement already taken hold he would have had an acceptable out that wouldn't have hurt him politically and would have taken it. That's speculation, of course. And then there is this:

"Anyone confronted by the actuality of combat is deeply changed forever," Thorne said. "It's terrifying -- people are hurt badly and killed. It makes you grow up, and most of us began to deeply question what we were doing."

I have no standing to question how the horrors of war might effect someone. And I have nothing but compassion for people who have endured that tremendous hardship. But this country is already in a war. And I worry about a Commander in Chief who, perhaps because of his personal experience, would not be able to prosecute a strategy involving military action, even if in the best interests of our nation. War is horrible, not romantic. But it, unfortunately, can also be necessary. Does Kerry believe that? I don't know.

To return to Greenstein's criteria: Kerry has not displayed Johnson's legislative prowess while in the Senate; his campaign operation displays anything but the organizational ability of an Eisenhower; and, while he may be a great speech maker in a classic sense, I've yet to see him communicate effectively with the American people about anything. It isn't a good score and if Greenstein's criteria were an SAT equivalent for the presidency - Senator Kerry might be best served thinking pell grants and public education.

Summing up - he was not overly well-liked at Yale. His leadership within an organization caused it to fragment. I saw nothing to suggest any real commitment to service, no volunteer work in causes social or otherwise, excepting those that ultimately would benefit John Kerry. Maybe other opinions are different. The links are there to read for yourself. What I am seeing is an empty suit - and like any empty suit - it is decidedly vulnerable to wind change. And I see someone who's views of America's position in the world differ drastically from mine. In fact, some, if not many sentiments he has expressed early on I find rather offensive. That is simply not want I want for a commander in Chief at this time in our nation's history.

Comments

[RJGatorEsq.]

Terrific article. Terrific blog.

Thanks for the effort!
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