Republican Joe Scarborough Complimented Democratic President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Leadership Qualities — which Demonstrates that Effective Leadership Has Little to Do with Narrow Ideology or Party Affiliation

© 2012 Peter Free

 

27 July 2012

 

 

Former Florida Representative Joe Scarborough has a gift for making intelligent written observations succinctly

 

Of the mess the United States is in today, Scarborough said:

 

The balancing act demanded by the moment — of how to stimulate growth while simultaneously addressing long-term debt — would be a vexing enough problem for great presidents.

 

The Roosevelts, Lincoln, and Reagan would find themselves frustrated by the challenge. Obama and Romney simply appear incapable of rising to meet the challenges of this historic moment.

 

We all might find some inspiration in the example of FDR and his vision of the presidency as a place of “moral leadership.”

 

A key element of the brilliance he gave the country was a spirit of what he called “bold, persistent experimentation.”

 

As he saw it, if a solution failed, then admit it and try another. But, as he put it, above all “try something.”

 

And given the stakes of the moment right now, we need a leader who possesses the courage and vision of the man who guided America through a depression and world war while confined to a wheelchair.

 

Sadly, that kind of leader is nowhere in sight.

 

© 2012 Joe Scarborough, Ordinary leaders, extraordinary times, Politico (25 July 2012) (paragraphs split)

 

 

Two points

 

The fact that Republican Scarborough would pick former Democratic President Franklin Delano Roosevelt as a pattern for the kind of leader that Americans should be looking for today indicates:

 

(i) Scarborough’s mature political objectivity

 

and

 

(ii) the fact that great leadership has little to do with staying within ideological confines.

 

 

Young and middle-aged folk will probably not know that the Republicans of my youth despised FDR

 

In the 1940s and 50s, stalwart Republicans literally hated President Roosevelt.  In their eyes, he was a socialist, communist, or worse.

 

Grand Old Party folk particularly resented FDR because the majority of voting Americans loved the man’s courage and his gutsy pragmatic willingness to do battle with, and triumph over, the United States’ society-threatening problems.

 

Republicans especially detested President Roosevelt because his immense political talents, combined with a sense of a near regal sense of noblesse oblige and dedicated public service, conspired to make him one of American history’s most significant (and successful) political leaders.

 

Envy, jealousy, you pick.

 

That former Republican Representative Joe Scarborough would surmount such pettiness says something favorable about Scarborough's objectivity and his grasp of what makes a great political leader.

 

Which leads to my second point:  Great leadership is above political party.

 

 

Competent national leadership, in trying times, is not about the confines of political party — it is about clear sightedness, problem-solving mission, and (even) implemented destiny

 

Leadership is about coping successfully with the problems that Reality and limited vision throw our way.

 

In a democracy, great leadership is about lighting the motivational fire that guides, hones, and implements a democratically chosen destiny.  It is about trial and error, balance and wisdom.

 

Towering democratic leadership is about the ability to translate ordinary people’s dreams into substance.

 

From the perspective of the leader’s character, competently and inspirationally taking the helm, in trying times, is about courage and a stalwart soul.

 

Ergo, Scarborough’s emphasis on the presidency as a place of moral leadership:

 

“The Presidency is not merely an administrative office,” Roosevelt said.

 

“That’s the least of it. It is more than an engineering job, efficient or inefficient.

 

“It is preeminently a place of moral leadership.

 

“All our great Presidents were leaders of thought at times when certain historic ideas in the life of the nation had to be clarified.”

 

© 2012 Joe Scarborough, Ordinary leaders, extraordinary times, Politico (25 July 2012) (paragraph split)

 

 

The moral? — There are indeed no leaders in sight

 

We have settled for being led by (the human equivalent of) an unseemly pack of argumentative, flea-infested moles.  Which should make us wonder who we are.

 

When our alpha apes “ain’t  nuthin,” what does that make us?