Judgment

Looking at the republican presidential primary race can cause one to ask what should we expect in the way of judgment from our President? The person who finally wins the election to the office of President has make countless decisions that affect the lives of all of us. While he has advisors and other sources of information, the final decision rests with the President. A Presidential decision can have a great deal of consequences in terms of financial costs as well as the costs of human lives. We have experienced the results of a “bad” decision, to invade Iraq, can cost. While the advisers to the President, Cheney, Wolfowitz, Bolton, and company were able to present arguments that this would “be a walk in the park” and would “last no more than four to six weeks”, the decision proved to have far greater costs and consequences. Today, we can look at a number of contenders for the nomination of the republican party that appear to have little or no chance of either securing the nomination or winning a presidential election. What does this campaign say about the judgment of many of those candidates? It is obvious that the results in Iowa will be the electoral equivalent of “shock and awe”. Pundits will make a lot of noise about the results, just as they make a lot of noise about the polls about the results, but judging from history the likelihood of Iowa caucus results paralleling the Presidential election are slim to none. Can we learn from the efforts of the candidates as to who might have the judgment to serve as president? Which of the candidates really has a chance of winning a nomination? Which of the candidates will make best use of the resources available to him or her and which of the candidates will allow their ego to blind good sense and good judgment? Spending contributors donations is not very different than spending taxpayers dollars or human treasure once in office. It is necessary to be assured that whomever is elected to serve as President has the necessary judgment to spend wisely and to avoid wasteful spending on a hopeless cause or overspending that results from decisions grounded in poor judgment.