American Leadership

I have had the blessing to be well led during my time in the military. I’ve held some military leadership positions too, and wasn’t anything special. But nobody got hurt and the work got done. Well, OK, two guys had accidents and ended up in the hospital, but I’m still walking and so is the other guy. Unfortunately, Washington politics seem to enter the equation at the O-5 paygrade. Maybe the next generational battle cry will be “don’t trust anybody over O-4”. But nonetheless, our military breeds leaders. The one above is a United States Marine.

There is also plenty of leadership in America’s private sector. The smartest people I’ve met seem to be drawn to the risk and reward associated with putting out their own shingle and making a go of it. Look at a successful earthwork contractor, or plumber, or machine-shop owner in America, and that thing you see is leadership. There are millions of these guys.

Unfortunately our system for selecting national leadership has been broken by a combination of forces. Some of these forces were foolish people with good intentions, others were people who meant to damage the Country.

Leading us to the decision between John McCain, Hillary Clinton, and Barack Obama. Congratulations to those whose goal was to push the Country to this point. Things will get more interesting when the money runs out though. Fortunately for us, there’s still plenty of there there.