Vetting Our Leaders

[I posted this comment at Confabulation when some of the Obama picks were running into vetting problems. Would that those problems have torpedoed Timothy Geithner's nomination, as they did the rest! Geithner is the worst blemish on the Obama presidency to date; far from being a change agent, he's as status quo-defending as they come -- which is not really a surprise given his personal history and arc of ascent.]

Why do so many of our public servants and business and non-profit leaders stand up so poorly to careful vetting? It is in the nature of those who want to rise to the top to take such shortcuts as offer themselves. To be sure, there are differing degrees of scrupulousness about what shortcuts may be taken. That can be based on conscience; quite often it is based on expediency -- what level of risk of exposure is acceptable?

But show me someone who disdains all shortcuts and I will show you an ethically admirable person who will never rise to the top in any organization. The ornery principled type who insists on "making it on their own merits" will assuredly never do so.

There may perhaps be rare exceptions to this, but as a general proposition I think it is pretty solid.

[I added this follow-up comment a bit later.]

It occurred to me today that one of the definite problems we've got right now is that when information comes out about politicians that would automatically dis-qualify them from holding a lower management position at J.C. Penney, we can actually pretend to have a serious conversation about whether that information ought to dis-qualify them from serving as Vice-President, Senator, Governor, or Secretary of the Treasury. Excuse me, where are our standards? Do any of us think that we could get away with that crap in our lives and jobs?

For all the hopes I have invested in the new administration and the undoubtedly impressive personal qualities of our new President, politics is still what it is. Recently Scot Faulkner, former high-ranking Republican official and author of the book Naked Emperors: The Failure of the Republican Revolution (another apostate!), gave a lecture on politics at Lawrence University here in Appleton, Wisconsin, and a choice bit of his talk was reported in The Lawrentian newspaper: "Congress is like a big freshman dorm. Congressmen are away from home for the first time, they have no adult supervision -- it's all about sex, drugs and rock'n'roll. They go nuts and screw around all term, and then come 10th week, they pull all-nighters and ask for extensions."