Name an effective U.S. President who did not have great confidence in his ability to make decisions, though. Or name one who doubted his own goodness or questioned his basic beliefs or basic goals.
I’d have a hard time digging up an appropriate quote, but I get that impression from Lincoln’s writings, for the first part. If any president had low confidence in their decisionmaking ability though, how strongly should we expect to know about it?
If any president had low confidence in their decisionmaking ability though, how strongly should we expect to know about it?
Fair enough (and I am impressed that you were able to go right to IMHO the best example out of the 44 choices), but if you replace my “did not have great confidence” with “did not publicly display great confidence”, my point (that the quote of Bush is not significant evidence of arationality or irrationality) stands.
If any president had low confidence in their decisionmaking ability though, how strongly should we expect to know about it?
In fact, now that I think about it, that point is support for the conclusion I have been arguing for, since the American voter is impressed enough with confidence that anyone without unusually high confidence in the intrinsic rightness of his own basic beliefs might have to fake it in public just to be an effective presidential candidate no matter how distasteful he or she privately finds it.
Name an effective U.S. President who did not have great confidence in his ability to make decisions, though. Or name one who doubted his own goodness or questioned his basic beliefs or basic goals.
I’d have a hard time digging up an appropriate quote, but I get that impression from Lincoln’s writings, for the first part. If any president had low confidence in their decisionmaking ability though, how strongly should we expect to know about it?
Fair enough (and I am impressed that you were able to go right to IMHO the best example out of the 44 choices), but if you replace my “did not have great confidence” with “did not publicly display great confidence”, my point (that the quote of Bush is not significant evidence of arationality or irrationality) stands.
In fact, now that I think about it, that point is support for the conclusion I have been arguing for, since the American voter is impressed enough with confidence that anyone without unusually high confidence in the intrinsic rightness of his own basic beliefs might have to fake it in public just to be an effective presidential candidate no matter how distasteful he or she privately finds it.