Cross-posted at Letters Blogatory.
Washington has always coveted the glamor of Hollywood, and Hollywood has always wanted to be taken seriously rather than dismissed as mere entertainers. That’s why we have a White House Correspondent’s dinner, and why so many stars wear nerdy eyeglasses. But not too long ago, in a more innocent time, it was shocking when an actor would win an election to high office. The first big-time movie star I know of to do it was George Murphy, whose election as a senator from California in 1965 prompted the great satirist Tom Lehrer to sing:
Hollywood’s always tried to mix
Showbusiness with politics
From Helen Gahagen
To … Ronald Reagan?
But Mr. Murphy is the star
Who’s done the best by far
Oh, gee, it’s great!
At last we’ve got a senator who can—
Really sing and dance!
Can we expect America to stand against her foes
With no one in the Senate who can really tap his toes?
Think of all the musicals we have in store!
Imagine Broadway Melody of nineteen eighty-four!
And now that he’s a senator
He’s really got the chance
To give the country
A song and dance!
Ronald Reagan, of course, was later elected President, though there is no question that he had devoted many years to policy and politics before 1980 and though he had the kind of executive experience (as governor of California) that is one of the traditional pathways to the presidency. Since then, we’ve had figures such as Arnold Schwartzenegger as governor of California, Jessie “the Body” Ventura as governor of Minnesota, Al Franken as senator from Minnesota, Clint Eastwood as mayor of Carmel, Cal. and Sonny Bono as mayor of Palm Springs, Cal. No doubt I am missing some.
After actress, talk show host, and American icon Oprah Winfrey gave a barn-burner of a speech at the Golden Globes award ceremony this week, people immediately began talking about her as a candidate for President in 2020. Now, like everyone else, I like Oprah Winfrey. She’s likeable. And she’s proved to be a canny businesswoman. If you had the choice to invest in Oprah Winfrey, Inc. at the beginning of her career or to invest in Donald Trump, Inc. at the beginning of his career, Oprah would have been the superior choice by a mile. (Owning stock in Donald Trump would have gone badly if for no other reason than his multiple bankruptcies).
But she is no stateswoman. She has not served as a governor, a senator, the Vice President, or a general, which are the traditional routes to the presidency. She seems to me to be entirely unqualified. And that’s nothing to be ashamed of: she has worked hard and excelled in the entertainment industry, but she has done nothing in her life to prepare to hold high office.
The desire to look to a charismatic but unqualified outsider as a savior or a solution to our problems should be familiar to everyone who lived through the 2016 elections. Of course I think a President Winfrey would be superior to a President Trump, mainly because she seems to meet minimum standards of character and temperament that President Trump does not. But we need to find a way to get back to a world in which we look to people who have the basic qualifications for the office they seek to hold.
I’m not saying we can only elect soulless, boring technocrats. We want authenticity in our politicans. But we have to make sure that we know real authenticity when we see it.
One of my favorite books on style, Clear and Simple as the Truth, has this anecdote about Senator Fulbright:
Senator Fulbright was a Rhodes scholar with an Oxford education. Before he went to the Senate, he had been the dean of a law school and the president of a university. His background was perfectly congruent with what he sounded like in action as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee conducting hearings on the Vietnam War, but when he campaigned in rural Arkansas, where he got his votes, there was no hint of Oxford, or even Fayetteville. On the stump, he sounded completely down home. After the election, that sound dissipated with every mile he got closer to Washington until he was sworn in for a new term and resumed both the seat of power and the music of policy.
So we see that politicians with deep experience, knowledge, and gravitas can still be appealing popular politicians, or at least they could in the past. Today, Senator Fulbright would no doubt be condemned as inauthentic, but that condemnation would miss the mark. He was a complicated man of many parts. President Obama was in a way like Senator Fulbright—a man of many parts, but with the unique advantage that his popular persona—cool and sophisticated—was not that different from the persona of a boring technocrat. Thus he was able to avoid the charge of inauthenticity in a way that Hillary Clinton wasn’t. Part of President Trump’s appeal to his base is that he is not a man of many parts. He is exactly what he appears to be—all Fayetteville (or rather, all Queens), no Oxford.
Actors have a unique advantage: they can seem to have the gravitas and erudition of a Senator Fulbright, but then, they’re actors. I have no doubt that Oprah Winfrey could have a presidential demeanor. Perhaps Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson could have one, too, though I don’t really want to do an experiment to find out.
Instead, what I want is for us to have the maturity not to get stars in our eyes when we contemplate our favorite entertainers as political leaders. I wouldn’t hire Oprah Winfrey to take out my appendix; I wouldn’t ask her to represent me in a lawsuit; I wouldn’t commission her to write an opera; I wouldn’t seek her advice on a scientific question. I would want someone with the right experience and skill to do these things. The same is true in politics. We used to understand this. I hope we can understand it again.
In my view, no business person is qualified to go directly from the CEO chair to the presidency. Wasn’t a good idea when Hoover did it, would’ve been a disaster had Wilkie done it, and is definitely a disaster today. This is because government is about understanding how checks and balances work, how relations with other lawmakers and other nations works, and how to forge compromises and bring people together to make critical decisions. A CEO rules by fiat, a President rules by consensus.
Even the strongest executives in the White House had to work with legislators and other world leaders to get things done. I love Oprah and think she’s a talented CEO, far more talented than the incumbent. I also think people are dismissing her qualifications out of hand in a way they aren’t dismissing Howard Schultz or Mark Cuban, who are just as unqualified, but happen to be white males.
Yet if we are the party that believes in the public sector and the positive impact it has on transforming the lives of ordinary people, we shouldn’t nominate a private sector leader with no public sector experience. We should make government service something to be proud of again and elevate people with that experience. I absolutely welcome her and other credibile celebrities to run for higher office, but the highest office should be reserved for people who have the government experience to get things done. She or Michelle Obama would make a phenomenal Mayor of Chicago. She’d be a fantastic Senator, but President? People should wait until they’ve worked in government a day in their life before running to head it.
I am dismissing Howard Schultz and Mark Cuban, too.
Oh you’re not one of the offenders. Time magazine loves promoting Schultz and Cuban obviously has been toying with the idea for years. I think all three could do a great job starting at a lower level of government (maybe not Cuban as much, who is too libertarian for my taste). Bloomberg couldn’t have run straight from his old job, he needed to be Mayor of a global city for three terms. Even then, a Senate or Governorship might have been needed to really prepare him for the job.
Hoover had served most of the 20s as Secretary of Commerce, and before that Director of the US Food Administration and led humanitarian relief efforts during the Great War.
And how was the rest of the play Mrs. Lincoln?
What’s that supposed to mean? I know he wasn’t a great President, but you said he went from CEO to the WH which isn’t the case. He had several years of government service, including in the Cabinet, under his belt.
Where does she stand on the $15 minimum wage?
Good question. My hunch is that she would advise anyone working for less than $15 with no benefits to “Go to school and learn new job skills! Reach for that goal! You can do it!”…..blah, blah, blah…..but I could be wrong.
Ted, look under your seat. Is there anything there? No? Now, imagine if Oprah becomes President.
Oprah herself is not the answer. But she shows a communication style and delivery that needs to be emulated. She listens, she’s empathetic (and makes a great show of it, literally), she’s supportive, she challenges — but not too much. (I mean … Oprah book club. Amazing.) Etc. People are comfortable with her in their living rooms. She’s been poor. She talks to folks where they are.
She’s also responsible for bringing quacks like Dr. Oz and Dr. Phil to prominence. So … there’s that.
No she doesn’t have the résumé. But we need to remember that people don’t vote the résumé anyway. She (and maybe Ellen DeGeneres) is a good example of the mode of communication a Dem candidate needs to use: Kitchen table. Always, the kitchen table.
Randy Bryce gets it — who does this guy’s ads? Where’s he getting the $?
He’s getting a ton of money from all of us donating to him. And his ads are perfect. Like I said, I think she has a lot of amazing qualities that would make for a fine career in public service, but you start at a lower level before reaching for the top. Even Reagan and Arnold knew that.
“People don’t vote the resume,” which is exactly why it is important for elite opinion (I’m looking at you, Blue Mass Group) to rule her out as unacceptable. That’s precisely where Republican elites failed in the last election.
“Elite opinion” – blush!
Look, as you pointed out, this kind of thing has a long history, with a range of results. Al Franken was, surprisingly, an earnest public servant — aside from, uh, the groping and stuff. Reagan was an ignoramus who normalized ignorance.
But Trump’s sociopathy, ignorance and viciousness are sui generis. I reject the comparison.
Thanks for the thoughtful post.
Totally get that you wouldn’t support her in a primary.
Respectfully disagree that she shouldn’t be *considered.* Top 1% leader/entrepreneur, top 1% communicator, and compared to likely nominees, probably top 10% potential to win support from moderate Republicans.
Just saying – that’s a lot to balance against the downsides.
Larger point: I doubt that it’s possible anymore for “elite opinion to rule her out.”
Do you think it’s possible?
(I happen to believe that’s a good thing overall, but that’s a different question).
I.e., I’m not sure what you think the “elites” thing might look like. But let’s say for discussion if some party leaders, bloggers like Kos et al, and a bunch of WaPo and NYT columnists said “We love Oprah, but no way.”
Geez, am I off target to guess that would actually help her, if she chose to run? Elites can shout all they want, but I don’t think that’s a big driver in persuasion anymore.
On your larger point, GGW, I think we had best hope that there are some institutions out there that can help shape public opinion, otherwise we are in deep deep trouble.
There are only a few actual requirements for the position written into the Constitution. The emergent, unwritten, requirement is not knowledge or experience, but that amorphous thing called ‘name recognition.’ Oprah has it. If that is ‘hard and fast’ requirement — and it’s hard to imagine Trump as President without it being so — then ‘boring, soulless technocrats’, are therefore wholly disqualified and will never again ascend to that height. The new normal?
I have no doubt that Oprah, should she run, could win. The divergence between the skills necessary to campaign for the job and those required to actually do the job, as I’ve long opined, being so extreme, I’m also confident that she would be as bad, if not worse, a president than Donald Trump… precisely because she is so much more well-intentioned.
To be perfectly honest, as much as I admire Oprah, I’d welcome a Jeb Bush coup before even considering casting a vote for her.