The Quest for Power Trumps Policy – Obama and Clinton

Democracy and Power 105: The Politician Seeks Power

In order to get power and retain it, it is necessary to love power; but love of power is not connected with goodness but with qualities that are the opposite of goodness, such as pride, cunning, and cruelty.
—Leo Tolstoy

In America, a politician intentionally selects to enter politics.  Politicians seek power in the name of public good, but they predominately seek power. When a person enters Congress or the Presidency, they seek and use the coercive power of government.

The Quest for Power Trumps Policy – Obama and Clinton 

Former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates witnessed Hillary Clinton tell President Obama that she opposed the 2007 surge in Iraq because he was running against her in the Iowa primary.  Gates wrote, “Hillary told the president that her opposition to the [2007] surge in Iraq had been political because she was facing him in the Iowa primary. . . .”   Keep in mind, Clinton had previously supported our war in Iraq.  

Gates recalls Obama’s response to Clinton’s admission, “The president conceded vaguely that opposition to the Iraq surge had been political. To hear the two of them making these admissions, and in front of me, was as surprising as it was dismaying.” 

Dismaying is an understatement!  Try, appalling or horrific. Two of the most powerful people in the world admit political ambition influenced a momentous policy discussion.  Policies changing the lives of millions of people.  Life and death decisions impacting thousands of Americans and Iraqis.  Policy edicts that disrupted and destroyed lives throughout the Middle East – Libya to Afghanistan.  Lethal government force that will have enormous repercussions for many years to come to the people in harms way and the United States.

Tolstoy understood the universal quest for power:  

In order to get power and retain it, it is necessary to love power; but love of power is not connected with goodness but with qualities that are the opposite of goodness, such as pride, cunning, and cruelty. 

James Madison, the knowledgeable force creating America’s Constitution, knew our leaders must be virtuous:

“The aim of every political Constitution, is or ought to be first to obtain for rulers men who possess most wisdom to discern, and most virtue to pursue, the common good of society; and in the next place, to take the most effectual precautions for keeping them virtuous whilst they continue to hold their public trust.”

Virtuous whilst they continue to hold their public trust, which is essential and absolutely needed today in America.