http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11623419/site/newsweek/Well, I saw Clinton at another governors association meeting the other day, and I had to agree when a Democrat whispered to me, "You know, if the Constitution allowed it, that guy could get elected again."
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Clinton's performance reminded me of the leadership strengths—and weaknesses—of his baby-boomer successor. George W. Bush is in choppy water over the Dubai ports issue. And he is so, in large part, because, unlike Clinton, he is a man of bullet points, not explanations; of slogans, not systems; of certitude, not complexity.
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I've known Bush for a long time and I know that he distrusts talk, at least public talk. He'd rather make a decision—give an order—and then go out and attack a felled tree with a chain saw. He is confident to the point of arrogance when he makes a "tough call." But he objects by nature to the demand that he explain his reasoning or the process behind it.
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Another reason is his father's political saga. Junior hated watching his dad's painfully compulsive need to explain himself in public and vowed: not me. Then there's West Texas, where Bush learned his social Tough Guy ways on the playgrounds of Sam Houston Elementary and San Jacinton Junior High, and then later at the Midland Petroleum Club. The ethic out there is to distrust talkers. You shake hands.
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Another decent article by Howard Fineman.