Trump Slams Allies in favor of Putin (again)...

[Dill]

(07-17-2018, 01:41 PM)michaelsean Wrote: Went to high school with a SS Agent who dd the Clinton's and W.  A guy I work with is still friend's with him.  The Bush's were very nice, Bill was awesome, and Hillary was the worst person he has ever met.  But you really don't need to be that close.  anyone who has paid attention for the last 30 years knows it.  And unlikable is unlikable.  There are public figures you are drawn to and public figures you aren't.  Her public persona is horrible.

So you are going by someone else's impression. Sometimes that is all or mostly what we have.  I don't reject that in principle.

But I am a person who has "paid attention" (to what, exactly?), and I don't come away with the same impression. My view of her pubic persona comes largely from events such as the debates with Trump and her 9-hour interrogation during the Benghazi hearings.  What I saw was competence--preparation, mastery of detail, understanding of government.

I have never seen anything in her remotely like Trump's bad public behavior, yet that behavior seems to have recommended him to many ("He tells it like it is; no 'political correctness'").

If you were "unlikeable" Hillary's lawyer, and the special counsel subpoenaed her for questioning, would you be worrying about her performance the way Trump's lawyers worry about him testifying without counsel at hand?  Who would you worry about more in a one-on-one with Putin, or interacting with heads of state at an EU summit? Which public persona would your vote be putting in that situation? Those are the questions I want answered before I pull the lever. "likeable" can factor into that, but it cannot displace competence. Incompetence without likelability--that I don't fathom, and that is what we have.