Have We Turned A Competency Corner?

Watching Barack Obama during the 2008 Presidential campaign, I was struck by how his focus was always on the issues, while John McCain followed the typical Republican game plan of attacking his opponent. McCain's negativity was business-as-usual within the political arena; Obama was all about getting down to the business of turning things around.

Among many other qualities that were attributed to the eventual winner of the election was "competence." Americans were slowly getting to know this man, through the debates and interviews, and by his reactions to the deteriorating financial mess in his country. And what they saw, for the most part, was someone who remained cool in a crisis, thought about every question he was asked (rather than automatically sticking to his talking points via offering canned responses), and had a wealth of personal experience that allowed him to relate to average Americans more than is usually the case with the modern presidential candidate-millionaire. In other words, he came across as someone who could conceivably be up to the task, as opposed to filling the "lesser of two evils" mentality that characterized apathetic electorate decision-making in years past. Was his successful campaign and inspiring personality the beginning of the end for a recent trend toward accepting incompetents instead of demanding excellence?

Dilbert creator Scott Adams offers another possible candidate for the turning point over on his blog: Chesley Sullenberger, the airbus pilot who famously brought his engine-less plane with 150 people on it down safely in a water landing near New York City last week. Adams makes an eloquent case for that event reflecting the fact that we've passed the nadir of the incompetence trough and are turning back in the right direction at last.

Either way, I hope that it's true that we've turned a corner in this regard. We need to begin celebrating competence once again and stop believing that mediocrity is the loftiest bar that we can set for our leaders, and for ourselves.