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Followship
or Leadership?
Virginia
has plenty of risk-averse leaders willing to peddle
more-of-the-same solutions, but very few courageous
enough to
articulate the hard truths or push for innovative solutions.
The
next election cycle will tell us who among
Virginia’s
politicians are practitioners of Followship or who
are capable of genuine Leadership.
We need a whole lot less of the former and
more of the latter if we are to have real progress.
We
should define our terms very carefully, beginning
with the meaning of “progress.”
It’s hard to miss the pattern of late among
liberals. They
seldom refer to themselves nowadays as
“liberals,” but rather as “progressives.”
Who can be against progress?
“Progress,”
however, does not convey a complete thought.
Progress toward what?
Recent
public opinion surveys indicate that most Virginians
want to see substantial advancement toward solving
longstanding problems, particularly in
transportation, education and local government
finances. That’s
what they consider progress.
This
does not mean that most of us support significant
increases in taxes and government programs as a way
to solve those problems.
We just want the problem fixed in the most
efficient and effective way possible.
“Followship”
is the pervasive condition in Virginia
politics at the moment.
It connotes dependence on polling and focus
groups, an aversion to political risk and a
staleness in political discourse.
Practitioners
of Followship are like bandleaders who insist on
walking backwards in a parade lest they lose sight
of the people they should be leading.
We aren’t likely to get any bold solutions
from this kind of politician.
“Leadership”
is a term we all think we know and understand —
until we’re asked to define it.
For more than 200 years, biographers have
tried to capture in words what made George
Washington a great leader.
It’s a tough assignment.
We
often find it easier to describe what
“leadership” is not.
It certainly isn’t telling voters one thing
during an election campaign, then doing something
quite different after being elected.
We’ve had too much of that in recent years.
True
leaders always have a remarkable measure of
confidence about where they want to lead people.
They aren’t hog-tied by fear of failing or
offending. Their
values are internalized; their cues don’t come
from consultants or surveys.
Virginia
needs to break away from tired approaches and
hackneyed political talk.
Too many of our politicians assume that any
new thinking will somehow bubble up from the general
populace and, unless and until it does, they
aren’t about to risk supporting anything truly
innovative. A
single courageous politician could shame all the
rest in 2005 by demonstrating Leadership.
More
of the same in education and transportation policies
will not solve Virginia’s
problems. Continuing
along settled paths will mean inevitable tax
increases. In
the long run, it will not produce better
communities, overall educational improvement or
greater mobility.
Times
like this call for the political gumption to throw
out traditional ways of doing things.
We should be reexamining our objectives and
searching for the best way to achieve newly
articulated goals.
Voters
want and expect Leadership.
They don’t always reward it or appreciate
it, but they understand that progress is virtually
impossible without Leadership.
What
we need is at least one candidate who will tell us
that the change we need will be painful, but
necessary and worthwhile.
He or she won’t sugarcoat the message or
wilt in the heated opposition from threatened
special interests.
Virginia
once had such leaders by the dozen.
Can’t we find just one in 2005?
--
November 29,
2004
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