Peacetime armies of course do suffer from the general kind of alignment problems Kling describes but I think his specific diagnosis seems about as wrong as it possibly could be. My guess is he knows something about premodern aristocratic militaries and about the pre-Marshall US military but doesn't realize how vastly different it is today. If anything the classic peacetime selection problem in modern militaries that train realistically is that they overpromote the exact kind of driven, charismatic, improvisational, maybe-not-all-that-reflective type of officer whom Kling seems to think is best, who then under wartime strain "regresses" to acting like a much more junior guy, micromanaging inappropriately, out of touch with ground realities and out of date with the specific domain knowledge needed to do his subordinates' jobs effectively.
Eisenhower is a great illustration of it, actually. His career as a line officer was minimal and unimpressive and he was never, ever intended for high command; he was supposed to be the brains behind the commander but then got the job kind of by default. He was correctly identified as extremely valuable, and ultimately placed in the highest possible field command in which he succeeded admirably, based on his ability to write good memos and reports and seem smart and helpful in meetings; this would almost certainly not have happened in peacetime and seems like a perfect example of what Kling is trying to get at, but it's completely opposite in the details from how he imagines.
There is probably a lot more I could write about this actually.
Perhaps there could be a discussion about historical sources of "moderation" or at least "reformist" impulses in politics. Biased by my US-based perspective, it may benefit that you could provide a Canadian politics.
In the American context, it's worth considering that a lot of the progressive impulses in the late 19th Century come out of groups that were "captured" by partisan polarization: elite Northern WASPs who could never feel comfortable identifying permanently with the party of Rum, Romanism, and Rebellion, but who could be courted by very specific Democratic reformers (Cleveland, Wilson) that were dependent on certain voting blocs (swing voters in the Northeast) to attain the presidency.
Eisenhower plays a similar role. Someone who grew up as a Republican, and for historical/regional reasons wasn't ready to commit to the party of the Solid South, but who nevertheless accepted some aspects of the New Deal and didn't want to turn the keys of the GOP over to hard line conservatives like Taft.
Can polarization today actually help? Identify groups and interests that due to today's identarian politics are committed to one party, but for other reasons are also interested in good governance and reform. I'm thinking of say Mormons in the West, who are going to vote Republican for culture war reasons, but have shown a greater interest in good governance than their Evangelical coalition partners.
Interesting. In the parochial Canadian federal context, I think of the post-war Tories of ironically being the party of change because they are the one party who have the commitment device (ideological base) to get stuff through despite special interests and inertia. They often come in a boom and bust cycle, and change the 'regime' so to speak. After the Tories often implode, the Liberals often come back into comfortable power after people see a lot of change (good and bad but change nonetheless), and often have the brokerage skills to synthesize the good stuff (think CCB, or Chretien's fiscal conservatism) with the good old sunny ways for a bit. Rinse and repeat. Liberals, from a broad stroke, seem to be quite unable to push serious institutional reform because they are a party of the various solitudes. Its telling that for all this 'march of the progressives' that the Right bemoans of the current party, the actual policy landscape has not changed much in this regard.
To me, it suggests that the medium term future might too noisy for the US moderates to risk getting stuff done.
we shouldn't forget that many of the "adverse" style are narcissists and psychopaths who turn everything into a binary win-lose game, a structure where they feel safe, at least where their grandiosity is safe from reality, and a structure they can form to fit their preferred backstabbing style. We need to find ways to exclude them from the get-go, as they create an environment that suits them and excludes the rest of us losers.
A good "moderate" would be extreme on issues where the status quo is toxic.
Eisenhower correctly noted that it would be smart for the US to invest in nukes rather than heavy equipment in conventional land armies to defend against a Soviet tank rush through West Germany. He then took the money he saved to balance budgets and spend on important R&D.
Taking on the military industrial complex so openly was hardly a "moderate" position. Politicians today are completely unable to do it for instance, and you have to go to the fringes of the right or left to get anyone that would talk the way Eisenhower did.
Another example of an "extreme moderate" I can think of was Lee Kuan Yew.
Peacetime armies of course do suffer from the general kind of alignment problems Kling describes but I think his specific diagnosis seems about as wrong as it possibly could be. My guess is he knows something about premodern aristocratic militaries and about the pre-Marshall US military but doesn't realize how vastly different it is today. If anything the classic peacetime selection problem in modern militaries that train realistically is that they overpromote the exact kind of driven, charismatic, improvisational, maybe-not-all-that-reflective type of officer whom Kling seems to think is best, who then under wartime strain "regresses" to acting like a much more junior guy, micromanaging inappropriately, out of touch with ground realities and out of date with the specific domain knowledge needed to do his subordinates' jobs effectively.
Eisenhower is a great illustration of it, actually. His career as a line officer was minimal and unimpressive and he was never, ever intended for high command; he was supposed to be the brains behind the commander but then got the job kind of by default. He was correctly identified as extremely valuable, and ultimately placed in the highest possible field command in which he succeeded admirably, based on his ability to write good memos and reports and seem smart and helpful in meetings; this would almost certainly not have happened in peacetime and seems like a perfect example of what Kling is trying to get at, but it's completely opposite in the details from how he imagines.
There is probably a lot more I could write about this actually.
Maybe our moderates are too extreme in their moderation. Nested moderation?
Perhaps there could be a discussion about historical sources of "moderation" or at least "reformist" impulses in politics. Biased by my US-based perspective, it may benefit that you could provide a Canadian politics.
In the American context, it's worth considering that a lot of the progressive impulses in the late 19th Century come out of groups that were "captured" by partisan polarization: elite Northern WASPs who could never feel comfortable identifying permanently with the party of Rum, Romanism, and Rebellion, but who could be courted by very specific Democratic reformers (Cleveland, Wilson) that were dependent on certain voting blocs (swing voters in the Northeast) to attain the presidency.
Eisenhower plays a similar role. Someone who grew up as a Republican, and for historical/regional reasons wasn't ready to commit to the party of the Solid South, but who nevertheless accepted some aspects of the New Deal and didn't want to turn the keys of the GOP over to hard line conservatives like Taft.
Can polarization today actually help? Identify groups and interests that due to today's identarian politics are committed to one party, but for other reasons are also interested in good governance and reform. I'm thinking of say Mormons in the West, who are going to vote Republican for culture war reasons, but have shown a greater interest in good governance than their Evangelical coalition partners.
Interesting. In the parochial Canadian federal context, I think of the post-war Tories of ironically being the party of change because they are the one party who have the commitment device (ideological base) to get stuff through despite special interests and inertia. They often come in a boom and bust cycle, and change the 'regime' so to speak. After the Tories often implode, the Liberals often come back into comfortable power after people see a lot of change (good and bad but change nonetheless), and often have the brokerage skills to synthesize the good stuff (think CCB, or Chretien's fiscal conservatism) with the good old sunny ways for a bit. Rinse and repeat. Liberals, from a broad stroke, seem to be quite unable to push serious institutional reform because they are a party of the various solitudes. Its telling that for all this 'march of the progressives' that the Right bemoans of the current party, the actual policy landscape has not changed much in this regard.
To me, it suggests that the medium term future might too noisy for the US moderates to risk getting stuff done.
we shouldn't forget that many of the "adverse" style are narcissists and psychopaths who turn everything into a binary win-lose game, a structure where they feel safe, at least where their grandiosity is safe from reality, and a structure they can form to fit their preferred backstabbing style. We need to find ways to exclude them from the get-go, as they create an environment that suits them and excludes the rest of us losers.
A good "moderate" would be extreme on issues where the status quo is toxic.
Eisenhower correctly noted that it would be smart for the US to invest in nukes rather than heavy equipment in conventional land armies to defend against a Soviet tank rush through West Germany. He then took the money he saved to balance budgets and spend on important R&D.
Taking on the military industrial complex so openly was hardly a "moderate" position. Politicians today are completely unable to do it for instance, and you have to go to the fringes of the right or left to get anyone that would talk the way Eisenhower did.
Another example of an "extreme moderate" I can think of was Lee Kuan Yew.