Tuesday, August 09, 2011
Who made a payroll?
I'm tired of brand-R commentators constantly saying that some brand-D politician or candidate "never made a payroll."
Decided to look up previous presidents to see who actually ran a business at some point in his life.
Most presidents have worked in private business, at least when young. Reagan is the only one who spent most of his life working in the private sector, though he never owned or operated a business. The vast majority went straight into politics after Army or college.
Within the last 100 years, here are the four presidents who actually ran a real business:
Harding owned a newspaper for a few years.
Truman owned a haberdashery (hat store) for many years.
Carter ran a peanut farm.
Bush Junior owned an oil company and a baseball team, at least in name. By most accounts he was mainly drunk at the time.
Among those, only Truman seems to have been a serious businessman, not just 'doing the business thing' for political showmanship.
Is that really a sterling list? Does that lead to the conclusion that "making a payroll" should be the prime brand-R qualification for the next president? ¶ 12:37 PM
Decided to look up previous presidents to see who actually ran a business at some point in his life.
Most presidents have worked in private business, at least when young. Reagan is the only one who spent most of his life working in the private sector, though he never owned or operated a business. The vast majority went straight into politics after Army or college.
Within the last 100 years, here are the four presidents who actually ran a real business:
Harding owned a newspaper for a few years.
Truman owned a haberdashery (hat store) for many years.
Carter ran a peanut farm.
Bush Junior owned an oil company and a baseball team, at least in name. By most accounts he was mainly drunk at the time.
Among those, only Truman seems to have been a serious businessman, not just 'doing the business thing' for political showmanship.
Is that really a sterling list? Does that lead to the conclusion that "making a payroll" should be the prime brand-R qualification for the next president? ¶ 12:37 PM
