“But leadership is not just about getting the job done…. How many times have we read about a university athletic program that was excelling in athletics but was caught in a cheating scandal along the way? Or a financial institution that made its stockholders a lot of money but eventually collapsed because they violated the law? If as a leader you fail the institution you are leading, then you have failed – period. Once again, leadership is difficult, but not complicated. To do it right doesn’t require a sophisticated chart, a calculus formula, or a complex algorithm, but it does require some guidance.”

Author’s “Introduction” to William H. McRaven The Wisdom of the Bullfrog

In my latest Loonie Politics column I say the Canadian chattering classes’ lead-balloon response to Trump’s clumsy 51st-state joke was devoid of wit in any sense.

“If you have to swallow a frog, it’s best not to look at it too long.”

Tennessee governor Ned McWherter quoted in The Economist April 6, 1991 [specifically urging the legislature to adopt a state income tax, which I’m against, but I applaud the maxim as a general rule]

“There is, you know, such a thing as being too intellectual in your approach to a problem. He [Truman] believed that even a wrong decision was better than no decision at all.”

Clark Clifford, quoted in an article in The Economist August 1, 1992 [if it had a byline I did not record it; it was evidently something Clifford “then a bright young man” said later than his time in that administration].

“A cadet will not lie, cheat, steal, or tolerate those who do.”

The United States Military Academy Cadet Honor Code, quoted in William H. McRaven The Wisdom of the Bullfrog. McRaven adds that “Below the honor code is the mission of the United States Military Academy. The mission of West Point is not to produce Pattonesque geniuses, four-star generals, or presidents of the United States. The mission is to produce ‘leaders of character’. And the honor code provides the foundation of that character. The code beckons young men and women who aspire ‘to live above the common level of life.’”

“I believe in men who take the next step; not those who theorize about the two-hundredth step.”

Theodore Roosevelt quoted in John Morton Blum, The Progressive Presidents: Roosevelt, Wilson, Roosevelt, Johnson.

“All I can say is, the man who said, ‘Talk is cheap,’ never had to say, ‘I do.’”

Donald Trump, quoted in National Post October 8, 1999

In my latest National Post column I argue that various embarrassing missteps by Canadian educational institutions, among others, show that the woke aren’t just nasty, they’re so narrow-minded they really don’t know anyone with a brain or a heart disagrees with them, let alone why.