We don't elect statesmen, so no politicians qualify.  

I like Bill Moyers for the job.

Seems like the best candidates for that always die young.

I am reading "Walking with the Wind," (as recommended on this site a few months ago), and cannot help but think that along with John Lewis, there are some absolute gems of human beings in America who have been working for the common good for their entire lives.

Perhaps our next era of government will prove to be an opportunity to actually learn from the past, rather than try and reinvent history in an effort to resurrect undemocratic and failed policies.

there is no such thing as history. there are only historians.

Although he has redeemed himself as a thoughty person when it comes to global warming, he is a slender reed to lean on as an "elder statesman".  I don't think he has reckoned how much damage was done by letting the Bush Bullies get away with stealing the 2000 election.  Kerry did the same in 2004 because he couldn't acknowledge the wrongness of paperless ballots and uncertified source on the machines.

Now I have heard all the arguments - not wanting a civil war, etc.  But Bush took silence as consent to take the government all the way to illegaldom.

Now we have a pot full of dems who feel that they have to be "nice" and try for "bi-partisanship".  And even now Schumer is saying that we "are not ready for health care reform"!

It would seem that dc turns people into utter idiots!

Grandma Jo

...when you spend twenty years poisoning the rich soil of political and public service with round the clock demonization and public character assassination which now bombard us over the airwaves and has become the daily norm in the American experience.

Politicians of this new millenium are, more often than not, quickly put into either the "Us" or "Them" column by our mighty noise machine.  And once in your assigned column, there is no middle ground on which they can easily build a reputation of credibility and respect.  The discourse has become so contaminated with the idea that you must not just disagree with those on the other side of the fence, but you must destroy them.  This destructive attitude has become almost reflexive within the two party framework that we currently have.  And even Democrats have not been immune to displaying shades of this behavior.  This makes it almost impossible for people to develop strong cross party alliances which form the basis of compromise and shared purpose from which great leaders and great policies emerge.  No one today, in any large measure, seems to want to take the courageous step to boldly try and break the cycle in which we have allowed ourselves to become trapped.  The media love this state of affairs as it allows them to focus on the bloodletting without having to delve into the substance of any disagreements.  Everything revolves around the personalities in the fight.  They simply become casual ringside announcers describing the blows in excited tones.

I think this is why so many people see in Obama the possibility and the hope that there might be someone who can begin to restore the process that we need in order to confront the huge and potentially catastrophic situation we as a country face today.  Americans all know that a continuation of the status quo is only going to perpetuate the long, slow death spiral that we seem to be experiencing today.

"Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity"

Maybe Arianna can twist Walter Cronkite's arm to get some kind of "And that's the way it is" piece over at HuffPo. Since this race is now only about the media, candidates certainly are in the back row, it would be nice for him to make a pointed reminder. The media needs an elder statesman more than even the parties.

is it just me, or is the Boomer generation remarkably short-sighted and selfish?

I mean just look at the mess people in the 30s today are facing: no pensions (but our boomer parents have them); no health insurance (and the boomer generation seems intent on denying it for as long as possible); no elder statesmen, as you mention; sending the good jobs overseas (thanks Bubba); fighting a war of choice with our children and grandchildren, and passing the bill onto them as well.

I mean maybe I'm generalizing: there are certainly a lot of great Boomers out there fighting the good fight.  But it seems to me the people in power are just like they've been stereotyped: the Me generation.


John Mccain Called his wife WHAT??

If the 60s were the Golden Era of Elder Statesmen, I can't see that it did us much good.  Did LBJ confer with Truman before escalating the Vietnam War?  Did Truman say that he should watch out and not get bogged down in a war like Korea that we couldn't win?  Did he ask Eisenhower what he thought?  Didn't the old general give him some warnings?

Though you didn't mention him, the youngest and the wisest of the elder statesmen, Adlai Stevenson, certainly did tell Johnson privately that committing troops to Vietnam was a grave mistake, but Johnson only had contempt for Stevenson.

There are elder statesmen now, just as in the sixties.  If Cheney and Rumsfeld had wanted advice, they could have spoken to the elder Bush, or to Henry Kissinger, or to George Schulz.  If they had, and if they had listened to the advice that they got, I doubt that we would be in the mess that we are in in Iraq.

It doesn't matter how many elder statesmen there are, if the people who actually hold power think that they don't need advice.

We live in a brave new postmodern world where there is no such thing as "moral authority" - no voice, however experienced or inspirational, is any more authoritative than any other. Jimmy Carter, Al Gore, and every "Party Elder" from here to McGovern could tell Hillary to stand down but it would be to no avail as they have no authority over her and Bill. They have no authority over anyone. The only ones who can tell her to stand down are those who fund her campaign, and so long as they're willing to throw good money after bad she can do as she damn-well pleases, and you can rest assured that the destruction of Barack Obama would damn-well please her.

(Insert gratuitous swipe at Bill Clinton failing to please Hillary here)

The Underground Railroad

There's a corollary to the dearth of Elder Statesmen that I've though lamentable for going on 2 decades now.

That is that, in our society now, where there was once a role for philosphers and philosophy and the sort of evaluative thinking that accompanies them, we have seen the steady erosion of this as the moralism of aggressive religion has subsumed philosophy and pretty much made itself into the only reference for moral or ethical evaluation permissible and available in the broad forums of public discourse. And this is a tragedy as it's crippled our society and our culture by coercing the sorts of self discovery and self-related-to-community discovery and duty into the authoritarian structure and belief-based judgmentalism of religion.  

At minimum philosophy and theosophy each need to be able to explore our human condition free of the restraints of each other. As it is right now if our culture is a stool it's short one leg.

Denial is our most dangerous adversary.