Hagel
I have developed an ongoing fascination with Chuck Hagel over the last couple of years. He’s a principled guy. When I say that, I mean in it in almost precisely the opposite of how most ideologues and partisans mean the word when they use it. I bought his book, America: Our Next Chapter this summer, but had a hard time reading it. I eventually did read most of it, but skipped a few chapters. It was terribly pedestrian. Hagel, however smart he may be, is no intellectual. Even with a co-author who no doubt did the heavy lifting of putting Hagel’s thoughts to paper, it often comes off like a high school student’s “write your own biography” assignment. You need not be an intellectual to be smart and to be shrewd. Tonight, I read an interesting portrait of Hagel that came out in the New Yorker just before the election. It’s worth checking out.
