High office teaches decision making, not substance. It consumes intellectual capital; it does not create it. Most high officials leave office with the perceptions and insights with which they entered; they learn how to make decisions but not what decisions to make.
The longer I am out of office, the more infallible I appear to myself.
The convictions that leaders have formed before reaching high office are the intellectual capital they will consume as long as they continue in office.
Most high officials leave office with the perceptions and insights with which they entered.
Let me make my point about Vietnam. When the Nixon initiation came into office, there were 550,000 Americans in combat. And ending the war was not a question of turning off a television channel. And so, debating on how we got there and what judgments were made was not going to help us.
I do not believe that Putin intends to leave office in a Cold War atmosphere with the United States.
