I give a link, so you can see I did not alter story.
http://www.trivalleyherald.com/Stori...936780,00.html


Let Billy Beane help pick Democratic nominee
By David M. RUBIN and Thomas Kniesner

THE current traveling exhibition Baseball as America: Seeing Ourselves
Through Our National Game demonstrates that everything in American society
has its parallel in baseball. So why shouldn't press coverage of
presidential politics?

Billy Beane, the general manager of the Oakland A's and the subject of
Michael Lewis's recent best-selling book, "Moneyball," spends comparatively
little on players, yet Beane's teams achieve great success on the field.
While conventional baseball wisdom favors studs who can run fast, throw hard
and hit well in tryout camps, Beane knows that the truly valuable players
are ones who have demonstrated they can do important things in actual game
situations such as take pitches, put the ball in play, and get on base.

Most baseball scouts, reporters and analysts are as clueless judging the
worth of players as the GMs they cover.

The same reliance on false indicators plagues national political reporters.
In assessing seven candidates for the Democratic presidential nomination,
they rely on stale measures that have nothing to do with whether the
candidate is likely to become a good president. Their equivalents of hitting
well in batting practice, foot speed and arm strength are the false gods of
money, organization and debating skill (plus coziness with the press, of
course).

Suppose the press corps decided to ignore their typical measures and focus,
Beane-like, on the traits that actually predict success in office, and not
just success in capturing the nomination? What traits would they seek to
headline instead?

Economists have long researched how prior work experience affects a person's
success in a future job. The field is known as the economics of human
capital. The relationship between experience (and schooling) and future
success has underpinned the research of several Nobel Prize winners in
economics.

WHAT is it that correlates positively with the perceived success of Lincoln,
Washington and Roosevelt, and negatively with just about every president
from Ohio (Grant, Harding, Garfield)? A statistical analysis by one of the
authors reveals that prior experience in the executive branch of
government -- as a governor or cabinet secretary who makes decisions and
administers a work force -- is where Billy Beane would put his money. Unless
you think you've found another George Washington or Dwight Eisenhower, only
fools bet on candidates from the military who command (not manage)
subordinates. Equally bad bets are long-serving members of Congress, an
institution where consensus-building among a large group of equals is
rewarded, and not vision. The more years one has spent in the military or in
the legislative branch, the less likely it is that he or she will be an
effective President.

If the press corps did look for these traits among the Democratic
candidates, how would they price them as free agents?

With his 16 years as lieutenant governor and then governor of Vermont,
Howard Dean would command the biggest contract as the most likely to be a
successful president.

Dennis Kucinich's stint as the boy mayor of Cleveland puts him in second
place, although his six years in the House work against him (and don't
forget the curse of being from the Buckeye state).

Next come Joe Lieberman and John Edwards, whom Beane would consider quality
bench players not good enough for the daily lineup. Their congressional
experience is offset by too little other activity that contributes to being
a good President.

At the bottom of the list are Wesley Clark and John Kerry. Beane would never
sign Clark because of his 34 years of military service, a sure predictor of
failure as President. Kerry bears the same handicap: too many years in
Congress, 18, which makes him the absolute worst choice among the
candidates.

(This analysis can't be applied to Al Sharpton because he has never served
in government or the military. Putting him in the White House would be
similar to Billy Beane signing a cricket bowler as a pitcher. Hey, you never
know.)

How likely is it that our corps of political reporters will start focusing
on what matters in a candidate's background -- executive and administrative
experience on the plus side, military and legislative experience on the
minus side -- and ignore such distractions as money and organization, poll
numbers, sexual hi-jinks, gaffes in the heat of debate, disarray in the
campaign staff, and other familiar news pegs?

It's possible. Before Beane's genius was revealed, who would have thought
that many of Jason Giambi's contributions to the A's could be replaced by
Scott Hatteberg, of all players, at a fraction of the cost? (Just ask the
sorry Yankees about that.) But now franchises in Boston and Toronto have
caught on to Beane's valuations, and others will follow. Which political
reporter is willing to play Billy Beane and help us avoid having the
equivalent of Mo Vaughn ($17 million salary, 15 total hits in 2003) as the
Democratic candidate?

David Rubin is Dean of the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications,
Syracuse University, and Thomas Kniesner is chair of the Department of
Economics at the Maxwell School of Syracuse University. Both are lifelong
Cleveland Indians fans and one will probably vote in the Democratic primary
in New York.