When Presidents Are “Tough”

Americans expect their presidents to be “tough,” to be sufficiently cool that they are able to make decisions in difficult situations. But the qualities that contribute to good decision making in such situations may go beyond conventional understandings. Ordinarily, a detached weighing of the consequences of alternative modes of action does not actually take place. Psychological factors often influence the kinds of decisions made and may work in a positive or negative direction. Contrary to the conventional assumption, empathy and the emotions that are apt to accompany such a capacity will promote rational decision making by placing certain checks on high-risk choices. An idealized self-image of being tough and unresolved emotional issues involving feelings of anger and rage may incline a decision maker toward high-risk choices that could have significant negative consequences for the decision maker and the people he represents. In this essay certain conventional views of what it is to be tough will be given, to be followed by an analysis of the actions of recent American presidents that provide evidence of the more complex view of the terms to be developed here.

The Oxford Encyclopedic English Dictionary states that the word “tough” as used to describe a person means that he or she is “able to endure hardship; hardy. Unyielding, stubborn, difficult. Acting sternly; hard. Criminal or violent.”

Candidates in the U.S. presidential contests are often subjected to tests of their toughness that elicit all of these meaning except “criminal or violent.” Back in the l968 Republican primaries, George Romney was mortally wounded by a confession made in Detroit that during a visit to the U.S. embassy in Vietnam, he had been brainwashed by the officers on the soundness of the American policy. In the Democratic primaries of 1972, the leading contender, Edmund Muskie, suffered a setback from which he never really recovered when he stood outside