Likability isn't the issue in our election decisions

“I kind of like him personally, Daily Herald Editor John Lampinen said in the midst of an editorial board discussion of candidates to endorse for election. “Actually, I tend to like all of them personally. That's what makes this so hard.

The Daily Herald began its series of political endorsements this week, and we'll continue through the end of next week telling you who we think makes the best candidate for positions from governor to county board member. In our editorials, you will hear us speak directly and often passionately about our expectations, and sometimes our disappointments, involving individual candidates.

But one thing that may not come through is the general sense that, whether we think a candidate is the right person for a given job or not, we tend to appreciate them all or at least most of them and find them engaging and sincere. If you judge politicians by the distortions of their broadcast advertising, their rehearsed sound-bite conversations and their choreographed appearances at debates, it's easy to come away with the stereotype that most of us have of them as disingenuous, ruthless automatons who will say or do almost anything to get elected.

When you meet them in the more informal, face-to-face setting of the editorial board interview, you can get a slightly different but important perspective. You realize that, like journalists, cops, lawyers, teachers, CEOs, CPAs, M.D.'s, PhD.'s, insurance agents, cabdrivers and practically every other type of worker you can name, politicians are at their core decent people.

Yes, some of them are cocky and arrogant. Some are sweet and polite. Some are so smart you wonder why they do this, some so dumb you wonder why they think they could do this. Some are funny and personable, some though not many in this business a little shy and distant. They are, in short, people.

That's an easy thing to forget in the run-up to an election, and one of the many ironies of politics. Politicians spend thousands, sometimes millions, of dollars to try to give us the impression that they are normal, everyday, down-to-earth community- and family-loving average Joes, but they end up with a general reputation as untrustworthy charlatans. Turns out when you meet them one on one, they tend to be more the former than the latter.

That is one of the values and frankly one of the dangers of the editorial board interview. It does give us a chance to get to know candidates in an environment that is more natural than that of their more-common public appearances, so it's easier to see them as fathers, mothers, spouses, former athletes. scholars, volunteers or whatever.

But it can also be misleading. Aside from the natural skepticism we have to maintain simply to evaluate someone fairly, we must constantly ask ourselves, “Would our dad or mom or sister or best friend really make a good congressman or governor or county board member or dogcatcher?

Most likely not. Realizing that, we focus our debates not on how well we think we might get along with a particular individual but on how dedicated and successful that person will actually be in the job.

A lot of people we like personally don't get endorsed for positions they seek. Some people we don't particularly care for personally do. It depends on the job and the individual.

But sometimes, as Editor Lampinen indicated, the choice is much harder to make than you might think and for different reasons than you might think.

Jim Slusher is an assistant managing editor for the Daily Herald.