The Tradeoff between Expierence and Personality

Election day has come and gone. It was a day that most Americans, including myself, never thought would come in our lifetimes. The historical and political consequences of November 4th 2008 will not be soon forgotten. Now, however, we must move on. A new era is dawning in our country and President-elect Obama knows celebration has ended and work has began. His first step towards reshaping America has been to select his chief of staff. Representative Rahm Emanuel will take the job. As a former adviser to President Bill Clinton Emanuel has all the experience in government you could want. He was directly involved in the bailout plan. Someone with that much knowledge about the financial crisis would be invaluable to the new president who's inheriting the crisis. Emanuel knows Congress, he know the ins and outs of government. All this knowledge seems to make him the perfect candidate for the job.
So, if the guy's smart and knows his stuff, what's the problem? His personality is standing in the way of the country's support. Many are divided on if he is the right choice. He is known for being loud, swearing and yelling often. He comes off as pushy and abrasive. He seems especially over the top when standing next to the cool and calm Obama. This is where the trade off we see so often in politics comes into play. Is it better to hurt feelings and push hard until everyone goes along with you or at least listens or is it better to play nice with the others and hope they like you enough to support you.
It happened in the election with McCain. Had he been the nice, well spoken, gracious man that he seems to really be during the campaign he would have gained some voters. That's not to say he wouldn't have lost any if he had. So where does a politician draw the line? When is it too much? Where's the right combination of the two? In my opinion knowledge is more important in general, but if you can't use the knowledge appropriately its useless. So my best solution for politicians: be smart, but be trustworthy. If the people trust you you'll get what you want and you can be as loud as you want. While how you say something is important, your content should matter more, it doesn't always, but it should.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/06/us/politics/06rahm.html?ref=politics