Voters should be looking for the following qualities as they watch the debates:

Oped, Orlando Sentinel

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Florida's future: A president's role

Reed Markham

January 21, 2008

Floridians have a unique opportunity to send a message to America about the qualities we expect in our next president. As the fourth-largest state, Florida has great needs. Florida also has great possibilities.

In the next few days the presidential candidates need to express to Floridians their vision of Florida and their commitment to achieving that vision.

There are several qualities essential to successfully leading the nation. I would like to identify three our next president should exemplify:

*First, Florida needs a president with judgment-in-action.

The complexity of rapidly changing events makes it critical for a president to have the ability to effectively analyze several areas of domestic and foreign-policy performance simultaneously.

John W. Gardner, one of the nation's foremost experts on leadership observed: "Judgment--in-action is the ability to combine hard data, questionable data and intuitive guesses to arrive at a conclusion that events prove to be correct. Judgment-in-action includes effective problem solving, the design of strategies, the setting of priorities, intuitive as well as rational judgments."

Our next president should possess a track record of effective, large-scale problem solving. Our next president also needs to be an innovator with the ability and commitment to assist Florida's leaders with complex economic challenges -- the housing crisis, expensive health insurance, increasing unemployment, rising taxes, and the lack of capital for significant economic development.

A president with judgment-in-action will preserve Floridians' way of life and hopefully expand rather than shrink pocketbooks.

*Second, Florida needs a president who will hold the federal government accountable.

Past presidents have attempted to hold the government accountable for spending but experienced limited success. Congress has an addiction to spending. When funds are tight for budget-conscious families, they cut out the frills. When Congress sees a growing deficit, it continues to spend billions on pork-barrel projects.

Some progress has been made in decreasing pork, including the removal of funding for the Alaskan bridge to nowhere. But Citizens Against Government Waste reported that Congress spent the savings on other programs.

Floridians would like to see a president who gets the job done.

*Third, Florida needs a president who possesses a steady, proactive vision of the state's future.

Gardner summarized the value of a steady leader: "It is not possible to overstate the value of steadiness in leadership.

"Individuals and groups who wish to align themselves with a leader find it hard to do so if the leader shifts position erratically, whether from emotional instability, duplicity or flagging determination. Leaders symbolize many things, among them the capacity of the whole community to stay the course."

A president who is an agenda setter with a dynamic, steady vision, will guarantee a better future for Floridians.

Reed Markham lives in DeLand. He's a former speechwriter for the U.S. Supreme Court.