Editor Alan Murray explains in the latest issue of Fortune magazine why none of the candidates for president ended up in the magazine’s annual list of 50 top leaders.
The U.S. political system is broken, and we see little reason to think the current contenders can fix it.
Start with Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders. It’s stunning that, well into the 21st century, the two candidates generating the most enthusiasm are throwbacks to the 20th. One is channeling a fascist strongman, the other running as a self-styled socialist. Neither has the vision or skills to take us into the future, but both have tapped into the public’s deep dissatisfaction with the recent past. The financial crisis and its aftermath left many Americans disillusioned with government and left government unable to address even the most tractable problems. A key turning point came on Aug. 5, 2011, when Standard & Poor’s downgraded U.S. Treasury debt for the first time in history after congressional leaders failed to provide even the inklings of a plan for tackling the nation’s debt. That and subsequent failures have handed Trump and Sanders supporters their strongest talking point: Could it get any worse?
Hillary Clinton talks about building bridges instead of walls and has built a record of bipartisan cooperation in her post–First Lady life as a senator and secretary of state. But by repudiating the trade agreement she once championed, she has undermined the bipartisan legacy of her husband’s administration. And by mimicking her primary opponent, she has become even more polarizing than her storied name had already made her. Then there’s Ted Cruz, who celebrates, even as he exacerbates, Washington’s dysfunction. He who governs best, Cruz believes, governs not at all.
Among the notable pols who make Fortune’s list? House Speaker Paul Ryan ranks No. 8. South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley earns the No. 17 spot. Outside the list of elected leaders, American Enterprise Institute President Arthur Brooks sits at No. 32.